—~—
"Alright Bonehead, how do we get started?" Serafall asked cheerfully, turning to Bob and giving the skull a beaming smile.
"…Bonehead?" Bob echoed, his voice strained in distaste. For the briefest moment I thought he was going to say something about the odd, if appropriate, nickname that Serafall had given him, but he seemed to take it in stride.
I guess he didn't feel like being a smart ass to a one of the ruling entities of the devils, even if she looked like a cute preteen who hit puberty with a running start.
"The best thing to do is to find the appropriate material for the body," Bob began to explain to Serafall. The pinpricks of light that made up his eyes moved between Serafall and I. "The most common material to use is wood, due to its malleable organic nature and the variety that is available."
I'd already learned all this over the past week, but I suppose it didn't hurt to give the twin tailed devil some information about what we needed to do.
"Everyone is suited toward a different type of wood. Harry, for example, is a good fit with Spruce. Spruce is the kinda wood that works well with someone with a good sense of humor—or at least someone who thinks they have one. Unfortunately for Harry, Spruce is a difficult wood to work with," The skull continued to explain. "So it's important that we find a tree with good compatibility to avoid issues."
"Wow! That's interesting," Serafall spoke up, her wide blue eyes staring at Bob in fascination. "You're talking without moving your jaw!"
The light that made up Bob's eyes stilled for a moment. "Y-Yes well," he said awkwardly. "You yourself seem to be suited toward—"
"—I want a Cherry Blossom wand!" Serafall declared, interrupting Bob with a happy declaration. "It's flowers are so pretty and pink!" She gushed. "It suits me, right? Right?" She looked between Bob and I for confirmation.
I wanted to speak up and point out that you didn't exactly get to choose what type of materials best suited you and that picking one based on how pretty it was seemed like a bad idea.
"Absolutely!" Bob agreed quickly. "How did you know?"
My eyebrows raised sceptically at Bob's response.
Serafall let out a delighted laugh and did a little spin, clapping her hands in excitement. As she did, Bob glanced me and the lights in his eyes moved right to left quickly, as if he was shaking his head.
"Now, picking the best material for you is step one," Bob continued, speaking up to get Serafall's attention as she did her little spin of joy. "The next step is to find a tree that has the unique properties that make a good magical focus. There are a lot of variables, but it boils down to three things. The age of the material in question, metaphysical significance and attunement to elemental forces."
I found it surreal to see, as Serafall listened to Bob intently, hanging on every word he said. It was a strange contrast to moments before when she had basically been dancing on the spot in excitement. "I see!" She exclaimed, beaming at the skull and nodding seriously. "I understand completely."
"You do?" "You do?" I found myself asking dumbly at the same time as Bob.
"Jinx." "I'm not doing that, Harry."
I scowled and gave the skull an annoyed look. He was such a kill joy sometimes.
"Of course!" Serafall said, puffing her chest out proudly. "Simply put, older is better and if it's got a historical significance it's super and if it's been zapped with lightning or burnt down it's the best!" She exclaimed, throwing her arms out and causing her breasts to bounce in response to the energetic action.
Yet again, I found myself staring at the young-looking devil girl in stark disbelief. How had she gotten all that from his explanation? It'd taken me a small while to understand what Bob had said and I'd been in the wizarding business for a few years.
"…It took Harry a while to understand what I was saying." Bob said and gave me a meaningful look.
"…Shut up." I grumbled and glared at the skull sullenly.
I looked to Serafall who was smiling happily, pleased with having easily decrypted what Bob had said. It shouldn't have surprised me that she did. She was a lot older than she looked, as well as a lot smarter than she looked, but considering she wore a bright pink magical girl costume as her daily wear, that shouldn't have been hard.
Serafall noticed I had been staring at her and looked up to me, a pretty smile upon her lips. "What's wrong Harry?" she asked, sounding genuinely interested.
"Nothing," I said after a moment and offered her a smile. "I was just surprised by how smart you are."
Serafall beamed at me happily at the compliment, and then after a second her brow furrowed and she processed it. "…Wait…surprised?" she repeated and I suddenly found myself on the business end of a finger prodding into my stomach. "Mean! You're a big meanie, Harry!" she pouted and protested. "You shouldn't think bad things about me! I'm your master!"
It took all I had not to burst out into laughter at how utterly adorable she sounded.
She gave me a sullen glare before huffing and turning back to Bob. "What else is there?"
"Well, as you can imagine, finding a tree that has all the right qualities is difficult, but it is also possible to artificially imbue wood with the qualities that are required to make a good staff—or wand—" he corrected himself quickly at Serafall's sudden narrowing of the eyes. "However, that takes time to do. Depending on the quality of wood it can take up to fifty hours over the course of a month to prepare the wood, and that's simply attuning it to the types of energy that you want to use with it."
Serafall's nose crinkled. "I don't want to have to wait!" She protested and huffed. "I guess we'll have to find some really old trees then!" she decided, folding her arms across her bust and nodding seriously to herself.
"Harder than you'd think," I said to her with a grin on my features. She was adorable when she acted so seriously. "I spent a whole day at the library and found nothing."
"Don't you think that's because you can't read Japanese," Bob suggested.
"Shut up Bob," I glared at him briefly.
"Oh!" Serafall suddenly exclaimed, her blue eyes widening. "I forgot! I can just ask Altria!" She laughed and bobbed herself on the head lightly.
"Who?" I asked in surprise, my eyebrows raising to meet my hairline.
Serafall spun to face me, a big grin on her face. "Get ready, Harry!" She said to me. "You're going to meet another member of my peerage. Be on your best behaviour alright? If you give a bad first impression I'll be very sad."
"R-right," I nodded slowly, a frown forming on my lips. Serafall had been rather tight lipped about the rest of her peerage. Well, that wasn't entirely correct, when I had asked her, she had ignored my question and continued to chat about her favourite television show. I had felt it was less of a 'did not want to talk about it' and more of a 'wanted to talk about the show with Milky Milky Spiral…something or other. I hadn't managed to retain the strange jargon that she had thrown at me in rapid sequence.
Serafall lazily lifted her hand up and waved it through the air. I watched in interest as, in front of her, a magic circle appeared in the air. To my surprise, it wasn't red like the one Rias summoned whenever she invoked her power. Instead, it was a very faint, almost white, azure. Not only that, but the design was wildly different as well.
Rias and her peerages invocations of demonic power came in the odd form of a glyph reminiscent of a backwards S. This one however, was strange in that it was composed of multiple geometric shapes overlaid into a complex pattern.
The demonic circle of power hung in the air for a moment, before it began to shimmer, and a second later it was as if the space inside the outermost circle was torn away and I found myself looking through what seemed to be a hole in the air.
