…A New Mission…
"Aurdel, could you explain to me what you're doing with a scarf and a chunk of manatite? I personally can't see how the two would be related," Megumin asked him as he worked, sewing patterns and small stones into a long, red scarf he'd made.
"Well, have you ever considered as to how mana from manatite is transferred to the user from the rock to be used in a spell?
"No, not necessarily."
"...You really should since you're supposed to be an Archwizard but that's besides the point. I decided to see for myself if there was anything that might do it, I found this." He brought over the hunk of manatite, placing it on a crude microscope he'd managed to build. "Take a look."
He gestured to the microscope, "I don't get it."
"You have to put your eyes up to the lens of it to see," he tapped the top of the microscope.
Megumin put her eye up to the lens, "I see patterns of crystals in the manatite… but what are they supposed to mean?"
"They don't mean anything, at least not that I know of, but they do have a specific use. Those patterns act as channels for the flow of mana. That leads us back to this," he put one hand on the scarf and lifted it up. "What I did, with the help of Wiz, was chip off some of the manatite and reconstruct those same crystalline structures in a more refined form. Then after that I sewed them into the scarf."
He threw the scarf around his neck, then took the end of it and threaded it into a hole in an almost completely sealed box on his hip. Once it was in, he had it tied down. "What's that?"
"This is essentially a mana battery. For some reason high quality alcohol in this world is able to hold mana in it once transferred, so that's what I did."
"Ah, so that's why Aqua was crying on the couch."
"Couch? She was on the floor."
"Darkness took her spot on the floor and gave Aqua the couch, she said it was more exciting to lay on the cold floor. "
"That… sounds about right. Anyways, I also took the mana from her and transferred it into this battery."
"...I think I would understand this more if I knew what a battery was."
"Eh, it's an object that stores power. The ones we typically used in my world are electric, but this is all besides the point. Essentially this allows the user to freely carry around a spare pool of mana, one also capable of amplifying the spells they use."
"Does that mean I can test it with Explosion?" She raised her staff.
"Absolutely not, if we manage to get caught in the blast we'll be blown to smithereens by both it and the battery rupturing. So since a deadly friendly fire accident is the last thing I want, I'll just test something that won't kill someone on someone that doesn't matter too much."
He cleared his throat, "Hey Aqua! I'm sorry about taking your wine and mana, you can have it back!" The moment he finished that sentence there was a stampede of footsteps down the hall from a few rooms over, he stood beside the doorway and aimed his right hand directly at it.
Aqua came charging in, "Finally, you've come to-!"
"Wind Breath!" The stones on the scarf shone a bright red, then, as expected, a gust of wind blew from Aurdel's hand. However this gust of wind was much more powerful than the standard spell and sent Aqua flying off into a wall, her head spinning dizzily once she'd actually landed.
"Yes, it does work as I thought it would. I don't know how much more powerful it is than the standard spells, but it's safe to say it's by a multitude."
"I don't understand how you're able to think of these things, what normal adventurer would look at a bunch of rocks and decide to make a magic powering scarf?"
"If you haven't been able to tell by now, I'm not a normal adventurer. I hadn't survived for forty one years just by plain luck Megumin, there's reasons behind it. Because while your world here might be dangerous, where I'm from is much more so."
"Because where I'm from battles were fought day to day for the survival of humanity. And in those battles you had to think on your feet and use everything you could to your advantage, or the only thing you'd accomplish is being placed on a casualty list." He sighed, "Though of course I did get added to one because I died because of my injuries on Reach, but that's another story entirely."
There was an awkward silence, "So are we going on a quest or not?"
"Today? No, it's far too late to go on one. Besides, I still have to help Wiz and Luna with all of the damage reports and paperwork after what you did."
"I swear that I saw a baby dragon inside the city! You can ask Aqua and Darkness, they saw it too!"
"You're just lucky we won't get taken to court over this. I don't want to imagine the legal cost of trying to defend acts of terrorism."
"Another dungeon?" He looked at the paper Luna handed over to him.
