Disclaimer: Black Clover is owned by Yūki Tabata, Studio Pierrot, and Shonen Jump.
Saga 56: Same Sky Part 2
The Grand Meridian, Neutral Territory, Night
"... Mommy? Who are those two people?" the redhead girl asked while eating next an albino boy and a dark haired boy, "and what are those things on their backs? Are they like wings that big bro Liebe has?"
"Please stop talking, child," begged Lucifer.
"To be fair, you're the one who'd walked into our house uninvited," the dark-haired boy bluntly pointed out as he ate his fish porridge, "we have every right and reason to be asking questions to strangers."
"But still, do forgive us," the albino boy remarked politely, "we don't see that many people around here."
"Usually, they drop dead and I'm the one burying their bodies," the [Stygian] remarked as he sat across Astaroth in the dinner table, "no one's fault, really. Anyone with a lick of magic enters this place, they get sucked dry of their mana first before their lives get siphoned."
"Guilty as charged," the woman who looked like Asta's human pointed out, "come on, kiddos, finish your supper and get some rest for tomorrow."
"Yeah," the three kids remarked as they finished their meals before heading back into their rooms.
With the kids gone, it was just now Astaroth, Claudius/Lucifer, the [Stygian] named Liebe, and the woman who's apparently the mother of the household. As the four stared at each other in awkward silence, each trying to come up with ways to break the quiet, none of them speak for a good while.
"... So," Astaroth spoke first to the woman, breaking the silence, "... you said 'Asta' to me, right?"
"... So you're really him," the woman replied with a tinge of pain in her voice, "... it really has been over 15 years, huh?"
"Mom, what's going on?" asked Liebe, "is this walking corpse really the son you left back at the church in Clover Kingdom?"
The woman nods with regret in her expression.
"... Do you hate me for doing so?" asked the woman.
"I'm not going to hate someone whose name I don't know," Astaroth remarked, "just tell me, who am I really? Why did you leave me there in the first place? And why was I born without any magic like that damn [Stygian] sitting across me?"
"... Asta, please-"
"I go by Astaroth now," the Prince rebuked the woman, "tell me your name."
The woman lets out a deep sigh before she got up and grabbed a kettle with four drinking cups and sets them on the table.
"... My name is Licita," the woman answered as she poured drinks into the cups, "... and yes, I am your mother."
The whole kitchen room goes dead silent yet again upon the revelation being shared.
"... I take back what I said," Astaroth remarked semi-apologetically, "for now, you can call me Asta if it makes you feel any better."
"Shut your friggin' trap," Liebe snapped, "what gives you the right to push around my mom like that?"
"The fact that we two Fallen Angels that you, a mere bottom-feeder [Stygian], is picking a fight against us," Claudius replied threateningly, "I'm only staying my hand only because I'm making an exception to that woman since milord seems to be related to her," the Fallen Angel of [Pride] explained, "don't make me think that you're waiving the right to be spared because of your impudence."
"You two," Astaroth firmly remarked.
"Shut it," Licita snapped, finishing Astaroth's scolding for him, causing the other two to stand down. "... I'm sorry, he means well," she apologized, "he's just a little overprotective."
"Nah, it's just awkward around here," Astaroth replied before clearing his throat, "... can we talk about something else?" he asked, "something like, I dunno, why you left me at the church as a human baby, and why you took in a [Stygian] that looks eerily similar to me?"
"Thank you for pointing that out," Liebe deadpanned, "so I don't have to."
Licita then lets out a really deep sigh before chugging her drink and slamming her cup down onto the table.
"... Okay Asta, Liebe," Licita remarked, her face crinkling as if she swallowed a lemon, "... mom's gonna tell a really, really awkward and possibly traumatic story, so brace yourselves."
"I've seen my entire group of Dark Elves that were under my protection explode into a burr of swords before me weeks ago," Astaroth pointed out, "whatever comes next, it cannot be worse than that."
"My condolences," deadpanned Liebe.
Licita then lets out another deep sigh before she shared her story.
"... The truth is... I lied about being from the Clover Kingdom, Liebe," Licita remarked to Liebe, much to the latter's surprise, "... I'm actually from the Spade Kingdom, specifically, Grinberryall."
"Never heard of em," Liebe pointed out, "and why do they matter?"
"... Well, I was from a certain group of people who weren't born with mana who were under the ruling family's protection. They turn to Demon-worship as a way to curry favor with the powers and implant their powers into our mana-barren bodies, turning us into Adaptors," Licita explained, her expression growing more painfully awkward, "... but, I was the exception."
She then pulls out a jar, pops open its cork, and spills out a carving knife bigger than the jar itself.
"I was born with [Inventory Magic], which allows me to store non-living objects into any containing vessels," Licita explained as she shoved the knife back into the jar seamlessly before closing it, "saves a lot of time and space and makes cleaning house a lot easier."
"Yep, mom's practically a goddess of cleaning," Liebe bragged.
"... So, what happened to you that made you leave?" asked Astaroth.
Licita lets out a quick sigh before explaining.
"... Three things," she heaved out, "the first is, being the only magic user in a covenant full of resentful, non-magical, Demon-worshipping humans made me their punching bag," the woman explained, "my magic couldn't do anything to them, but that didn't stop them from beating the crap out of me on a daily basis, usually with planks and stones, or stones tied to planks," she remarked with a nervous chuckle, her brows now beginning to glisten from the cold sweat precipitating from her head, "I'm honestly surprised that I came out of it with permanent injuries. Not even a malformed bone."
