Author's Note: So one week into a two week quarantine. With luck I'll get my second shot soon and it'll all become irrelevant. You lot in the mean can Read, Review, Favourite, Enjoy and Stay safe!
Chapter 6: Spear Point Negotiations
Hyoga was a vicious get, Katarina was starting to learn this the hard way after they sparred a few times.
"You're fast with your weapon, but you need more work." The platinum blond haired man stated after helping Katarina up for the third time, having knocked her down just as many. "Now that I have a idea of what we're working with we should practice your movements some." Hyoga explained as he led Katarina over to a training dummy with a shield being held out in front.
"Why does that dummy have a shield on it?" Katarina asked after blinking for a moment.
"Because this is Melromarc, and the army hates them. Now pay attention." Hyoga stated as he walked up to the dummy. "The spear's reach is not only for closing the distance to hit your opponent faster, you can also use it to reach around a target's shield and pierce their sides." Hyoga used the spear to reach around the shield and made a show of exposing the enemy weak points along the sides and behind the shield. "Another benefit is being able to strike from further away which can be used both offensively..." Hyoga gave a hard jab with his spear causing the leather flail that was in place of the dummies other arm to swing around and nearly hit him if not for Hyoga immediately stepping backwards to avoid the blow. "...and with sufficient agility defensively."
"Okay! Lemme give it a try!" Katarina lined up her shots and struck. Where she lacked in training for formal spear-man ship she made up for with movements practice in the ball room and strength refined from working on the farm and climbing trees. Her main advantage here was size, being smaller a wild and unwieldy weapon like a flail had a hard time striking her. But she was able to accurately and consistently strike the dummy while ignoring the shield.
"How's she doing?" Eclair asked walking into the castle courtyard.
"Improvement is within acceptable margin." Hyoga punctuated his sentence by using the staff with one end wrapped in cloth to strike at Katarina's side scaring her badly enough that she tripped up a bit. "Needs to look out for surprises though."
Eclair nodded begrudgingly. Hyoga for all his ruthlessness was a kinder mentor than the wave's would be down the line. Her father was a fighter, he would not have been felled easily, the fact that it was a less severe wave then the one that would hit them in a short amount of time did not sit well with her.
"The Shieldfreeden party is here to see her." Well that was going to be messy.
"Come." Hyoga tapped Katarina on her back with his training spear. "There are politics to tend to."
Katarina could only let out a sigh. The last time she did politics her stomach had turned black and blue and Kuro faked getting kidnapped. The Shieldfreeden delegate had been confined to a tavern that was currently under guard by the Church of the Three Heroes. If there were anymore blatant attempts at kidnapping then they would find out about it fast. Tanya was a little surprised to learn the man she would be talking to was human. Surprised and disappointed. But she supposed that the Church didn't find the idea of fuzzy animal ears as cute as she did. The delegate looked at Katarina and the Eclair, looking for confirmation which she gave with a nod of her head. The delegate's suspicious gaze turned on Katarina and then back to Eclair who again nodded her head.
"Um can I interrupt?" Katarina asked hand in the air but didn't wait for a reply before she said her peace. "I interrupted spear training to come here, and after I've gotten a grip on it for today I plan to go out and level up some. Can we move this meeting along?"
"Yes. The Waves wait for no one." The man stated bluntly. "Our first wave will be in two weeks, it will take five days on Filolial to get to Shieldfreeden from here." Meanwhile the Melromarc wave was was three weeks away. "I understand your need but there are problems of my own too. I cannot help you without making a enemy out of the very scary men outside who work for the people who brought me here."
"Yes the church." Negotiations was impossible after Siltvelt's kidnapping of the Sword Hero. Those demanded that they trusted someone to be left alone with the remaining hero's long enough to conduct those negotiations. For all of her potential power the Spear Hero was still but a child, and perhaps with the exception of the murdered shield hero, the least skilled in combat. "But the church is not the only one who can make threats." Eclair was already drawing her blade.
"Are you threatening me?" Katarina asked looking at the man in front of her suspiciously.
"You? No." The delegate stated making his opinion on the matter to be quite clear. "The young lady's country though?" Eclair was putting her sword back as the delegate indicated her. "Yes."
