I don't own Tales of Symphonia. I own Agorned, but not any other worlds I may mention. I also own: Nia, Stephen (or his corpse, anyway…that's just scary), Tyrio, Linori and Arcana. Cruxis, Magic, Mystik and Hazel are based on real people.
"We are from Agorned...the only destroyed world…"
I gaped at him. How come everything seemed to revolve around Agorned? Did he hate me for being there when his world became destroyed?
"I'm…"
"Sorry?" he interrupted. "For what? We know it was Stephen who destroyed our world – that was possibly why the curse also targeted him, fuelled by our collective anger…"
"I could have done…something…anything…about Agorned…" I said uncertainly – Linori showed no regret at Stephen's death, and I wondered vaguely why I was still talking to him.
"Why bother tracking me down?" Cruxis asked impatiently, small flares erupting from her nostrils. "You won't admit that you can change the curse, so…"
"We can try and help, but nothing will happen with the rest of my companions as they are at the moment. They still believe that Cruxis is completely evil, with no hope of change."
"I resent that!" Cruxis objected. "I have never once done an 'evil' deed in my life – apart from the few things that curse made me do! I may have done a few…grey deeds, but never completely black!"
"So that cult you started in Agorned?.." Linori asked sceptically.
"If you'd checked your history, you'd know that they only started trying to take over the world and killing people after I left!"
"And there's the organization in this world named after you…"
"Again, I had nothing to do with the ruling of the organization! Mithos only named it after me!"
"Joining the military in that weird world?"
"Well, that was- wait, what weird world?"
"I think it was called Amestris…"
"Oh, that was only to study alchemy and gain access to the library – I left before any wars started."
"Becoming a scientist for an evil super company?"
"Again, only to study different sciences in different worlds! Look, the point is, everyone tries to make me out worse than I am!"
"Okay, but you have to try and persuade my friends that – all of whom would probably kill you before letting you come anywhere near them – we all have awakened demons, and powerful ones at that…"
Cruxis gave a sigh. "What demons have you got, then?"
"I have the power to weaken a person's demon. My brother, Tyrio, can do the opposite – strengthen other people's demons. Magic and Mystik both have the power to perform spells and rituals by instinct rather than book learning – Magic uses objects to channel her power and Mystik uses words. Arcana can shapeshift into any form, animal, human or monster, and Hazel – you've already met her – can see the future."
"Hazel? The weird girl who found Raine?" I wondered. "That would explain how she knew my name…"
"I don't care what demons you and your friends have," Cruxis said flatly. "If you were amateur enough to believe you could create a flawless curse, then I can crush you all easily."
"I don't get it, though…" I complained. "Why would it be impossible?"
Linori shrugged. "We were always taught that it just was…"
"Humans are imperfect creatures, so anything created by a human will also be imperfect," Cruxis said bluntly.
I wasn't sure I liked this Cruxis who always knew the answers – it seemed every time she had to explain something that she was drawing on deep, painful experiences.
"One way or another, I need to see your 'friends', Linori," Cruxis said matter-of-factly.
"You couldn't take them all, especially not in your current form…" Linori explained, gesturing at her large, black, scaly body.
"She won't be alone," I promised. "Besides, didn't you say something about me being an elemental? I'm sure I could take a few of you. And if you and Hazel don't fight us – on the obvious condition that we won't seriously harm or kill anyone – then that's only four people…doesn't sound too difficult…"
"Well…" Linori said slowly.
"Isn't that why you came?" Yuan asked. "You and Hazel felt guilty, so you came to inform Cruxis of what was happening – it was the only thing you could do. And now there's another opportunity for you to help…so, what will you do?"
Linori sighed. "I'll tell Hazel. We won't fight you. And we're staying near Luin, in the forests."
Without a further word, he left, blending effortlessly into the forest.
Immediately, Kratos told me, "You aren't going to go just you and Cruxis. I know I can't talk you out of this…so I'm coming with you."
I gazed into his eyes – seeing the concern he had.
"We'll be fine…and I don't want to put you in danger because of me…"
"I can find danger perfectly well by myself. And I need to be there. At the very worst, I'll just…follow you on my own…" he gave a hint of a smile – we both knew it was the sort of thing Lloyd would say.
"Alright, then," I smiled. "Besides, how bad could these Agornedians be?"
A few hours later, we found out…
We had attempted to creep up on them, but somehow, they'd been forewarned – Cruxis had shouted something about a bird of prey, and I'd seen the eagle out of the corner of my eye, but hadn't seen the need for concern. However, it seemed that it was a spy of some sort for the group.
Now, chaos ruled the small clearing. One of the teenage girls had turned into a large, metallic spiky creature, which was currently trying to engage Kratos in a 'swordfight' – she was using large hooked claws to attack ruthlessly – yet I couldn't possibly give him a hand. I needed to protect us all from the relentless and powerful attacks thrown at us by Magic and Mystik. When I had a chance, I tried to render the tall boy useless, as he was making their spells and incantations all the more powerful.