"Altria!" Serafall called out into the surreal hole in the air. "Altria I need your assistance!"
There was a moment of stillness in the inky black of the hole, before suddenly, it wasn't so still and wasn't so empty and a room appeared on the other side of the hole.
That should have been surprising enough. I'd heard of, and even attempted long range communication with magic before, that wasn't anything too new to me. What was new, was that what I was seeing wasn't something as simple as a thaumaturgic connection, showing an image. No, I could see through the hole as if I were looking through a window.
She had literally cut open a hole in the fabric of space and time to make a phone call.
I found myself at a loss for words.
On the other side of the magic hole, a young woman in a suit appeared. My first impression of her was that she looked like a no-nonsense type of person. She had high cheek bones, a pair of full lips. Her eyes were a pretty, if intense green colour, and her face was framed by honey blonde hair that, aside from her fringe and bangs had been tied back into a low ponytail.
"Good evening, Mistress. How may I be of assistance?" The blonde haired woman—apparently called Altria—spoke, her voice cool and collected.
"I need your help to find the oldest and most famous Cherry Blossom tree and Spruce tree in the world!" Serafall said, utterly serious.
The woman on the other end of the call blinked once. That was the measure of surprise she gave at the strange request. "If I tell you, Mistress, may I ask what you intend to do with the information?"
"We're making magic wands!" Serafall exclaimed gleefully, and reached over grabbing me and pulling me closer to her. "Altria, meet my cute new Knight Harry! Harry meet Altria, she's my talent agent!"
I suddenly found those intense green eyes settling on me. It lasted a fraction of a second, but I felt as if I was being evaluated before the sensation suddenly vanished. "A pleasure to meet you, Harry. Serafall has told me much about you." Altria, Serafall's apparent talent manager said to me politely.
"Nice to meet you as well, Altria," I said awkwardly, feeling suddenly put on the spotlight. "She's told me… nothing about you," I offered lamely.
The blonde woman's lips twitched up into a brief smile. "I cannot imagine she would have. I am Serafall's talent agent, financial manager, day to day manager, and any other type of manager you would believe that a ruler of the Underworld would require."
I couldn't help but smile briefly at that expanded description of her position. I glanced down at Serafall who had pouted at her words. Somehow I didn't have a hard time believing that at all.
A brief look of contemplation passed over Altria's features and then she added, as an afterthought. "And Queen of her peerage."
If Serafall hadn't told me beforehand that she was contacting a member of her peerage, I may have been stunned by the statement. As it was, I was only mildly surprised. I had no idea what I had expected, but I certainly hadn't expected to meet Serafall's second in command.
"You have a question," Altria stated calmly. "Please ask it, If I am able to answer, I will," she told me politely.
"This is going to sound really stupid," I admitted. "But…were you always so pretty?" I asked lamely and immediately regretted opening my mouth as the room fell silent.
"Pardon?" Altria asked after a moment, her honey blonde eyebrows raising a fraction.
I grimaced. "It's just, every devil I've met has been…really good looking," I said embarrassedly.
"I have not changed physically since I became a devil," Altria said after a brief moment of consideration. "However, I am aware of what you speak of. There are very few devils that are physically unappealing." She regarded me for a moment. "You are concerned that you are ugly and thus are experiencing self-esteem issues." She observed critically.
In that moment I learned something new about Altria, Serafall's Queen. She had absolutely no sense of tact whatsoever and may have as well kicked me in the nuts.
Beside me Serafall gasped in shock at the 'reveal' by Altria. "Harry! Say it isn't so!" she cried out in shock. "Self-esteem issues aren't good at all!" She reached up and gripped my shirt and pulled me down with surprising strength and wrapped her arms around my head, hugging it to her chest tightly. I barely managed to stop from falling forward as she pulled me down to her level and dropped down onto a knee to steady myself.
I suddenly found my face pressed against Serafall's bountiful breasts, and realized, for first time, how thin the material of her outfit was and how soft her breasts were. The realization was quickly followed by another; breathing was hard when your face was buried between the valley of two breasts.
"Mhmph!" I made a sound of protest and attempted to pull my face away, only to find out another truth: Serafall was crazy strong and escape from her loving embrace was impossible.
"Oh Harry!" Serafall cried out, her voice filled with compassion. "You shouldn't think like that at all! You're really really cute you know! Tall and handsome! Dark and sexy! A hot stud!" she exclaimed, tightening her embrace further and cutting off what little remained of my oxygen supply.
"Mistress, please release him." I heard Altria's voice somewhere in the back of my mind. It was fuzzy. I was starting to become a little concerned.
"No!" Serafall said firmly, her voice filled with passion and shook her head and body, jerking me around as she did so. "I'm not letting go until Harry feels better!"
"He won't be able to feel anything if he dies from asphyxiation," Altria pointed out patiently.
I suddenly found myself able to breath again as Serafall's arms disentangled from around my neck and she allowed me to pull away from the death-trap that were her breasts.
"You weren't having trouble breathing, were you Harry?" Serafall asked, concern filling her baby blue eyes.
I gulped down as much air as I could in those first few seconds. "N-No," I managed to get out after a second. "Your compassion just took my breath away," I said, unable to keep my sarcasm out of my voice.
It flew right over her head. "Oh Harry!" She cried out and looked like she was going to embrace me again. I quickly pulled away and stood up, putting my head out of reach.
Through the hole in the air, Altria shook her head softly. "To answer your earlier question, Mistress, the oldest known cherry blossom tree, known as the Miharu Takizakura is located, as the name suggests in Miharu near Fukishima."
I immediately forgot about my brief brush with a breast induced death and stared at the Serafall's Queen in stunned disbelief. How had she known any of that at all? Since Serafall had asked she hadn't stepped away or even looked away.
She continued unbidden. "It was designated as a national treasure of japan roughly seventy years ago. By your interest in it, am I to assume that it is going to be destroyed?"
An affronted look appeared on Serafall's features. "Of course not!" She protested, before hesitating. "I mean, I want to use it to make a magic wand…" she mumbled. "So…Maybe?"
Altria regarded Serafall with a look for a moment before she let out a sigh. "Following on from that, the oldest known spruce tree is located in the Fulufjallet Mountain of the Dalarna province in Sweden. It is known as Old Tjikko."
Altria's gaze drifted from Serafall to me. "To answer your unasked question, I have an eidetic memory and—"
"—and I made her read the Encyclopaedia Britannica!" Serafall boasted and let out a boisterous laugh. "I can ask her anything and she knows the answer!"
