Author's notes: Thanks for all the support, everyone!
Dark Ice Dragon is the original creator of many of the ideas used in this fic, as well as the inspiration for many of my original ideas! Please read the Noblesse / Legend of Sun Knight crossovers by Dark Ice Dragon and review/PM to give credit where it is due!
Beta-read by the incredible chicaalterego! You have her to thank for flaming me until I came up with a decent chapter! Heh, just kidding chica ~ thanks so much for all your hard work! I absolutely could not have come up with such a nice chapter without you!
Sun had been at a loss what to make of this place he had landed in.
He had blinked open his eyes, not that doing so showed him anything, and waited for his mage sight to come into focus, fully expecting to still be in his room – possibly being nursed in his bed with some grievous injury or other from the magical mishap.
What he saw quickly dashed that idea. This was not the Church of Light. Not even anywhere in Forgotten Echo. He hadn't traveled much – but he could 'see' and hear perfectly well, and his surroundings were completely foreign.
For one thing, he was surrounded by dozens, maybe hundreds of people just on this street alone, speaking in a tongue Sun had never heard before. There was also an incredible amount of lightning energy surrounding him, and even within and about the vast majority of the people. It seemed to travel underground and even through the very air in enormous amounts, culminating in strange glass and metal and some sort of warped earthen element objects.
Perhaps this place fell within the jurisdiction of the Church of Thunder? He wasn't sure where that was, so in a way it made sense that nothing was familiar.
But, even if he looked past the lightning element everywhere, this place still didn't make sense.
The ground was hard and smooth, like polished rock, yet the elements making it up seemed to be an unnaturally uniform combination of sand, stone, and various other earthen materials, and fashioned into the streets and walkways and… buildings? Even much of the clothing on the people seemed to be made of elements other than natural cotton, wool, or leather. He couldn't even guess at words for what these strange materials were.
It was also incredibly odd that there were barely any animals to be seen, and the plant life was spotty at best, in organized patches, strips, and blocks. Instead of horses, people whizzed by either in strange metal (or some sort of warped glass material) contraptions on the large thoroughfare, going at incredibly fast rates. Other traveled on small, metal horse-like contraptions – some rather thin and precariously balanced, some quite large. It was all very strange. And very loud.
It'd taken him a moment to get his bearings after being helped up by that young man, who must be a warrior from his mixture of elements. So much fire within him. Probably a servant of the God of War. After chattering something in that strange tongue, the young man ran off without waiting for any sort of response from Sun.
A warrior alright. How rude. Well, at least he didn't walk right past Sun, as everyone else had. You'd think someone would show some respect for a holy knight, even if they didn't recognize him as the Sun Knight!
Well, he had to begin somewhere, so Sun began earnestly searching for something, anything familiar. There had to be some sort of temple, or palace, or even a market where he could get directions from someone that spoke his language.
He concentrated and spread out his mage sight to its very limits. This city was huge – it must hold tens of thousands of people! Even his incredible range was not enough to find the end – it would probably take days, even weeks, to cross on foot. He frowned, but continued focusing, trying to find some sort of starting point. Surely it had to hold something or someone…
And then he spotted an amazing dark aura – one very obviously being carefully concealed. It would've fooled anyone's eyes but his. In fact, before he'd been blinded he would've missed it entirely. It was only since he now relied exclusively on his mage sight that he was able to find Roland's aura, even with his life-ring from Pink on. Since such an aura had to be Roland's, he looked no further, focusing in on that one aura and heading in its direction.
Roland must have been blasted here along with him – thank goodness! Someone to rely on! Someone reliable to rely on!
Someone excellent at fighting that could protect him if things got dangerous!
Not that he wasn't simply happy that he wasn't alone, that he had one of his closest friends was so near at hand. It was an incredible relief and quite lifted his mood.
So he'd followed the aura quite happily, being sure to keep his radiant smile in place so no one would know something was wrong with the Sun Knight – though, strangely, no one seemed to be recognizing him. He'd finally reached some sort of building, an enormous structure on par with the Holy Temple, surrounded by a gate and with a guard watching the gate. Apparently the guard was punishing another guard, who Sun recognized as the young man from earlier.
This must be some sort of training grounds. The huge guard punishing the younger one certainly had enough fire element within him – though, surprisingly, the young man had far, far more. That boy would go places! Probably up into the inner circle alongside the Son of War himself!
Could this be some sort of church? For such a large structure, it would have to be the main religion in the area, which should be the God of Thunder from all the lightning element.
Strangely, though, most of the people inside only had a small degree of lightning element – not enough to be lightning magicians, nor Thunder Priests – but regardless, Roland was inside so it was time to introduce himself.
"This Sun Knight, who has arrived in this beauteous though distant land by the will of the God of Light, seeks audience with the one in charge of this blessed edifice. The God of Light shall surely bless you for recognizing this Sun's brother, the Hell Knight of the Twelve Holy Knights, and treating him with the most graceful and beautiful of hospitalities. Sun expresses his deepest gratitude for such gracious welcome and requests to be led to my brother with as much haste as the God of Light deems allowable and polite, as a reflection of his love."
