Castlevania: Aria of the Ascending Soul
Written By: Lady Lunar Phoenix
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
Warmth from the fireplace filled the room with an almost 'take a nap' type of feeling, the light was a call back to warm campfires. Social settings among friends, while shielded from the elements by thick earth strong stone that rose up all around them. A peaceful study, with a shelf full of books to read, well cushioned chairs and couches the rest upon, and a floor with a rug thick enough to stop the chill from seeping up from the mountain stone floor.
Over the span of an hour the hunters had begun to filter into the place, from Julius and Yoko to the LeCardes and the Freelance Police. Which just made up the living, with both father and son Morris', Aulin and the LeCardes ancestors also in the room. Dispersed about the room, taking up various seats, while Death obliged them by keeping Its senses peeled for any potential cultists. All the while the sheer oddity of the situation not lost on any of them.
Alucard was, essentially, holding court on behalf of his father, with a group of vampire hunters. The very clans that he had sided with against his father, now sat, still in alignment with him, 'for' the protection 'of' his father. All the while Death was guarding the outside of the study by its very presence for the same Dark Lord.
In short, it was surreal.
"So Death said that one guy is 'part of the clan'?" Alexis repeated glancing between the entity and Alucard in disbelief. In the corner of her eye she could see Charlotte and Jonathan both wince and start looking around at anything but someone in the room. Causing her to frown in growing concern, "You know something?" She called out, the direction of her head causing the others to follow suit in response.
Charlotte flinched as she hugged herself as though she could feel cold. But no one else said a word, and the crackle of the fireplace was the only movement brave enough to make a sound.
"We know how it probably happened, but that doesn't mean we expected it or wanted it... But we won't talk about it. So just accept that yeah, its probably what Death said," Jonathan answered instead.
Charlottes' expression twisted into this conflicted one of gratitude, shame, and pain. "There is a 'reason' the clans stay the way we do, why we preserve the secrecy. And to be clear, it was our fault."
"No, we didn't ask for that to happen!" Jonathan argued, his voice a low growl of stubborn annoyance. While the living, even Julius and Yoko, were left looking about in confusion.
"The fact of the matter is the one in the castle has been removed from the field, let us return to the matter at hand," Alucard instructed. His tone eternally patient and ridged, with both Jonathan and Charlotte apparently bowing to this instruction.
Julius was left frowning, given his position in his clan, if this was 'that' important, why hadn't he been told? While he trusted Alucard, there was something unsettling in that there was apparently this gap of secrets he knew nothing about. 'I don't care about this random threat of someone who was part of the clans. We always knew that it was a real chance given the Belnades handling of men in their clan. But this... Jonathan looks like this was personal...'
"Hopefully the others are just mindless beasts and can be dealt with more efficiently than we started off with," Alexander added, in an effort to motivate the group into resuming their planning.
"All the while someone is sealing the rooms in the Castle, in a similar manner as during Jonathan's time in the castle." John noted with his arms folded across his chest and a frown on his face.
"Does the castle get weaker as its sealed off? Or is this possibly an attempt to seal Soma away to keep him from resuming control of the castle?" Eric asked thoughtfully as he stood next to the window. With both his daughters sitting on either side of him despite the lack of seating.
"Soma doesn't have to be 'in' the Master Chambers to control it now, however; they've ensured he can do no more. As for myself, I 'would' require the Master Chambers, and if they were to find and seal me there. It would cut me off from controlling the castle regardless," Alucard explained barely turning his head to address the hunter.
"That's weird though, Dracula couldn't control the castle when we went through," Jonathan noted with a frown.
"Yes, how did that change?" Charlotte asked walking a little closer to the group.
"He's already here, he's been here long enough to return to his full power, thus a seal would be meaningless. Were he newly summoned however," Alucard explained while leaving his comment hanging for the others to ponder through.
Which wasn't hard, it was already established that Dracula's powers were generally at their weakest when he was first summoned back. Soma on the other hand, had been here long enough to return to his full power... Granted he was still young, and if he had his 'full' power was subject to impression.
More over, it was meaningless now, because that seal was tearing him up. He was unmoving on his couch, appearing almost dead beyond his naturally pale appearance. "We need to find the things sealing up the castle and resolve them... Then make sure Alucard can reach the Master Chambers so we can... But what do we do about the Castle?" Max asked in annoyance. "We have this giant castle that is probably ground zero of a nuke or something. We can't move it on our own, we can't shield it, everything around it becomes nuclear fallout, and the people inside would be wiped out. What do we 'do'?"
