...I have nothing to say, enjoy
Main project chapter 3
He couldn't believe his eyes.
"Excuse me, Mr Luka, but what should we do in this situation?"
"Ask that group to retreat some and move over to the other side."
"Oh, so that's how you fix those parts! Thank you for helping, Mr Aidan, next time I'll be able to do it myself!"
"Good, I don't have that many hands to fix everyone's machines."
"We're running out of potions! Jun, would you mind getting some ingredients for us from Victoria or Ossyria?"
"Huh? Oh, okay. I'll go find Ace and help prepare the ship."
"Zanier! How's the situation on your side?"
"Pretty okay. Valfor's there how bad can it be?"
"...this is..." Nineheart breathed.
A wide, self-satisfied smile appeared on the lady's face.
"Welcome to the Resistance base, Nineheart! Now, let me just report something..." she chirped.
She quickly slid into a seat and switched on the intercom, putting on a headset.
"Ulrika, he's out. Flawless mission this one was." she spoke into the mike.
She then nodded a couple of times before replying.
"Got it, I'll get him up to date."
She removed the headset and got off the chair. Meanwhile, Nineheart was looking around the base in amazement. The base didn't look anything like what it did before. It looked as if it had undergone some renovation, turning it into a high-tech intelligence centre. There were a few familiar faces in the crowd, but even these few seemed so foreign. He wondered how the knights were doing. He hoped that they hadn't lost to the Resistance in terms of intelligence.
"Nineheart, do you seriously not know who I am?"
The lady had come back to his side and repeated the question she had already asked twice before.
"No, I'm sorry but I'm afraid no." he replied.
She sighed, bringing her palm to her face. That action reminded Nineheart of someone, but he couldn't remember who.
"Juejona. Ring a bell?" she said.
And he remembered. Juejona was a Wild Hunter back from before the time they had created an alliance. She and her brother was involved in the incident concerning Vita and also took part in the Alliance meeting. She looked very different from before, much more mature and professional than before. Yet the similarities present, such as her eyes and her hairstyle, made him wonder how he hadn't realised it was her. Maybe he was getting old.
"Ah yes, Juejona. You've grown up quite some haven't you?" he said.
"Now you sound like an old man, Nineheart. Wait, you always ranted and preached like one before." she said.
Nineheart scowled at Juejona. What was with the reduction in respect now that she was older? But she did help in getting him out of confinement so he was in no position to complain.
"Oh! I ought to tell them about the news. She'll be so pleased to know that you're finally free!" Juejona exclaimed.
"Lirin!" she shouted across the room.
Nineheart turned towards where she was shouting to and noticed Lirin. She was next to Aran, discussing some matter in her usual serious, diligent manner. Upon hearing her name being called, she turned and caught sight of Nineheart. Lirin's eyes widened in surprise and she broke into a run. Soon, she was barrelling into Nineheart and had engulfed him in a tight hug.
"Nineheart! You're finally back! You're finally free from the Black Wings! It must have been horrible there right? Did they treat you badly? What's in that big bag of yours?" Lirin chattered on, firing questions at Nineheart rapidly like a Gatling gun.
"Calm down Lirin, I'll answer your questions later, when we have time to sit down and chat someplace okay? Relax your hug a bit, it's getting hard to breathe. And we're attracting attention." Nineheart said.
"Oh, sorry!" Lirin apologised.
Lirin instantly let go of Nineheart. By then quite some people had already noticed the presence of the silver-haired man, wondering who this man Lirin had been hugging so tightly was.
"Nineheart? Is it really you? It is! Ickart, they really got Nineheart out!"
The red-haired Blaze Wizard ran up to Nineheart and gave him a quick hug.
"Good to see you're still fine, Nineheart."
The dark-haired Night Walker greeted Nineheart calmly, a warm smile on his face. Beside him was a little child, wavy dark hair tied up in a fishtail braid at the nape of her neck, holding onto his hand.
"This is?" Nineheart asked, gesturing to the girl.
"Our daughter, Olivia." Oz replied.
"That means that you two are..."
"Yes. Have been together for quite some time already." Ickart finished for Nineheart.
"Who's that?" the little girl asked.
"Nineheart." Ickart replied the young girl warmly.
"Oh, the one who rants a lot, is very critical, always threatens to cut pay and have silver hair like a girl. His hair does look like a girl's." Olivia said.
Immediately, her parents, Juejona and Lirin gave the little girl a reprimanding look. Nineheart scowled. Oblivious to all that, the girl continued.
