Later, just before dinner was served, Lina found herself waiting outside
Amelia Wil Tesla Fridley-Seyruun's office for an audience with her majesty.
Princess Amelia had been busy all day with official paperwork; her workload
had grown considerably ever since her marriage to Prince Marthorne of
Fridley. Lina paced impatiently in front of the door. Even though she'd
gotten used to how busy Princess Amelia had been lately, she never liked
being stood up outside a closed door when she had known Amelia longer than
most of the people she signed papers for. Suddenly that door tore open and
a smiling Amelia appeared.
"Oh, Lina-san!" Despite their years of friendship and Amelia's elevated status, Amelia still addressed Lina respectfully. She'd done it for so long now, that it was really a term of endearment more than anything. "I'm so sorry to have kept you waiting. They didn't tell me who it was or I'd have come running. But now the paperwork is all done, anyway, and it's about dinner time, if I'm not mistaken, so we can go relax somewhere nice and comfortable to talk!" Amelia chanced to look into Lina's face and noticed that Lina did not look quite so exultant and lighthearted as she usually did when dinner was announced. "Oh, dear, I hope it's not bad news." Amelia said timidly as she walked with Lina down the corridor towards the dining hall.
"Just the possible end of the world, no biggie," Lina fluttered her hand facetiously, and then braced her hands, intertwined, behind her head. "With your permission," she teased, flashing Amelia a wink, "I'd like to go out scouting for this new danger, and do some investigating of mine own." Her face creased with sudden worry, "I don't know, Ame-hime, everything else has had an obvious weakness, or at least was humanoid enough to seem to. But this? I'll just have to wait and see what I can do once I can see it with my own eyes. Sources say, it eats anything in its path - big unhappy blob of flesh-eating madness. Pleasant, huh?"
"Wait, wait! What? End of the world!? What do you mean, Lina-san?" Amelia clutched her fists to her chin in an expression of fear and wonder.
"Don't worry about it, Princess! Lina, sorceress supreme, is on the job!" Lina quickly summarized what she had heard, purposefully evading any specific mention of monsters or Xelloss. Speaking of which, or rather thinking, in her rush to see Amelia, Lina had completely lost track of where Xelloss even was. She glanced behind her absently, but it was just endless empty hallways. ". So, uh." Lina tried to pick up where she had left off, "I'm just gonna, you know, do some examining, and stuff."
"Maybe I should go with you!" Amelia suggested, her eyes suddenly glinting with excitement. "After all, it's my duty as ruler to personally see to the people's safety."
"I dunno, Ame," Lina commented, looking across the way at the princess, "Not only is your safety crucial, but you've lots of paper work to do." Lina bit her lip and grimaced lightly at Amelia's enthusiasm, "I'll make you a deal, if my awesome magical powers and brilliant mind don't solve the problem - I'll call on you and you can. you know, back me up." She nudged Amelia with her elbow teasingly.
"Oh, all right, Lina-san," Amelia sighed. She hadn't expected Lina to agree. And she inwardly knew that Lina was right not to. But before Amelia could dwell any longer on the issue, her thoughts were interrupted by loud shrieking coming from the direction of the kitchen. Instinctively, Amelia raced towards the source of the noise with Lina at her heels. Rounding a bend in the hallway, the princess smacked right into a fleeing form, knocking them both off their feet. "Oh, excuse me!" Amelia apologized to the person, who turned out to be a young kitchen maid.
"Your majesty! Your majesty!" the girl sobbed. "It's horrible! There's a strange man in the kitchens causing havoc all over. He seems completely insane!...I've never seen him before.Oh, Princess!"
"There, there," Amelia paused to comfort the girl before rising to her feet continuing on her way. "I'm going to take care of it." Lina shifted weight uncomfortably in the background, hoping to Cephied himself that she was wrong.
When the two women reached the kitchens, passing several more kitchen staff on the way, they found them a complete and utter disaster. Food was splattered everywhere, dishes overturned, tables broken in two.
"What is going on, here?!" Amelia cried loudly, glancing around the large, gray room. Slowly a dark shape extracted itself from a shattered wood cutting table, splinters and flecks of gravy decorating his hair.
"Oh my heavens," he said.
"Oh, no! It couldn't be!" Amelia cried, covering her mouth with her hands. "This just can't be happening!" She looked frantically to Lina for assistance, but Lina could not see beyond the hand she had slapped over her face.