"Its not like we can send the victims outside the castle 'to be safe'. If they're just going to end up getting a nuke to the face," Sam admitted with a sigh.
"I can send the castle back into the seal... Or anywhere else so long as I know where its going..." breathy and exhausted though it was, Soma's voice managed to shatter the fragile quiet of the room. The pops and hisses of the fire seemingly lending its sound to his voice. All eyes, living and dead, turned towards him, where he laid there eyes shut and his chest heaving slightly in the terrible effort it took to get him to breath. "But that will be all I can do, after that I can do no more to help you regarding the cults. So you best be planning wisely and not with futile frivolity."
"Well, would it be less of a burden if you gave permissions over to Al?" Yoko asked as she moved to Soma's side and took his unringed hand into her own. It was so cold that without a thought she began rubbing it, trying to stimulate some warmth back into the appendage.
"I could, but he needs the Master Chambers to give the orders..." Soma answered, returning them to their current problem.
If the cults were able to seal up the Master Chamber once Alucard was inside, they would lose a powerful ally in Alucard, 'and' control of the castle.
"Does the castle have a means to defend against a nuke? I mean, like a natural shield or some defense?" Alex asked his gaze shifting between Alucard and Soma unsure of what the answer would be.
Alucard deferred to his father immediately, turning his head to gaze down at his father as well.
"If I could think straight. I mean, yes, it could repel a nuke or a thousand with a flurry of spells... but the nuclear fallout with destroy everything around it. More over the 'fallout' I could probably purge that with another wash through the reincarnation station..." his voice faded away the more he spoke.
Leaving the room to realize that they were pushing it with just questions and sighed because in the end he had a point. Fireballs, just a sky full of fireballs and nuclear fallout... Or bats, or birds, or whatever else Soma felt inspired to fling out to deal with a pest.
"Why did they have to unlock the atom?" Yoko groaned in frustration.
"Father does have a magical equivalent," Alucard pointed out, ridged in his seat as he oversaw said father. "I have done what I can for the rest of the world, we have no sign that nuclear armaments are on their way here as well. But that does not mean we should not bring this to a swift conclusion, even if father is not the threat. These cults 'are' just by being free to run about the castle as they have been."
"And this is why you do not disturb the natural order," Death grumbled from its spot.
"Says the entity who's friends with an immortal, 'un'natural, vampire..." Max retorted.
"It was as you mortals call it 'a social experiment'," Death retorted easily enough.
"Can't you just do what you always do and start killing them off? I mean I can see why you can't out in the world, but here..." Max pointed out with a mildly disgruntled tone as she looked up at the hovering entity.
"Nothing would give me greater joy, however; I can not see the difference between you mortals. In my eyes, you are all the same, I recognize only those like Vampires for the nature of their souls are unique among the living." Death pointed out while its fingers gently rapped against its scythe patiently.
"Meaning, you can't tell the difference between one of the kidnapped victims of the castle and a cultist, got it," Sam bemoaned as he leaned back in his seat. "This is ridiculous, we need the leader who's doing the sealings. The rest of the little guys can wait, but how do we 'find' him?"
"Grant only knows his voice, and we haven't seen... We haven't..." Julius began and cut himself off as he looked among the people in the room. "Where... There were a good number of allies among the spirits..."
"It... it isn't as though we sent out a notification that there 'would' be a meeting..." Loretta noted slowly. But she was just as invested as the others as they began to look around the room, hoping that one of the other spirits would join them. Now.
"You don't think they've been sealed do you?" Stella asked as she folded her hand over a manifestation of her old fencing epee.
Slowly every pair of eyes turned towards Death and a roughly similar pondering crossed their minds. If 'Death' could see the souls of the living, and undoubtedly the souls of the dead. Could it see the seals through out the castle or just the souls? Could it tell if there were trapped souls in rooms?
"It 'is' strange though that unlike all the ages past, the souls of the clans passed on hunters would choose 'now' to return..." Alucard noted, stoically looking at Death's back. Just to listen to Yoko's heart beat elevate.
"I dunno, Dracula isn't following the usual pattern, maybe they just... Actually," Julius began before redirected his thoughts. "Why 'did' you decide to make yourselves known, Uncle?"
"Well, Alucard was missing," Jonathan confessed with a faint shrug. "We got asked to help look for him."
"Oh, Grants friend in China... yes I guess that makes sense," Julius replied with a nod. "Typical that he has connections all the way between the living 'and' dead."