On the other side of the portal that hung in the air, Altria gave a soft sigh and shook her head. "If that is all you required, Mistress, then I must remind you that we are scheduled to begin filming again tomorrow morning. Please do not have a late night and be sure to get plenty of rest."
Serafall's face broke out into a brilliant smile. "Of course!" she said happily. "I'll be there bright and early! The show can't go on without the star!"
"By your leave," Altria said politely and actually bowed to Serafall.
"Take it easy Altria!" Serafall chirped and waved her hand.
The outermost circle that had contained the hole in space suddenly vanished and an instant later the hole in space was crushed into nothingness, as if it had never been there, defying physics as I knew it.
I couldn't help but stare at Serafall. That simple wave of her hand had been significantly more complex than any magic I had ever seen before.
"What's wrong Harry?" Serafall asked as she noticed my dazed stare. "Did you need another hug?" She gave me a warm, encouraging smile.
"Not right now," I said quickly and shook myself out of my funk. "I was just really amazed that…" I trailed off "…you have your own television show," I finished.
Serafall's features brightened excitedly and she nodded rapidly. "It's called Magical Levia-tan!" She exclaimed excitedly. "Do you want to come watch me film it tomorrow? I'm certain you'll have fun!"
I grimaced. "I would love to," I said to Serafall, meaning every word. "But I have school tomorrow and I'm pretty sure Sona wouldn't be happy if I skipped it."
Serafall deflated before my very eyes. I'd used the magic words 'Sona wouldn't be happy'. They were her kryptonite.
"…Personally I was more amazed at the spatio-temporal hyperlink that she hand waved into existence." Bob said dryly from the side. "But hey, ugly duckling, you focus on the cool show with the magical girl."
I glanced over at him, suddenly finding myself impressed with the skull, despite his snark. He had constantly insisted that he was an amazing resource for magical knowledge, and to be fair to him it'd been showing in places certainly, but still. To know what she had done was another thing all together. "You know how she did that?" I turned to him, my eyebrows raising up.
"Well, no, not really. I just made the name up. Didn't want to say that she made a 'magic hole in the air'," Bob admitted.
I stared at Bob for a moment. Just like that the increased respect I had for him flat lined. I shook my head and looked to Serafall. "What was that?" I asked her, deciding to just go to the source for the answer.
The blue eyed devil blinked. "Just a little something to make talking with my peerage a bit easier," Serafall said to me lightly. "They're everywhere, so I feel really bad if I can't at least talk to them face to face," she explained to me.
"How did you do it?"
Serafall tilted her head to the side, confusion in her eyes. "What do you mean? I just did it."
"Yeah, but how?" I pressed. "How did you do it?"
"I just did it!" Serafall insisted, pouting at me. "Why are you asking me silly questions, Harry?" She chided me. "We've going on adventure, who has time for that kind of stuff!"
"Yeah Harry," Bob chimed in. "Who has time for silly questions like how to open up rips in the fabric of time and space?"
I gave Bob an annoyed look, but held back on saying something back.
Serafall gave a serious nod. "Exactly! Listen to Bonehead."
I decided at that moment that the better part of valour was not banging my head against a wall. "Okay, fine then." I said. "Let's go get you your magic wand."
Serafall let out a sound that was a mix between a shout of delight and a squeal of pleasure. She bounced upon the soles of her shoes a few times, grinning before she reached over to the desk, and picked up Bob.
"Here, you carry Lazybones." She said to me, thrusting Bob into my hands. "We don't want to come back until our adventure is complete!"
Upon hearing that he would be joining us for our apparent romp around the world, Bob made his displeasure known. "H-Hold it!" He protested as Serafall handed him to me. "I'm allergic to adventure! Put me back! Put me back!" He demanded.
"Sorry, Lazybonehead," I said to Bob, completely unapologetically. "The boss lady has spoken."
Serafall lazily raised a hand into the air and a moment later the ground beneath us was lit up by glowing azure and the world vanished in a blinding flash of white light.
I felt the chill of the wind before anything else. The scent of grass and the faintest aromas of something sweet and floral in the air. As the light faded, I found myself standing on the top of a hill, on a path that stretched up one side, and went down the other. It was overcast, and the world awash with dull hues.
I blinked a few times. "…How did you know where to teleport?" I asked, turning to Serafall. "Didn't she just tell you the name and the general location?"
Serafall shrugged a shoulder. "Because."
"Because?" I repeated slowly.
She gave me a bright smile. "Because because!" She said brightly, giving me a beaming smile.
I shook my head and let out a faint laugh before I took time to actually look around where we had appeared.
I could see a road a hundred yards away, cars racing along, oblivious to our sudden appearance. To our right looked to be a small building with signs about it, no doubt some sort of information spot, considering the gigantic pictures of pink leafed trees around it. On the other side, a few hundred yards away were houses.
As my eyes found the tree, I found myself staring, wide eyed in shock. The sight of the massive tree before me took my breath away. I had seen bigger trees before, but this was something else. Despite being higher up than it, it's massive form loomed, thick branches—each the size of my body—stretching out around it, drooping from the sheer weight of the cloud of pink blossoms that clung to every inch of it.
From the first moment I saw it, I could tell that this tree was barely holding itself up—In fact, it wasn't It was leaning over at an almost forty-five degree angle. I could see dozens of poles beneath the branches, holding them up to stop them from collapsing to the ground, and taking the tree with them.
It was clear that the tree before me was on its last legs, but at the same time, there was something majestic about the ancient thing before me.
"Amazing!" Serafall breathed out. "Look how big it is!" Without another word, she began to walk along the path that lead down to the trunk.
In my hand, Bob let out a low whistle. "That tree's twice as old as I am," He said from my arms.
"How can you tell?" I asked, surprised by the sudden statement from the skull I held.
"It's a spirit thing." Bob answered easily, evading my question, the orange lights in his eyes averting and looking away.
I rolled my eyes and followed Serafall down. As I did, I noticed that there was a large tree line behind us on the ridge of the hill. It was composed of the same manner of tree as the one in front of us. They were all dazzled in pink blossoms, and each one was lovely in its own respect. Yet, when compared to the one before us, I couldn't help but find them lacking. It was like comparing a cat to a lion.
As we came around the side, I noticed that there was a low-level barrier surrounding the tree. It was made up of stone posts linked together by chains. The chains themselves were rusted. The pathway wound itself down the hill, before splitting off and heading toward the front of the tree.
We came to the front of the ancient cherry blossom tree, and found a tiny shrine. It, like the tree, had seen better days. The tiny blue tiles on the top of it were coated in dirt, dust and a number of other things that had been blown onto it. Some had broken off, and others were chipped. The wood was weathered and tinged a faint mossy green, yet, despite that, it looked like it was being taken care of. It was all obviously the original craftsmanship.