"I'm afraid so Aurdel, but this time it's actually necessary that you take this quest," she looked pensive after giving it to him. "This quest is far too dangerous for any other party to take, the first party that tried to complete this quest was completely wiped out. After that the other adventurers in the guild recommended that you take it."
Perhaps it hadn't been right for him to show off the other day, it'd leave him in situations like this. The dungeon in question hadn't been named yet as it was newly discovered, located in an area of barren wasteland between Axel and some other city called Alcanretia. But the main reason for it being so dangerous was the enemy encountered, a Vampire. Here, Vampires were one of the top levels of undead, almost nearing the power of a Lich, and as such were extremely deadly. Nearly all of those who'd discovered the dungeon were killed by this vampire, the only survivor had escaped with serious injuries and was saved by a passing caravan.
But if it was such a big threat, and if he was supposedly the only one possible of stopping it, then he had no choice except to accept the quest. "I don't think you should have too much trouble fighting that Vampire. You're strong and you have that Archpriest that purified Beldia. But please…" She lowered her head and spoke quietly, "...Don't die."
Aurdel left the guild and went back to the mansion where everyone was having dinner. Aqua was drinking, Megumin and Yunyun were 'dueling' and Darkness sat there wishing she could be abused in the same way. They all looked up at him, "Oh, Aurdel. You're back early. Did something happen?"
"We have a quest for tomorrow," he explained everything.
Aqua put down the glass full of wine, "If that place is close to Alcanretia, we should go there once we're done with the quest! The city has a bunch of great hot springs." Going to a hot spring sounded nice. Unfortunately for him he still couldn't take off his armor, so it didn't matter very much to him.
"I-Isn't that city home to that crazy Axis cult?" Yunyun asked, she was still grappling with Megumin.
"It is, but I think it might be worth it just for the hot springs," Megumin said.
"Hey! Why are you saying such mean things about my followers?! They're all very good children!" Aqua immediately went to pouting defensively.
"The Crimson Demon Village is also along that way, we could head there after we're done with our time in Alcanretia."
"I'd rather we go one step at a time. We'll do this quest and go to Alcanretia, then some other time we can visit your village."
He folded his arms, "Either way we're getting up early tomorrow, I need to arrange for a carriage to actually take us to where we need to go. So finish your dinner and go to bed, and I don't want to hear any complaining about it. I've already told Wiz of our plans to leave so she'll be watching over the house while we're gone so don't leave any big messes for her to clean up. Especially you," he pointed to Aqua.
"Me?! Why me?!"
"Have you seen your own room? It looks like a pig sty in there. Clean it up before we leave or else I'm torching everything in your room."
"Don't you dare!"
...On The Road...
"I thought I told you all to wake up early?!" He was annoyed with his party. Everyone, except for Yunyun, hadn't listened to him and slept in.
"What's the big issue? Can't we sleep in?"
"No, because we're going to miss our ride if we don't leave right now!" He rushed them away from home and to a caravan, just outside of Axel. There were several sets of horses with carriages saddled to them, each one filled with people travelling.
Except for one, theirs. "I rented us a carriage, unfortunately someone already paid for one of the seats and put their pet in our carriage. That means we'll have to change up the way we're sitting," he climbed in and sat down. "Unfortunately I'm too heavy to sit on the back as it'd throw the carriage off balance and cause it to tip over, so one of you will have to sit on the back." The four women of his party looked at each other, considering their options.
Then he saw Megumin with a devious smile, she started walking over to the carriage. "Megumin, what are you doing? We haven't decided who is going to sit on the back yet," Darkness ask confusedly.
"I have my own idea," she climbed up into the carriage and, unexpectedly, sat down on his lap. The others were speechless, Yunyun specifically let out a sound of shock and awe.
"M-Megumin?! W-what are you doing?!"
"Taking a seat, what else?" She seemed smug.
"B-but-! Y-you can't just-!" Yunyun stumbled over her words in a panic.
"There's nothing wrong with this, I've already slept with Aurdel before."
"WHA-?!"
"I didn't sleep with you, you fell asleep in my arms. There's a big difference."
"Aurdel, I can't believe it! You're a lolicon!" Aqua shouted.
"What in God's name is a lolicon?"