It was a calculated measure. If you gather together all of the adventurers, all of the mercenaries, murderers and soldiers in the kingdom, divide them into groups, and position them in every village in the country then you may survive one or two waves. But that was not a sustainable measure, those groups have vastly less offensive power to offer against the waves then the four legendary heroes or even the seven stars, and the waves are meant to grow in power with each new one that occurs. Compare and contrast the heroes of legend. Strong enough to take the armies of the wave, said to fell the monsters of the wave like wheat before the scythe, and most important a automated transportation ability that would automatically take them to fight the wave that was tied to whatever hourglass they had registered with. One or two waves would not fell the country, but was Melromarc in a position that they could refuse to send them aid in the first place?
"Sorry I'm late." The familiar tapping of a cane had brought the King into the room where the meeting was taking place, to the surprise of all those in attendance. "I was in the middle of a conference call with my wife." The King walked over and put a seat down to the left side of the table. "Would someone fill me in on what was happening?"
"Yes your majesty." Eclair had not forgotten to whom her slave seal was registered to, she wanted to throttle the king but stayed her hand. "This man was just making not too thinly veiled threats to the country of a full scale attack if we do not allow the spear hero to register with Shieldfreeden to deal with the wave in their territory."
"Why are you holding back what we agreed to do?" The King asked looking to Eclair with blatant suspicion on his features.
"Apologies your majesty I simply do not take being threatened very well, even if it wasn't aimed at me specifically." Eclair had no idea what was going on here but followed along anyway.
"As you can see." The king held up a blue crystal which then produced a holographic image of a official document with a very important looking person's signature on it. "The official stance of Melromarc is clear. The Heroes are not curs that we can command at whim, what countries they defend is entirely up to them."
"So it is." The delegate was allowed to examine the document before dismissing it. "But what of the church?"
"If anyone attempts to attack anymore Heroes then they well be considered enemies of the state." The king narrowed a glare at the delegate. "Anyone who attempts to lay hands on the heroes will be treated as a enemy of the state."
"Is this about what happened to Kuro and Maple?" Katarina asked looking at the king with legitimate concern on her features, and grew concerned as the king nodded in the affirmative.
"We did not mean to lay claim to the four heroes." The King stated making his opinion clear. "I could only stand back and watch Faubrey abuse their authority for so long."
The Shieldfreeden delegate nodded his head in the affirmative. The more times they attempted the ritual and failed the closer the next wave would come to pass. In that matter Melromarc can be admired for having expedited the process.
"The Queen? Why haven't I seen her around?" Katarina asked looking confused.
"She and my youngest are currently away at the conference that was formed in response to the waves." The King stated before letting out a sigh. "Apparently our well intention summoning of the four of you has them up in arms with us now with some threatening war." Katarina glared at the man across from her confusion and maybe a little bit of anger on her features.
"You're threatening war with your country in danger from the waves? You were really serious about that?"
A banging of a gavel indicated another meeting of the Council of Katarina's had formed and one thing had come to mind to all five of the brain-cells of Katarina.
""""THIS MAN IS DUMB!"""" Four Katarina's all shouted indicating the screen showing the conversation with the the delegate they had been talking to.
"Order in the court! Order in the court!" Chairman Katarina shouted trying to bring the situation under control.
"I say we leave his stupid country to fend for itself for a couple of months!" Hotblooded Katarina shouted being clearly angry.
"Being angry about things isn't going to fix any thing!" Logical Katarina stated though she was just as angry as the others.
"Were we summoned here just so that the countries can argue over us!?" The not currently timid Katarina stated loudly. "Is this what Maple nearly got herself killed over?"
"Dummy! Dummy! Dummy!" Excitable Katarina was currently just throwing a temper tantrum.
"Order in the court!" Chairman Katarina broke the gavel, which considering it was imaginary was impressive. "What we need is a way to make these people stop arguing over us before they try to kill us again! Any ideas?"
""""Hmmm...""""
Katarina and her four split personalities reached consensus as they returned to the real world to deal with the problems addressed to them.
"Hey you can contact the peace conference directly right?" Katarina asked giving the impression that she was about to do something incredibly stupid.