I could feel the reverence that the locals had for the tree. That there was no graffiti or broken branches spoke tons.
Without hesitation, Serafall walked right past the shrine and hopped over the barrier, humming to herself as she did.
I blinked slowly as I watched her step through the overgrown grass and approach the trunk of the tree. "Are you really going to break off a branch?" I asked her, surprised.
Serafall spun around, her eyes wide in shock and offence. "Of course not!" She exclaimed. "That would be silly and mean, Harry!"
A wave of relief flooded through me. For a second I thought she was actually going to destroy the tree. It was obviously well loved and long lived icon for the people around her. I can't imagine the offence they'd take if they suddenly found it with a broken off branch that was nowhere to be seen.
"I'm going to take it all!" Serafall answered happily, before gesturing for me to come closer. "Come on! I have to show you how so you can do it with Old thingy!"
"What." I said slowly, staring at her, my eyebrows ascending to my hairline. "What do you mean, take it all?"
Serafall gave an exaggerated sigh and regarded me with those blue eyes. "Harry, come." She said to me firmly, pointing to the ground beside her.
"I'm not a dog," I told her dryly, but none the less did as she asked, stepping closer, and then over the barrier.
"Bob, stay." I said to the skull in my hands as I set it down on one of the concrete posts.
"I'm not a dog either," Bob said grumpily. "Turn me so I can see the tree," He told me, and I did, before wading through the grass to get closer to Serafall.
The scent of the cherry blossoms was stronger than before, and I could feel the long grass brushing against the bottom of my pants. There was a faint sound in the air was the branches above gently swayed in a faint breeze that seemed to roll through.
As I got closer, Serafall carefully moved toward the trunk, and stopped in front of it. She smiled faintly and lifted a hand up, rubbing the tree. The trunk of the tree was covered in a thick layer of bark that was spotted with bumps as far as I could see. There were thick fissures in it that dug deep into the body of the trees, cracked from the sheer weight of it all.
"Now Harry I need you to pay attention to what I'm about to show you." Serafall told me and lifted her other hand, giving me the come hither. "Get up real close," she instructed.
I let out a soft sigh and grimaced. I had no idea what she was going to do, but knowing her, she was going to explode the entire tree and pull out the perfect wand from the remains. I stopped a few feet behind her, towering a few feet over her smaller form.
Serafall glanced up at me, and frowned. "No, get closer," She told me firmly, reaching to my shirt and pulling me closer until I bumped into her. "Hand," She said to me, holding hers out.
I rolled my eyes and offered her my hand, which she grabbed by the wrist and pulled forward, pressing it down over the hand she had laid against the trunk of the tree.
"..This is kind of uncomfortable," I told her awkwardly. I was half bent over and if my hand hadn't been firmly planted over hers, I'd have toppled from the difference in our heights.
Serafall gave an exaggerated sigh and glanced up at me again. "Closer," She said again, her voice firm. "I need to feel you against me."
I took a moment of silence to process what she just said.
"Pssst," I heard Bob from down by the shrine stage whisper. "Pssst, Harry, you're in!"
I rolled my eyes at Bob's tactless 'whispers'. Thankfully Serafall seemed to ignore them and continued to give me an expectant look.
What the hell, you only live once, right? Or at least, that's what they tell you. I was personally on my second life thanks to the girl that was currently asking me to spoon against her.
Without another word, I dropped down closer to her, kneeling slightly so that our arms were lined up, even if my shoulder was a bit far back.
"Closer."
I leaned down until my chest was pressed against her back.
Serafall let out a disgruntled sound and reached to my free hand, and pulled it around her waist tightly until I was pressed against her back firmly, her delightfully and immorally well shaped butt pressed against my crotch.
"There," Serafall said with a sharp nod. "Don't move," she told me.
"…For the record, I'm uncomfortable with this." I said to her.
No matter how old she actually was, or how big her breasts were, she still had the characteristics of a girl barely into puberty. It was entirely wrong to even think about her that way and made me feel dirty.
"You're my servant, it's only natural that you should do these things with me," Serafall told me firmly.
I found myself at a loss for words as a sudden wave of nausea hit me. Apparently I had severely underestimated and misinterpreted our apparent relationship. "…It's only natural that I do these things from you?" I repeated slowly, my voice strained.
She gave another nod and turned back to the trunk of the ancient cherry blossom tree. "Of course! I know you've been doing this sort of thing with Rias' Queen, but really it should be me showing you the proper way."
Akeno and I had been doing what? What the hell had Serafall been told about us? I could barely stand that she-witch and she thought we were doing things like this? I made a choking sound at the mere thought of spooning with that crazy bitch, and then frowned. On the other hand… She was pretty, in a sort of way, once you got over what a bitch she was. If she didn't spend half the time we spent in the same room trying to get under my skin…
I found myself picturing it, and to my utter dismay, I couldn't say that the thought displeased me as much as I thought it would have. I blinked a few times as I realized that I had zoned out, and Serafall was still smiling at me. My cheeks burned crimson. "I-w-we haven't been doing this sort of thing!" I blurted out. "Who told you that?" I demanded to know.
"Wouldn't you like to know?" Serafall teased me lightly, before her voice became serious again. "Pay close attention to what I'm going to do Harry. I can't explain what I'm doing, so you need to feel it, alright?"
Suddenly, I felt her smaller form exude a sudden spike on energy. It was tightly wrapped and contained, and if I hadn't been touching her as much as I had been, I doubt I'd be able to have sensed it in the air.
"W-wait, you're showing me a spell?" I stammered, my eyes widening.
For the fourth time, Serafall glanced back at me, a confused look on her lovely young features. "Of course, what did you think I meant?" she asked curiously, her head tilting ever so slightly.
"Never mind," I said awkwardly. "Just…show me the spell."
Serafall blinked a few times, before her lips morphed into a tiny knowing smile. "Alright," she agreed easily, turning back to the tree. "Pay close attention," she reminded me and began to gather up her demonic power.
I could feel it moving inside of her, pooling up along her arm and flowing out into the trunk. The demonic power that she drew forth and injected spread out, flowing up into the branches of the massive tree, and sinking down into the roots.
Through Serafall I could see and feel every energy-soaked inch of the tree. Despite how overwhelmingly large the trunk and branches of the tree were, to my surprise, the roots were far vaster, spreading out deep into the ground and stretching out far beyond the barrier that kept the tourists out.
I'd learned in biology at my old school that root systems were usually shallow and kept to the first meter or so of soil. That simply wasn't the case here. The roots of this tree went significantly deeper than normal, and the deeper they were, the older the roots were. I could feel it through Serafall, how old and ancient they were compared to the trunk of the tree.