Cruxis, despite being a large dragon was surprisingly agile and very powerful. Spell after spell left her, leaving deep, smoking trenches in the ground – yet the Agornedians seemed not to notice, and never got hit.
A tall teenage girl with black and blue hair was chanting incantations at a rapid pace, only for their effects to slam into my shield of air – but at this rate, either I'd tire, or they'd find a way to bypass the structure.
The last of the combatants attacked using the objects around her – the earth, the trees and leaves – by making hand gestures and signs.
"This is ridiculous!" I shouted. "How are we supposed to stop them from using their demons without knocking them unconscious or killing them?"
"You're regretting saying that you won't kill them, now, aren't you, Nia?" Cruxis asked, casting Eruption at the girls.
"Of course not! I'm just saying this is far more difficult than I thought!"
I sent a hurricane-powered blast of air at the boy, knocking him off his feet into a nearby oak tree. The girl with violet and black hair looked livid and the oak came to life to batter my shield with powerful, heavy branches.
"Brilliant!" I muttered to myself. "Had to be oak…oak's so difficult to set on fire, dammit! Why couldn't it be pine? Beech? But no, a huge, hundred year-old oak…"
"Stop complaining!" Cruxis retorted, casting a fire spell at the tree, leaving a scorch mark, but not setting it alight. " Oh, you are right – it is difficult to set on fire…"
"Who's the person with the fire demon here? Of course I'm right!"
I sent a massive blast of white-hot flame at the tree, letting the shield fall for a second. The flames enveloped the tree, finally causing it to burn. I quickly rebuilt the wall of air, ignoring the fatigue at the back of my mind. I had far more important things to worry about.
"Flames, become choked and douse yourselves," the blue and black hair girl ordered, and the tree put itself out.
I rolled my eyes. "That's what you'd call an 'oh shit' moment, isn't it?"
Cruxis ignored my remark. "Okay, Nia, listen very carefully to me. I would do this myself, but…I lack opposable thumbs right now, if no one had noticed…"
"What do you want me to do?"
"Find my bag, and get a pearl out of it."
"How the hell is that supposed to help?!"
In any case, I retrieved a shiny, opaque, white orb from her bag, which had been abandoned behind us at the beginning of the battle.
"Also, get out a few leaves of mistletoe and chamomile, and crush everything into a powder."
I followed these strange instructions, keeping the wall of air strong – the Agornedian's attacks had intensified since I began this.
"Using the powder, draw the rune of Frigga."
"The what of who?!"
"It looks like the letter 'p' if you drew it with only straight lines. Just do it!"
Carefully, I let one line of powder trickle out the form the spine of the 'p', and then two smaller, diagonal lines meeting to form the top.
"Last step, Nia. Go over the pattern with fire – scorch it into the ground."
My finger grew a blue flame that I used to touch over the rune quickly. Suddenly, the fighting just…stopped. The Agornedians still glared at us hatefully, yet they weren't fighting anymore.
"What did you do?" the girl with violet and black hair asked vehemently.
"The pearl releases anger, the mistletoe brings harmony and the chamomile calms and protects. When woven together under the rune of Frigga, which is a rune of harmony and trust, you can't help but stop fighting. And Nia sealing it with fire has two added affects. First, it's very difficult to remove, having been made by an elemental, and second, if she attacks you, the spell is forfeit."
I just stared. Cruxis had never…ever thought ahead this completely before.
The Agornedians glared at her with such hatred…it reminded me of the creature…and now it was easy to see that the curse was their creation.
"Let's start by being civil, shall we?" I asked, breaking up the tension in the atmosphere. "My name's Nia. I'm an elemental with power over fire and air, and I come from Reality."
A slight flicker of nervousness found its way into the Agornedians' expressions at the knowledge that I was an elemental, yet it was quickly suppressed.
Kratos followed my lead. "I'm Kratos, an inhabitant of this world."
"Jade Lucrecia Cruxis Silverwind – ex-Agornedian. I can summon any creature I wish…when I'm in human form, at least."
Now it was the Agornedian hunters' turn.
"Magic Swn-y-môr. Born in Agorned, on the wooded isle of Coeddu. My demon allows me to use magic though physical catalysts," the girl with black and violet hair spat, her violet eyes flashing dangerously.
"Mystik Swn-y-môr – Magic's twin. I can also use magic, though words," the girl with blue tips to her hair introduced, giving us all a searching look, as if evaluating us and assessing how much of a risk we were.
"Tyrio Terref," the boy said, taking a stance next to Magic, ready to protect her, despite our spell. "I can strengthen anyone's demon."
Finally, the metallic creature turned back into a teenage girl with blood-red crimson eyes and very dark brown hair. She turned her gaze upon all of us – I had the feeling she was trying to see who flinched at her eye colour, but no one did.
"I'm Arcana Minore," she chirped happily, bouncing up to take a closer look at the dragon-formed Cruxis. "So, our curse did that to you?"
Cruxis, somewhat taken aback by her strange behaviour, only just nodded.
"Oh, wow. Hey, guys, it wasn't supposed to do this, right?" she asked her companions loudly.
"No, Arcana," Magic said flatly.