Mirellia Q. Melromarc was not having a good week. This entire so called peace conference had been a series of shouting matches and blustering usually bludgeoned into submission by Faubrey as they blatantly abuse their authority to do what they want. Then word comes in of her husband lighting the powder keg by summoning the four heroes, and the belief that her husband has lost his mind when he seriously expected her to believe they were all girls Melty's age. Her only hope right now was that the various parasitic politicians would succeed in stomping out the fuse before the situation spiralled further out of control.
"Your lieges! Urgent transmission from Melromarc!" One of Faubrey's soldiers ran in and gave the politicians a sharp salute.
"Snk. Maybe they killed off another Hero." One man gave a particularly callous remark while Mirellia could only sigh.
"I will take it in my quarters, thank y-"
"Your majesty, it's meant to address the entire conference, and it's from the Spear Hero." Oh this wasn't going to end well.
The projection orb was placed on the table the lot of them were sharing which in turn produced a image of a girl who was indeed around Melty's age. Brown hair, blue eyes with a notable scar between them and training leathers like a cadet in the army. Oh a and spear too, one with a dangerously close resemblance to the legendary spear.
"YOU PEOPLE ARE DUMB!" So announced the dumbest person that Katarina knows, namely Katarina herself. "You're in the middle of a natural disaster! What are you even suppose to be arguing about!?" The response of the group of world leaders was along the line of what you would expect, bursting laughter and a groan from the Queen. The child in the illusion magic didn't look like she was taking it so well. "Which one is your Wife!?" A hand the Queen recognised as belonging to her husband pointed her out. "You there what are they laughing about!?"
"They seem to doubt your divinity." Mirella stated not having to ask them, for she too shared their opinion only finding it a lot less funny since her husband's joke was ultimately at her expense.
"You where are they at!?" The girl demanded of her husband to which he gave a probably correct answer that the Queen couldn't hear. "How am I supposed to know what a Faubrey is? Point them out!" That was the first red flag, there's no one, not even a child, who doesn't know about the most powerful and infamous country on the planet. "Buff me!" Silence and impatient tapping of the girl's foot. "Do it now!" The second red flag was when a spell Mirellia knows as the Hymn of the elements washed over the girl's body, a Ritual magic and one that only her husband could cast single handily. "Air Strike Javelin!" And so the little girl threw her spear through the air, and that was the last red flag Mirellia needed.
She immediately grabbed Melty and ran out of the room, casting every defensive magic that she could and freezing the water and wind barriers solid just for good measure. The Spear streaked across the sky and after about a minute smashed through the roof of the conference room, obliterated the table and left the legendary spear lodged in place there for but a moment before it disappeared and reappeared in the child's hand in the now badly damaged conference crystal.
"Mirellia! Are you and Melty okay!?" Mirellia's husband, who she swore she was going to encase in a block of ice and put on display in the castle courtyard when she got back, poked in to check on the situation through the use of the communication crystal.
"Excuse me I was having a conversation here!" The girl in the image pushed Mirellia's good for nothing husband out of her way and resumed the 'conversation.' "Why are you people threatening to go to war with each other when there are monsters threatening to rain down from the sky and wipe out your people!?"
"Not all of our countries are so blessed with one of the Seven Stars." A man who looked like a senator stated before levelling a glare towards the fat bastard whose lovely estate they were inside of. "Some of us are even hoarding them."
"Oi what's he talking about?" The girl was filled in 'off-screen' by Melromarc's 'king' on what the seven stars are. "WHAT? You people have already got seven other heroes running around and enough of a army to go war with each other over them!? Why did you summon us here!?" The girl asked the man who had been filling her in on the relevant details of the meeting as they appeared. It was a question that Mirellia has been wanting to know for a while now too.
"Excuse me miss if you do not mind me asking." Mirellia seized control over this convoy wreck before it got any worst. "But you haven't introduced yourself yet."
"Katarina Claes, heiress of the Claes Duchy, Fiance of Prince Geordo Stuart of the Sorcier Kingdom, Friend of Kaede 'Maple' Honjou the now deceased Shield Hero, currently The Hero of the Spear and massively peeved!" The girl in question released her string of titles like she was having a rant at them and now was out of breath for doing so. "Which one was suppose to be hoarding Seven Stars again?" The group pointed over to Faubrey.
