Thank you to everyone who read the last chapter. I hope you enjoy this chapter!
Chapter 71
Oracion Seis' Brain
Lucy
That giant city was without a doubt Nirvana. The fact that it was walking towards us proved to be a major boon for us. We were able to reach the walking city in no time. For some reason though, Wendelyn insisted that we climb up the second set of legs instead of the first.
We stood at the edge of city on top of the second set of legs. Siegrain and I were the first to get up there. Despite his condition, Siegrain was still able to fly with his magic. I would be lying if I said I didn't enjoy him carrying me.
"I bet you enjoyed that." Wendelyn teased, "Carrying your giiirlfriend?"
Siegrain's eye twitched, and I blushed. I should have seen that one coming. She's been teasing Siegrain the whole time. I would say something, but she honestly scares me. It still blew my mind that there could be someone that powerful and not be a member of the Ten Wizard Saints. I wondered how she might match up against Master Makarov. Siegrain was rank 8 in the Ten Wizard Saints while Master was rank 5. I was sort of interested to see just where she would place.
"Could we please focus?" Totomaru asked as he finished his own climb up the leg.
Wendelyn folded her arms but said nothing. Following Totomaru was Sol, Aria, and Lahar. Once we were all settled, I could see why it was a good idea to climb up the center leg. There was only one building that was lit up in the entire city. That one was the center tower. It was a safe assumption to say that the center tower was the control center of the whole machine. It was strange though that Wendelyn knew which leg to climb up. Maybe she just got lucky?
"Well, I think we can see our destination." Lahar said.
We all silently agreed.
"We should keep an eye out for any of our allies, or Oracion Seis."
Lahar sounded like he was about to go on a tangent about being on lookout, but Wendelyn put a stop to that immediately.
"Yeah, okay. Can we get going?"
Once again, we all silently agreed and headed into the city towards the tower. Lahar seemed a little put off that he was interrupted like that but followed us through the city without argument.
Getting through proved more difficult than I would have hoped. It looked like when the city was lifted from the ground, the tremors caused buildings to collapse and block our way forward. Fortunately, we were well equipped to get around these obstacles. Sol's mastery of the earth element allowed him to clear a decent amount of the rubble, while Siegrain could just as easily fly over it. Ultimately, we were able to reach the central tower with no real resistance.
It was at the central tower that we finally met some adversaries. It was just a bunch of normal dark mages. Phantom Lord's representatives made short work of them. We proceeded up the tower, at the suggestion of Wendelyn. There were more dark mages lying in wait, but it was clear they weren't any trouble. Once again, the Phantom Lord mages made short work of them. I was content to let them do the heavy lifting. I was feeling better than I did when I fought Angel, but it would still be a bit of a strain for me to summon a Celestial Spirit. I don't know about Siegrain, but I didn't think he should be fighting in his position either. Plus, I wasn't sure how much magic he realistically had left.
Finally, we made it to the top of the tower. It was a large control center with magic covering much of the room. It wasn't just raw magic though; this was a special kind of magic. I recognized it as Archive Magic. It was a relatively new magic designed about a decade or so ago. Most likely the Archive was running Nirvana. Whoever set this up must be a genius of some kind. I'm no expert, but I would think linking a modern magic like Archive up to whatever ancient system ran this thing must not be easy.
"So, you got pass the grunts?" came an eerily familiar voice.
It was then that I noticed a dark-skinned man with slicked back white hair sitting amongst the Archives. In his hand was a staff with a skull on the top of it. He stood up and I gasped. He had a few tattoos on him, but there was no doubt about it, I knew this man.
"Yeah, wasn't that hard." Wendelyn replied nonchalantly, "You might want to up your security?"
The man chuckled to himself, "Wendelyn Marvell, President and CEO of Heart Kruez Inc. To what do I owe the pleasure?"
Wendelyn folded her arms, "Oh you know, a giant city appeared out of nowhere and suddenly started walking. I figured I should check it out."
The man turned his attention to me, "I see two of my former pupils are with you. It's been too long, Lucy Heartfilia and Siegrain Fernandes."
"So, it really is you, Professor Alexander." Siegrain replied, somewhat in awe.
He gave us a menacing smile, "In the flesh…but I ask that you refer to me as Brain now. I do have to thank you both though. Training you two proved instrumental in training two other individuals. Perhaps you met them? Do the names Angel and Jellal ring a bell?"
The air in the room became tense. Magic radiated off of Siegrain. I took a step away from him, his earlier outburst still fresh in my mind.
"Going to throw a tantrum again?" Wendelyn asked, "If you are, please try and not endanger the rest of the crew? I really do hate playing the bodyguard."
The tenseness in the air dispersed and Siegrain calmed down. It was then that I realized my heart was racing. Thankfully, I was calming down as well.
"How did you know Jellal?" Siegrain asked through gritted teeth.
"I had originally planned to recruit him for Oracion Seis." Professor Alexander replied, "But that witch Ultear had other plans for him. Maybe if he joined Oracion Seis he would still be alive…"
Siegrain's expression softened into realization, "You have information on Ultear..."
"Why shouldn't I have information on one of the top mages of Grimoire Heart."
The room almost fell silent, if not for Wendelyn's yawn.
"Are we done here? Can we just fight and get this over with?"
The Professor cracked a smile, "Impatient, are we? I was just getting ready to see what Nirvana is truly capable of. And you all get a front row seat to it!"
