The Nehszriah has become obsessed with this story line... so here we go! Chapter the Second! Prepare to get some emotions out of Amelia. She's going to get to explore her emo side today. The Nehszriah does not own the Slayers anime, manga or their characters in any way, shape or from, except some old tapes.

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"No..." Amelia whispered. "No. No. No. No! NO!" She started to sob loudly as she fell to the ground in painful sadness.

"Amelia," Gourry said softly. "Please, don't cry." He only got tears in response.

"How long have you three been living here?" Lina asked Albert.

"About six months," he replied. "Everything was like this when we got here. Cullen, Bianca and I had wandered all across different countries before coming here, so having a permanent home is a bit new for us."

"Oh, what kind of cruel, heartless being could do such a thing?" Amelia sobbed. "My father and I are champions of justice, ready to take down any monster we come across... but why is everything gone?"

"Please stop crying Amelia," Gourry pleaded. He really was uncomfortable with her bawling like she was.

"No... this can't be happening!" Amelia sobbed. She ran up to her former home, tears streaming from her face. She did not want to see the destruction, yet could not help but to see what had happened.

"Wait! Amelia!" Zelgadis shouted as she got to the steps. "Don't go in there!" He grabbed onto her arm to stop her from entering the crumbling building.

"Let me go Zelgadis-san!" Amelia cried. "I can go in! Albert-san said they lived there!"

"There was a mazoku out here!" he snapped, forcefully drawing her inwards so that she faced him. The cold strictness that emanated from Zelgadis's eyes scared Amelia. It was not even like Zelgadis. "There could be another mazoku in there. You have to be careful!" he said.

"Oh, let her go Zelgadis," Lina said. She walked calmly past them and into the royal palace, slamming the large oaken doors open magically, not even looking up from the ground. After giving Lina her space, everyone else followed in their own time.

It was amazing to see the carnage that had happened after years of neglect ravaged the once-proud palace. The hallways were torn to shreds and devoid of all life. Rooms that once were bight and cheerful were now covered in dreary dust and debris. The whole thing was appalling.

I wonder what happened to Prince Phil and Amelia in all of this, Lina wondered to herself. Neither of them would just pick up and leave the palace unless absolutely necessary. If needed, they would stay and fight until the bitter end. It must have been quite the mazoku to drive them off...

Suddenly, Lina's inner questions were answered as they came upon the Great Ballroom. It was a very large room, larger than a good part of the palace at least. A gaping opening in the ceiling caused rain to fall upon a ghastly scene even worse than any member of the group could have ever imagined. There, still in their armor, were piles of bleached skeletons. Dressed in traditional battle armor from Seiryuun, they were heaped in hills of up to ten feet in height.

"What happened?" Gourry asked, amazed at how many remains were left behind.

"It was a last-chance effort made by the men of Seiryuun years ago to defend their country from Koronus," Cullen answered, stepping out from the shadows like a phantom. "Every man from about sixteen and older lost their lives in the melee. Peasants, middle-class, nobility... they all made the ultimate sacrifice."

"Stop it Cullen," Zelgadis snarled. Cullen looked over to see that Amelia had decided to bury her face into Zelgadis's chest as she painfully cried for her people.

"Oh, why doesn't she stop it?" Cullen snapped angrily. "If we succeed, then this is not what shall happen with these men. Your tears are wasted." His eyes glared at Amelia and Zelgadis coldly, as if trying to kill them with only his eyes.

"Shut up!" Amelia yelled out. She pushed herself away from Zelgadis and concentrated her teary eyes on Cullen. "Elmekia Lance!"

As fast as Amelia could cast her spell, Cullen was able to dodge it. The spear of light flew past his black hair and over towards the human destruction in the center of the room, where it bounced off some invisible wall.

"What was that?" Lina asked, perplexed at the sight of Amelia's lance bouncing off of nothing.

