I-I'm sorry for the delay. Stuff came up in my life; graduation plus a party to celebrate it that took up some time. And there had also been a death in the family not too long after that – my paternal grandmother. It took a bit of time for my family and I to properly deal with it, but she's at peace now. We're just glad that she went peacefully.
On that note, I dedicate this chapter to my grandmother. May she be with her loved ones in Heaven.
P.S. Please read the AN at the end of this chapter. It'll be concerning the updating pace for the next few chapters or so.
Chapter 23
Cinder watched her master pace back and forth, a look of genuine worry upon her face. This wasn't something exclusive only to her for now; the other Holy Knights were there as well and they too shared her concern. And all throughout their new base, the White Fang members that were still working for them weren't spared from the tense atmosphere either, not that one could entirely blame them if looking at things from their position.
Just late last night, Vidar had discovered what had occurred at the club. He discovered that Fenrir had shown up personally to Junior's club and had taken Roman, Neo, and Adam prisoner.
Needless to say, when he had quite reluctantly passed this news onto everyone else – better they find out from him rather than from anyone else – they had all but panicked, but Vidar had made it a point to tell everyone to try and stay calm while he thought things out.
Alas, that proved to be an almost arrogant thing to say. Just how could one stay calm when the enemy has three allies captive now?
"God damn it all…" Vidar thought as he continued to pace around the room, tuning out the stares his Holy Knights were giving him. Morgan and Amaterasu in particular looked worried for him, but he seemed to ignore them the most right now.
"You should've really seen that coming…" spoke Surtur softly.
"Quiet," Vidar replied, low enough for none of the Holy Knights to hear. "I'm anxious enough as it is without you bothering me."
"I bet you are," Surtur drawled, ignoring Vidar's first two words. "You should use Himinbjorg more often; I always told you that…"
Himinbjorg was Vidar's magical weapon. In the mythology from which magi seemed to be based on, it was a home for one of the gods, but in the case of Vidar, it was his magical weapon, the function of which was much different from its namesake. It is a magical weapon in the form of an almost mechanical looking eye, capable of observing others from vast distances away. In addition to this most basic function, it can also teleport Vidar and others that are in direct contact with him to virtually any location of his choosing. Himinbjorg can even fire magical beams, though said beams do take a bit of time to charge before actually firing. In this respect, it wasn't quite a frontline magical weapon, but more of a support type, one that Vidar had spent a considerable amount of time on to improve, utilizing science to mold his own magical weapon into something more akin to a satellite and with its functions further improved upon so that he could observe almost anything from anywhere and fire down beams if he so desired at any target he chose.
However.
"I know that," Vidar nearly growled, his patience waning with every passing second. "But you know well my magical weapon's limits, even after having enhanced it."
Indeed, while Himinbjorg can observe virtually anything of Vidar's chosing, there are still 'blindspots,' so to speak. For one thing, as it is a magical weapon, it is reliant upon mana to be activated and thus if no mana is being pumped into it, Vidar can't use it to see anything. For another thing, while it can give him the location of other magi, awakened or not, the more mana a magus has, the harder it is to actually get an exact location as to where they're at, as that person's mana acts as a natural smokescreen. The best Vidar could do is get a general idea of where they're at, which does him no good when the mana of the ancient magi lingers all around Vale and other such places, meaning he can't quite predict where they're at and where they may be. And while the magical beams Himinbjorg can fire are notably more powerful than anything any military in this current age can manage, said attacks still paled in comparison to the sort of firepower the ancient magi possessed, not to mention the sort of defenses they are capable of putting up.
It is because of these limits that Vidar has gone so far out of his way to recruit the Holy Knights and make them as strong as he could manage. It's why he is still in the process of experimenting with Dust as he tries to mix it with a few other samples he's had on hand for a long time now…
Shaking his head to rid himself of unnecessary thoughts, Vidar slowly turned to his Holy Knights, ignoring Surtur as the man called to him, unbeknownst to the Holy Knights.
"Captain?" Indra then spoke, having always been the one to usually speak up. "Just what's going to happen now?" The younger of all the Holy Knights could only do so much to avoid sounding scared, but said fear was evident in his voice. He may have been able to put up a decent fight against Daisuke all that time ago, but if the ancient magi can somehow use any of their three captives to track them down and attack at once, he wasn't sure he'd fair that well against more than one.