"Oh, dear," Xelloss said, looking slightly cross as he pulled a sticky chunk of something out of his matted locks. He sent a glare in the direction of the head chef who was hiding under a counter, holding a knife in a defensive stance, and staring openly at him. "That was a little unnecessary."
"W.w.what are you?!" the chef gasped.
"And I hadn't even done anything wrong!"
"Oh, shaddup!" Lina shouted, marching past crumpled tables and splattered who-knows-what on the floor to stand accusingly in front of Xelloss, "You'd better start talking, mister. And if I get... get. any." Lina paused, momentarily distracted and trying to remember what she had been about to say, "any. ah. ack!" With one eyebrow twitching in annoyance, Lina stretched forward and brushed off a particularly distracting smudge on Xelloss' nose and then straightened, her arms crossed. "Anyway, whatever I was gonna say, it was really menacing and clever, so get talking."
Xelloss, who had been backing away nervously during this exchange now straightened up. "Would you mind getting away from me," he asked politely as he forcefully pushed Lina off. "You're blocking my magic." Lina frowned as she stumbled back with the force of Xelloss' thrust, her boot crunching down on a section of wood and cracking it forcibly. Xelloss then backed away from Lina and concentrated. His image flickered for a moment, wavered, and then it was back, only this time spotless and well-groomed. He smiled and his teeth sparkled like pearls.
"So, now, where were we? Oh, yes. Well, you see," he gave her a charmingly innocent look, "I just wanted to prepare a special dish for you, Lina. A friendly gesture, you know." He shrugged and laughed. "I suppose I got carried away. Nostalgic, wouldn't you know. I can't help but feel a sort of comradeship with you. We did travel together quite a bit in our youth. Well.in your youth."
"You wanted to prepare something?" Amelia demanded in horror. "Xelloss-san, we may have been allies of justice together at one time, but these last years, as the designated leader and mastermind of the Mazoku ranks, you have personally led an all out war against us. I'm not so sure I care to trust in your good will."
"Prepare a special dish?" Lina questioned in shock, then shook her head with a laugh, "The last thing I saw you cook nearly killed us all with its smell alone."
Xelloss feigned a hurt look. "Just because none of you could appreciate my talent."
"Don't even! I couldn't stand it, and I can admit - I eat almost everything."
"What are you talking about? It was perfectly prepared.it was supposed to be like that. It's.oh, nevermind. Why am I even trying? I should've known that lesser mortals wouldn't understand."
"What was that??" Lina asked threateningly, pushing up her sleeves, and she stomped forward slowly. Xelloss' eyes opened slightly and his grin faded. "What's that, Xel? Don't like it when I get close? Whatever for? Maybe. this?" she thrust one fist in the air in front of him, her bracelets jangling with the movement. Xelloss cringed. He took one more step backwards and stumbled over a misplaced table leg. His head was lowered defensively and his face was scrunched up with pain. With a huff, Lina backed off and whirled around to face the frightened staff, "Dinner had better be prepared already - or somebody." she eyed Xelloss through the corner of her eye, "is going dooown."
"Oh?" Xelloss couldn't help snorting. "And just how do you propose to accomplish that?" Noticing the aura of flames building around Lina he added quickly, "Well, if you're going to get violent, I can make certain something is prepared." Before she could comment he had somehow conjured up a wooden spoon and a questionable looking butter knife. Amelia stood frozen in her spot, her lower lip quivering.
"Oh ho ho ho!" Lina had meanwhile been handing over her bracelets to the stunned Amelia and now hurried forward before aforementioned butter knife could be put into equally questionable action. "Oh no, Xel, my boy, you're not leaving my sight." She demanded, grabbing a handful of his sleeve and dragging the mazoku back over to Amelia. "Alright, Amelia, all this putting people in their places has made me really hungry. where's the grub?"
Xelloss huffed, his face pulled into a pout. "Well, there's some of it over there on the floor. Oh, and there's some cream and pie filling on the ceiling. Quite good, actually. If you let me go, I could fly up there and scrape some down for you."
Amelia watched, still stunned. The best she could manage was a "What is the meaning of this?"
"Oh, Amelia," Xelloss grinned. "How pleasant to see you alive and well." He attempted a bow, but Lina's tight hold on him prevented it from being very gallant. "Didn't Lina-san explain to you?" He shot Lina a look. "She did explain just who it was who delivered the message, didn't she?"
"Lina-san."
"Oh ho!" Lina's other arm jumped behind her head anxiously, "Did I forget to mention the name of my aforementioned 'Source'? Oh, silly me, huh? All caught up in worrying about big man--and monster--eating dangers to the world and, more importantly, my dinner. I'm getting dinner, aren't I?"