"Who are you calling a loli?!" Megumin raised her voice and shouted back at Aqua.
"Can you folks quiet it down there and get in the carriage? You're holding up the caravan, so if you don't we'll just have to leave you behind," the driver was beginning to get annoyed with them so it was best to just get it over with. They all climbed in and sat down. Aurdel could tell the air was awkward after Megumin had done. Aqua looked disgusted, Darkness intrigued and Yunyun was completely red and had her face turned away from him. Things never seemed to be normal with them.
People waved as they passed by and left the outer limits of Axel, watching it fade into the distance as they went down the road. He decided to take another look at the paper for the quest. "It says here that the first party that tried to take this quest was moderately high leveled, and that they also prepared a good lot beforehand. Any reason you guys can think of why they might have failed?"
"It's obviously because they didn't have a Goddess like me around to protect them."
"Let me rephrase that, good reasons."
"But that is a good reason!"
"W-well, older Vampires are typically supposed to have stronger magic. That c-could've been it." Yunyun answered him, but was clearly still uncomfortable.
"Well you don't need to worry about magic, not when you have a wielder of the strongest magic there is!"
"M-Megumin, we're going into a dungeon. You can't use Explosion."
"How dare you tell me when I can and can't use Explosion!" He held her back from attacking Yunyun, who shielded herself.
"Why can't you just learn some new magic?! You'd be so much more useful if you did!"
"Let me go Aurdel! I want to show her who's more useful!" She thrashed around trying to break his grip on her, but that wasn't possible so eventually she gave up. Really these to needed to get along better.
He turned his head to look out the window, staring off into the distance. For a while it was homes, farms and grassland. But after hours passed the scenery eventually turned into the badlands that they were expecting. And as expected of a badlands, Aurdel saw nothing. He was about to turn his head back after staring for so long when caught something off in the corner of his eye. "Hmm?" He moved a little, shifting himself to get a better look out the window.
At the same time he ended up waking up Megumin who'd fallen asleep, "Hey, what's the big idea?"
"I don't know, that's why I'm trying to find out." He leaned forward, closer to the window. "That's a dust cloud, off in the distance, but it doesn't look like one from a dust storm…"
Aurdel turned back to the driver, "There's a dust cloud off in the distance, any chance you know what it might be?"
"A dust cloud? Well… It could be a pack of lizard runners, they've started running for mates recently. But I think it's probably just a Sandwhale kicking up sand, so it's nothing to worry about. There are also Running Hawk Kites, but I don't think there's anything hard enough for them to run at in this caravan."
"Hard enough to run at?"
"Yes sir, when mating season starts Running Hawk Kites run at the hardest things they can find to get the attention of females in a chicken race like mating ritual. At the last second they turn away, before they hit the object. But don't be mistaken because all of them can be quite dangerous monsters. If anything though they'll probably charge into a rock."
Hardest thing… He looked down. Well, it was probably safe to say that titanium was an extremely hard material. One of the hardest, in fact, since it was both used in his armor and the armor plating of the UNSC's ships. "How fast can Running Hawk Kites run?"
"Well, about as fast as these horses. Why do you ask? It's not as if we'll have to outrun them. I don't think we could in the desert anyways, it would just put too much strain on our horses."
"Then can we stop the caravan? Because they're coming straight for us."
"Straight for us?" The driver looked over his shoulder, "They do seem to be coming this way… For this carriage in fact." There was some worry in his voice, but he kept himself collected.
Aurdel looked back and Darkness was practically in his face, "Aurdel! There's a horde of monsters charging at us, and I think they're coming straight for me!"
"No they're not, they're going for me. You might think your armor is hard but mine is harder by leagues, so don't get ahead of yourself." She fell backwards, probably missing most of what he said and instead imagining what it would be like to be attacked by a herd of Running Hawk Kites.
"Alright guys, we're up." He leapt out of the carriage with the others, "We're going to need to herd them up if we want to take them out. Yunyun, do you have any spells that can group them up?"
"I have Bottomless Swamp, but we would need a way to actually lure them into it. Once they fall in they're stuck in it."