Alucard was very well schooled on how to behave in all occasions and centuries to refine that training. But the sheer Olympic flip floping that was Yoko's heart rate was actually highly entertaining. He began trying to gauge how long until she outright passed out from the way it would speed up, slow down, the speed up again.
It had to be her brother, he could easily send a message, despite his mothers' desire to keep him hidden. 'They were called to search for me...' In a much purer sense than when Maria had gone seeking him out all those centuries ago. Yoko had, by the grace of God, never been one to be attracted to him, thus her concern was of the more pure design. Such a loyal child, and despite the way that she had a tendency to let her mouth run away from her...
Probably the only human to concern herself over his well being beyond the fact of his duty to the clans and world. The only human and would soon be dead like all the other humans he had encountered in his centuries of life. But kindness was to be appreciated and she was a good girl, 'And she cares for father and treats him like family. Despite the fact that he has undoubtedly started to regress back to acting his vampire age.'
"Old Man, would you know what types of beings the cultists turned into, would their human souls have been transformed to match their new identities?" Alucard asked, while several people just fought down the side eye look.
Sure, just call the active personification of 'death' an 'Old Man'. Once is a blue moon Alucard just said or did things that made everyone realize there 'was' something human under all that noble vampire regal air. But it was a good question so they all turned to look at Death with quiet expectations.
"I see someone has forgotten their schooling," Death grumbled as it folded its arms across its chest. It floated around to face the young master, its hood hiding most of its upper skull while the warm firelight played oddly with the blue flames of its eyes along the contours of its skull face.
… "For those of us who didn't exist during the ice age, what particular 'lesson' was that?" Max asked, leaning back in her seat and soaking in the warmth of the fireplace. Enjoying just that simple heat that came from a fireplace and the scent of wood smoke. A statement causing Yoko to barely keep from snickering.
"He's not 'that' old," John muttered, shaking his head clearly fighting a smile on his own face.
It was just the mental image of what Alucard must have looked like going to school as a child way back in those long ago days... Then they realized that Soma 'would' know what Alucard looked like if he was allowed to have, or retain when they were freed, those memories.
"Wait, Death was your teacher!?" Eric asked in stunned surprise.
"And that matters 'how' exactly?" Alucard coolly asked as he sat there, not even giving Eric a glance over his shoulder.
"I can tell if they've turned into Living Children or the Undead Children," was all Death said on the matter.
"Can't be human really, they're moving too fast if they've sealed up enough of the castle to start trapping the family members." Julius noted with a sigh as he looked down at the rug and seemingly through it. All the while humans were starting to be transformed into various types of beings, the boy from before as an example. Standing next to the door with an effort to be professionally quiet and patient, all things that he was clearly struggling with.
Glancing up, Julius could see the stunned awe on the boy's face as he looked upon 'Death'. Lacking facial muscles he couldn't express the much in the way of emotions any longer it was held in the childs' eyes. Constantly moving as though trying to absorb the sheer scope of the entity before him. 'Soma's too weak for me to ask about these people. Before perhaps if he was killed and sent back into chaos the humans could be saved... But with the way Soma is now, I'm still not feeling the strength in the Vampire Killer against him.'
But there 'was' feeling, somewhere there was a vampire... But where... "Death, how many vampires are currently in the Castle? That you know of?"
"Multiple, of various ranks of course some newly turned, some old the transformation of a human soul into a vampire one is a... peculiar thing. It is slow or quick to happen depending on each one who becomes a vampire," it explained.
Which suggested that possibly some of the transformed 'guests' of the castle could also now be vampires. "I see, and to each their own upon the transformation. I suppose if the thirst took a hold of them here, it would be little to nothing for blood to be provided."
"Yes, there are means of obtaining blood, and not necessarily through direct living humans," Alucard explained, his eyes examining Soma's near slumbering form. 'His scent has changed, it smells wrong... What is that ring 'doing' to him?'
"Do you think our spirit members can break the seals on the rooms if they're instructed on how?" Yoko asked finally, her tone thoughtful. "I mean we're running low on resources, if not we can split up into various groups I suppose."
"Find the cult leaders, unseal the castle rooms, free any trapped kidnap victims. Oh and defeat any of the cult members who have taken up spots in the castle." Alexis ticked off each task on her fingers, and shrugged, "we can do this two by two if not, and if they can help we can move in bigger groups."
"Which we might need given that the cult doesn't politely keep their hostages out of harms way during a fight," Alex agreed darkly.