"You can fend for yourself. Which one of you kidnapped Kuro again?" Now fingers were pointed at a lion demi-human. "You can fend for yourself too! And let Kuro do whatever she wants! Which one of you don't have any heroes of your own?" Several hands went up into the air. "Put them down if they're arriving in less than a week. I want at least that long to prepare." Only two hands went down, both from minor countries. "The rest of you send support to those guys! If any of you try to invade each other I'll come over and beat you up! If you don't have anything else you need to talk about then all of you go home!"
"Miss Claes if I may, if we are to send support to one another's countries then it will require planning and negotiation." Mirellia stated, preferably before the girl lost her temper and flew off the handle again. "Alright. Someone lemme know when the negotiation is finished with." And with that the transmission was cut off, probably so that she could go make her preparations.
Inside of Melromarc's throne room Katarina was given some tea with honey to soothe her sore throat from all the shouting that she just went through. Aultcray, soon to no longer be king, on the other hand felt like he just went twenty rounds with a dragon. After Katarina admitted her ignorance in not knowing a thing about politics the man who arranged her summoning took full advantage to try and smooth out the international cluster trap that was their foreign relationships, even then he had to whip together several sheets of paper into flash cards, thank the gods for miss Elena's educating Katarina.
"Excellent performance Lady Claes." Hyoga stated spear at his side.
"Huu. I never really paid much attention to politics in my world..." Katarina's eyes drifted away lazily as if she was the one who was just thoroughly exhausted right now. "I'm going to have to start reading up on that here aren't I?"
"I'll have miss Elena add it to your lessons." The King stated as he sat down to enjoy some of the tea with Katarina. "For now your language proficiency seems to have reached the point where you can start learning how to cast magic: we should take you out to get assessed." Katarina nodded her head in the affirmative. "After that we should take you out to go levelling, some proper opponents will help improve your spear work, and you need the material for your weapon too." Work, work, work. It never stops. Katarina was led to the castle town's magic store where she was being brought in to start learning magic.
"Assessment?" Katarina asked clearly looking suspicious.
"Where we determine your magical affinities." Aultcray stated as he opened the way into the store.
"I already know my affinity though." Pitiful as it might be Katarina can make bumps of earth appear at whim, mind you it wasn't much now but it should get better as she gets older.
"As do we. This is a formality before you get the necessary texts to begin learning magic." Aultcray explained as Katarina entered the store.
"Oh your majesty welcome." The mage working behind the counter was a portly woman dressed as a stereotypical witch. "Is this about the magic orb order you placed?"
"No. I've come to get this young lady situated with texts for learning magic." Aultcray explained indicating the magic crystal sitting on the desk.
"Magic orb?" Katarina asked looking at the King curiously.
"They're magic items that can instantly teach you a magic spell." Aultcray explained prompting a look of confusion from Katarina.
"Are we going to use those?" Katarina asked looking suspicious.
"I considered it but decided against on account of your eagerness to learn the language of this country." Aultcray explained as a crate was push over for Katarina to stand on to reach the counter.
"Magic learned via texts is more powerful and versatile then what is simply implanted into your head via a magic orb." Katarina nodded her head as she put her hands on the orb spawning a mixture of crimson red and bright green light in the process.
"Fire and healing magic. Oh this one's going to be powerful." The magic shop owner stated looking genuinely happy. Katarina was about to ask why they were buying magic orbs anyway but was stopped by the shop keeper's statement.
"Wait? Fire and Healing magic?" Katarina asked looking like someone who had been lied to for quite a while.
"You didn't know?" It was now Aultcray's turn to be confused, didn't she say that she knew her affinities earlier.
"My affinity is for earth magic like the rest of my family." Katarina stated still not quite wrapping her head around this situation.
"What makes you say that?" Que Katarina taking the King and her guard's outside to show them her Earth bump, only to realise that she some how had been set back when the damned thing wouldn't appear. "The Church's scriptures clearly stated that he spear heroes affinities are for fire and healing magic." Hyoga helpfully chimed in at this point in time. "Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that they are the spear's affinities."
"In any case." Aultcray handed Katarina the book in question. "We should head back to the castle now."