"I could jump into it, I don't know if I'd be able to get out though."
Aqua lazily leaned out of the carriage, "What are you guys doing?"
"Aqua, do you have a skill that can attract monsters so you can finally be useful?"
"Of course I do! And what do you mean finally be useful?! Here, I'll show you how useful I am right now! Force Fire!" A flare like object shot into the air from her hand, expanding into a bright light far above.
He saw the Running Hawk Kite Runners physically stop, turn to look in her direction instead of his and begin to charge again. "You moron!"
"How am I a moron?! I did what you told me to do!"
"I didn't ask you to do anything!" He ran back to the carriage and pulled out a spool of rope, "Really, think before you act!" Then he ran back to Aqua and tied the rope around her waist, "Yunyun, Megumin! Get your magic ready!"
"We got it!"
"Hey! What are you doing?!" He kicked Aqua's feet out from under her and held her in his arms, then began to run. Megumin and Yunyun ran after him.
"Put me down you damn lolicon!" She hit his helmet, as if it would do anything more than hurt her hand.
"Words that I don't know the meaning of mean nothing to me."
"Then I'll tell you what it is! You're a-!"
"Bottomless Swamp!" Yunyun cast her spell onto the barren ground and a massive purple hole opened up in front of him.
"You can tell me later," he began to swing her around.
"WAIT WHAT ARE YOU-?!" She was cut off by her own swinging as he let go and sent her flying, landing face first in the whatever goo filled that 'swamp.'
"She can't drown in water, so hopefully she'll be able to survive that." Her legs kicked around in the air as she struggled, trying to get out of the swamp. He made sure to hold on tight to the rope so she wouldn't sink any further into it. The Running Hawk Kites continued to charge forward towards Aqua and eventually into the hole. It took a few moments, but eventually the whole pack had fallen into it. Most had fully sunken and couldn't be seen but quite a few still remained at the top and he didn't want to risk any escaping and attacking them again. He yanked hard on the rope and Aqua came flying out of the pit and landed on the ground still covered in that purple goo. Now, since she wasn't muffled, she sobbed aloud.
"Alright Megumin, your turn!"
"Gladly!" They all made sure to run a distance away before she fired off her magic, they wouldn't want to be caught in the blast it made. "Explosion!" Then she did. The entire badlands area around them shook viciously and the swamp was enveloped in the blast, then it settled and neither the swamp nor all the Running Hawk Kites in it could be seen. "Ah, I think that's the second most amount of monsters I've hit with Explosion before." She collapsed, "That felt good."
"I think you take too much pleasure in your magic and in killing things with it."
"What's wrong with being enthusiastic about my craft?"
"There's enthusiastic, and then there's sadistic." He picked her up and brought her back to the carriage. "Alright driver, let's get going again."
They'd driven for only a few more hours before they stopped again, this time to rest for the night. The wagons were all set up in a circle on the road with all the sleeping travelers on the inside. A light fog had also begun to descend upon the area, something he found odd for a desert. His eyes were shut and he was beginning to fall asleep when he felt someone tapping on his armor. "Um, Aurdel, are you still awake?"
He sat up, "I'm still awake Yunyun, is something wrong?"
"No it's just… I wanted to ask you something," she tapped her fingers together nervously and glanced around. "What did you really do with Megumin?"
"Oh, you're still thinking about that. It was nowhere near what Megumin make it sound like," he shook his head. "It was the first night that we were at the mansion and there were still spirits around, Megumin wasn't comfortable going to sleep. So she sat in my lap and I made sure she felt safe, then I helped her fall asleep."
"Ah… I see." She looked a lot more relieved now, but still a little nervous.
"Was there something else you wanted to ask me about?"
"Well, yes, now that you mention it…" Her voice was barely above a soft whisper, "Can… can you do the same for me?"
"Sure, I have no problem with it. Do you mind if I ask why though? I know that you're a lot kinder than Megumin, but I didn't know you'd ask for it." He took off his helmet and motioned for her to sit down, she did.
"If there's something that Megumin has done, I want to make sure that I've done it to," she seemed a little bit hesitant giving her answer."
