Three… was really sleepy…
This whole tournament – wasn't it just a big waste of time?
Ah… There were so many better things to be doing…
A stray lock of hair fell into her face as she stood in her usual overblown slouch. An empty hand came to brush it back.
Better things; like cutting her hair. That was fun. But this stupid tournament… she'd had to put her scissors away.
So many things she did for One. So many things One wouldn't let her do. Once upon a time, Three had, just a little, hated her for that.
So stupid.
The Three of the past was such a fool.
How many questions had One answered? How many more could she still?
It didn't matter – not really. Three always had more questions. But now, she had more answers too. And how many things had she learned from those same restrictions?
So many questions she hadn't even thought to ask. Like a little frog, happy and ignorant in its well. One had shown her the truth. Indulging in her hobbies so mindlessly – all she'd done was blind herself to so many wonderful things.
It was irritating that she had to keep things quiet, that she couldn't share her results with anyone.
But when had it ever been about anyone else?
They were her questions – and her answers. Well, she'd share with her sisters if they asked nicely. Besides. It wasn't like One never let her indulge.
That first doll – the one that had opened her eyes to how fun they could be. That cheap knock-off dark lord they'd killed so long ago. The one who'd fancied himself an artist.
One had let her keep it. Not at first – she still hadn't understood back then. But Three had hidden it. And now, all these months later – One had found it again. She'd expected it to be destroyed, her mind filled with wild ideas of turning her back on her older sister.
One had just told her to keep it hidden. Even taught her tricks to do it.
And when her sister had taught them to control their power, to anchor it using an object, the more significant the better – well, it was only natural she'd picked that very first doll.
That doll stitched from the skin and bone and hair of those poor, poor tortured children.
It was so pretty. And even if One didn't agree, Three was so very glad she understood.
Two was noisy, but she was right.
It really was best if sisters got along.
And to think, she'd even get to see Zero. Their memories were false, but a set of false memories completely inconsistent with reality would be pointless – far too easily discovered – so naturally some of the things they remembered about their fake pasts would have to be real. And, of course, something as important as Zero's personality would have to be at least reconcilable with their actual perception of her – so basing her expectations for her first real meeting with her oldest sister on those memories was, more than reasonable, even rather intelligent.
... And besides. Even if they'd never truly interacted, how many people had Zero killed?
If One could understand, there was no way Zero wouldn't.
So, even if this tournament was so boring she could die, it wasn't worthless. Three was, to be honest, even a little eager – beneath the drowsiness and boredom. Soon, it would be time to truly meet the first Utautai.
"Have you even been listening?" Viktor asked, half exasperated, half snappish.
Three took a moment to muster the effort to raise her head.
"Did… you say something?"
He let out an aggrieved sigh.
"The announcers are finished. Whenever you decide to pull your head from the sky, we can begin."
Three blinked slowly. Once, then twice.
"… Oh. Then; go whenever."
Her head sagged back down, as though the strain placed on her neck from simply looking forward was some great burden.
It wasn't really. There just wasn't anything worth examining. She was… just saving energy. For when something interesting happened.
Viktor Krum's aggravation passed over to outright hostility.
His brow furrowed angrily, "Do you know what I think? I believe you are not as strong as you pretend. Those creatures… the one before you fought for a time before summoning them. Why bother if they will end the duel?"
His smile was one of grim triumph.
"She fought because it was necessary. Some requirement for your magics. No power so great is freely called, or everyone would be titans."
Three's eyes peaked from a curtain of hair.
"Is… that what you think?"
Her lips quirked. Monkshood fell from Three's sleeve.
A quiet giggle was loosed. For a moment, it seemed as though Three had simply stopped responding. But, as seconds passed, her mirth grew in volume.
One was, of course, the first to notice.
"Begin."
Viktor wasted no time. He had no intention of making the same mistakes that had cost Cedric. Passing an angel was impossible, or very near so. He would instead pass Three; and he had no intention of starting of with mere stunners.
If this girl was as strong as the last, or even a quarter as strong, then she would survive without issue.
He quickly began the wand motions for a Bombarda, falling into a pattern he'd practiced extensively for this day. In the end, it took him less than a second between the start of the round, and the casting of a spell that would obliterate a human.
It was too slow.
If he had began a heartbeat after One had started the match, then Three had began at the very same instance.
Her quiet, joyful giggling turning into full fledged laughter – loud and bright.
"Ah ha. Aha ha ha ha. Ha ha ha ha! HA HA HA!"
An explosion, clearly far superior in speed, and somewhat superior in power to what Cedric had released splashed completely uselessly against waves of purple light flying through the air with a noise that could only be described as tearing.