From beside him, Kalma nodded in agreement, too worried to vocalize her own thoughts at the moment.
Vidar let out a long sigh, trying to recollect himself. "What's happened has happened. Roman, Neo, and Adam have been captured and there's simply no way we could get them back. At least, not easily," he began. And he spoke the truth; earlier, he had tried to use Himinbjorg to try and locate the three, but to not avail; they simply weren't appearing anywhere. He silently theorized that Fenrir must be keeping them locked up in a pocket dimension or something, using Die Walkure to do so. "That said, we should consider ourselves rather lucky that the three don't know that much about our plans… at least not the very specifics of it."
He may have told the three the ultimate goal of the Holy Knights, to rid the world of the ancient magi that were far too stuck in their old ways of remaining hidden so that magic can be brought out into the open to help the world and everyone in it evolve into something better, but alas that was really all he told them. He made very little clear as to how they've built up their resources thus far or his identity.
Nonetheless, whatever the three would end up telling the ancient magi, Vidar knew that they could draw certain conclusions anyway. Still, it's better that they would only be operating on theories rather than actual proof, which means that he and his forces may be in the clear for a while longer.
"Hrmm, then when can we expect to do something about this?" Heracles asked. Gone was his usual jovial attitude and in place was the hardened look of a soldier that understood the need for serious action. Truly, it'd seem that his old life as a mercenary had done more than simply turn him into a sort of battle-thirsty person. "Is it finally time to just through caution to the wind? I can understand that having three captives doesn't quite mean the ancient magi will simply stroll on into our base here… but surely, it'd be more preferable to strike them before they can strike us."
Heracles, as is befitting the powerful Lion type Faunus given his namesake, showed a keen insight into the situation, thinking along more or less the very same lines Vidar had just been pondering, albeit with more of a focus upon attacking rather than anything else.
"While I'm sure attacking them would… make for an interesting event," Morgan spoke, back fully to her usual attitude, having gotten over the whole incident with Jaune being hurt for now. "I don't think it'd be too wise. After all, one of their own is dead as of recently and courtesy of dear Apophis here…" When she motioned to the second seat, the older Holy Knight nodded his head almost as if he was going to do a grand bow, an action that made Morgan nearly chuckle. "And with three captives now, I bet they're just raring to go at it."
"I never would've imagined you to be afraid," spoke Lugh, quirking an eyebrow. "Normally you're always so eerily calm and teasing."
"Maybe so, but this isn't exactly a situation that even I can just laugh off," Morgan replied. And although she hid it very well, she really was afraid of what could happen. She had a great deal of confidence in her abilities, due in part to all of her successes in life thus far. But the ancient magi most likely wouldn't be too impressed by her and wouldn't be showing her much leniency, even if they were to find out…
She stopped that particular line of thought as it popped into her mind.
"I see," Vidar then spoke again, getting everyone's attention. "I can see that all of you are feeling concerned about this, to varying degrees…" He nodded towards Heracles, Apophis, Amaterasu, and Lugh who all seemed to be taking this relatively well before looking to Morgan, Kalma, and Indra who genuinely appeared worried. "But let's not try to be too hasty here; the last thing we need to do is make things even worse."
"I think that'll happen on its own soon enough…" muttered Surtur suddenly.
As is usual, only Vidar heard him. "Silence," he whispered to him before continuing to address the others. "While I'm just as rattled as you all, for now, just go back to your usual activities. I can guess just where our three allies are being kept and I'm going to try to use Himinbjorg to see if I can actually pierce through the place's defenses. Should anything new arise, I'll inform you all of what to do next. Am I understood?"
Heracles and Apophis simply nodded in agreement. As much as the two would like to fight again, they've been with Vidar long enough to trust his judgement nigh-instantly. Morgan slowly sighed before letting out a sound of affirmation, having expected as much from her captain. Amaterasu simply bowed to Vidar, obeying his order without hesitation. As for the three youngest members of the Holy Knights, Lugh, Kalma, and Indra, the three looked uneasy for a moment or so, but ultimately they too muttered an 'understood' out.