"He also puts the world to sleep."
Juejona smiled gently, a hint of pensiveness on her face.
"...you still remember that?" she asked the girl.
"Of course! And the picture too! It was so funny." Olivia replied innocently.
"May I ask who's been miseducating this young girl? Especially the part on putting the world to sleep." Nineheart asked.
The group fell silent.
"Excuse me, but is this Nineheart?"
The silence was broken almost as soon as it started by a monotonous voice. A blonde youth with bluish-grey eyes sat on one of the chairs before the many screens present, headset on. He gave off an aura of apathy, and Nineheart had a feeling that he wouldn't like the boy.
"Yes, I am Nineheart." he replied firmly.
The youth nodded.
"Looking forward to cooperating with you." he said, before turning back to the screen.
Nineheart took that action as a sign the boy didn't really want to talk. The conversation was probably started for formalities sake.
"Anyway, what is going on? The only thing I understand is that you all have freed me from the Black Wings. However, what has happened to the Resistance base? What are the chief knights doing here? Why are Aran and Lirin here too?" Nineheart asked.
"All that explanation's my job. The Resistance base has been continuously upgraded over the years till it's become how it is now, with much help from the Cygnus Knights. The two chief knights are here because...in short, Erev was attacked and...taken over." Juejona explained.
"Erev was attacked and defeated? When? By who?" Nineheart asked, shocked.
"Yes, it was taken over by the Black Wings and now one of their bases. We can't get there anymore as they've only allowed Black Wings to use the ship there. It was taken over a few months after your capture. The Black Wings came in and many commanders were involved...including a new commander on their part."Juejona explained.
"New commander?" Nineheart inquired.
Juejona thought for a while before replying.
"Yes. Could I elaborate more about it later? Just let me finish up here first."
"Alright. What about the Queen? And the other chief knights?" Nineheart continued.
"...Ickart, Oz why don't you explain instead?" Juejona said.
The two exchanged an uneasy look.
"In that invasion on Erev, Irina and Mihail lost their lives while protecting the Queen. As for Hawkeye, he passed away recently in battle." Ickart explained.
"And as for the Queen...she was captured..." Oz said.
"Captured?" Nineheart exclaimed in disbelief.
The two knights looked away in shame.
"It was not their fault. One day, the Queen left the base of her own accord and disappeared. It was that way for a week or so until I discovered news that she had been captured." Juejona defended.
"Why did she leave?" Nineheart pressed on.
"We still don't know. I'm looking into it, but I haven't even been able to figure out her location, so it'll take time. We are trying to find her as we speak." Juejona answered.
"What?" Nineheart said.
"We didn't raid the base just to rescue you, we did it with the secondary motive of accessing the data in their database. Xenon is currently copying it, if I'm not wrong?"
Juejona looked over at the teenage blonde before the screen after speaking. He nodded briefly, though still staring at the screen. Nineheart composed himself and decided to leave it up to them.
"What about Aran and Lirin?" he went on with his other questions.
"Rien was attacked too, though that wasn't the first time. The island was pretty badly battered and Aran and I decided to leave as we didn't want to endanger the penguins." Lirin explained.
"The Black Wing were targeting the heroes back then. And currently, they're still finding for me." Aran added in.
The silver-haired woman walked over, her sentient pole-arm by her side.
"What about the other heroes?" Nineheart asked.
"...they've mostly passed on." Aran said stoically.
"What?! All of them?"
Nineheart couldn't believe his ears. To think that all of the other heroes except for Aran had passed on was...shocking at the least. For nearly all the heroes to have been eliminated...
"What happened?" he asked.
"..."
No one seemed willing to reply, all opting to look at the feet, or suddenly gain interest in something else in the base.
"To be frank, the Lumiere was crashed and only Aran survived. With the exception of the culprit of course."
It was the blonde-haired boy from before again. He had taken off his headset, left his seat and walked over to join the group. Nineheart observed the boy now wore a earpiece though.
"And the culprit was?" Nineheart questioned..
"Evian." he replied monotonously.
"Evian?" Nineheart repeated after the boy in disbelief.
The female Dragon Master? The young girl was kind-hearted and rather gentle, maybe even rather meek. It was hard to believe that she would be so brazen as to attack the heroes. It was amazing how she managed to kill off so many of the heroes at one go. Had she gotten that strong? Nineheart knew the girl had quite some power but apparently he had underestimate the extent of her abilities.
"How about her brother? I don't believe she killed him." Nineheart said.
The two twins were so close, he found it unlikely.