The gavel repaired with duct tape, which was pathetic considering it was imaginary, banged indicating that the council of Katarina's was in order once more.
"Our current topic is our magic and our actions moving forward." Chairman Katarina stated observing the reactions of her fellow Katarina's.
"We can use fire magic now!" Now quite literally hot blooded Katarina stated eyes sparkling. "This beats the tar out of earth magic any day!"
"But what are we going to do about Earth magic when we get back home?" Timid Katarina asked looking between her alternate selves quite concerned. "Magic affinity is like the number one paternity test in our world. A commoner being born with magic is common enough but have we ever heard of a noble having a completely different affinity from their family? This is Keith all over again!"
None of the Katarina's looked forward to the idea of her mother being accused of cheating on her father with some other man who spews fire.
"I would like to propose the obvious solution." Logical Katarina stated pushing up her glasses. "The Legendary Spear. If we can unlock forms that can manipulate earth and not use fire then we'll be able to fool everyone into thinking that not only do we still have earth magic, but that it has taken off!"
""""YOSH!"""" The other Katarina's seemed to have no problem with this plan.
"And on the bright side if we can keep fire as our secret ace no doom flag will be able to see us coming!" Excitable Katarina shouted fist pumping. "And with healing magic if we get injured then we'll just fix ourselves up!"
"Then it's settled! We'll learn healing and fire while looking for a way to use Earth for when we get home!"
Having decided on her course of action Katarina opened up the book on fire magic and started to read the words that were before her.
"I, the Hero of the Spear, have read and understood the origin of power." Katarina was only half aware of the words she was saying as her body started to glow with power. "Decipher the laws of nature and blast my target with a ball of Flames. First Fire!" A fire ball shot out of Katarina's hand in the direction her palm was facing, which then sailed over her head and crashed into a fruit stand. The king Choose that moment to yank the book out of Katarina's hands like he was scolding a misbehaving child, which he was.
"Please don't go shooting off fire balls in the middle of my town." Aultcray stated glaring at the misbehaving hero.
"My deepest apologies." He let Katarina keep the book on healing magic, which was probably a wise decision.
"Perhaps we should save the magic lessons until after she's on the road with no monsters to kill or room to practice her spear work." Hyoga suggested causing the king to nod his head in agreement.
"Oh I was meaning to ask." Katarina asked prompting the King to look at her. "You said earlier that you ordered a bunch of magic orbs: what are we using them for if not to learn their magic?"
"Materials for your weapons." The King said prompting Katarina to nod her head. Good, this seemed like the most straight forward method of acquiring Earth magic that she had available to her for the time being.
"What are we hunting?" Katarina asked looking Hyoga in curiosity.
"Balloons." The spear man stated bluntly.
"The ones in the field?" Katarina recalled noting that they weren't very efficient for experience points.
"Red ones. Worth about sixty orange ones in terms of experience." Katarina nodded her head in understanding. "They're vicious, attack in swarms and are more durable then orange ones too. They'll make good sparring partners." While Katarina was going out hunting a commotion was going on in the church.
"The Hero's are going out to fight for those animals!?" Siltvelt consists of nothing but the Animals, more disgusting than that though was Shieldfreeden which had them mixing together with humans. Faubrey, originally a bastion of humanity, had long ago accepted the taint that those creatures represent, Zeltoble was tolerable, for that was less a organised nation and more a state at war with itself but that wasn't the point. Only Melromarc maintained it's purity, the efforts of it's Queen be damned, and thus only Melromarc was worthy of the Three Heroes protection, to think other wise is nothing less than blasphemy, and it will be answered for.
Review Section:
RonaldM40196867: True. The version I am familiar with, the anime, seems like someone who while not willing to risk the lives of those she considers hers but anyone else is fair game.
REiNozomi: Possibly. No Raphtalia will not be joining Tanya's personal army. I have a couple of interests for Katarina worked on, but I can't give her the full attention a Harem would require without making the story all about her, at least not without spreading out the introduction of her romantic interests.
King of Fans: Thanks. Which while true it also doesn't mean that Siltvelt is going to be a smooth ride either. I mostly adopted the training methods from the anime, but yes the reasoning behind them are quite sound, and having a hoard of people out collecting material for her does offer a boon as well.