"Good," Vidar then said. "You're dismissed for now."
As they all left him to his own devices, the captain did his best to keep from ripping off his mask and sighing. Although he had told himself to calm down as well, what with the three criminals not knowing enough to actually help the ancient magi, he couldn't shake the feeling that this event may have marked a turning point for them all.
He could only do as he said he'd do and hope that said turning point wouldn't prove to be a critical one. As he got back to work on his experiments, he had to make a conscious effort to ignore Surtur, who couldn't help but mutter into his ear that he was seriously wrong.
Meanwhile, at Beacon Academy, the place bustled with a certain energy, like the calm before the storm. Said storm wasn't necessarily a bad one though; it was just a way to express how excited certain people.
Such as Hanako, for example.
"I can't believe it!" she nearly exclaimed from within the faculty lounge. "You really pulled off a miracle, master!" She said this while practically gluing herself to Naruto via a tight hug.
"Wasn't so much a miracle on my part. They just happened to be there when I was there," Naruto replied with a bit of a grin. Although he tried to downplay it, he too was quite pleased with himself and his downright scarily good stroke of luck. To run across Torchwick was one thing, but to then take him and two other people in league with the Holy Knights as captives was another.
He and Hanako weren't alone in the room though; Miki, Ryuichi, Mari, Ozpin, Glynda, and teams RWBY and JNPR were there as well, the latter eight people having been called out of class for this meeting. On that note, Miki was hugging her husband from his other side just even more tightly than Hanako was, a gesture that Naruto returned quite happily.
"S-Still," Miki began, trying not to sound too excited. This had been just the sort of thing they had been waiting for. "It's amazing that they'd just be there like that!"
"Indeed," Ozpin spoke, smirking behind his omnipresent coffee mug. "It's times like these where I think you're blessed by the gods themselves, old friend."
Naruto, eventually breaking the hug with his wife and gently pushing Hanako off of him, could only look to Ozpin a little sheepishly. "I kind of doubt that. But if they do, then I won't complain."
"So then what's next?" Ruby then spoke up, trying not to sound too excited and failing hard; her eyes were all but sparkling as she and her friends realized the sort of advantage they all had just gained. "You going to ask them questions?"
"Oh oh, like some kind of interrogation?!" Nora asked rather giddily. Then her expression became surprisingly serious as she asked a somewhat unusual question. "You plan to break anything of theirs?"
"Nora…" her teammates muttered, trying to not be a bit too embarrassed by the lively girl's sometimes scary interest in hurting people, even if said people are more than a little bad.
"Maybe," Naruto responded without humor, which made Nora actually fall silent nigh-instantly. "At any rate, you guys are all here because you deserve answers just as much as my friends and I do."
"So just where do you have them locked up?" Blake then asked, her emotions at war with themselves. Earlier, when she and the others had been informed about who else had been brought in alongside Roman, she had felt almost guilty to hear that Adam, her former comrade, had been captured. At the same time, it was pretty much inevitable that he'd pay for his own crimes eventually, so on that note, Blake could only feel a certain sense of satisfaction. That he would join up with the Holy Knights though was something she never would've imagined.
"Don't worry; I locked them up in one place they could never escape from," Naruto replied. Then before anyone else could speak, he snapped his fingers. "Die Walkure."
Instantly, a sound akin to a teardrop rang out and a flash of light occurred, nearly blinding everyone. Ryuichi, Mari, Miki, and Hanako were unaffected by the light whereas Ozpin and Glynda were only marginally affected, blinking a bit as they were all pulled into a pocket dimension that Naruto had created as of yesterday.
Teams RWBY and JNPR, on the other hand, had to cover their eyes in genuine shock at the suddenness of Naruto's action and when they were finally able to open their eyes again, the eight teens could only look flabbergasted at a completely colorless area.
Literally all around them, for as far as the eyes could see, there was only a dull whiteness. There appeared to be no sky nor no ground nor anything else that could be defined as an actual environment.
But what mainly got their interest were the three people that seemed to be completely incapable of movement only a few yards in front of them all.
"Oh goodie, you brought guests," Roman drawled out, sounding as sarcastic as ever in spite of his tiredness.
