Windcutter's Ridge, Human Empire, Ilia

"We're going to finish this quickly."

Ilia watches in awe as the field below them is bombarded with Thermal and Metallic arts from the sky, a combination of Jaymes' own design. The shrieks and roars from the kobolds echoes across the mine, topped by the kobold lord's roar of fury. For now, that should take care of the kobolds, leaving their leader isolated for the time being. If any survived the raining, fiery metal, Illfang is sure to heal them with that dagger, so Jaymes proposed to hit the Divine Beast hard and fast before they're surrounded.

Ilia grabs her steel sword and glances at her senior, who nods and slides down off the cliff into the dense smoke below, Ilia right behind her. Jaymes takes to the air, catching the lord's attention. Unable to see Medina, she hears her call out her Release Recollection, summoning her ancestors to assist in battle. They won't number as many as she could summon wayfarers, but for now, it'll have to do.

As for herself, Ilia unsheathes her steel sword as she spots Illfang's form. She takes notice she's on the left side, the dagger held tight by the upper appendage while the talwar fights against Medina and her bloodline while being annoyed by the aerial warrior. Leaping into the air, she bellows out a roar as she swings down on the wrist. Her sword cleaves halfway through, but enough to cause Illfang great pain and spurt blood all over Ilia.

She makes a second swing, calling on the goddesses to grant her strength, and dismembers the left hand, preventing Illfang from healing anyone. She drops to the ground and rolls away from the screeching beast."Medina! The dagger is free!"

"Right! Jaymes!"

"Here." Jaymes lands beside Medina, and the two share a glare at Illfang. "Ready?"

"Ready. Enhance Armament!" Red lycoris petals blossom from the Mirage Sword into the air. Jaymes sprints and holds his sword up as the petals surround Falchion. As he charges the stunned Illfang, his sword shines with radiance.

"Enhance Armament! Hiiiyaaaaah!" Jaymes thrusts his sword Illfang, the tip landing on the belly of the beast. The monster twitches as the enhanced strike of Jaymes' blade courses through it. From far behind, Medina sheathes Mirage, and as soon as the click between the hilt and the sheath is heard, the lycoris petals erupt from within Illfang. Ilia grimaces at the gruesome display, but it is a necessary evil to ensure the beast is dead to rights.

As Illfang collapses, its eyes lifeless, the blood-bathed Jaymes steps away and puts Falchion back in its home. "We're done here. Ilia, grab that dagger." Ilia follows Jaymes' instructions and removes the dagger from Illfang's sliced hand. She heads to him to give him the dagger. "Let's see the Stacia Window for it." He draws an 'S' in the air, the dagger's identification appearing to them. "Aha! Here…. And these two… Object Control Authority and System Control Authority. Ilia, what's your highest value?"

"I think my System Control Authority by a little bit."

"Hmm. Looks like you can use it. With this, we can help everyone."

Ilia doesn't understand. "Um, Jaymes, what are you saying?"

"Technically, I shouldn't give you this, Fanatio will rip me a new one, but for now it should be fine." He hands her back the dagger, smiling gently. "For now, we'll bypass the rules and use them to heal the villagers. But once you're approved, I want that to become your Divine Object."

"W-W-W-What? But I'm still a trainee!"

Medina shrugs. "So? Ronie and Tiese have been approved for Divine Objects, why shouldn't you? If anything, you deserve it more than they do. I mean, sure you don't have a dragon yet, but you have won the right to wield the knight's power. You've fought every Divine Beast since this began, so you've proven yourself worthy of being a knight in the order. But if that's how you feel right now-"

Ilia shakes her head and bows. "I-I accept!"

"Such a character."

"Mhm… Ah, it seems that barrier is gone now. Let's hurry up and return to Rulid."

Upon returning to the village, Jaymes instructed Selka to gather all the sick in one spot. Allowing Ilia to shine, she points the dagger at the ailing people, and in one flash of divine light, their wounds and bruises are gone. Ilia sighs in relief as she glances from the celebrating villagers to the dagger in her hand. "Amazing…"

"Still think you're unworthy?"