Professor Alexander pressed a button. An alarm went off as the entire structure began to shake. A bright light was being emitted outside the large window. It wasn't just a light though; it was a massive magic circle. For the sheer size of it though, it didn't feel all that powerful. With the preparations seemingly complete, the magic was unleashed in a massive beam. It effortlessly cut through the forest and made impact on a mountain range far away from us. Saying it made impact was an understatement though, the beam cleaved through the mountain like it was nothing, eradicating a large portion of it.
My eyes widened in horror.
"Like it?" Professor Alexander asked, "That is what Nirvana is truly capable of!"
"Yeah, and?" Wendelyn asked, "You're the one controlling it, right? So when we take you down, Nirvana goes down with you."
Professor Alexander turned back to Wendelyn in annoyance, clearly displeased by her lack of awe, "Fine then, if it's a fight you want, it's a fight you'll get! I could use some new members anyways. Three of my prayers had already been defeated, and Siegrain and Lucy would make fantastic replacements!"
Professor Alexander exerted his magical power onto us. It was impressive, but nowhere near what I felt from Siegrain and Wendelyn. If it weren't for that incident, I may have been scared stiff.
Professor Alexander pointed his staff at me and called out his spell's name, "Dark Capriccio!"
The powerful darkness spell shot from his staff. The beam of darkness shot straight at me, only to be intercepted by a wall of rock. The Dark Capriccio spell hit the rock wall. The wall cracked under the pressure, but ultimately, it was unable to break through.
"Hm, Monsieur, is that the best you can do?" Sol taunted.
"So, you're a little stronger than I assumed," He conceded, "No matter, I'll just have to use a little more magic."
Once more, Professor Alexander shot a darkness spell at me. This time, it was charged with significantly more magic power and broke through the rock wall. I only had a moment to react and jump out of the way. My body moved much faster than I anticipated, and I ended up crashing into Siegrain. I knocked us both to the floor, but I did successfully evade the attack.
In that moment, Totomaru and Aria moved in to strike. Totomaru drew his sword and laced it in red-hot fire. Professor Alexander parried the sword with his staff. Totomaru pushed back on Professor Alexander. I watched as my ex-teacher's eyes widened in surprise. He really wasn't expecting a challenge from us.
Aria appeared behind him and assaulted him with his air space magic. Totomaru easily readjusted and slashed his sword against his chest. Professor Alexander caught himself with one hand and pointed his staff in front of him.
"Dark Rondo!" Several dark ghost-like apparitions appeared and stormed us.
They struck us, but strangely, didn't hurt very much at all. Sure, they knocked me back, but I didn't feel much pain.
"Come on!" Wendelyn complained, "Is that seriously the best you've got!?"
"H-how, how are my spells not working?"
Wendelyn swaggered up to him with an annoyed expression, "I enchanted them. I thought maybe the Guild Master would be a bit more difficult, but you're really nothing more than a pushover. What a disappointment."
Wendelyn's fist descended on the Professor's temple, knocking him out. Before he went unconscious though, I heard him mutter, "Midnight…it's all on you now…that is my prayer."
He hit the floor unconscious.
"Actually, maybe my enchantments were too strong…" Wendelyn mused to herself.
Siegrain and I walked up to Professor Alexander. I couldn't believe that my old instructor was actually a dark mage! What's more, he used me to train Angel! Then there's the fact that he trained both Siegrain and Jellal. It did seem odd to me that Jellal was wizard saint level, when Siegrain only got there thanks to Professor Alexander's teachings. It made sense now, and it was heart wrenching to think such a good man was really so evil.
"That makes three important people in my life, who turned out to be dark mages." Siegrain said.
I placed my hand on his arm. It must be hard for him to see so many people close to him falling into darkness.
"Yeah, and you almost became one yourself." Wendelyn chimed in, "You're welcome by the way."
There was annoyance in Siegrain's eyes, but he didn't dare say anything. He really did have Wendelyn to thank for not becoming a dark mage himself.
"So…" Lahar called out to us, "The good news is, Brain was the one controlling Nirvana."
"So, then we have control of Nirvana, Monsieur?"
Lahara shook his head, "The bad news is, there are two other individuals in command of it. Their names are Midnight and Klodoa."
Siegrain and I walked over to Lahar, who was working on the still active Archive.
"Could you like…hack it or something?" I asked.
"I'm not that good with Archive. Is anyone here skilled enough for that?"
The room went silent. That silence was broken by a cackling.
"Hahaha, in the end we still win!" came a new, sort of raspy voice.
We all turned around to find Professor Alexander's staff standing upright. The skull was glowing from the eyes and the mouth was moving.
"How sad, the staff lives!"
"I've got a name you know, it's Klodoa!"
Totomaru unsheathed his sword, "So if we take you out, that's one less person controlling Nirvana?"
"Geh!" Klodoa seemed to have just realized his mistake.
"W-well I'll have you know!" He never got to finish his sentence. Siegrain fired a beam of magic at the staff and it broke in half. With that, the Archive showed that only one person was left in command of Nirvana.
We all stared at the now broken staff, and Wendelyn voiced our thoughts, "Well, that was anticlimactic."
Thank you for reading. Please review and let me know what you thought of the chapter. Reviews really do help me tell how the story is doing and how I might be be able to improve it.