As for Neo, the petite woman simply glared in exhaustion at the ancient magi and Beacon Academy residents.
But Adam was the most vocal of the three, surprisingly or perhaps unsurprisingly. "Blake… to think you'd actually join Beacon Academy after defecting." The man could only shake his head, his mask gone so that everyone could see his red colored eyes.
"Adam…" Blake muttered, unable to really say anything.
"So the two of you have a history together, huh?" Roman snarked, turning his head towards the Faunus. "Never knew you were into underage girls."
Both Adam and Blake glared at Roman, who was clearly taking out his anger and fatigue on anyone there, but Ozpin then stepped forward and tapped the nonexistent ground with his cane, the sound getting everyone's attention.
"Enough with the attitude, Torchwick," the headmaster began. "Instead, let's focus on more important matters. Such as your association with the Holy Knights and what they have planned."
"Ha, you really think any of us are going to tell you that easily?" Roman replied hotly. He struggled to move, but to no avail; when Naruto had made this space last night to contain them, he had used Die Walkure to essentially give the three enough personal space to sufficiently breath, but nowhere near enough space to move in any significant way.
"Not really," Miki surprisingly said. In a slight flash of light, she summoned Svafrlami. "But if we must…" She hefted her magnificent blade with just one hand, as easily as a child would carry around a small toy.
"Heh, we were told all about your magical weapon. Kind of doubt you can threaten us with something that pretty much is an instant kill," Roman boasted, but he did eye the blade warily, feeling the power radiating right off of it.
Teams RWBY and JNPR looked on in silence in discomfort at what had short transpired. Ozpin, Glynda, and the ancient magi were so far being almost uncharacteristically serious. They all considered themselves to be 'good guys,' and so to see some of the 'good guys' seem to be ready to genuinely hurt the three criminals for answers was an unnerving thing. Of the two teams, only Blake, due to her previous affiliation with the White Fang, has had the experience of knowing how the world could really be like and even then, to see the ancient magi continue to converse with Roman with the possible intention of beating the answers out of him so casually was something to be worried for.
"Enough with your prattle," Glynda all but growled out, her grip on her crop tightening noticeably. "Your new companions have attacked our school and endangered everyone there and seem intent on threatening others if it means getting rid of us. You have no ground to just stand there and be so uncooperative."
"Uncooperative…" Adam then said, drawing all eyes to him as the Faunus surprisingly spoke now. "You say we're being uncooperative? When I was first approached by the Holy Knights, their captain explained to me all there is to know about you lot. About how long you've been around and everything that's occurred since you all ever became magi."
His words somewhat worried Naruto, Miki, Ryuichi, Mari, and Hanako. If Adam wasn't simply exaggerating, then that meant this mysterious captain of the Holy Knights had been keeping some pretty damn good tabs on them for centuries. "What do you mean by that?" Ryuichi then asked, wanting him to elaborate since Roman seemed content to not do so.
"We were told all about what you are capable of," Adam continued. "With your abilities, you could change the world, and yet you all hide like cowards." The man actually growled now. "From what I've been told, you all seem supportive of the Faunus… so why haven't you guys done something to help us long ago?"
"Because as much as we'd want to," Miki spoke. "We couldn't risk being exposed to the world. We have a lot of faith in human and Faunus kind, but if our existence became known and they ever figured out exactly what magi were…"
"Magi would either end up being persecuted for their power or would be sought after like weapons," Mari continued, her expression as grim as Miki's.
While it would seem as if the two women were exaggerating, the others knew they weren't. For as long as sentient life has existed, people would always discriminate against others that were considered to be far 'different' from the established norm. And considering how much the abilities of magi could potentially disrupt the usual balance of society, that alone would possibly be grounds enough for people, humans and Faunus alike, to consider lashing out against them.
Even if that didn't occur, there are those who always lust for power. The abilities that magi commanded were the kind of abilities that people could only dream of and other times were things that people couldn't even imagine, much less ever gain. But of course that wouldn't stop some from trying to obtain such power, for good or bad. And once, if ever, it is discovered that magi are born with their magical abilities, there is no telling what people would do to try and get their hands on such people of potential power.
Roman took that moment to chuckle. "Let me guess. You guys don't want another Fimbulvinter War to go down, is that it?"