Ilia looks up to Medina, her senior's eyes warm and cheerful. "Medina, I… No, I think I'm fine now, seeing what this dagger can do. Although, I would prefer it to be a sword, nonetheless."

"Jaymes can change that. If Administrator could turn gems into a sword, we should be able to do the same for a dagger while retaining its properties."

Ilia takes a glance at the red knight, situated away from the crowd. "He's amazing… Oh, but you are too, Medina!"

"Haha. indeed he is. Don't forget to thank him." Medina looks away, her uplifting attitude disappearing as she turns to the villagers. "Administrator's presence kept the Divine Beasts at bay, and whether it's true or not, they're somehow correlated with the new enemy. One thing is sure, we prevented an invasion."

"They had a lot of those blue ores smelted into weapons."

"...I fear this is just the prelude to something deadlier than the Clamp Crises or the war. But for now, we must-" Medina is interrupted by a resounding roar in the sky. Looking up, she sees a grey dragon circling the village, with black armor and reins on its head and belly. Wait a minute… That's Kirimai, Eydis's dragon!

Hearing a pop from the ground, Jaymes enters Ilia's sight as he flies towards the dragon. It takes off, heading south towards the forest, and the Lord of Knights gives chase. Medina, frowning, grabs Ilia's shoulder. "Come on! If that's Eydis, she's drawing him away from us into danger!"

"Right behind you!"

Obsidia Castle, Dark Territory, Mia

After two hours of searching-and two hours of fruitless searching-Mia and Arthurio rejoin Kirito, Ronie, Supreme Commander Iskahn, Sheyta, and Brunhild on the ground floor of the castle. No information on the kidnapper was received by the party that visited the mage guild's, but they had plenty to share.

"At the guild, they don't have a handle on the mages who went missing in the war, and they haven't been doing any experimentation on augmenting minions. I questioned them as the supreme commander, and by the Law of Power, they can't lie to me,"

"There was one lead, however," Sheyta adds. "About a month ago, at a clay-harvesting spot under the guild's control, a large amount of the finest clay that had already been extracted and bagged went missing."

"A large amount? Like…how much?"

"Around enough to make three minions, they said. They handled the incident internally and didn't report it to the Council of Five…Though I doubt we could have predicted this would happen today, even if we'd been aware of the theft…"

"A month ago…Then it probably does have something to do with the incident in Centoria," Kirito says under his breath.

"We already got the report from the guards…but how did your search go?"

"Well…we searched from the top floor to the storage room all the way underground and didn't find any minions or Leazetta. It wouldn't even matter if there were hidden rooms or spaces you didn't know about. As long as they weren't hiding someplace completely isolated from consecutive space, they couldn't have evaded my searching ability."

"If you say it, then it must be true…Which would mean they have to be far, far away by now…"

Mia silently thinks about the situation to herself. How could they let the castle be attacked in the absence of the emperor; nay, who is bold enough to attack the castle in the absence of the emperor? Sure, he has his enemies beyond the Council of Five, but this act of cowardice enrages her. To kidnap little Leazette and demand Iskahn to either slay Kirito or have his infant daughter slain instead, that's cruel.

"…Oh! Um, Lady Sheyta…," Ronie says as she rushes over to the Integrity Knight "Near your bedroom, is there another large obsidian door like the front gate here?!"

"Obsidian door…? No, all the doors around are wooden, and the window frames are iron."

"Are there any mechanisms that would involve stone scraping on stone…?"

"Oh! When the guards said they heard a sound like a stone mortar and pestle! Yes…if there's a hidden door on the exterior of the castle, it might make that kind of noise…but…"

"But if it was just a hidden door, your nose could sniff it out?" Iskahn finished. He crossed his arms. "Plus…I've never heard about anything like that near our bedroom. Besides, why would you put a secret door on the outside that no one can use? It wouldn't make sense unless you could fly."

"What if…it's not a secret door…?" Kirito muttered, looking up at the ceiling of the great hall. "You said it yourself, Iskahn. The real top floor is above the current top floor of the castle."

The commander, ambassador, mage, and two knights all gasp at the same time. "The…the fiftieth floor…? B-but it's sealed airtight, and the guards saw that the chains weren't cut."

"What about from the outside? Is there even a single window on the fiftieth floor?"