"What made you prevent escaping sooner?" asked Claudius.
"Second, the location," Licita pointed out, "Grinberryall is literally surrounded by three hostile states," she explained, "West was the Kingdom of Avalon, South was the Libratium Duchy, and East was Ulster Alliance. Needless to say, I would've been butchered at any moment should I even walk into the wrong patch of grass," she pointed out with nervous laughter, "Avalon was out to kill my kind, myself included by association, the Duchy was being run by a sadistic despot of a governor of the Zogratis Family, who would've raped, tortured, desecrated, maimed, and put my gutted corpse on display for the hell of it, and Ulster was literally crawling with giant monsters that can easily swallow me whole, and roving bands of brigands didn't help matters either."
"Okay, all of that shit sounds legit terrifying," Liebe remarked before asking, "then what made you want to leave in the first place despite the surrounding danger?"
Before Licita can go on any further, she suddenly goes into a panic attack, first her breathing becoming more sporadic akin to a hyperventilation, then her legs quaked like mad, along with her arms vibrating as if her bones were being struck by an unseen, unknown supernatural force, causing her to fall off of her chair, and finally, she goes into a jittering and spasmodic screaming fit, as if she was being possessed by a malevolent force.
"Mom?!" Liebe called out as he tried to calm Licita down, "MOM! GET A GRIP!"
Upon hearing her foster son's voice, Licita's screams quiet down into heavy breathing as she regained touch with reality.
"... If this hurts too much, we can stop," Astaroth suggested.
"No, I have to get this off of my chest," Licita remarked as she then slapped her own cheeks to maintain focus, "I'm an adult woman taking care of four kids, dammit."
After a few moments of silence, Licita continues on with her story.
"... Asta, I'll be frank with you, if it were under anyone else, I would've stayed in Grinberryall's underground settlement without a second thought," Licita shared her testimony, "but the truth is, my own mother, your grandmother, was the third reason why I left."
Licita then gulps loudly before revealing her name.
"... Her name is Astarte," Licita revealed, "she was the leader of the underground people, and she was not only complicit to my suffering, but solely responsible for making it worse," she remarked, her voice now being tinged with suppressed rage and fear, "at the age of four, she attempted to plant a Demon inside of me as a way of 'salvaging' me into a Contractor, but my own [Inventory Magic] flared at a certain point, taking a ceremonial object away from the ritual's circle, causing the connection to Hell to be severed, and after the failed invocation, my mother then proceeded beat me within the inch of my life."
"... Okay, that's horrific," Astaroth commented in a surprised tone, "but not as bad as I thought-"
"When I turned 13, I suddenly found myself naked in a sealed room with another person in my age," Licita remarked, her voice taking a monotone expression as a way to cope with the impending horrors that she's currently reliving through, "then strange-smelling gas flooded the place from the vents, and by the time I regained my senses, I was straddling him while my hands were in a vicegrip around his neck," she shared her story, now on the verge of breaking down into tears, "... he was your dad, Asta. ... My own bitch of a mother made me kill a guy that I didn't know, save for the fact that he was just as willing as me, as in, not at all!"
Next to Licita, Liebe's expression then begins smoldering in subdued rage.
"... You don't have to call that whore your mother, mom," Liebe's voice trembled out in murderous rage, "she doesn't deserve that kind of adoration after all that she did."
"Hell is too good of a place for that monster wearing human skin," Claudius commented, "why? What was her purpose?"
"You know about the whole congregation that I was born into, and the fact that I was the only one who had magic and didn't have a connection to a Demon?" Licita pointed out before letting out another fearful gulp, "... turns out, I was still considered useful for something after they realized that I was pregnant."
It didn't take much for the three Demons to figure out what they were planning to with her.
"... You ran, didn't you?" Astaroth remarked upon realizing that he would've had more siblings, but in the worst way possible, "you knew that you were just being used to give birth to sacrifices, didn't you?" the Prince pointed out, "you were trying to get me away from being used by Astarte, weren't you?"
"They even chained me to a wall to prevent me from escaping," Licita recalled, her wrists now aching from the shackles that were once around them at their memory, "... but luckily for me, I managed to pick out a dead rat's rib bone and used it as a lockpick and free myself, my jailors forgetting that I had [Inventory Magic], so getting things into my hands wasn't that hard," she remarked, "and upon going outside for the first time in my life, the whole world was completely white with snow. Turns out I was in the middle of a winter solstice, the coldest day in Spade Kingdom, and where everyone stays inside lest the they freeze to death."
"Fate was truly kind to have spared you from death, woman," Claudius complemented before receiving a smack to the head from Astaroth.
"Like you wouldn't believe," Licita remarked half-cackling, "did you know that I almost died twenty-nine times on my journey away from that shitty bitch called Astarte, including the time where I literally had to give birth to Asta in a ditch and rip out the umbilical cord bare-handed?" she explained, "... I think the only thing good that came from that bitch and her beatings was that it made me really resilient. Even bleeding to death didn't even kill me."
"Oh my god, seriously?!" Astaroth cried out before looking at himself, "... I guess my rate of survival also got carried over from you."
"Yeah, mom's friggin' invisible," Liebe bragged, "I saw her kill a boar bare-handed and we didn't worry about food for a whole week."