"That's right. That war, although it was before our time, cost a lot of people their lives," Ryuichi then spoke. He folded his arms across his chest as he stared at the redheaded criminal harshly. "We don't want a repeat."
"The same thing goes for Ragnarok," Hanako then spoke in a soft voice, though her gaze was far from soft; it was so focused and stern a gaze that when she looked from Roman to Neo and then to Adam, all three of them actually flinched. "Although we managed to pull through, it was an event that definitely would've had horrific consequences if not for my master winning against Odin." She spoke of Ragnarok and its basic facts as if it were no big deal. Given that the Holy Knights, according to Roman here, seemed to know so much about them for so long, she considered it to be no problem to just speak of something they may very well know of.
"And? Why can't you do something now about things? Especially you!" Adam nodded towards Naruto. "We were told in particular about you. You have the power to do whatever you want, so why not use it?"
"…Because I'm not a god, if that's what you're trying to say," Naruto said slowly. "I may be powerful, yeah, but just because I have the ability doesn't mean I have the right. I may be powerful enough to kill everyone or rule over them like some demented tyrant, but I don't have the right to do so, much less the desire to attempt it. I'm not that kind of person and I don't ever plan to be that kind of person."
Everyone actually fell silent at his words, which were so confidently spoken. But then they were all broken out of the 'spell' his words had placed them under as Naruto spoke again. "But we're getting seriously off track here; tell us about the Holy Knights. Now."
His mana began to make itself known, an ocean blue light surrounding Naruto, the pressure of it slowly crushing down on everyone around him. This wasn't something he was intentionally trying to do. No, this was merely the result of him not holding back his mana as much.
"…And just what makes you think they told us anything?" Roman then said after a tense minute or so of silence as he futilely tried not to be intimidated.
"Hey, they seemed willing enough to tell you about them, right?" Yang then spoke, in doing so reminding everyone there that she and her friends were still there. She clenched her right fist hard enough for her knuckles to crack a bit. "So why wouldn't they drop a hint or two here and there at least?"
"Y-Yeah, she's right," Jaune, amazingly, spoke. He took a step or two forward, trying to stand tall and look confident. "That they'd tell you so much about magi and their abilities shows that to some extent the Holy Knights need you to know something in order to help them."
Naruto smirked. "The boy's right. So start talking."
"Like he-," Roman began.
"Die Walkure," Naruto said, cutting him off.
The next thing Roman knew, the little space he did have to breathe in closed slowly, centimeter by centimeter until he could feel his own chest being pressed upon hard. It quickly became a bit hard to breathe properly.
But just as quickly as this happened, the change in space undid itself as Naruto stopped. "I really don't like doing things like this… but I'll do it again and again until you talk," he all but whispered. "Your new buddies have killed a close friend of ours. And they were willing to send some creature to attack Beacon and nearly kill Jaune here… there's no telling what else the beast would've done if it had continued."
Naruto's ocean blue eyes bore into Roman's, his expression hard and unforgiving, silently demanding the criminal to answer.
From Roman's side, Neo could be seen struggling, trying to break free, but the quiet woman might as well be an ant suddenly at the bottom of an ocean, trying to resist its crushing pressure. It just wasn't going to work.
As for Adam, the man glared at Naruto first and then proceeded to glare at Blake. "Look at this, Blake. He and the rest of his fellow magi and your headmaster are content to hurt us just for answers."
"That's because what you're doing with these Holy Knights could endanger a lot of people, Adam…" Blake whispered, just loud enough for the man to hear in addition to her friends.
"Is… this really needed?" Weiss then spoke, the heiress having remained silent until now. She looked uneasily to the adults there. It was unnerving to see them all act this way.
It was Glynda that responded. "The world isn't as black and white as you'd prefer," she said, albeit softly and in understanding. By looking at the two teams for a second, she could tell that they were feeling rather conflicted over this. It was clear that their idealized images of being hunters and huntresses were being crushed right now upon seeing how callous Naruto appeared to be and how calmly the rest of the magi and Ozpin were taking this in stride. "There isn't always a 'right' way to doing things, but sometimes you have to do what you can to accomplish certain goals… not even the best of hunters and huntresses are exempt from that."