"Yes and no," Arthurio explains. "When the emperor is here, there's a huge window in the throne room, but now it's just solid rock in its place from the outside."

"It must have closed up," Kirito says with certainty. "When Vecta died and the chains resealed the room, the stone outside must have moved to cover up all the windows. The space was completely cut off from the rest of the world. The stone-grinding sound the guards heard was the rock moving once again."

"But…but…," Iskahn pales as he struggles to speak. "Only Emperor Vecta and Emperor Jaymes can undo the seal on the fiftieth floor. Jaymes is in the Human Empire right now, right?" Mia nods. If her master was here, she'd notice it immediately. "Would that mean the one who abducted Lea is…?"

He grits his teeth, too horrified to finish that sentence. Mia herself feels her rage burning at just the mere thought of what Iskahn implies. The group remains silent until Sheyta's voice cuts through it. "Let's go to the fiftieth floor."

Kirito nods in agreement. "Yes. We might learn something if we examine the door."

"So the seal's not broken." Iskahn releases the chain and places his hands on the dark double doors that separate them from the path to the throne room, then his ear to the surface. "...I don't hear anything, but if Lea's anywhere inside the castle, it's got to be here." He turns back to Brunhild, looking back with a minuscule of what Mia would describe as hope. "Can you sense the emperor now?"

Brunhild is quiet for a moment, then makes a relieving nod to the group. "Yes, now I can. But...the way we speak is him initiating the conversation, not me. So no, I cannot speak to him."

"Dammit!" Iskahn steps away from the door then turn and take a fighting stance, his clenching right fist glowing red with fire, heating the chilly air. Mia believes he's going to punch the chain until Kirito steps forward.

"I'll do it, Iskahn."

"No…let me do this."

"Save your fist for the fight against the minions and kidnappers. Plus, I'm good at this sort of thing,"

Iskahn looks at Kirito, exhales, and releases the energy and stance"You can get away with anything, can't you? Fine…it's all yours,"

Kirito steps up to the chains, placing a glowing hand on them. Mia doesn't doubt Kirito could break the chains, but she wonders how her master will respond once he learns about this. Of course, the chains might not break at all. The closest anyone got was Lady Sheyta, and that was creating a shallow mark in the center of the chain.

A mark Kirito finds, Sheyta reconfirms, and Kirito says he'll use it for himself. He takes a few steps back and draws the pitch-black blade from his back. A sword just as legendary as her master's, Mia has heard the tales of Kirito's success from Ronie. His sword, the Night-Sky Blade, was created from a branch of a resource-sucking tree in the northern lands of the empire combined with metal. It took a year for it to be crafted, and the longsword has done many deeds since. It took Kirito through the Central Cathedral against several Integrity Knights, the Prime Senator, and Administrator herself. Jaymes used it himself in the second bout against Administrator alongside Falchion. When Kirito woke up again during the war, that very blade illuminated the dark sky across both lands and dealt one of two final blows against Vecta.

But as powerful as the sword is, it alone won't cut the chains. Falchion bounced off the chains when Jaymes tried, but Mia's sure Kirito's going to use the same power her master used when he finally broke them-Incarnation.

Kirito assumes a thrusting stance, his left hand forward, Night-Sky in his right and level with his shoulders, feet spread apart. Red light surrounds the swordsman, eventually turning the black blade crimson. The wind picks up around them, from a sweeping gale to a roar comparable to a dragon, shaking the hallway.

"Un...believable."

"So he is as strong…"

"This is all… Kirito's Incarnation."

Mia is impressed by the swordsman's display of power. Seeing Jaymes' might made her want to bow down and worship him, and to see his counterpart in the empire is just as strong as the emperor amazes her. If they were to do battle, it might shake the very core of the Underworld.

Kirito's attire seems to change as well as he's dressed in black clothing, a leather jacket flapping from the intensity of the wind. With a yell, he thrusts the crimson sword towards the chain, it extends its reach and makes contact with that single mark Sheyta left behind.