"Anyway, after getting through the giant-ass Grand Magic Zone known as Ulster during its coldest day, I somehow made it to Clover Kingdom within the skin of my teeth," Licita explained, "unlike the people in Spade Kingdom that I knew, who either viewed me as a piece of meat to be devoured or wanted me dead out of association from Demon-worshippers, the people at a village that I collapsed on were saints. Took me in, cleaned me and Asta, gave us clean clothes, and fed us," she remarked, "... that is, until I found them all dead the next morning."
"What happened?" asked Claudius, "did the whole village get raided? Succumbed to an epidemic? Someone poisoned the well?"
"... No," Licita replied in a melancholic tone, "... it turns out that my [Inventory Magic] can work on living objects," she remarked as tears begun to stream from her eyes, "... mainly, whenever anything with mana gets near me, I drain them dry before I kill them, and I cannot stop my own powers. The kind villagers that took me and you in at our weakest... mom killed them all against her will..."
Licita then breaks down into tears, bawling and sobbing into Liebe's arms.
"... They branded her as a criminal and she was forced to flee after looting what they had so she can start over," Liebe pointed out as his foster mother cried in his embrace, "and I guess that she left you behind so that you didn't lynched along with her."
For the first time in a long time, Astaroth felt as if his past 15 years as a human were nothing short of fate dictating his movements. The reason why he didn't die and never biologically developed mana in the first place so that he wouldn't be killed my his own mother's abnormal condition.
Just as fate had planned to become the Prince of War, this was all also part of Astarte's desires. Was his life his own or just pure outside happenstance that were beyond anyone's control?
Regardless, it was all too clear on what's going on.
Humanity's desire for magic has brought nothing but needless tragedy and destruction. First the Dark Elves that he'd ultimately led to their demise because he wanted to fulfill their desire for vengeance, and now the reveal of the origins of his birth happening because of his own prior mother's suffering that she'd endured because of that bitch who dares to calls herself his grandmother.
"... After hearing all that, I will not blame you for what you did to me," Astaroth remarked, "because if you didn't, I wouldn't be able to comprehend what you've been through."
"... What do you mean?" asked Licita.
"The truth is, I'm not exactly, alive, per say," Astaroth revealed as he stabbed his own chest and pulls out the rotten heart in his current vessel, "I was killed off six months back by a rouge Magic Knight before resurrecting into a Fallen Angel. After that, my own soul was basically moving about in my own corpse, the wings themselves being added onto me prior to my revival," "first I led the Fallen Angels to eliminate the Eye of the Midnight Sun so they wouldn't get in our way later on, after that, we forged an alliance with the Dark Elves to increase our numbers, then I fought Magic Knights at a Dungeon near the Diamond Kingdom, killed three of them and rendered one of them comatose, then after our hiding spot was discovered, we were forced to flee towards Clover Island, fighting Leviathan on our way there, then upon reaching the island, we were set upon by another Demon named Cain, who I managed to beat out of a sucker punch, then we fought an Angel who burned off what was left of Claudius's own wings, and I won because of my [Anti-Magic]."
"... So even I couldn't keep own child from death," Licita sobbed out, "... if I knew, I would've taken you back with me."
"I wish I can take back the time where I let the Dark Elves die before me," Astaroth remarked, "but no matter what, we can't take back our actions," he pointed out, "so the next best thing to do is to plan for the future."
"What do you have in mind?" asked Liebe.
"... I'm going to destroy all magic by becoming the next Demon King," Astaroth explained, "I'll usher in a world where everyone is reliant on their own physical limitations and merits. I'll bring about a new age where no one has to live in fear and persecution. And if anyone has a problem with it, I'll kill them, simple as that," the Prince declared, "because people have been too hooked onto mana to simply give it up without a fight. They want a fight? I'll give them a fucking massacre."
He then found Licita's clean hand touching onto Astaroth's decayed hand.
"... Please, no more," she begged, "I've left you for 15 years. I am not losing you again," she protested, "I've heard your story, you don't need to struggle anymore. I can tell that you have plans, plans to change the world, but the world is too big for just one person to change. I don't hate people in general, I just want to live in peace like everyone else, and last thing on my mind is senseless violence."
"The whole world has already gone mad, Licita," Astaroth pointed out, "I've learned that humans weren't supposed to shoot fire or wind out of their hands, let alone store objects into disproportionately-sized jars! Have you not seen the rain of swords that rained all over the continent?!"
"Wait, rain of swords?" asked Liebe, "the fuck are you talking about?"
Upon hearing that, Claudius rushed out the door to get a closer read at the surrounding place.
This place... Claudius thought as he looked around, ... is borderline sterile of mana, the Fallen Angel discovered upon sniffing the air, realizing that all of the natural environment was completely barren of any traces of the magical, ... that woman's abnormal condition has completely devoured the surrounding mana in the surrounding 10 mile radius! No wonder why the surrounding area looked so clean in comparison to the rest of the continent! There was no mana for Cain's [Damocles Industry] to solidify from the start! Not even the fucking stratosphere even has a lick of mana! he mentally screamed out upon connecting the dots, Just how powerful is that woman?!
"Claudius?" Astaroth asked as the Fallen Angel came back in, "what's going on?"
He then pulls the Prince closer to him and begins whispering to him, their natural telepathy being shut off due to the lack of mana surrounding them.