And she was right. Although none of them showed it, the ancient magi were as unsettled by this as the teens were. Whatever the Holy Knights had done to earn such loyalty from Roman and Neo and Adam was downright unsettling to dwell on considering that for the next several minutes, Roman resisted Naruto's usage of Die Walkure with eerie determination.
But while this certainly felt wrong, all of them had grown up in the time of shinobi, where conflicts were perhaps even more prone to moral questioning than the conflicts that have occurred thus far in Remnant. As such, they had no choice but to do their best to stay true to their own morals and ideals without getting too carried away.
But sure enough, Roman's will had to break eventually. There was simply no way that a criminal like him could be strong willed enough to endure this for particularly long. "Stop…. Damn it… knock it off…"
"…Then talk already…" Naruto spoke in a low and almost sad voice. "Just give us at least something for us to work with."
"Roman," Adam began, looking to the man. "Don't you dare-."
"Siegfried. 'Adam Taurus is forbidden from talking.'" With just those few words, Naruto ensured Adam couldn't try and sway Roman. And sure enough, as soon as he spoke the words, they took effect, Adam's mouth closing against its own will and was rendered unable to open up against to speak, the result of the concept magic that Naruto used.
Roman and Neo both looked to Adam's silencing and grimaced at the rather off-handed manner in which Naruto had performed the action. "…Fine," Roman finally spoke, relenting to Naruto's demand. "I'll talk. But only a little…"
Naruto let out a sigh of relief, an action that mirrored by his humanoid magical weapon and wife. Ryuichi took his wife's hand into his own and squeezed it gently, an action that she returned. Ozpin and Glynda both sagged slightly in relief as well, theirs shoulders slumping noticeably. And teams RWBY and JNPR looked very relieved as well, Ruby and Nora almost literally cheering.
"I don't know too much about what they're gonna do next," Roman admitted. "But I know a bit about their abilities and their names."
"What about their location? Their base of operations and any other places they may be using," Ozpin questioned as he walked up next to Naruto. He still held his coffee mug, but he'd spent the last several minutes without having taken a single sip.
"…Yeah, I know that too. But if I tell you and you go attack them, they'll sense you coming a mile away," Roman replied, having to repress a grunt.
"You let us worry about that…" Ryuichi then muttered in response.
Roman sighed. "I somehow knew this would come around to bite me in the ass," he thought. He remembered how distrusting he'd been of the Holy Knights when he'd first heard of them. But following Vidar sitting him down and telling him about his goals and the sort of abilities the ancient magi had, following the operation that turned him into a pseudo-magus, he'd found himself becoming surprisingly loyal to the Holy Knights. Whether or not this was because of the aforementioned events or due to something else, Roman knew not, but at any rate, his loyalty for them didn't quite extend far enough to die for them.
Nonetheless, it was with a rather bitter taste in his mouth that he slowly began to tell the magi and Beacon residents what he knew…
Back at the base of the Holy Knights, Cinder, known to her fellow Knights as Amaterasu, frowned slightly in worry.
Having been personally trained by Vidar since she was young, she's come to pick up a sort of 'danger sense' that only really came into play when something seriously went wrong.
And that worried her greatly in spite of her marginal frown. Something had gone wrong, but she could hardly fathom what exactly was causing the rare emergence of this feeling.
"Should I go talk to master?" she thought aloud, in the room all by herself for now. She shook her head, deciding against that decision almost immediately. He was already busy as it is, still proceeding with his experimentations while also trying to think on what to do with the capture of Roman, Neo, and Adam. Surely, she was simply feeling bothered by the current situation.
Dismissing her worry, Cinder could only sigh as she began to slightly recall her younger days. She had grown up well enough with her family, consisting of just herself and her parents. It had been a good life for the first eight or so years of her life. Until the accident occurred.
She and her parents had been in a terrible car crash that had resulted in the deaths of the latter two while Cinder just barely survived, being carted off to the hospital for medical care. It had been there at the hospital, after she was out of the danger zone and was resting uncomfortably in her room that Vidar had approached her.