It was almost as if the tree was glowing. It took me a few moments to realize that, in fact, the tree actually was glowing. The trunk had begun to let out a faint azure glow from beneath the bark and it was slowly creeping to the surface and chasing away the shadows that had begun to creep along from the setting of the sun.
Faint motes of light began to appear from the branches and the pink hued blossoms that clung to every inch of the canopy. It wasn't long before the features of the tree were enveloped by the light that it gave off. The amount of demonic power that coursed through the tree in front of us was blinding.
I wasn't exaggerating.
I had to squint to avoid being blinded by the sheer luminosity that it produced and eventually had to shut my eyes completely.
Even though I couldn't see the tree, through Serafall's body, pressed against my front, I could picture it clearly in my mind, the outlining shape of the tree, and the strange changes that were overcoming its entire body. The most obvious I could feel were the outermost roots and branches. They were beginning to draw back into the trunk of the tree, little by little, as if time was rewinding.
As the roots rescinded into the body of the tree, I felt my feet begin to sink into the ground as it became unstable and the earth began to crumble beneath our feet. Still, I held myself against Serafall, fascinated by what I was experiencing through her.
The branches and blossoms of the tree had begun to vanish as well, and even the trunk was beginning to shrink.
There was a faint groaning, followed by a series of heavy thuds around us, one very close by, barely a meter behind.
My eyes snapped open and I jerked my face away from the blinding light of the tree, squinting to make out what had happened.
The poles that had been holding up the heavy branches of the tree had fallen. Without the weight of the tree branches to keep them steady and propped up, they had slipped and fallen to the ground. The one behind us, had it been tilted a bit further would have no doubt brained me where I had been standing.
The world around us was bathed in a bright aqua glow from the demonic energy that Serafall was pushing into the ancient tree. I watched the shadows and the overlays of light as they shifted and moved, the outlines fading in and out as more and more of the cherry blossom tree shrunk down toward her hand.
The earth beneath us became more and more unstable as the root system continued to vanish and another second passed before my foot crunched through the brittle dirt and I found myself slipping away from Serafall, my arms flailing in an effort to keep me steady to no avail.
Even as I fell, I found myself surprised as Serafall, despite the earth literally falling to pieces beneath us, remained in the same spot, her hand pressed against the trunk shrinking tree. She stood there, literally on air, apparently oblivious to the impossibility of what she was doing. The two twin tails that her hair had been tied into began to sway ever so slightly, catching on an updraft that wasn't quite there.
A long shadow that had been cast from Serafall standing between the tree and I had been the only thing that stood figuratively between me and full loss of my eyesight.
It was at that moment, as I landed on my ass, that I found myself uncertain as to whether I should have been more shocked by her apparent disregard for gravity, or that the massive tree that had weighed in the figure of several tons had been reduced to the size of a punching bag and was showing no signs of slowly down.
There was no fanfare or sudden critical moment that signified the end of whatever it had been that Serafall had done. One moment the world had been awash with the brightest of lights and the next, there was darkness.
After a few moments my eyes began to adjust to the sudden shift in lighting and I found myself staring up at Serafall. Unfortunately—or fortunately, depending on who you asked, I was a bit too low, what with her standing in mid-air and all, and ended up with a rather clear view.
Suffice it to say, Serafall wore white under all that pink.
Serafall took a deep breath in and slowly I watched as she drifted down from where she stood in the air. I found the distracting view vanishing as she got lower, and instead I found myself staring at what she held in her hands.
My first thought was, "That's not a wand," I said bluntly.
Serafall turned around as her feet touched upon the shattered ground and gave me an amused smile as she twirled a long thin rod in her hands. "It's a wand!" she insisted and shoved the top of it in my face. "See? It's got a big star and everything!" she exclaimed, using her other hand to point at the ornate end that was shaped, as she said, like a star, though it also had a ring around it that connected it to the rest of it.
I wasn't sure what I had been expecting when she had started to reduce the massive thousand year old tree. I certainly hadn't been expecting to find her holding several tons of tree in her hand, or for it to be the colour of the cherry blossoms of the… Cherry blossom tree.
Serafall blinked her large blue eyes slowly and her brow furrowed. "What are you doing down there, Harry?" she asked me surprised. "Were you paying attention? If you weren't I'll be very unhappy," she informed me lightly, a cheeky grin appearing on her lips.
"I was," I told her and pushed myself up onto my feet, careful to keep steady despite the lack of real traction. "Until the whole ground fell away part, anyway." I hesitated a moment. "How did you do that, anyway?" I asked. "Standing in the air that is."
She tilted her head to the side adorably. "You mean fly?"
"That was more like hovering, than flying," I pointed out. At the look she gave me though, I quickly agreed with her. "Yes, that."
"You haven't been taught to fly yet?" Serafall's expression changed from annoyance to surprise as her eyebrows rose. "Harry! It's been like a month, you should have learned how to fly by now," she accused me, prodding my chest with the end of her new 'wand' which was actually a rod.
"It's been two weeks," I corrected her politely. "And it's not like I've had a certain someone around to show me how," I pointed out to her, lifting a hand up and pushing the rod away from my chest.
Serafall puffed her cheeks out. "The reason I'm making you go to school is so Sona and Rias can teach you that stuff!" she protested.
"And because it gives you a reason to come around," I pointed out mildly.
"That too," Serafall agreed without a hint of offense. She regarded me for a moment before letting out a soft sigh. "I suppose I should teach you," she mused aloud. "Can you at least manifest your wings?" she asked me curiously.
"I can," I admitted after a brief moment. I'd been experimenting a lot, and not in sexual way that a few of my more gossipy classmates were. I drew my attention inward and focused on a section of the middle of my upper back. There, between the shoulder blades was a bundle of what you could almost consider to be nerves. They weren't natural in origin, and I'd only really begun to notice them a few days after everything had settled down.
There was no physical key to activating them. Originally, no matter how much I shrugged my shoulders or flapped my arms, they had remained inert. I had been too proud to ask anyone else how to do it, but eventually, through trial and a fair bit of error, I managed to manifest a pair of large bat-shaped wings that did absolutely nothing.
That had been the biggest let down since Ewoks.
With a small amount of effort I manifested the wings of darkness that all devils seemed to possess, and immediately the bundle of nerves at the middle of my back came to life, giving me a sudden awareness of the new appendages.
"Good!" Serafall nodded in approval with a smile. "Now, fly!" she insisted, throwing her hands up dramatically.
"If it was that easy I wouldn't have to ask," I told her patiently, smiling despite myself. "How do you do it?" I asked her, gesturing behind her. "You don't have your wings out, but you still did it," I observed.