"Milord, this place might be the best place to recover our bearings," Claudius whispered into Astaroth's ear, "this place literally has no mana, and that woman's mere presence kills anything with it. Plenty of corpses to salvage for body parts for your vessel, and plenty of time for the situation outside to cool down before we reengage."
"You know that I can hear you, right?" Liebe pointed out to the two's surprise, "don't worry, we ain't gonna force you two to stay, in fact, I'd liked if you two never came here," the [Stygian] pointed out, "so, let's compromise; you two can stay as long as you need to, but in exchange, you can't hurt any one of us, and you're gonna help me keep watch around here."
"No objections," Astaroth replied, "provided if we can reassemble our vessels back together and the right to leave when we see fit."
"For the latter, just tell me when you're about to," Licita sighed out, "... the last thing I want to happen is to see my son leave me without saying as so much as a goodbye."
And thus, there were now two additional tenants in Licita's household.
Agartha, Mimo Amazon, Clover/Heart Kingdom Borders, Midnight
"God friggin' dammit!" Rades cursed as he swept his arms across his stone working table of the dissection tools and the pile of body parts, "why can't I even work with him? He should be dead right now!"
Before him laid a body of a young male with light-brown hair wearing a Black Bull's robe over his aquamarine-colored plainclothes akin to that of a villager. His [Soul Corpse Magic] wasn't working on him, since by all accounts, he wasn't even dead.
In fact, there were no signs of decay or rot on him, even after he took a cattle hammer to the boy's skull, the next day, it looked as if nothing had happened to him.
"The hell is going on with this brat?!" Rades cried out in frustration, "all I'm getting is that this cadaver is filling up with mana all by itself! Just what the hell is in it that's making it suck up the surrounding mana like that?!" he cursed out with increasing rage, "is it some sort of parasite? A curse? Some kind of abnormal nonsense I haven't heard of?!" the necromancer continued screeching out, "I've already cut his body open several times, and every time, no matter now many times I modify the damn meatbag, everything reverts back to normal!"
"Your yelling isn't exactly helping matters, crypt keeper," Nikolas suggested in his lamp where his soul was residing in, "cool your head first, then reengage."
"Says the guy who doesn't even have an actual head!" Rades barked back, "get off my case, you poltergeist!"
"And who's fault is it for bringing me here?" deadpanned the electric ghost in a brass shell, earning him another yell from the enraged [Soul Corpse Magic] practitioner.
"May I ask," Mammon asked as he appeared out of nowhere between the two, "what is causing this kind of commotion?"
"This damn brat's corpse ain't doing shit with my magic!" Rades remarked as he picked up the boy's body by its wrist and hung and flung it around like a doll, "even after six fucking months, I can't even leave a fucking dent on it before it goes back to way it was!"
"An undying body whose soul is not present," Mammon commented as he dug up his host Morris's memories of his notes and documents, "... hm, this sounds like the post-mortem signs of Overgauge."
"... The hell is that?" asked Rades.
"An abnormal amount of magic born within an insufficient body," Mammon explained as he surveyed the body brimming with mana before switching out to Morris, "how strange, this is the second time I've seen such phenomenon. First time was with a Shining General candidate from Project H.O.L.O.N. I've worked with. Rather an enthusiastic fellow, if me and my host recall correctly."
"So you're saying that this boy before us was born with an abnormal amount of mana but didn't have the body to compensate for it?" Nikolas pointed out, "how is that possible?"
"There are such things as mutation genes within a person," Morris continued explaining, "it's been theorized that there were a time when humans didn't have magic, and our exposure to magic as a whole drastically increased our chances of genetic mutation. Granted, the chance of mutation is relative, so it's still abysmally low, but more possible."
"That still doesn't explain why this damn thing is still fresh," Rades pointed out, "what, is the excess mana making the damn thing regenerate like some sort of fungi infestation?"
"Actually, yes," Morris answered before switching back to Mammon, "the boy's composition is rather unique. A soulless body that cannot be destroyed completely... there might be some use to this thing."
"How?!" cried out the necromancer, "this thing's a fucking dud! I can't assume control over it since my [Soul Corpse Magic] only works on dead and rotting bodies!"
"Give it a soul," Mammon replied, "basically, like what I did with Morris's, although my case was rather consensual, and because that boy can't say no, implies consent."
The two then look at Nikolas, mainly at the fact that he's a soul lacking a mobile body.
"... You know," Rades remarked, "you said that your body was taken from you, correct?"
Before Nikolas can protest, he looks at the fresh body of the boy's before looking at himself as he let out a sigh.
"... Touché," commented Nikolas as he was then placed next to the shell of a body.
"Okay, before we get started, here's the breakdown," Mammon remarked, "our goal is to implant Nikolas's soul into the body while making sure that said body doesn't implode during the process. We're not trying to make a zombie here, we're effectively trying to bring someone back good as new."
"Sounds like Sally's job if more than anything," Rades pointed out, "your two's magic are [Result Magic] and [Transplant Magic], correct?"
"Imagine the latter as a scalpel and the former as stitching," Morris spoke out after switching with Mammon, "Rades, your job is to make sure that the mana current between Nikolas and the boy's body remains stable during the transfer. Meanwhile, I'll be engaging the transfer process itself and Mammon will be there to seal the deal," the scientist points out before Mammon returns to the forefront, "any questions before we start?"