The laughter quickly took a tinge – no, a full blown descent into madness. Insanity seemed like the only answer to laughter so wholeheartedly joyful at seemingly nothing. Not to mention the sheer pressure that came with laughter capable of blowing a man off his feet.
It was striking – how different Two and Three's power felt. Just the minute difference of their noise of choice to conjure their strength, and instead of the impartial nature of Two's – that crushed without intent to do so – there was now Three's, which felt like a malicious, methodical, and surely mad entity had come to kill.
Well, that was how Three would describe the difference.
Humans would be too terrified to notice all the little details. Probably. No one but her sisters had heard Three sing and lived to speak of it. She'd have to make sure to get the details later. Plenty of subjects to interrogate… oh. She could've prepared other experiments involving group exposure to an Utautai's power.
Too late now. Such a waste. She'd just ask One later. It seemed like the sort of thing she'd know.
As for Viktor, there was little he could do but curse his luck, grit his teeth, and lower himself to the ground to prevent being blown away. Part of not repeating Cedric's mistakes meant not wasting his time trying to attack mid-summoning.
"Behold. The Third Song. Quickened Puppets of Antiquity," Three's voice, calm and rational, cried out – a terrifying contrast to the insane laughter that continued from the very same source.
Certainly he understood by now. Challenging an Utautai – how pointless.
"The raging demon's deathly gaze. The army of heretics who defy the natural cycle."
Maybe the things he said would be true for a human. But when had she ever been human?
"Render into ash the powers of reason and order."
Three's head, thrown back in her mad mirth, slammed back down to face her opponent. Her hair whipped forward as she met Viktor's eyes from where he worked some spell as he clung to the dirt.
She didn't really care about the frustration she saw.
But.
The hint of fear was nice.
"I, Three, summon thee in my name."
Maybe… she could make it bloom into terror.
"Armisael, invade."
… Yes, that was a good idea. It'd be… a benchmark. For how much the human mind could take before it cracked.
The same circle – still coated in an unreadable script – Two's angel had emerged from appeared once again, only this time a different set of creatures emerged.
Strange animals crawled forth from the ground, some porcelain like material serving as skin – joints and facial features glowing a harsh purple light.
The most striking part was the shape. Every single one was warped, with bulbous, oversized heads. Their limbs were just a hair too long to be possible, and their torsos seemed terribly small in comparison.
First two, then five, then ten, then dozens of different species rose one by one. Each an infantile parody that could only be described as grotesque.
"Go on… my dolls are here now… so play to your hearts content."
Armisael was… special. Unlike all the other angels, Armisael had once been human. And a unicorn. And a dog, and a cat, and a horse, and a monkey, and so many other things. All the things she'd made it.
You see, Armisael wasn't one thing. It was… a technique. To link many things through one. The knowledge to twist mortal flesh into an angel, and then bind it.
There was a "real" Armisael, of course, the humanoid angel so alike her very own doll. The focal point, and the inspiration. But why bother summoning it? It wasn't like she needed it to control only a dozen or so soldiers. Armisael was here. But 'Armisael' wasn't necessary.
She still had to sing though. Couldn't summon anything without singing. Couldn't control more five or six, either. Such a pain.
The other human dolls weren't needed either. Humans were such a rare subject. No point wasting them. Not here. Plus, humans always reacted so badly to them.
Well, it wasn't like she only had one human soldier. There were one or two people that One had let her turn – people so disgusting it had turned her older sister's stomach. That just killing hadn't quite satisfied.
Still too rare to waste. And besides – Armisael really was special. Unlike other angels, the creatures that made up Armisael already existed on Earth before they were angels.
"Shit!" Krum cursed, and released the spell he'd been preparing, as an amalgamated pack rushed him. The topsoil for several meters around Viktor was transmuted into some kind of oil. He chugged a potion as he simultaneously released a silent Incendio at the ground.
In other words, unlike the others' angels –
His side of the arena quickly became a hellscape.
"Just because I did not prepare for this, does not mean I did not prepare!" He shouted, just audible over the crackling of flame.
The nearest three of her dolls caught ablaze. Unconcerned, she ordered the rest to rush him. Whatever potion let him endure the fire seemed to let him endure smoke just as easily. But every fire needed to breath. And humans breathed the same thing fire did.
A dozen misshapen and aflame infant beasts charged him with reckless abandon. There was nothing he could do. Still, they died one by one, overtaken by a huge field of fire.
Piling up dead.
– her dolls wouldn't disappear back to where they came from.
Piling up corpses.
This was where they came from.
Krum drowned in a sea of fire and her dead soldiers.
Normally, she'd be so very upset by the loss of her dolls. But, even if you loved something, there would naturally be failures. Armisael wasn't designed for beasts, after all.
And, in the first place, Viktor Krum hadn't been worth sending more than failures.