Serafall's face scrunched up in frustration. "You just…do it," she said firmly.
It occurred to me that she might not have even known how to explain how she did it. I hadn't ever found the courage to ask, but I had begun to suspect that Serafall was a lot older than she looked. Old enough that she'd gotten how she'd learned all the basic stuff and did it on instinct, which meant he wouldn't get any good answers out of her.
Serafall sighed and folded her arms across her chest, her newly 'fashioned' magical rod in her hand. She looked to be deep in thought. "You uhm… kinda…" she trailed off slowly before lifting a hand up to her lips and biting down on a finger.
I decided to help her out. "I've tried pushing my demonic power through them," I told her. "I tried imagining them helping me fly," my face scrunched up. "I tried jumping up into the air and even off a roof top…that didn't work as well as I had expected it to," I admitted awkwardly, reaching up to run my hand over the faint layer of stubble that I had managed to amass since the start of the day.
Serafall's eyes widened and a sudden hit of inspiration seemed to take her. "That's it!" she exclaimed, grinning at me, her arms flailing about briefly. "That's how you fly!"
"What? Jumping off buildings?"
Serafall's enthusiasm died down and she gave me the oddest look, as if she thought that I had hit my head during my brief attempt at mimicking a kids attempt at being superman.
"No, you dummy," Serafall chided me lightly, her lips blossoming into a bright smile "You've got to dodge!"
"Dodge," I repeated slowly, unsure if there was an error in translation or not. "I'm not sure I follow," I admitted to her.
Serafall gave a faint huff and pursed her lips, looking like she was having trouble verbalising what she wanted to explain to me. "You have to dodge," she repeated.
"What? The ground?" I asked dryly, unable to comprehend was what she was asking me to do.
"No, that would be silly," she chided me lightly. "You have to dodge the planet."
It took a few seconds of silence and a look of expectation on her features before it dawned on me that she was being completely and utterly serious.
"Of course," I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm. "That makes perfect sense. The secret to flying is to dodge the entire planet. Why had I never thought of that before? Boy do I feel stupid."
Serafall beamed at me happily, apparently delighted that I understood what she had been trying to explain to me.
I met that look with a bland one of my own and watched as it slowly dawned in those blue eyes of hers, that I was in fact, being completely facetious, and that I did not believe her for a second.
"You're being sarcastic!" Serafall gasped, as if accusing me of witchcraft, disbelief in her eyes at the sheer nerve I had for wielding the forbidden art of sarcasm against her.
I gave her an offended look and brought a hand to my chest, touching upon it as if I had been shocked and offended myself. "How could you even think for one second that I wasn't?"
Her eyes widened, suddenly taken aback by the tone of my response. "I'm sorry Harry," she said to me instantly, looking genuinely apologetic. It lasted a moment before she blinked and she played back my words. "…Hey wait a minute!"
I couldn't help but burst out into a bout of shoulder shaking laughter at the sheer outrage that appeared on her lovely features. My laughter was furthered by her suddenly stomping her foot against the crumbled remains of the ground beneath us, her foot sinking in by inches each time.
"That's not fair!" Serafall protested heatedly and made a sound akin to a growl before she stomped her foot one final time. The world shook around me as her foot impacted the loose dirty beneath her and if I hadn't been sitting, I imagine I would have fallen over as we suddenly found ourselves inside a sudden depression in the earth as the force of her stomp flattened the earth beneath us.
The few wooden support poles that had remained standing suddenly found themselves toppling over at the sudden shift in the ground around us.
"Skull down!" Bob cried out from somewhere behind me, but I paid him no attention.
The first time I had ever met Sona, she had claimed that if her sister got too excited she could literally destroy Japan. For the first time ever, I found myself actually believing her. I could have replicated the feat, true. But it would have actually taken me a physical effort to do so. She'd done it with a slip of restraint and a stomp of the foot.
That sort of power was terrifying.
Serafall glared at me sullenly, her cheeks puffed out childishly. I found myself torn between staring at her in wide eyed shock and looking at crater we suddenly found ourselves inside. A shiver ran through me and I managed to put on a forced smile. "Not a fan of sarcasm I take it?"
Serafall let out a soft sigh and gave me an annoyed look, her hands coming to rest on her hips. "I don't get it," she admitted to me.
I gave her a pitying look.
Those who did not understand sarcasm were the victims of it.
"I can teach you," I told her as I stood up and dusted the dirt from my pants. I held out my hand to her with a smile. "I can educate you in the dark arts, for a price," I told her, my voice holding a grave undertone.
"Really?" Serafall asked suspiciously, her eyes narrowing slightly. "Can you?"
"We'll never know unless we try," I informed her, keeping my hand held out to her.
She looked at my hand contemplatively for a long time, before a resolute gleam entered her eye and she nodded. With her free hand she reached over and clasped mine. "I'll have you teach me everything you know!" She declared boastfully, before another grin slipped onto her lips. "But first, let's go to Sweden!" she exclaimed, thrusting the rod in her other hand up into the air with a cheer.
I let out a genuine laugh at her sudden enthusiasm and shook my head. "One second," I told her, and turned around, carefully making my way over to where Bob was, carefully scaling the slope that had appeared from Serafall's earlier stomp.
I found Bob in the dirt by the post where I had left him. He'd been knocked off by the mini-earthquake that had occurred from the 'excitement'.
"Help," Bob's voice came out muffled. He was face down in the dirt and grass. I crouched down and picked him up, turning the skull over in my hand and dusting off the dirt that had caked onto it. "This is unacceptable," Bob grumbled. "Dirt of all things," he protested. "I'm very valuable you know!" he sniffed in disdain. "I shouldn't have to put up with this sort of thing."
I rolled my eyes. "I feel for you Bob, I really do," I told him. "Dirt's just awful, isn't it?"
"Are you making fun of me?" Bob asked suspiciously, the pinpricks of light in his eye sockets flickering over my face, looking for signs of deception.
"No, of course not, why would I do that?" I said to him dryly.
"Because you're a snarky snarkface," Bob told me flatly. He paused for a moment and changed the subject. "That was fascinating," he told me. "Did you see what she did?" He paused again. "Well, even if you did, I doubt you understood it, you're far too uneducated," he informed me.
"For a second I thought you were going to say stupid."
"I was," Bob admitted. "But I wouldn't put it past you to drop me in the dirt again if I did."
"I'm not going to dignify that with a response," I told Bob, sniffing in disdain.
"That's because you'd be lying if you did," Bob informed me snootily.
"Oh, hey Bonehead," Serafall smiled as we got closer and she noticed the skull in hands. "Look, I have a new wand!" She exclaimed and poked the Skull with her new 'wand'.