"Uh, yes," Nikolas remarked, "what do I do?"
"... Don't die?" Mammon pointed out, to which the ghost then lets out a sigh as the process begins.
"Here we go," Morris remarked as he and Mammon's hands placed themselves over the boy's body, "[Transplant: Nikolas Tesla] to [Body]."
Rades then provides a way for the soul into the body, just as how would he plant his own mana into the corpses to use them as puppets. Only this time, he was working with a living soul, something that he'd never handled before, and the last thing he wants to do is piss off a Demon, as much as if he doesn't give two shits about the guy that he was holding onto.
He never cared for anyone to begin with, so why was he doing this? Was he going soft, or is the Demon subtly making him comply with his magic?
Either way, him handling Nikolas's soul entering into the young boy's body then caused the corpse to open its eyes into a pair of blinding lights.
"Now, the hard part; stabilization," Morris remarked before he switched out to Mammon, "on my mark, I want you to exert your mana around the body and form a shell to contain it while I try to integrate the soul into the new body," the rascal Demon explained, "fail, and the blast will kill everyone within a mile-wide radius."
"Geez, no pressure or anything!" Rades cried out as he then adjusted his mana to form itself around the body, which began screaming in a distorted voice of a young male's and an aged man's mashed together into an unholy cacophony that ground against the necromancer's ears.
Meanwhile, the Demon before Rades, kept a cool head in spite of sweat dripping from his brows, which then a handkerchief floats across his brows and wipes the dew off, all the while trying to stabilize the volatile cocktail of magic and human soul rattling before him.
I'd say, this does remind of the time I've worked on my Hecatoncheires Drive for the boy, Morris thought as he and Mammon worked together to keep Nikolas's soul and the Overgauged body from causing a fission that would trigger an explosion with both of their magics, one misstep resulting in my life being ended in a flash of flame and lightning burning me to a crisp? Oh, what a thrill!
You're enjoying this too much, Mammon commented before his expression shifted into a glee, just the way I like it! Life is not worth living without trying new things! Not that the necromancer needs to know that I have no idea what I'm doing, but it's working anyway!
The buzzing of the light then reaches its crescendo, followed up by a blinding explosion of light that engulfed the two.
Upon the light slowly fading away, an uproarious laughter boomed out from between Rades and Mammon.
"SPLENDID!" Nikolas's voice thunder out, revealing himself to have successfully taken the young boy's body for himself, "ABSOLUTELY SPLENDID! THE WIND AND FABRIC CARESSING AGAINST MY SKIN! THE WEIGHT OF THIS BODY'S FLESH AND BONE BEING PULLED DOWN BY GRAVITY! VISION! VOICE! VASCULAR FUNCTIONS! I, NIKOLAS TESLA, HAVE BEEN REBORN!"
Then strands of electricity were then sprayed out all over from his body, with Rades ducking for cover whereas Mammon simply used both of his allotted magics to simply redirect the lighting around itself.
"... Hmm, too messy for my liking," Nikolas commented as he then snapped his fingers, transforming the wild bolts of lighting into glowing doves that each crackled with electricity, with one of them landing on his finger before cuddling its cheek against his own, "... yes, I've missed you too."
The dove made of lightning cooed in return.
"The Overgauged mana being reined in by the soul's skill of control magic," Morris commented, "results have surpassed expectations. Well done! That's another success added to my bucket list! And I couldn't have done it without you, Rades."
"... Uh, yeah," the necromancer awkwardly remarked, "... no problem?"
Genuine gratitude; a feeling that never crossed his mind before and after joining the Eye of the Midnight Sun.
No one thanked him for burying the bodies of the deceased, only looking at him with disdain as if they were looking at a disease-riddled rat.
No one recognized him during the Magic Knight Entry Exams, his powers to control the dead being written off as heretical and dangerous.
And no one batted him an eye when contributing to the Eye of the Midnight Sun, seeing him as another expendable pawn in the grand scheme of things.
For the first time, he's was accepted. By a literal Demon of all kinds of people.
... He honestly didn't know what to make of this alien feeling.
... Hm, so emotionally starved that he can't even comprehend gratitude, on top of massive lack of impulse control, Mammon thought upon seeing that his [Result Magic] couldn't sway Rades to feel grateful since he never had the concept in his mind to begin with, ... perhaps staying with them for longer than anticipated might prove... fruitful.
Terra Cotta Dormitory, Residential District #2, Libratium, Spade Kingdom, Early Morning
"... Can't sleep," Fana groaned out while lying on her bed, eyes wide open as bloodshot pie plates, "... I'm bored."
She then gets up from her cot, heads to the communal washroom and heads towards the mess hall to collect herself.
Damn vixen planting that fucking thought into my head, Elf!Fana grumbled out inside Human!Fana's head, so we're going to be off worse than dead should we end up finding our own dead body in the future? How the fuck does that work?!
"... Please shut up," Fana groaned out as she sat listlessly on one of the chairs that she took down from the table, "... you're not the only one with that kind of shit running through her head. After all, we share a body."
Goddammit woman! Keep your noes out of my thoughts! Elf!Fana barked out in her head.
But before the argument can escalate any further, Salamander than manifests itself before the girl in its lizard form before it then bites both of Elf!Fana's and Human!Fana's noses by simply biting the physical nose that both Fanas felt at the same time.