"Oh, Lina-san. How could you?" Amelia gasped. "You knew I'd get upset about trusting your life to a monster, didn't you, and you thought to keep it from me so that you could run out recklessly like this!"
Meanwhile, some of the staff who had fled earlier returned, bearing trays of cold meat and cheese and bread. "General Inverse," one of them said apologetically, "It was the best we could manage on short notice without the use of the kitchen." The cook's assistant looked as though he was praying for L-sama to stay Lina's hand.
"How thoughtful of you," commented Xelloss and he promptly picked up a piece of cheese and ate it.
"Woo-hoo! Food!" Immediately, Lina's free hand was quickly emptying whatever she could grab into her mouth, but she found it a bit awkward with one hand in a death-hold on Xelloss. "Hey! Mine!" She shouted, slapping Xelloss' hand, "Don't even think about it." Pausing, she turned to Amelia, half a slice of bread in her mouth, "Youu wamf somefing?"
"Oh, certainly." Amelia nodded. She dug heartily into the food, but couldn't stop herself from throwing wary glances in Xelloss' direction every few seconds.
"Don't worry. I can't teleport anywhere in the range of your city, thanks to Lina-san's little magic. I'm not going anywhere fast." Xelloss pretended supreme boredom, absently cleaning under his nails. "When this is finished, I trust we can be on our way, Lina? You did say we could leave after dinner, didn't you?"
"Huh, oh, yeah sure." Lina shrugged, gulping down another hastily made sandwich whole, and rubbing her stomach with one hand, "Ah. I really needed that, I guess. So, uh, Xel," she tugged absently on the sleeve she was still holding, "How far is it, cause I may wanna take something along to snack on."
"At the edge of the kingdom, near a monster encampment.don't worry," he added quickly, at Lina's look. "I'll give them orders not to touch you. It would be several days worth of flying, but.if you'll let me teleport, I could take you with me and get us there in .673 seconds."
"Oh, Lina-san."
"Yeah, you'd better give 'em orders not to come five feet near me." Lina muttered, releasing Xelloss' a moment to crack her knuckles experimentally. "Teleport, huh? Well, it will take a lot less time. you know, Xel?" Lina grinned, slapping him affectionately on the back, "If you weren't my former travel-buddy turned arch-nemesis, I might not trust you as much as I do."
"R-i-i-i-ght," Xelloss responded. "Well then, I'm ready when you are."
"Oh, Lina-san!" Despite their years of friendship and Amelia's elevated status, Amelia still addressed Lina respectfully. She'd done it for so long now, that it was really a term of endearment more than anything. "I'm so sorry to have kept you waiting. They didn't tell me who it was or I'd have come running. But now the paperwork is all done, anyway, and it's about dinner time, if I'm not mistaken, so we can go relax somewhere nice and comfortable to talk!" Amelia chanced to look into Lina's face and noticed that Lina did not look quite so exultant and lighthearted as she usually did when dinner was announced. "Oh, dear, I hope it's not bad news." Amelia said timidly as she walked with Lina down the corridor towards the dining hall.
"Just the possible end of the world, no biggie," Lina fluttered her hand facetiously, and then braced her hands, intertwined, behind her head. "With your permission," she teased, flashing Amelia a wink, "I'd like to go out scouting for this new danger, and do some investigating of mine own." Her face creased with sudden worry, "I don't know, Ame-hime, everything else has had an obvious weakness, or at least was humanoid enough to seem to. But this? I'll just have to wait and see what I can do once I can see it with my own eyes. Sources say, it eats anything in its path - big unhappy blob of flesh-eating madness. Pleasant, huh?"
"Wait, wait! What? End of the world!? What do you mean, Lina-san?" Amelia clutched her fists to her chin in an expression of fear and wonder.
"Don't worry about it, Princess! Lina, sorceress supreme, is on the job!" Lina quickly summarized what she had heard, purposefully evading any specific mention of monsters or Xelloss. Speaking of which, or rather thinking, in her rush to see Amelia, Lina had completely lost track of where Xelloss even was. She glanced behind her absently, but it was just endless empty hallways. ". So, uh." Lina tried to pick up where she had left off, "I'm just gonna, you know, do some examining, and stuff."
"Maybe I should go with you!" Amelia suggested, her eyes suddenly glinting with excitement. "After all, it's my duty as ruler to personally see to the people's safety."