They didn't have a clue what he said. Rats. Maybe he should have tried to simplify it, but would that even have helped if they all spoke that strange language?
Or maybe they understood a bit after all? They sounded bewildered, but quickly enough the older guard instructed the younger one to escort him somewhere.
And, praise the God of Light! The young warrior escorted him into the building and towards the dark aura!
Only… as Sun grew closer, it became quite obvious that the aura did not belong to Roland. Which prompted the rather alarming acknowledgement that someone else was hiding a dark aura possibly on par with Roland's…
And the understanding that this was not a temple of any sort. For one thing, he only felt a handful of other people on the premises with bodies dominated by any particular element enough to have been blessed by a god. Sun also sensed two strong non-human presences that seemed like a cross between a vampire and an elf, one being similar to those two but far more powerful, one human who apparently had a magic wolf's heart beating in his own chest, and two humans that flat out just didn't make sense – for how could one be completely human, but contain such strange mixes of elements? As well as the strange dark being he was approaching.
No self-respecting church would have such a strange hodge-podge of inhabitants. (Of course, his church has an undead running around inside of it, but that was besides the point.)
Sun began to doubt he was even on the same continent. Meaning, since 'everyone on the continent knows the Sun Knight'… there's a good chance no one here would know him? His knowledge of any other continents was… nonexistent. He hadn't even known there were other continents, which makes it all the more possible that no one here knew about his continent.
Crap! He was all alone, who knows where, for who knows how long, not even sure how he got here, and with no idea how to get home!
But, just in case he was wrong and they did know about the Sun Knight, he'd better play his part right. With his luck, even if this was a different continent, he'd run into his teacher the second he slipped out of character.
The young man… warrior? maybe not… threw open the door and spoke to the dark being, gesturing to Sun behind him. The creature was in the form of… Wait…
The dark being actually was human? A strong, healthy human male, still very much alive, with wavy shoulder length hair and seated behind a desk buried in paperwork… rather reminiscent of Storm, actually. To the point that Sun found himself curious what color the guy's hair was. If it was blue, that would just be hilarious.
The human with the dark aura dismissed the young man, then began staring at Sun and frowning. With such a strong dark aura, even if hidden, he must surely sense Sun's holy aura – which would explain the silence and the frown quite well.
Frankenstein was, as usual, buried in paperwork behind his desk when Shinwoo threw the door open.
"Chairman! I brought the foreign exchange student!"
Frankenstein frowned, still staring at the file in front of him. There was no exchange student coming today, certainly not one from another country. Last time this had happened, it was Regis and Seira. Before that was Rai. Even before he looked up, he wasn't expecting a normal student to be standing behind Shinwoo.
Sure enough, the person was far from normal. A rather alarmingly beautiful young man with silky-smooth perfect blond hair falling to mid-thigh and sparkling ocean-blue eyes. And, while apparently not a noble, he had the most unusual aura… But he didn't appear to be a modified human. Could he perhaps be part-noble? Sure, Frankenstein had heard stories, but he'd thought…
"Thank you, Shinwoo. You may return to class."
"See you later, Chairman!" said the overactive red-head, waving as he ran out the room, being sure to close the door behind him.
"Wait! You don't -!" but the teenager was long gone. Frankenstein sighed in exasperation. How long would he have children intruding on his personal space, spilling crumbs, depressing his master by playing strange modern games, and talking far too much?
But this was not time to reflect on such things. Not when he had such an unusual stranger in his office, for who knows what reason.
For now, the important thing was that this man certainly wasn't a student. The youth was clearly in his early twenties, and was dressed in some sort of knight's costume, not a school uniform by any means. For goodness' sake – the guy was dressed all in white, even down to the gloves and boots! The only thing missing was a sword… however, the guy looked rather weak physically, so it probably was just a costume.
Though that light aura was not to be trifled with. As if in response to Frankenstein's appraisal, the aura gave a brief flare. The young man gave an innocent looking smile, having obviously spotted the chairman's slight change of expression in reaction to the holy aura.
Sun's mind was traveling at light speed.
This man with a dark aura was extremely strong, to the point Sun had felt the need to give him a brief warning.
The man was undoubtedly politically powerful, being in an obvious position of power within this enormous building. Though, since this place couldn't be a church and didn't appear to be a palace, what sort of political power was unknown.
Sun had no money, his purse being tucked away neatly in a drawer in his room. He had nowhere to stay, as he had not seen any light aura within the city, and thus no small temples to the God of Light where he might otherwise have sought a room.
And apparently he didn't speak the same language as the people of this city. Which could be a serious problem. Of course, there was a small chance he just hadn't run into anyone who spoke his language yet. He'd best give it a shot.