How exactly he'd snuck into her room and why had mattered very little to her at the time. As in shock and depressed as she'd become, it had honestly been a welcome change to have someone visit her. And it had been there in that dull hospital room that Vidar spoke to her softly, starting out with small talk, just slowly trying to build up some trust with her until she was willing to do more than just nod or shake her head.
It had been after she'd finally grown to trust him enough that he'd used a mysterious ability to heal her of her injuries, much to her shock at the time.
When she was discharged the next day and had left the hospital with the doctors trying to pick their jaws up off the floor, that she ran into him again. Vidar had been without his mask and uniform and had gently approached her at a nearby park to speak with her. He told her how he'd actually known her parents for a long time. Not only that, he'd known her family in general for a very long time. It wouldn't be too wrong to say that he was the person that'd be taking care of her from now on. And it had been on that note that he'd slowly eased Cinder into a talk concerning her own lineage and ultimately the existence of magi.
Cinder could only chuckle a bit, remembering fondly just how flabbergasted she'd been as a kid to learn of what magi could be capable of. It'd been then and there that Vidar had spoken fondly of his own dreams for the world… and in turn that'd been when she decided she'd help her new caretaker, her new 'family.' He'd taken her in and had provided her with everything a child could want, treating her gently yet firmly as he'd raised her, all the while telling her of magi and of what he'd like to achieve.
And from that moment onwards, when she'd been enraptured by Vidar's dreams and decided to help, the man had trained her into a skilled fighter before turning her into a pseudo-magus when she'd been a teenager.
And ever since then, she's been by his side, helping him in a number of ways, from serving as his lab assistant to being a sort of recruiter, in order to help accomplish their dreams.
"That's right, I can't start doubting myself now… not like Morgan." At that last part of her thought, the black haired woman grimaced slightly. Although the others seemed oblivious to it, she alone noticed that Morgan seemed a little different from before. Ever since Surma's failed mission at Beacon Academy, the very tall blonde woman had seemed to be almost eternally concerned about something, no doubt connected to the blond boy that Surma had so grievously injured.
That said, it rather hurt Cinder to think on this; she considered Morgan a good friend in spite of the somewhat standoffish vibe she seemed to give off. After all, the two of them were more or less around the same age (with Cinder grudgingly admitting that Morgan was the younger of the two of them and would age just as gracefully in the future) and with the same sense of gratitude and loyalty towards Vidar. That Morgan now showed the possibility to 'stray' was yet a new worry to add to her list. And to think it was because of that blond boy. But nonetheless, Cinder felt it best to give the younger woman the benefit of the doubt. After all, she knew not the relationship between Morgan and the blond boy and just because there was a possibility of defection didn't mean it was going to actually happen.
So yes, perhaps it'd be in her best interests not to worry so damn much. It wasn't good for her mental state and definitely not for her skin. At that last thought, Cinder chuckled a bit, finding her own slight and subtle self-depreciation a bit amusing to dwell on.
"It'll be okay," she thought lightly. "Everything will all turn out okay. After all, master wouldn't let things escalate that fast."
As she went about her business, she had absolutely no idea just how wrong she'd end up being in the coming days.
And that is that for now. My apologies for it being a little shorter (noticeably so, still) than the previous two chapters, but future chapters will be longer than this one.
That said, in addition to my grandmother's very recent passing (which took some time to deal with), I've also started my summer class as of yesterday (as of when this chapter's postage). It's from Monday to Thursday every week for 6 weeks and as such, the professor is going to be cramming a lot into those 6 weeks. As it now stands, I'll be having homework roughly every day and have 15 hours of lab-work to complete. As a result, I'm going to be rather busy for those next 6 weeks.
However, I more or less seem to have it all planned out already. As long as I can start going to the lab on Monday next week, I can get a little over 2 hours done each day. Meaning that if I do this for 7 days, that 14 hours completed already, so just one hour left to officially do on the 8th day to finish up my lab-work requirement. And since all of my homework will be online, I can do it on the computer during my time at said lab, so two birds with just one stone.
This still doesn't change the fact that I will be busy, so in all likelihood the next chapter will not be up until possibly the end of June, when things are winding to a close in my summer class.
Just… thought you all should be aware of that.
I hope you understand and thank you as always for reading.
Until the next chapter, everyone. Take care.