"I dunno, Ame," Lina commented, looking across the way at the princess, "Not only is your safety crucial, but you've lots of paper work to do." Lina bit her lip and grimaced lightly at Amelia's enthusiasm, "I'll make you a deal, if my awesome magical powers and brilliant mind don't solve the problem - I'll call on you and you can. you know, back me up." She nudged Amelia with her elbow teasingly.
"Oh, all right, Lina-san," Amelia sighed. She hadn't expected Lina to agree. And she inwardly knew that Lina was right not to. But before Amelia could dwell any longer on the issue, her thoughts were interrupted by loud shrieking coming from the direction of the kitchen. Instinctively, Amelia raced towards the source of the noise with Lina at her heels. Rounding a bend in the hallway, the princess smacked right into a fleeing form, knocking them both off their feet. "Oh, excuse me!" Amelia apologized to the person, who turned out to be a young kitchen maid.
"Your majesty! Your majesty!" the girl sobbed. "It's horrible! There's a strange man in the kitchens causing havoc all over. He seems completely insane!...I've never seen him before.Oh, Princess!"
"There, there," Amelia paused to comfort the girl before rising to her feet continuing on her way. "I'm going to take care of it." Lina shifted weight uncomfortably in the background, hoping to Cephied himself that she was wrong.
When the two women reached the kitchens, passing several more kitchen staff on the way, they found them a complete and utter disaster. Food was splattered everywhere, dishes overturned, tables broken in two.
"What is going on, here?!" Amelia cried loudly, glancing around the large, gray room. Slowly a dark shape extracted itself from a shattered wood cutting table, splinters and flecks of gravy decorating his hair.
"Oh my heavens," he said.
"Oh, no! It couldn't be!" Amelia cried, covering her mouth with her hands. "This just can't be happening!" She looked frantically to Lina for assistance, but Lina could not see beyond the hand she had slapped over her face.
"Oh, dear," Xelloss said, looking slightly cross as he pulled a sticky chunk of something out of his matted locks. He sent a glare in the direction of the head chef who was hiding under a counter, holding a knife in a defensive stance, and staring openly at him. "That was a little unnecessary."
"W.w.what are you?!" the chef gasped.
"And I hadn't even done anything wrong!"
"Oh, shaddup!" Lina shouted, marching past crumpled tables and splattered who-knows-what on the floor to stand accusingly in front of Xelloss, "You'd better start talking, mister. And if I get... get. any." Lina paused, momentarily distracted and trying to remember what she had been about to say, "any. ah. ack!" With one eyebrow twitching in annoyance, Lina stretched forward and brushed off a particularly distracting smudge on Xelloss' nose and then straightened, her arms crossed. "Anyway, whatever I was gonna say, it was really menacing and clever, so get talking."
Xelloss, who had been backing away nervously during this exchange now straightened up. "Would you mind getting away from me," he asked politely as he forcefully pushed Lina off. "You're blocking my magic." Lina frowned as she stumbled back with the force of Xelloss' thrust, her boot crunching down on a section of wood and cracking it forcibly. Xelloss then backed away from Lina and concentrated. His image flickered for a moment, wavered, and then it was back, only this time spotless and well-groomed. He smiled and his teeth sparkled like pearls.
"So, now, where were we? Oh, yes. Well, you see," he gave her a charmingly innocent look, "I just wanted to prepare a special dish for you, Lina. A friendly gesture, you know." He shrugged and laughed. "I suppose I got carried away. Nostalgic, wouldn't you know. I can't help but feel a sort of comradeship with you. We did travel together quite a bit in our youth. Well.in your youth."
"You wanted to prepare something?" Amelia demanded in horror. "Xelloss-san, we may have been allies of justice together at one time, but these last years, as the designated leader and mastermind of the Mazoku ranks, you have personally led an all out war against us. I'm not so sure I care to trust in your good will."
"Prepare a special dish?" Lina questioned in shock, then shook her head with a laugh, "The last thing I saw you cook nearly killed us all with its smell alone."
Xelloss feigned a hurt look. "Just because none of you could appreciate my talent."
"Don't even! I couldn't stand it, and I can admit - I eat almost everything."
"What are you talking about? It was perfectly prepared.it was supposed to be like that. It's.oh, nevermind. Why am I even trying? I should've known that lesser mortals wouldn't understand."