"OWOWOWOWWW!" both Fanas chittered out as their Salamander swayed on their faces by their teeth before letting go and landing onto the table before them, "WHAT WAS THAT FOR?!"
"He says that just 'looking at you two argue is becoming painful to watch'," a young boy's voice called out from behind, "but that's strange, because there's only one person."
As Fana turned towards her back, she then saw a brown-haired boy in his pre-teens with a simple green vest over his simple white and gray top with dark blue pants with simple brown leather boots before her. But standing on his shoulder wasSmurf, the miniature clayman was first seen working at the reception desk when they first arrived inside Libratium.
"... Who are you?" Fana asked, with Elf!Fana paying more attention to Smurf.
"I'm Klein!" the boy replied in a chipper tone, "and Kreiger's my dad! I always see him off every time he goes out for groceries!"
That boy... Elf!Fana commented as she viewed the two before her through Human!Fana's eyes, ... he has a spiritual connection with that tiny dirt doll on his shoulder. Not only that, his mana isn't like that of humans that I used to know!
"Hey miss!" the boy called out, snapping both Fanas back into reality, "what's that Sith's name? Mine is Smurf!"
"... He doesn't have one," Fana answered, while looking at Salamander, the latter returning with a judgmental look that screamed-"you're on your own, missy".
To name one of the Four Elemental Spirits akin to a pet is pure sacrilege! Elf!Fana rebuked, Salamander isn't some house pet that you can coddle-
"Hey miss, can pet your Sith?" Klein asked.
Before either Fanas can answer, Salamander simply hops onto the boy's shoulder before it cuddled its own cheek against Klein's own.
"Hehe, I think it likes me!" the boy giggled out as the two Fanas looked at the scene in utter disbelief.
"... I think it's testin' us," Human!Fana commented.
Whoever he is, this kid ain't normal, Elf!Fana remarked, even for Spade Kingdom standards.
"Coming!" the boy cried out as a knocking sound was heard from the door, "oh hey, Mr. Milkman!"
"Lunar Milk Emporium, I got your six bottles," the milkman said from outside the door followed up by the sounds of glass bottles clanking, "thank you for your patronage."
The door was then shut as Klein takes the milk bottles into the kitchen before the Mess Hall.
"Want some warm milk to cheer you up?" asked Klein as he poked his head over the kitchen countertop, "dad always said warm milk is a medicine for a hurt soul."
Fana then lets out a tired sigh before heading into the kitchen with Klein.
"... Want me to help you out with the stove?" Fana asked.
"Don't worry, I know how to use the kitchen no problem!" Klein replied with a thumbs-up.
Normally, I'd object to receiving charity from a human child, Elf!Fana pondered, ... but yes, I do need something to distract me from my own gripes. Get me an extra-large mug if he has any.
Salamander, upon sensing its bounded partners calm down a little, it then lets out a sigh of relief. Although no one was there to see it, it was enough for the Fire Spirit to see the two souls somewhat improve their relationship, or at least, not hate each other outright.
Black Bulls Base (Travel Mode), Mimo Amazon, Clover/Heart Kingdom Borders, Morning
"UP AND AT EM!" Henry's energetic voice echoed out through the walls of the base, waking everyone who've heard it, "WE STILL GOT LOTS OF GROUND TO COVER, SO LET'S BOUNCE!"
"... Good grief, I missed the time when Henry was quieter," Yami grumbled out as he crawled out of his bed and did his morning routine, sans feeding his beasts, which he let go due to them already finding mates after they've escaped during the Capital attack that somehow reached all the way to the Common Realm.
In the base's communal washroom, he found members of Green Mantis and Crimson Lion Kings taking their turns washing up.
"Mornin' capt'n!" Magna saluted Yami.
"What's up?" Yami remarked as he brushed his teeth alongside with his fellow captain, Jack.
"Keh keh keh!" Jack cackled out as he gargled on his water before spitting it out, "how come your washrooms are cleaner than what I have at my base? Damn lazy shitheels, I'm checking on your progress to see if you've been slacking during your cleaning shifts, you hear me?!"
"Jack, please stop demoralizing your own men," Fuegoleon chided the lean and gaunt captain, "we're on an urgent mission right now, and last thing we need is reduced performance when in combat."
The three captains then hear an explosion coming from the other side of the base, followed up by screaming from the other Magic Knights.
"THERE'S A TIME AND A PLACE FOR EVERYTHING, YOU DAMN DIRTY APES!" Mereoleona roared out, "WHO SAYS YOU CAN TAKE A PEEK WHILE IT'S THE WOMEN'S TURN?! DO THAT WHEN WE'RE AT A NATURAL HOT SPRINGS OR SOMETHING!"
Another explosion then followed shortly after, the plume of hot smoke blasting into the men's washroom, the captains themselves remaining unfazed.
"... Pot calling kettle black there, Vermillion," deadpanned Yami.
"Leave her be, she'll calm down when she feels like it," Fuegoleon remarked as he walked away from the communal sink.
"Keh keh, now if they only had that kind of balls during active combat, then I wouldn't have any reason to threaten em back to the front," Jack remarked before he walked away.
After Yami finishes shaving his stubble, he walks out of the washroom and runs into the Crimson Lion King's vice-captain, completely nude, but radiating in pure rage.
"Please put some clothes on," Yami remarked.
"Later," Mereoleona replied with a snarling voice, "my blood is already pumpin' and I need to find the culprit so I can pounce em."