"How cute," Bob said politely. "It really suits you, Miss Satan." I couldn't help but notice how respectful and dignified he sounded when he spoke to Serafall. It was an abrupt change from how he was when we spoke. I shook my head and smiled at Serafall. "Are we ready?"
She gave me a bright smile and nodded before once again lifting her new 'magic wand' into the air. "Let's go!" she exclaimed. Another magic circle erupted beneath us and within seconds it expanded out and swallowed us both.
There was another flash of blinding whiteness, and the next thing I knew, I found myself in the middle of a mountain range. The sung hung high up in the air above s. It looked to be around midday. It occurred to me that the last time Serafall had taken me for a trip around the world, I hadn't quite noticed the sudden shift in time.
However, going from the early evening to midday was a shock to the senses. My eyes stung for a brief moment and I had to squint. They slowly adjusted to the sudden day light and I found myself looking around.
There wasn't a single sign of civilisation as far as I could see. No roads, paths, signs or even tiny buildings in the far off distance. On the other hand, perhaps they were hiding behind the massive swaths of grey clouds that loomed in the distance, covering the view below the other mountain tops.
Despite it being midday, and the sun burning brightly above, it was cold. There was a strong, quick wind that carried over us that brought with it a chill that sank to the bone. It didn't seem to bother Serafall who was smiling happily and taking the time to look around as well. Unfortunately, I wasn't immune to the cold and found myself wrapping my arms around myself.
The mountain top we were on couldn't exactly be called green. There were far too many rocks, and they were all covered with a pale green moss. There were small bushes around us, dispersed and scattered, barely one every few yards. It reminded me of the long stretches of nothingness through Nevada that I had endured as a child following the hotel circuit that my father did across the country—except a lot more moss.
As I breathed in the cold mountain air, I noticed that it had a certain scent to it. It seemed fresh and it stung the nostrils, and yet at the same time there was a certain odor to it that carried on the wind.
It took a while to notice that there was something other than rocks and moss on the mountain top. A dozen yards away stood a single solitary tree. From where I was I estimated that it was just over twice as tall as I was and the trunk was maybe half again as thick as my calf muscles. There were some leaves at the top, but most of the trunk was barren except for a few outlying branches that protruded here and there.
I noticed after a few seconds of staring that the lowest branches were actually bent down and seemed to disappear in the brush around the base of the tree. It took me a few more seconds to realize that the brush around the base of the tree wasn't actually brush. Somehow, the lowest branches of the tree had actually grown down into the ground and around the bottom of the tree. I hadn't noticed at first because it seemed a lot greener than the leaves at the top.
It suddenly dawned on me. "This is the tree?" I blurted out. I looked to Serafall, disbelief evident in my eyes. "Are you kidding me?" I demanded to know.
She shrugged shoulder. "How should I know?" She asked looking as confused as I was. "I mean, it looks pretty old?" she said, peering at the singular tree as she began to walk toward it.
"Are you sure that we're in the right place?" I asked her, an eyebrow raising up but none the less following after her, watching my step as I made my way through the field of rocks and brush. It perplexed me how she seemed so nonchalant about walking through it. All she had on were some thigh-high socks and a pair of high-heels.
"Of course!" Serafall responded instantly, her eyes set on the tree. "That's the tree!" she insisted, pointing toward it. "The oldest spruce tree known to man!" she insisted.
"But it's so small," I uttered, eyeing the tree again. Compared to the massive Cherry blossom that she'd claimed for her own it was positively minuscule.
"It's not the size, Harry!" Serafall insisted, turning upon her heel and facing me with a grin. "It's how you use it!" She declared, thrusting her rod in my face and winking.
Bob burst out into laughter in my hands. "Yes Harry, it's not the size, it's how you use it! Wise words you need to hear, I'd imagine," he chortled.
I blinked slowly, my mind taking a moment to process. "I have no words," I told her, shaking my head. "Let's just get this over with," I said to her and thrust Bob's skull into her hands. "Here."
Serafall blinked and stared down at the skull that had been pushed into her hand. Bob stared back up at her. "Have fun you two," I told them before I trudged my way across the desolate mountain top.
As I walked closer I was careful to step over the rocks that were scattered around. It became even more difficult as I got closer and the thick layer of brush that surrounded the tree had to be navigated. It was almost impossible to cross. The branches were sharp and thorny and would tear apart my pants as well as the skin they protected. I had to circle the tree a few times before I finally noticed a small patch that I could step through that, while tearing my pants, wouldn't result in me needing stitches.
I stepped into it and held back a wince as the sharp branches dug into my legs painfully. I balanced myself and was careful not to stand on any of the branches that dug into the earth. I reached across and carefully pressed my hand against the tree. The bark felt brittle under my fingertips, like the faintest nudge would knock some of it loose. Unlike Serafall's tree, which was five times as wide as she was, it was easy for me to wrap my hand around the front half of the tree trunk and grip it tightly.
I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. I focused myself slowly and began to push away all the distractions. The chill in the air, the brightness of the sun, the air as it stung my nostrils and the stabbing pain of the branches digging into my shins. I blocked it all out and drew my attention inward. I found the source of the demonic energy within me and began to slowly draw upon it.
This was a gentle and slow act, there was no brute force involved. There was no slinging of fire, or thundering blasts of force. As I drew the aura out from within me, I slowly began to pour it through my outstretched arm and into the tree.
Or at least, I tried.
As the first of the energy passed into my hand that clutched the tree, I felt a resistance form that stopped the demonic power dead in its tracks. It was like trying to force play dough through a fly screen. I eased up on the amount of force I was exerting in my attempt to pour my energy into the trunk beneath my fingertips. I exhaled softly and began to slowly feed my aura into it, bit by bit.
It took a few moments, but I could feel the gentler, slower approach working and my aura began to flow through my arm and into it. It was a slow effort, but as the aura began to spread within the cell structure, I eased up the pressure and began to strengthen the amount I was exuding.
I wasn't certain how long it took, but eventually the demonic energy that I was forcing into the tree began to spread beyond the trunk, into the branches above and the root system below.
I slowly began to comprehend the exact shape of the tree as my aura flowed through it. It became an extension of my own self, something I was unable to control, yet very much aware of. As I felt more and more of the tree through my aura, I began to realize that the main body of the tree wasn't in fact that old. I couldn't put what I felt into words, but somehow I knew that the trunk of the tree was barely a few hundred years old.
A far cry from being one of the oldest in the world, and yet, as I began to look deeper and followed it into the earth beneath us, I came to realize that what laid beneath was significantly older and the further and further I followed along, the older and older the roots became. I found myself fascinated as what I felt became older and older.