The light, wind, and Kirito's changed appearance vanish in an instant. But Mia's eyes are locked on the chain; it is now cleaved in two for the time being. "By all things holy…"

"He did it…"

"Mia, Arthurio, we have to go." Brunhild's command brings them back, Mia notices the commander kicking the doors open. Mia follows them inside the cold, dark hallway. Her right hand reaches back for her bow instead of her sword, tugging slightly at the bowstring to make an arrow appear. She shivers as she follows the four darkworlders in front of her, hearing the imperials enter the room behind her.

A second set of doors bar them, which Iskahn opens again with his fists. These doors lead right to the throne room-and the cries of a baby from within. Running along the red carpet into the dimly-lit chamber, Mia pauses behind her fellows as they glare at the monstrous black minion, its wings spread out; beyond it, a shadowy robed figure standing next to the emperor's seat of power. In the wearer's right hand is a purple-glowing dagger, Leazette underneath it.

And then he speaks, though the voice sounds inhuman. "Ah, so it was the swordsman delegate who cut the chain. You are more trouble than even the stories say."

"So…you're a man! Then you're not a dark mage," the supreme commander shouts.

The kidnapper laughs with a spine-tingling hiss. "From what I hear, men use sacred arts in the human realm, yes? So a man can be a dark mage, can he not?"

"Wait, I recognize that poisoned blade. You're with the assassins guild!"

"Are you certain? Anyone can use this sword. I might even be a pugilist you drove out of the guild… The time for talk is over. I'll have to forget about the public execution, but I still mean to collect the delegate's head. Ambassador, use that slicing hand of yours to cut it off, or your daughter dies." To make certain of his threat, the mysterious being brings the dagger closer to Leazette, but something deflects its sideways. Mia knows her aim with the Loveblight Bow is not that accurate, but then she sees a white light around the baby. She didn't need to question which person in the room is responsible for that barrier of Incarnation.

"Sheyta! Iskahn!"

"I'm on it!" Iskahn erupts literally in flames as he spurts forward, the minion intervening at its master's command. Iskahn roars and strikes the minion with a flaming fist right in its stomach. Pulling him away from the poisonous blood that follows, Sheyta turns her attention to the kidnapper and charges at him. Her left hand flies out, and the kidnapper's right arm is sliced off from the shoulder down. Sheyta looks to sever the remaining arm, but to Mia's shock the knight topples over. Looking at the kidnapper, she notices a thin object projecting from the dark hood. A blowgun.

Readjusting Leazette, the robed man darts to the left of the throne towards the black wall. There isn't another route of entry into the room, she knows, she's inspected this place many times, but then she remembers what's true to the left of the throne. That wall is not solid, but glass, and the man display that as the wall flashes red and a segment of the obsidian wall starts the scrap against each other-like mortar against pestle.

"Oh no, you don't!" Mia raises the Loveblight Bow and takes aim at the man; at the same time, Ronie and Arthurio run towards the kidnapper. With the man moving, there's a chance she could miss or hit Leazette, and to lead the shot might have her aiding in his escape through the appearing window. So Mia, placing her trust in the bow, shoots against the left wall that's still stone, letting the art-created arrow ricochet towards the man. She misses, but the slight adjustment he had to make is more than enough time for Ronie to make her move.

Her fellow apprentice readies her blue-glowing blade and crosses the impossibly long distance to the man in a single leap, severing the left arm. Leazette is hurled through the air into Ronie's arms while the man leaps through the window into the morning light. Arthurio continues forward to the broken opening, and Mia joins him. "Where is he?"

"I don't know. If only I was faster, I could have caught him."

Mia sighs as she shakes her head and steps away from the resealing window. "Don't worry about it, Arthurio. We did what's most important." They turn to Ronie, the girl comforting the wailing Leazette,

Kirito's hand on his page's back. "That's all that matters for now."

Arthurio says nothing and turns back to the reformed wall. "...Did you see it, Mia? Around that man's neck."

"Mhm. I remember that stone as clear as the day we saw Vecta. But what does this mean?"

"It means we need to speak with Emperor Jaymes immediately." Mia turns to the commander, his rage subsided by his daughter's safety. "Supreme Commander."

"Yes?"

"Requesting permission to enter the empire and inform the emperor of recent developments. I would like to leave immediately as the trip will be long."

"Permission granted. Go."