"The Sun Knight of the Church of Light greets thee. By the God of Light's will, this Sun has been sent unexpectedly on an auspicious journey to places indefinite. The God of Light surely wishes this Sun to learn more of his benevolence and care by teaching him reliance upon Himself through the gracious hospitality and welcome of strangers."
Frankenstein stared at the strange young man, speaking in a beautiful, though archaic and unbearably formal, ancient dialect of Chinese.
Having not heard or spoken the language himself for over six hundred years, it took him a minute to translate it inside his head. For just three sentences, it gave him a rather impressive headache. The young man stood there looking uncomfortable until Frankenstein spoke up, in the same language though using a much more casual style.
"You're lost, broke, and have nowhere to stay – so basically you need help?"
The young man's eyes actually sparkled in joy at hearing Frankenstein's reply. It was clearly an enormous relief to find someone else that spoke his language, as shown in the beautiful smile that lit up his face.
"This Sun Knight—"
Frankenstein held up a hand to cut off Sun, with a suffering expression that would've been perfectly at home on Storm's overworked face. His head throbbed at the mere thought of translating more ancient formal gibberish.
"Please, if you would simplify your words? I am the chairman of this school. Do I refer to you as Sun Knight?"
"That would be most welcome."
"I understand, Sir Sun Knight, that you are apparently in some trouble – though why you would seek me out is another matter entirely. As it seems incredibly unlikely that you came here by chance…"
"All is by the God of Light's will, and by his kindness this Sun—"
"Please stop that. It makes conversation difficult. My point is this. Why are you here?"
Sun opened his mouth, remembered this man had as much of a problem with his formal speech as Storm, quickly revised what he wanted to say, and finally spoke.
"I told you."
Frankenstein rested his forehead against a fist, cursing inside his head. This young man obviously wasn't a normal human. After all, he must have sensed Frankenstein's own dark aura, or why else would he have shown off his own light aura like that? So why had this Sun Knight come here in the first place? Had he been looking for him? For his master? Perhaps he'd sensed Regis and Seira, and wished to speak with the young nobles? Or maybe he had something to do with modified humans and was looking for M-21, Tao, and Takeo. In which case he might have links to the Organization, so perhaps Frankenstein should…
The door swung gently open and his master confidently strode in, Regis and Seira right behind him.
While the man behind the desk was distracted and seemed to be in the midst of a deep internal debate of some sort, Sun found himself distracted by the approach of the strange aura he'd felt before. The being that was similar to the two vampire-elf beings, but far stronger. Those two vampire-elf beings were following the creature, but even their rare existences seemed to fade before the incredible creature.
It was with interest that Sun studied the being as it approached the room, opened the door, and confidently strode in. Never before had Sun seen such a person, if it was indeed a person, so he took the opportunity to study this strange and powerful creature carefully.
It's appearance and form was in the shape of a human, but the elements forming its body were far too numerous and varied. It was extremely powerful, undoubtedly, though it also appeared to be hiding its true powers. Besides all that, the creature was incredibly graceful. Its every movement, each single step, was marked with a grace surpassing even Sun's teacher. There was only one word for such grace.
Elegance.
Perfect, exquisite elegance.
The being's eyes turned with mild curiosity towards Sun, then towards the other man. The "chairman of this school," whatever that meant.
Even granted the creature's grace, it was quite surprising to see the human behind the desk quickly get to his feet, come around, and bow slightly, gesturing the other to the sofa and turning to a corner of the room where there were tea supplies set up.
The two vampire-elf creatures exchanged startled looks which Sun couldn't quite decipher and stood off to the side, perhaps waiting on the other two to come to some sort of conclusion?
Sun stood there, feeling quite out of place, and even more so as the elegant creature asked the human what sounded like a question in a beautiful tongue very different from either Sun's or the one the other people of this place had been using.
"We have a guest?"
"A stranger, master. He calls himself a Sun Knight, speaks an ancient tongue, and professes to be lost."
Rai nodded slightly. A smile, peaceful smile graced his lips as Frankenstein set the tea before him. He lifted the cup gently and took a sip, then met Frankenstein's eyes for a moment.
Frankenstein looked uncomfortable. "Master, we don't know anything about this man or his goals."
Rai said nothing, but he closed his eyes and took another sip.
Frankenstein immediately acquiesced.
"As you wish, master." He bowed quite properly and turned to the stranger.
Speaking in the young man's tongue, he said, "Sir Sun Knight – would you like some tea?"
The serene smile returned to Rai's lips.
Author's Notes: Yes, yes, I know you all want to see Regis out of sorts about Sun's incredible elegance, but that'll just have to wait for next chapter! And don't worry about Roland, he'll be coming back into the story very shortly – that scene's already planned out, for the most part! If you guys want any cut-scenes showing the panic going on back in the LSK world, please let me know, because I'm seriously considering just focusing on the Noblesse storyline.
Hope you enjoyed, and please review!