Three stopped her song.
Come to think of it… why had she bothered with the full chant and song? For a dozen rejects, just a few lines would've been enough. The others couldn't partially invoke, but it was different for her and Armisael.
… had she been swept away with the atmosphere? Done it just to match her sisters?
Peer pressure was frightening.
In the end, amid an impressive chorus of screams from the audience, shocked at Krum's apparent burning (One had expected more stalwart nerves from a culture that allowed children to play Quidditch), One had eventually called the match.
A panicked Auror had tried to break the barrier, only succeeding in exhausting himself.
After the flames had died down, One, jumping from the competitor's booth and passing the horrified contestants and panting Auror alike, casually approached the towering mound of Armisael corpses. Obviously, she passed through the barrier with contemptuous ease.
The wizard looked more than a little frustrated at that.
With a gesture to Three, and a quick hum from the girl in question, the charred bodies of Armisael were banished.
Lying unconscious, having been dragged down to the ground and suffocated by bodies and flame, was an otherwise untouched Viktor Krum. Three had likely been unaware how long the potion would last, but One had seen it plain as day, and could clearly hear the amount drank. Even the very moment the fires died enough for him to breath again, the time until permanent damage occurred from oxygen deprivation, the amount of time it would take Three to banish Armisael and pull him free.
She'd heard, seen, tracked everything.
She hadn't called the match before the flames died down simply because it wasn't necessary.
Krum was quickly revived, and with that, the second match ended.
"Okay, how the bloody hell do you explain that song?!" Harry exclaimed.
His suspicion was warranted, One would grant that. Three's song was, barring only her own, the most clearly hostile. His odd talent for hearing the truth behind the words of the Utautai was something of an annoyance.
There was plenty to be suspicious of about the Utautai, and this only fueled his natural wariness. One herself had used these very clues to uncover the true nature of her kind.
If only he knew how right he was to be suspicious.
Still, obfuscation wasn't a difficult task. Lies of omission had proven to be an unfortunate staple of her chosen path.
"It is exactly as it seems. A curse, upon all those that would sacrifice in the name of necessity. Perhaps ironic considering her strategy. Or," she suggested, "perhaps not at all."
After all, Three hadn't sacrificed her lowest quality dolls because she'd been made to. She'd chosen to, having long since crafted many greater creations.
Aside from that particular bit of vagueness – which Viktor, baring no serious injuries but to his pride, seemed to see through, if the sour look on his face was any indication – there were technically no lies in her words.
Only purposefully overlooking the precise identities of the sacrifices. Well, in the end the part that would concern these children more is the identity of the ones on the receiving end of her sister's curses.
Even One found it somewhat unclear. No matter how deeply she desired to understand her sisters in their totality, it was an impossible task.
Some bleed over from Zero was clear. She was certain none of the other Utautai knew their true nature – thus, there was no other explanation for the allusions they made to it. But how much?
The grim proclamations in Three's song of suffering and death targeted "those who went along with the sacrifice", but that could just as easily indicate Zero or humanity as a whole. Perhaps it even meant the flower, though it seemed far less likely.
All of the above were far too willing, in One's mind, to abandon the Utautai to their fate.
Truthfully, given Threes temperament, it almost certainly referred to humanity as a whole. Only her own biases and hopes gave rise to another interpretation.
Introspection for another day. Too many things, too important, to be distracted today.
Silence reigned.
Nerves, the onset of genuine apprehension at seeing their peers' failures. The bitter taste of defeat for the other two. Perhaps simple contemplation from Potter. He seemed more adjusted to this kind of life-threatening pressure.
Undaunted, One finished her promised explanation.
"Its name is Corroscience. Corrosion science – more than poison, a natural process that masks as and simultaneously erodes sense. A decision that defies all logic, but is reached by rigid and unassailable methodology. An odd self-parallel. A mad conclusion that must be true. That – that is Three."
No one replied.
The tension this time was suffocating. When Viktor Krum's scores were announced, barely anyone present even heard. None paid attention.
They were poor. That was sufficient. No one here was competing for last place. What did it matter who was first among losers? It had been another failure, and all that remained was to see if the final two would fail as well.
So the third match began.
ya boi got punked.
Three is uniquely unfair for a wizard to fight, just because she has a better range game and, bar really nasty spells like fiendfyre, wizards have crap crowd control. Like you have to be able to fight close up to not get rushed down. Also that doll thing? legit straight from Utahime Five. Her mindset iss... basically like a kid that likes to break their old toys?
I feel like I've said this already, but writing is purely self-indulgence for me, so if something seems inaccurate, rushed, or otherwise just bad it probably is, but it's more important that I keep this sustainable so I can finish. Just felt like being upfront and I totally get if that puts you off.