"Then please stop destroying my base," Yami begged in his usual dry tone.
"Make me," the female vice-captain rebuked.
"Henry."
A trapdoor opens up below her feet, causing her to fall into the hole that leads elsewhere before the floor closed back up again, but away from Yami, and allowing Henry to repair the damages done.
"... Sorry about for pushing you this hard, Henry," Yami remarked.
"No need," Henry replied through the intercom, "I feel like I go on forever."
"Well, just be there for breakfast," Yami replied as he walked down the halls, "also, share this time. When someone makes Charmy looks as if she was fasting, you know that you're a glutton on an unprecedented scale."
"Got it," Henry replied before he turned off his intercoms and headed to the main lounge.
Down there, the rest of the Magic Knights were gathered, each having their own share, with Mereoleona plopping into the room from the open ceiling, landing onto the cough wearing a frilly baby-blue calico dress with a bonnet, the doll-like attire clashing horribly with here fiery appearance.
"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't beat the shit out of you," Mereoleona threatened Yami as her [Fire Magic] flared out of her into that of a lioness, causing everyone, save for the few bold or stupid, both being Jack's case, "for no, not even my own mother, has dared to put me into a dress."
"My house, my rules," Yami pointed out, completely unfazed as he huffs a cigarette in front of her face, "wreck my shit, I wreck your image."
"... Well played, Yami," Mereoleona complemented with a scoff, "out of all the Magic Knights here, you are the only one that deserves to keep his balls."
"Sis, you gonna change back?" asked Leopold before he was then bonked over his head by Mereoleona.
"Bah, saves times from actually going back up," she remarked as she bit into her toast, "I'll take this as another challenge. See what it feels like to move in a skirt. Maybe it might end up making my kicks stronger because of the sheet around my waist and blocking my legs?"
Henry then plopped himself next to Mereoleona, looking more healthy compared to his past sickly self, as indicated by a ponytail tying his massive bale of hair to the back to reveal his soft-looking eyes. He was still relatively thin, but after his binge yesterday, he wasn't looking pale, there being a bit of coloration to his prior-pallid skin.
"Gotta hand it to ya," Mereoleona remarked as she pulled Henry closer to her, her tomboyish mannerisms again clashing badly with her doll-like attire that she was in, "for a string bean, you're pretty good, aren't ya?"
"Only when I'm sufficiently fed of mana," Henry replied, "my own condition renders me completely immobile if I go below a certain threshold as a way to keep my own remaining mana in me to keep me alive," he remarked as he drank his orange juice, "... couldn't even starve myself to death as long as I had a drop of mana in me, even after my own legs atrophied to jerky meat. It was quite a mortifying experience after my parents left me all by myself, leaving me trapped in my own bed, in a manor in the middle of the woods, and after Captain Yami literally busted down the front door before sticking around the place, he was the man that I knew that I'd follow for the rest of my life."
"Holy crap, dude," Leopold remarked as he rubbed his bump on top of his head, "... I really gotta work on my mental fortitude if I want to keep up with you."
"I'm curious, though," Fuegoleon remarked as he remembered his time when he first met Henry and Brigid coming out drained, "how come when I allowed you to take some of my mana I was perfectly fine, but that Ulsterian sorceress came in, she came completely drained?"
"It's a little odd, but I think I have a theory," Henry remarked, "Fuegoleon, like everyone else here, has human flesh and bone completely divorced from the magical workings, and uses mana like tools," he pointed out, "Brigid however, her flesh and bones were made of mana, hence they weren't divorced from how magic works, and thus I ended up draining more from her. It can said that being a living being that uses magic, against per say, a being made entirely out of magic, the former provides some degree of protection from spells or curses that target mana directly, whereas Brigid is like a sentient spell that can easily be disassembled in a flash by those same spells, despite her powers alone being more than enough to level the entirety of Clover Kingdom to bedrock several times over."
"Interesting!" Mereoleona remarked as she pounded her knuckles against her other hand, "as soon we meet, I'm gonna take a swing at her to make myself stronger!"
"Oi! They're mine!" Jack cried out, only having eaten a single apple slice and Sekke being threatened into eating the rest, "I still have prior claim to kicking their asses!"
"Says the idiot who got his ass kicked by just one of them. If I didn't know you any better, I'd figured you'd be a closet masochist," Yami deadpanned, with Jack himself being held back by Mereoleona by only one hand gripped on top of his head, "and also, Brigid's out cold when I took her back to the tavern on the giant pig, they said she'll be fine, but it'll take a while for her to be back in working order again."
"You even took her out before me?" Mereoleona remarked as she still held up Jack in an iron grip as she looked at Henry with a toothy grin, "interesting! Perhaps we can train you into becoming even stronger!"
"No no, my own magic only allows me to control the base's structure freely," Henry pointed out, "the mana draining is only part of my condition."
"Even better!" Mereoleona replied, still unconvinced at Henry's claim, "train hard enough, and you can probably make the whole base grow wings and fly!"
But before anyone else can contribute to the conversation, several black canisters were then broken through the base's windows.
"Ha?" Sekke remarked as he kicked one of the shells rolling around the floor, "the heck is this thing?"
Upon kicking it, the shell then opens up its vents, releasing a blast of noxious gas from it, followed up by the rest of the shells doing the same, causing everyone's eyes and noses to burn at the putrid stench vile enough to make them lose their meals prior eating them this morning.