"She didn't kill him. Rather, it was his death that triggered her attack. After her brother's death, she snapped and started to attack the heroes. We don't know what exactly happened. Aran received quite a knock to the head and thus suffers from some memory loss of that moment." the boy answered.
"I see...what about Evian now?"
"She's defected to the Black Magician's side. In fact, she is one of his best commanders. Under his wing, it seems she has taken up several forms of forbidden magics and is rather proficient in magic transfer." the boy said.
Nineheart nodded. He had read about it once before. It was the transfer of magic from another to oneself or vice versa, whether the other was willing or not. It had been labelled a forbidden art due to its dangers.
"She's the new commander I talked about. Not exactly very new, but new to you at least." Juejona said.
A moment of awkward silence ensued, broken roughly by the blonde boy again.
"I still haven't given a proper introduction of myself, have I? I apologise. My name is Lios." the boy said, extending his hand.
"When it comes to the monitoring of operations, Lios is the head." Juejona said.
"Nice to meet you, Lios. I am Nineheart Von Rubistein, once the Queen's strategist, now just an ordinary citizen. Is it okay for you to be here, talking to us? If I'm not wrong, the battle is still ongoing." Nineheart said, shaking Lios's hand firmly.
"The battle's being wrapped up. The rest of the team can also handle itself without me there." Lios said dispassionately, withdrawing his hand right after and placing it back in his pocket.
Nineheart wondered if the boy was saying the truth. If so, why would he need that earpiece for?
"You look very young. To be placed in such an important position at such a young age is a great accomplishment." Nineheart commented.
"Thank you." he replied monotonously.
The boy didn't sound thankful at all. The way his voice didn't convey any emotion at all was slightly unnerving. Together with his lack of facial expressions, it made one wonder if he was emotionless.
"Ah, mind if we excuse ourselves first? We have things to be doing so..." Oz said.
"Sorry, brother, can we find some time to chat again later?" Lirin asked.
"Yes, feel free to go on and do what you have to." Nineheart replied.
Oz, Ickart and Lirin left. Aran took that as a cue and left too. As they left, a familiar voice spoke up.
"Nineheart, I apologise for not coming over earlier, but I had to look over the operation. Congratulations on your new freedom." Luka said.
Nineheart took a careful look at the red-haired battlemage. He looked the same, except with the addition of glasses. However, his demeanour had taken a complete change. Nineheart could see none of his previous cheerful disposition in what was now serious amber eyes, burning with a flame that seemed to call for vengeance. He knew, for he had seen that previously in the two Demon Slayers' eyes. He wondered of the two were still the same. Beside Luka was the white-haired mechanic Aidan. He too hadn't changed much, maybe not at all.
"It's alright, I understand. I assume Brighton's part of the operation?" Nineheart asked.
"Unfortunately no. He is no longer with us." Luka replied sombrely.
"In fact, none of the original Resistance members are with us anymore." Aidan said.
Nineheart found it hard to believe. He knew what had happened with Claudine, but the death of the others came as a shock. How many more of their comrades had passed on in the course of his imprisonment? How many more would leave them as the battles continued?
"I assume the operation's over?" Lios cut in, changing the topic.
"Yes it is. The rest are on their way back." Luka answered.
"Where's- oh there!"
Nineheart recognised the voice as the one belonging to the Black Wing girl who had brought him the paper and pens. He had figured that she probably was with the Resistance once he had realised the Resistance had saved him. He mentally reminded himself to thank her.
"Oh, the hard-to-please preacher?"
Nineheart stared in shock as a wine-haired man entered, eye patch over his left eye, leaving only the demon tattoos around his right eye visible. A large sword was slung across his back, over a fur-trimmed black jacket. Underneath was a set of black clothes, a brown belt around the waist and a brown scarf around the neck.
"What's he doing here?" Nineheart snarled.
The brunette girl turned to demon man and shrugged.
"Told you this would happen." she said.
"Obviously." the man smirked.
"Calm down Nineheart, he's with us now." Juejona said.
"You mean this bastard who invaded Ereve and killed Shinsoo is on our side now? Are you being serious?" Nineheart exclaimed.
"He's been around for quite a number of years and proven himself trustworthy." Juejona said.
"Oh really?" Nineheart questioned.
"Of course he is! He's taken part in a lot of mission and is one our best and most trusted Resistance members now!" the brunette exclaimed.
"Eh calm down there Ulrika-" Juejona said.
"Oh my, Ulrika defending Damien! Today is truly a beautiful day!"