"What was that??" Lina asked threateningly, pushing up her sleeves, and she stomped forward slowly. Xelloss' eyes opened slightly and his grin faded. "What's that, Xel? Don't like it when I get close? Whatever for? Maybe. this?" she thrust one fist in the air in front of him, her bracelets jangling with the movement. Xelloss cringed. He took one more step backwards and stumbled over a misplaced table leg. His head was lowered defensively and his face was scrunched up with pain. With a huff, Lina backed off and whirled around to face the frightened staff, "Dinner had better be prepared already - or somebody." she eyed Xelloss through the corner of her eye, "is going dooown."
"Oh?" Xelloss couldn't help snorting. "And just how do you propose to accomplish that?" Noticing the aura of flames building around Lina he added quickly, "Well, if you're going to get violent, I can make certain something is prepared." Before she could comment he had somehow conjured up a wooden spoon and a questionable looking butter knife. Amelia stood frozen in her spot, her lower lip quivering.
"Oh ho ho ho!" Lina had meanwhile been handing over her bracelets to the stunned Amelia and now hurried forward before aforementioned butter knife could be put into equally questionable action. "Oh no, Xel, my boy, you're not leaving my sight." She demanded, grabbing a handful of his sleeve and dragging the mazoku back over to Amelia. "Alright, Amelia, all this putting people in their places has made me really hungry. where's the grub?"
Xelloss huffed, his face pulled into a pout. "Well, there's some of it over there on the floor. Oh, and there's some cream and pie filling on the ceiling. Quite good, actually. If you let me go, I could fly up there and scrape some down for you."
Amelia watched, still stunned. The best she could manage was a "What is the meaning of this?"
"Oh, Amelia," Xelloss grinned. "How pleasant to see you alive and well." He attempted a bow, but Lina's tight hold on him prevented it from being very gallant. "Didn't Lina-san explain to you?" He shot Lina a look. "She did explain just who it was who delivered the message, didn't she?"
"Lina-san."
"Oh ho!" Lina's other arm jumped behind her head anxiously, "Did I forget to mention the name of my aforementioned 'Source'? Oh, silly me, huh? All caught up in worrying about big man--and monster--eating dangers to the world and, more importantly, my dinner. I'm getting dinner, aren't I?"
"Oh, Lina-san. How could you?" Amelia gasped. "You knew I'd get upset about trusting your life to a monster, didn't you, and you thought to keep it from me so that you could run out recklessly like this!"
Meanwhile, some of the staff who had fled earlier returned, bearing trays of cold meat and cheese and bread. "General Inverse," one of them said apologetically, "It was the best we could manage on short notice without the use of the kitchen." The cook's assistant looked as though he was praying for L-sama to stay Lina's hand.
"How thoughtful of you," commented Xelloss and he promptly picked up a piece of cheese and ate it.
"Woo-hoo! Food!" Immediately, Lina's free hand was quickly emptying whatever she could grab into her mouth, but she found it a bit awkward with one hand in a death-hold on Xelloss. "Hey! Mine!" She shouted, slapping Xelloss' hand, "Don't even think about it." Pausing, she turned to Amelia, half a slice of bread in her mouth, "Youu wamf somefing?"
"Oh, certainly." Amelia nodded. She dug heartily into the food, but couldn't stop herself from throwing wary glances in Xelloss' direction every few seconds.
"Don't worry. I can't teleport anywhere in the range of your city, thanks to Lina-san's little magic. I'm not going anywhere fast." Xelloss pretended supreme boredom, absently cleaning under his nails. "When this is finished, I trust we can be on our way, Lina? You did say we could leave after dinner, didn't you?"
"Huh, oh, yeah sure." Lina shrugged, gulping down another hastily made sandwich whole, and rubbing her stomach with one hand, "Ah. I really needed that, I guess. So, uh, Xel," she tugged absently on the sleeve she was still holding, "How far is it, cause I may wanna take something along to snack on."
"At the edge of the kingdom, near a monster encampment.don't worry," he added quickly, at Lina's look. "I'll give them orders not to touch you. It would be several days worth of flying, but.if you'll let me teleport, I could take you with me and get us there in .673 seconds."
"Oh, Lina-san."
"Yeah, you'd better give 'em orders not to come five feet near me." Lina muttered, releasing Xelloss' a moment to crack her knuckles experimentally. "Teleport, huh? Well, it will take a lot less time. you know, Xel?" Lina grinned, slapping him affectionately on the back, "If you weren't my former travel-buddy turned arch-nemesis, I might not trust you as much as I do."
"R-i-i-i-ght," Xelloss responded. "Well then, I'm ready when you are."