"My eyes! My eyes!" Henry cried out as his eyes turned bright red.
"EVERYONE OUTSIDE!" Yami barked out as he reinforced his right fist with his [Dark Magic] to add more weight into his blow, leveling the segment of the base's wall to create a hole large enough to allow everyone present to escape.
"Keh," Jack clicked his own tongue as he made it outside with everyone else, "so much for not wrecking the base."
"My base, my rules," Yami heaved out, now looking around to see where the perpetrators came from, "my ki's out of whack just from the smell alone," he remarked to himself before recalling where he was right now, "... wait, we're at the Mimo Amazon, right?"
"Yes," Fuegoleon remarked as he tried not to vomit from the inflicted stench coming off of his clothes, "... and the stench itself is like that of the Rainbow Stinkbug's, but a million times worse."
"Waah!" Charmy cried out in distraught, "who would do such thing of ruining a peaceful breakfast?! Don't they know that breakfast is the most important meal of the day?!"
And again, just as anyone else were about to chime into the conversation, everyone present then heard a fain sound of buzzing heading towards their direction, and it wasn't from the noxious gas burning their eardrums.
Quickly surrounding them were a swarm of giant, human-sized insects of various taxonomies, with the one in the front being the most humanoid in its posture and bearing, discounting the pair of blades sheathed around its waist. In general, the insect itself resembled a vaguely humanoid kuwagata beetle from Hanafuda but with a faded dark-turquoise colored carapace that resembled steel armor, its two pairs of translucent wings beating rapidly to cause a vibration that emitted a buzz-sound in the air along with the rest of the swarm of its ilk, and above its two crossed legs and four crossed arms was a head with a pair of glowing topaz eyes with a mandible mouth skittering and creaking below it, staring holes at them menacingly as it hovered with the rest of the swarm.
"... I'm no insect expert or anything," Leopold remarked, "but I get the feeling that they aren't from around here."
"You're right," Yami replied as he drew his blade, his danger senses screaming past critical to warn him of the threat laid before them, "you can say that they're an invasive species."
The leader then uncrosses its four arms as it drew its swords.
"NameBakasuraSinof[Indulgence]," the head insect chittered out in a garbled voice of that of a male's and female's spoken together, "preparetobedevoured."
"Hah, dunno what it said, but I don't care!" Mereoleona remarked with her trademark gusto, again, clashing horribly with her current dress, "I'm about to be the world's first person to kick Demon ass while wearing a dolly dress!"
"Keep your wits about you," Randall calmly pointed out as he readied himself into a fighting stance, "their numbers imply that they're individually weak, but there's more of them than all of us."
"Bah hah!" Sekke gaffed out, "a bunch of insects against us Magic Knights? Give a break!"
"I know you're scared..." En pointed out, who himself was still bracing himself for the coming battle, "... I am too, but I won't go down gently."
"Any of you shitheads even think about running or dying, I'll kill you myself," Jack ordered as he brandished his [Death Scythes] on his forearms, "until then, consider this mission pest extermination!"
"Devourdevourdevour," the horned leader declared by pointing one of its dual blades towards the Magic Knights, signaling the swarm to charge.
"... No such thing as an easy day," Yami grumbled to himself as he coated his katana's blade with his [Dark Magic], "... bring it."
The Magic Knights and the giant swarm then begin their clash amidst the rising sun behind their base of defense.
To Be Continued...
Author's Notes: And here we are, the borders of Heart Kingdom already begins in an ambush.
Recovered from my writer's block and managed to finish the grinding events in time, so I am feeling pretty good right now.
Hopefully, next week's writing session doesn't end up as that much of a slog to get through. Hoping at least.
References:
- Licita's three kids are based off of the three main protagonists Emma, Norman, and Ray from The Promised Neverland.
- [Overgauge]/aka, "Mana Cancer" is named after Fate/Grand Order's "Overgauge" state for boss fights. It's symptoms are like the basic functions of what cancer does, but without the tumors and the soul of the native body being strained rather than tumors that sap away all vital sources within the body.
- Nikolas Tesla's lighting dove constructs are his real-life allusion's romantic infatuation with a pigeon in lieu of a human woman.
- Klein's outfit is partially based off of Kazuma Satou's adventurer's outfit. Overall design is loosely based off Rudeus Greyrat from Jobless Reincarnation. His name also means "small" in German, so it made sense for him to a preteen around Violet's age.
- The vanguard leader of the giant insect Demons is based off a Cardfight! Vanguard Megacolony Unit, Unrivaled Blade Rouge, Cyclomatooth. The name Bakasura means "man-eater" in Sanskrit, and an infamous monster in the Epic of Mahabharata. Also the way it speaks is the fast-speaking of Shaw from Arknights, only to accentuate their bizarre and manic nature rather than Shaw's squirrel-speak.
- The "Devourdevourdevour" was derived from Necalli's catchphrase "Devour!" from Street Fighter V.
Hypothetical Voices (for funsies, as usual):
Klein: Rumi Okubo (JPN), Emi Lo (ENG)
Bakasura (in a voice of legion-style): Takashi Matsuyama & Rika Tachibana (JPN), Mark Swint & Sarah Williams (ENG)
So, what do you guys think of this Saga?
Please leave a comment or a review, for I'd like to know what my audience is thinking!