"To think this happened by an accident…I'm gonna need to get to the bottom of this…"
"Arcana! We are not on their side!" Tyrio shouted. "Stop acting like it!"
"Aww…but I was just curious…" she whined, looking pitifully dejected.
"Stop complaining! Just be glad you've gotten to see the affects of the curse – if things had gone to plan, you wouldn't even have seen this far," Tyrio yelled, showing how annoyed he was with the hyper girl.
"So much for being civil…" I muttered. "Look, we don't want to fight with you."
"Because we'd win, obviously," Mystik pointed out.
"I doubt that," Kratos said bluntly.
"Says the one without an awakened demon!" Arcana scoffed.
"We didn't even have everyone here today! Hazel and Linori aren't here, so we don't have our full group!" Magic crowed, trying to win this newly started battle of words.
"Neither did we," I said offhand, thinking of everyone that had stayed behind at the Renegade base. "But, you don't even know where Linori and Hazel are – besides not being here – let alone why they weren't here to help."
"What?!"
Well, that shut them up…
"They didn't agree with the plan to curse Cruxis, did they?" I asked with a small smile.
"So…Linori would betray us?!" Tyrio snarled, angered. "I always knew he was a worthless wimp of a brother. If I ever get my hands on him…"
"Don't be rash. You may end up regretting those words," Kratos advised.
"I wouldn't have thought they'd do something like this, though…" Mystik said slowly.
"I did!" Arcana said, with no trace of remorse or hate in her voice or demeanour. "I overheard them talking about it, but they tried to cover it up when I came to speak to them."
Arcana truly was odd…
"Our original purpose was to ask for your aid in removing the curse," Kratos explained, when it was plain that no one else would.
"Forget it! One, if we even wanted to remove the curse, why should we help an evil person like Cruxis? And two, that curse is impossible to remove – or did the traitors skip that part?"
"I have had it with so called 'powerful' demon users who don't accept the first law of demonic powers as absolute!" Cruxis shouted in frustration. "I bet even Nia could remember it better than these idiots!"
"Excuse me? 'Even Nia'?" I asked, glaring at my friend.
"Sorry, I just meant that you haven't been trained and have only heard the law once before…"
I sighed, but decided to let it go…for now…
"Anyway, Cruxis isn't evil," I insisted.
"Well, we don't feel like helping anyway," Magic argued childishly.
"I'd help you guys!" Arcana piped up, only to be ignored by the vast majority.
Arcana fell into a sulk, her eyes and ears becoming canine, so she could – quite literally – give everyone puppy-dog eyes.
"No!" Magic barked firmly – she wouldn't be swayed by something that simple.
A dark-furred wolf joined Magic's side, growling at Arcana with its hackles raised.
Arcana was seemingly unfazed by this, turning herself into a larger wolf and growling back. The wolf backed away – she'd never intended to attack Arcana, only scare her.
Arcana turned back into her human form. An eagle gave a loud cry, before swooping down to perch on Arcana's outstretched arm. She tickled the soft feathers underneath his beak while he spoke to her. Naturally, I could understand, seeing as he was a bird, but it surprised me that Arcana could also understand him.
"Linori told Bandit to tell me, to tell you that him and Hazel are nearby. They can hear the whole conversation. Hazel says that there's no point in this, as in the end, all of us Agornedians will be divided by this, and end up staying in their base until we make up our minds."
At this point, the eagle turned to me. "She also said that you can understand me. Greetings. My name is Dashita."
"Nice to meet you. I'm Nia."
I was used to getting strange looks for talking to birds – I shrugged this one off pretty easily.
"Magic? Would you consider keeping an open mind about Cruxis for a couple of days?" Kratos asked – ever the diplomat.
Tyrio whispered something in her ear, which to my hearing sounded like: "We don't have to make a decision now – if we want to help after a few days, we can…"
A jet-black lynx purred his agreement beside them.
"After everything…we've spent years hunting her down, and now, when we've finally got her…"
"I know it sounds stupid, Magic, but we can just take a couple of days to think about it," he whispered.
"Also, if we agree to consider it, they'd be in our debt. At the very least, they'd have to offer us a place to stay for the night, and a meal…" Mystik seemed to think like a traveller, and I wondered how long they'd been travelling for.
I blinked – so far, Hazel's prediction had been spot on. Yet, why was I so surprised by this? I knew she had a demon of prophesy…maybe I was just prejudiced against it by the popular opinion of fortunetellers in Reality…
"Of course we would offer you a place to stay…" Cruxis said, pretending she hadn't overheard the whole exchange. "There's plenty of room at the Renegade Base, after all…"
And this was how we came to share the base with six Agornedians as well as: one wolf, one lynx, a bat, a ferret, an eagle and a snake…
People, heed my warning! Do not write two long-term stories at the same time! (Saralli Caira High and Regeneration) And don't set yourself stupid targets like trying to update them both within the week! The problem is (as Magic and Jade in real-life can fully appreciate) that I want to finish Regeneration before a certain point in Saralli Caira High (otherwise, it's spoiler-ific!)
Anyway, I'm really glad I've got this up so quickly! Please review!