A young purple-haired girl around Ulrika's age came running up to them, a sweet smile on her face, a dark jaguar by her side.
"I presume you are Nineheart, the one we sent Ulrika to save?" the girl asked him.
"Yes, indeed. And you are?" Nineheart replied.
"Cutie. That is my real name, not a nickname or anything." she replied.
"Nice to meet you, Cutie." Nineheart greeted.
"Cutie is the current Wild Hunter instructor. She's been doing the job for quite some time." Juejona informed.
"I see that the youths of the Resistance are quite capable." Nineheart said.
"I haven't had the post for that long, just ever since..."
Cutie's face fell as she cut off her sentence midway.
"Ever since Belle died. What's with you people, all so unwilling to mention things like that." Damien finished for her crudely.
"Damien." Ulrika elbowed him, giving him a warning glare.
"What? It's the truth, no point hiding it right? Nothing's going to change even if you don't mention it. They've died and that's all there is to it." Damien defended.
"Can we please move on from this subject?" Juejona interjected.
"Juejona, continue updating Nineheart." Lios said flatly.
"Oh of course. So, I've told you the fate of the Resistance, the Cygnus Knights, oh the Victorian instructors! Thankfully, they're all still doing pretty well...aside from the fact the towns get attacked by Black Wings from time to time and that the monsters have gotten stronger. But other than that, all's pretty fine over there. Compared to the rest of the world that is." Juejona said.
"I see Victoria Island has held up quite well. How about the Novas?" Nineheart asked.
"Well, frankly...we haven't received word from the Novas for quite a while now...probably because we can't even access Grandis now." Juejona explained.
"The dimension portal kind of crashed." Ulrika said.
"...crashed?" Nineheart asked.
"Literally. It just fell apart." Ulrika said.
"Not only that, but at the same time, many other portals crashed. For example, we no longer have access to Ellin Forest of the Past. We can't seem to reach the time temple either. Dimension Portals at each town also similarly broke down and places we can only reach by them are no longer accessible." Juejona added.
"For some reason, though, Elluel remains accessible despite everything." Cutie said.
"Probably because of the fact it's more closely linked. The connection nearly collapsed. Or it could be Mercedes's presence over here." Lios stated monotonously.
"Mercedes's presence?" Ulrika asked.
"Hey you never told us!" Cutie complained.
"It wasn't of any importance." Lios said.
"Then why do you tell only Nineheart?" Ulrika retorted.
"I didn't, I did tell others."
"Like?" Cutie questioned.
"Damien." Lios stated.
"Damien?" Ulrika exclaimed, directing the question more towards Damien then Lios.
"Well its because I happened to be there when he was telling it to someone else. And not like that information would help in anything." Damien defended.
"Who were you telling it to?" Cutie asked Lios.
"Olivia." he replied.
Ulrika and Cutie stared at Lios, an expression that said 'What' on both their faces. Nineheart raised an eyebrow. He had the feeling this boy was...different but now he felt he was downright strange.
"Telling the kid but not us? That's just like you." Juejona laughed.
Lios gave an offhanded shrug
"And I'm guessing, Lios, you told her because she somehow managed to get to that topic." Juejona said, looking very much amused.
"Yes." he replied in his usual deadpan manner.
"Seriously, getting some things out of you is really like a game of luck, like those super secret missions in games." Juejona said.
"I will never understand this guy." Cutie said.
"Me neither." Ulrika said.
"How the hell did you know anyway Juejona." Cutie asked.
"You'll catch on after working with him for some time." Juejona replied.
"Some time? We've been working with him for years and nothing's changed." Cutie complained.
"Then don't try and understand him." Juejona replied cheekily.
"What..." Cutie dead panned.
"Seriously, it'll make your life easier." Juejona said, smiling.
"...okay." Cutie gave up.
"Back to the topic. Anything else I had forgotten, Lios?" Juejona asked.
"That should be all for now. He can learn the rest along the way." Lios replied.
"Okay. I'll get going home anyway, have some work to do up. Juggling three jobs isn't easy you know. Sayonara." Juejona said, taking her leave quickly.
"Three jobs?" Nineheart asked.
"Well, officially her one and only job is that of a journalist, but she does have her 'job' as part of Resistance and 'job' as a Black Wing member. And they're all quite different." Ulrika explained.
"Her job as a Black Wing? I assume this means she's an undercover agent." Nineheart said.
"Yep. Very good at it too. She's been doing it for years with hardly any slip-ups." Cutie said.
"And what do you do?" he asked Ulrika.