He mulled it all over in his mind, "You know for being a rival, you don't seem to hold any ill will against her." He began to stroke her hair carefully.
"I-I do, It's just that y-you haven't seen it," that answer was full of nervousness."
"It seems more to me like you want to be her friend, but that you don't know how to approach her and actually ask."
"I-I don't want to be her friend, she's my rival. I can't be friends with my rival." Again, more hesitation.
"You don't have to spill everything to me, but you do have to be honest with yourself and with what you want. And please relax a little, you look like you're as stiff as a rock."
"S-sorry, I'm just… nervous."
"Just relax, you don't have to worry about anything."
He looked up towards the night sky, staring at the stars. "Look to the sky and watch far above, watch for the angels that fly with the grace of a dove. And when you do then you will see they are none other than you and me. Because there is no other better way to be, to be here and now with my family." He sang those words, and he could tell that she was much more relaxed. But those last few words stung him. He kept singing though, "Because family should be together, there is no way to replace one another. Now quietly close your eyes and rest your head, let your mind wander as you drift off to bed. So that when you wake tomorrow all will be as should be, together. You, and me."
He looked down, by the time he'd finished she'd already fallen asleep. She slept like an angel, snoring softly. He gave a pained smile to himself, this only reminded him of how much he missed them. He moved carefully to make sure he didn't wake her, taking her off of his lap and laying her down onto the bedroll he'd been sitting on. After that he looked around, there was a pair of Crimson Eyes looking out at him from the dark. "I presume you were listening in the whole time?"
"I was," Megumin stayed laying down. He could clearly see that she was a little upset, "Why'd you do that for her."
"Because she wanted me to do it for her. Is there some valid reason that you can give me for why I shouldn't have?"
"Of course I have one, but I'm not going to tell you. At least not yet. Anyways, I'll only forgive you if you do it for me too."
He sighed, "I don't have any issues doing it, but would it kill you to be a little nicer to her? She doesn't-" He stopped dead in his tracks, he squinted his eyes and looked behind her."
"She doesn't what?" He raised his hands for a moment, he needed her to be quiet. "Don't tell me to be quiet, you didn't finish your-"
Aurdel quickly grabbed his sword and through it, blade forward, just above Megumin. "What was that for?!"
"Because you didn't see the undead that was just about to attack you." Megumin looked up and behind her, the undead monster fell to the dirt beside her and she scrambled back. "Go wake everyone up, I'll fight them for now." He walked up and picked back up his sword, making sure to stomp the undead's head, while Megumin ran off to wake up the rest of their party and all of the adventurer guards that came with the caravan.
The fog that was light before came to be much heavier now, it felt as if it were descending upon the caravan itself rather than just the area itself. He cut through undead creatures as they appeared, making sure that they stayed dead by destroying their bodies. A dozen of them had fallen by his blade when something suddenly happened, one of the carriages exploded! Bits of wood, metal and cloth flew everywhere and everyone who wasn't already awake was stirred awake. "What's going on?!" Someone shouted.
He took a closer look at the shattered carriage, "Jesus Christ." Blood and flesh was splattered, bones strewn about. What little could be made out was the faces of the group that'd been sleeping next to it.
"No, not quite," a voice said. It was a man's voice, one with a silky quality and that of having a silver tongue. He looked for its origin and saw someone standing atop one of the other carriages, they looked to be holding someone. Aurdel drew his sword towards them. "Your group does look strong, so I won't fight you here. No, it would be much better to fight you in my own home. So come if you dare. If not, I'll just kill you all." The voice threw the body down, it was completely pale and drained of blood. They'd found their vampire.
One of the other adventurers prepared to throw a torch of the caravan, so they could all get a clear view of his face. But the moment that they did the figure completely disappeared without a trace. "What the-?!" One shouted, the man that had thrown the torch lay dead on the ground.
"I can see why the other party was wiped out now," Aurdel said grimly.
"A-Aurdel, what do we do?" Megumin asked, quivering. She wasn't the only one among his party that was afraid.
He looked off into the distance, where the fog was the thickest. A blue light shone. "The only thing we can do. Kill a vampire."