What I felt and understood humbled me. There were branches on this tree that were older than me. The roots themselves were ancient and even before the human civilization was out of its diapers this tree had already been old. It had seen the rise and fall of civilizations from its lonely, solitary mountain top.
It had been born at end of the last ice age and it had been here for thousands of years.
As I felt more and more of the tree and began to delve deeper into what it was, I came to understand that it was alive. Not quite sentient, but there was a certain presence about it. Perhaps it was simply the age of it, but I found myself reluctant to do what Serafall had done.
Did I really have the right to claim something this old as my own? It had endured for almost ten thousand years and, if left alone, I knew that it would endure until the next ice age began.
It would be a lonely existence, but it was one worthy of praise.
As my aura fully synchronized with the ancient life before me, I came to another conclusion.
That type of life, even for something oblivious to it, wasn't something that could truly be praised. It was an empty existence, pointless and almost insignificant. It was dull and boring. Compared to what I would do with it if it became my focus, what we would experience and what I intended it was nothing.
I felt a thrum of resonance through the tree that caused my hand to tingle. An instinctual understanding hit me.
This tree wanted something more than simply to survive.
It wanted to live.
With my resolve strengthened, I focused my entire will upon the tree. I wasn't quite certain what Serafall had done when she had transformed the thousand year old cherry blossom tree. While she had told me to pay attention to what she was doing, I'd only been able to vaguely comprehend what she had done.
Had she forced it to change? Had she told it what she wanted it to do? Had she coerced it with threats of setting it on fire? I couldn't be certain. But, what I could be certain about, is that both the tree and I wanted the same thing.
I took a deep breath once more and slowly exhaled as I pictured in my mind the perfect focus—or at least tried to. For the life of me, I couldn't get a clear picture of what I wanted. I had thought over it for weeks, even before I had found myself in Japan I had been thinking about how I could make the perfect focus. I had imagined things from utterly plain wands to grandiose staves. None had ever felt quite right, and the tree before me was too different to any of them to reconcile.
After a while, I decided that the first step I needed to take wasn't picturing what it should become, but getting it ready. I began to fuse the energy that I had poured into the tree with each individual cell of the tree. With the branches, the twigs, the leaves, the roots, every single inch that I had come to understand.
I could see through my eyelids a faint white glow as my energy took hold of the tree and began to will the tree to turn in upon itself. The leaves were the first to begin to rescind. They slowly drew back into the twigs and branches until they vanished within the mass and then even the twigs and branches began to draw inward.
My energy took hold of the tree and encouraged the shift in size and nature and before too long even the top of the tree began to shrink down. It was fascinating to behold. It began to take on an almost ethereal quality beyond the glow that it gave as it slowly turned in upon itself and compacted tighter and tighter until it formed into a long smooth shaft.
Despite the features of the tree vanishing, it never quite lost the individual pieces. I could still feel them within the main structure of the shaft of light. Soon, all that remained were the lower branches and the roots that sunk deep into the mountain top. For some strange reason they had resisted being drawn up into the main body, and no matter how much I tried to encourage them, they remained stalwart.
A sudden moment of clarity hit me like a freight train as to why the base of the tree wasn't willing to draw up into the trunk.
The tree wasn't the trunk.
The tree was the roots. They were what had endured ten thousand years.
Realizing that, I focused harder and began to reduce the shaft of the tree downward and encourage it to merge into the roots. I felt as the shaft I grasped onto began to shrink and become smaller and smaller. It wasn't long before the thirteen feet of tree had shrunk and all that remained was what rested below my hand.
It was only once the majority of the trunk had been fed to them that the roots allowed themselves to be manipulated. Even then, I could not directly feed them into the base of my slowly forming staff. Instead, I encouraged them to draw up and wrap around the shaft, sinking into it and compressing along the base.
It took a while, but I felt the ground beneath my feet become unstable and weak as the roots drew back up out of the soil. My feet sunk down into the arid ground beneath them and I began to lose myself in the creation of my new focus. It wasn't until Serafall spoke up and called my name that I realized that I had finished.
"Harry, that's not a wand," Serafall said, her voice sullen, petulant and somehow distant.
I slowly opened my eyes, and found myself looking at what the tree had become.
Serafall was right. It hadn't become a wand.
My first impression, was that it was far too short and far too thick for how minuscule it was. Barely three feet in length from where I held it to where it touched the ground. I lifted it up to get a closer look, only to find resistance. With a frown I gave it a stronger tug and the ground around the base of the staff came apart as the rod drew up, and up, and up and with it my eyebrows.
The bottom half of it had apparently been buried in the ground. By the time I excavated the entire length it had come to a very respectable six feet tall. I couldn't help but grin.
Dirt clung to the bottom half of the staff. Beneath it the wood was a dark colour, more basalt than wood. I ran my fingers over the length of it and noticed that it had the rough texture of stone. Every foot or so there was an extruded band that tapered down along to the base.
Unlike Serafall's it wasn't ornate. There were really no truly outstanding features that you could take note of. It was something of utility, not beauty, and yet somehow I felt it was perfect. Whether it was because of how compatible I had been with the tree that it had been, or because I had made it an extension of myself, I couldn't quite tell, but it felt right to me.
A tiny finger prodded against my side and I found Serafall standing beside me, a pout upon her features. "Harry," she repeated. "It's not a wand. I wanted you to have a wand!" she insisted.
I gave her a small smile, my new focus grasped in my hand. "It's a very manly wand," I reassured her. "You wouldn't want me to have a girly wand, would you?" I asked her.
She hesitated a moment, her blue eyes flickering between the dirt covered staff in my hand and my face. "Well, no," she admitted reluctantly.
I couldn't help but laugh. "Then mission accomplished, wouldn't you say?" After a moment I turned my attention back to my staff and admired it. "Ten thousand years old," I told her, a hint of pride in my voice.
My masters eyes widened in shock. "Wow!" she exclaimed. "It's super ancient!" she leaned forward and peered at it in fascination.
I couldn't help but smile in amusement as she got closer and even reached to it, prodding it with a finger.
Her nose crinkled as she got a bit of dirt on her fingers and she shook her hand, flicking it off.
I felt an odd peace within myself as I stood there, sun overheat, the air freezing cold, and my new focus in my grasp.
"Say," I asked suddenly. "Could you take me home," I hesitated a moment. "Levia-tan?" I used her nickname with an encouraging smile.
She blinked and glanced up at me, her lips quirking into a pleased smile. "You want to go back already?" she teased me lightly. "But we're just getting started! Right Bonehead?"
"Right," Bob agreed without hesitation. "Anything you say Boss."
"Actually," I spoke up. "I meant my home back in America. I was hoping you could take me back for a bit."
—~—