"I'm a student so I obviously don't work. But in the Resistance, I lead the operations most of the times. There are a couple of us who are in charge on the field and we each have units of our own. I tend to be involved in stealth operations." Ulrika said.
"I see. How about the others?" Nineheart asked.
"I'm a student too, in fact, classmates with Ukrika. For Resistance matters, I'm just in charge of the Wild Hunters, so I usually lead the general operations and battles, not so much of those specialised missions like Ulrika. Damien tends to go solo, at most with one or two others, especially Ulrika." Cutie said.
"Cutie...would you stop with your shipping already..." Ulrika scowled.
"Hehe, no! Luka is in charge of Battle Mages, mostly staying in the base to look after the new recruits and helping to monitor the situation from the base during operations, especially bigger one. By the day, he works as a teacher, as before. I dont know what Aidan's day job is, but I do know he is in charge of the Mechanics and also stays in the base to look after the new recruits. Oh and he does all the technology stuff, as well as make upgrades to what we already have. And ensure the base doesn't shut down. Xenon and the other mechanics help him out with those too. Xenon and Aidan are nearly always together in the base though, they tend to have to take care of stuff together." Cutie said
For some reason, she giggled and made a small cross with her index fingers. Aidan looked away abruptly, to which Luka raised an eyebrow. Damien sniggered and Ulrika just facepalmed.
"The two Chief Knights don't really leave the base together, having to look after their daughter, with usually only one going into the fight. But nowadays they don't even leave the base, unless for large operations, because someone has to look after the remaining Cygnus Knights." Luka informed.
"Aran does fight, but usually when the Black Wing launches an attack on us, and not the other way around." Aidan added.
"The Black Wings are attacking the Resistance? Have they found your base?" Nineheart asked.
If that was so, then the base wouldn't be that safe anymore and moving away would be a good idea. Though the sheer number of equipment in the base and the personnel they would have to move made that a rather time-consuming option, it would be safer to do so.
"They haven't found our base, but they have started to attack Edelstein to lure us out. And the damage is substantial." Lios said.
Luka's expression hardened, his eyes steely with hatred.
"Those bastards, targeting all the innocent people of the town. Raiding their homes, beating up the people, taking their possessions...and even lives." Luka seethed.
"Luka, calm down." Aidan quickly said.
"Xenon's taking a long time this time round. Nearly everyone's back, yet she's still nowhere in sight. Same for Valfor." Lios muttered.
"Von's not back either. Weren't Valfor and Von supposed to cover Xenon while she hacked the system?" Ulrika said.
"So little personnel for such a job?" Nineheart asked.
"Well, we had quite a big diversion, what with rescuing you and all." Ulrika said.
"Could you please go into the details of this operation you carried out just a moment ago?" Nineheart inquired.
"We had two objectives for this mission. Firstly, was to release you from your imprisonment. We managed to get Ulrika to enter the Black Wings, and then managed to get her to provide you with the paper and pen. We invaded the base by force nearly exactly when Ulrika entered your cell. Your cell is pretty soundproof, so Ulrika didn't hear the Black Wing's sirens until she left, which was her cue to get you out. Meanwhile, we got Damien to ensure that the route we planned for you to take was clear. Ulrika then led you out without obstruction and passed you to Juejona, who was already on standby and waiting for you. Juejona brought you to our base and that objective was fulfilled. The second objective was to get more information on the Queen's whereabouts. While the fight was going on and you were being led out, we sent Valfor, Von and Xenon to hack the system. Valfor was to divert the Black Wings' attention as well as to help hold off the enemies, while Von was there to back Xenon up. We sent as little people as we could to ensure they were as inconspicuous as possible." Lios stated.
"And there's no need to worry, the three are on their way out, I just lost contact with Valfor." he continued calmly.
Nineheart stared at the blonde incredulously. He just lost contact and yet was this calm?
"I bet he flew again." Damien said.
"Hey has anyone managed to calculate his flying speed yet?" Cutie asked.
"It varies a lot, so the range is very large. And I believe he has not flown at maximum speed so far, so I don't know his maximum speed. For minimum, it would be 0 metres per second." Lios replied.
"...I guess that's a speed..." Ulrika said.
"I just realised. Our original plan was not to overload Nineheart with more information." Cutie reminded.
"Then we should just let the old man go rest or something." Damien suggested.
Nineheart frowned at the use of the word 'old'. He has grown older, but he wasn't that old.
"I'll show you to your room then." Lios said, turning and walking off once he finished his sentence.