"There is some sort of force field preventing anything but weather from getting into the rest of the room," Albert answered. "None of us have been able to get to the bodies so we could bury them."

"Who in the hell taught you three magic?" Lina laughed. She went up to the very edge of the force field and put her hands out as if she were pushing on a large rock. "ZAKER!" Lina's incantation sent an electric surge throughout the force field, disabling it and sending electricity up and out of the roof's hole and into the clouds.

"How did you do that?" Bianca asked in awe.

"Easy stuff," Lina said, acting all cocky and letting her ego surge. "I'm just surprised that you guys did not know it, unless you have been learning magic freelance."

"Actually, we learned it from our mothers," Albert answered defensively.

"That is a bit odd," Lina said. "Did they teach you guys just basics or something?"

"No, we really were taught some advanced stuff," Bianca said. "Albert-kun doesn't have much talent and our mothers died before Cullen-kun or I could really grasp anything too powerful from their teachings. Since then we have been doing magic research on our own."

"Hey! No fair!" Albert whined. "I do too have magic abilities!"

"No you don't you octopus-brain," Bianca came back. She and Albert glared at each other fiercely.

"Hey Lina," Gourry asked as he carefully stepped into the former boundaries of the force field. "How did you know what spell to use to let us in?"

"It was a certain mazoku spell used to leave monuments," Lina said. "Some of the monuments that have been preserved by mazoku magic are good, such as sculptures in rocks or ocean coasts. This is obviously a reminder to all those who faced Koronus after Seiryuun that he is not to be messed with. He allowed the weather to seep through the magical barrier so that the decaying corpses could become skeletons quicker than normally."

"That is just sick," Gourry commented. Suddenly, a growling noise came from his stomach. "Lina, I'm hungry."

"What!" Lina snipped. "You are hungry at now of all times?"

"Yes."

"I know where the kitchens are!" Albert piped in. He ran off with Gourry willingly following at his heels.

"Ah, great," Lina sighed as she went to go and pick up a very expensive-looking sword from the hilt of one of the dead soldiers.

"Lina-san," Amelia sniffled. "Please, do not touch them. Let them be."

"If you say so Princess," Lina said, putting her hands up over her head to show that she had taken nothing. She and the others decided to follow Gourry and Albert, who of course had gotten lost and ended up in the overgrown garden instead of the kitchens.

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"So, where do you guys all come from?" Lina asked. She and the others were in the kitchens of the palace, eating some thin soup that Bianca had made. Albert looked up from his bowl and over at Lina warily.

"Why do you ask?" he replied.

"Well, I kind of wanted to know a little bit about the people that I am helping," she said.

"For your information, we have no homeland," Cullen snapped from the very end of the table. "My sister and I, as well as Albert, were born wherever our parents happened to be. We never had the luxury of a permanent home before we found this place all dilapidated and abandoned." After slamming his empty bowl on the wooden table, he stormed off into the hall.

"I am sorry," Bianca apologized. "My brother is really not comfortable talking to people. I really wish that he would have been kinder."

"No," Lina said. "I should have not said anything."

"It is alright," Bianca said. "Besides, we know relatively little about our parents. They died years ago in separate attacks from Koronus."

"That must have been awful," Amelia commented. She had calmed down by this time and was now dry-eyed.

"Not really. At least, not now. A few more years with my mother would have been nice," Bianca said.

"Yeah," Albert said through some soup. "My dad still needed to teach me some sword techniques before he left."

"Left?" Zelgadis asked curiously. "What do you mean by that?"

"I mean," Albert said after swallowing. "My father left my mother and me to fight Koronus and so that it was harder to find the three of us. He died some time around my ninth summer."

"I'm sorry," Zelgadis said, darting his eyes to his soup.

"Ah, I'm used to the fact by now," Albert said nonchalantly.

"What do you guys remember about your parents, since you are clearly fine with talking about them?" Lina asked.

"Little," Bianca replied. "Some of what I know is because Cullen-kun told me. I remember that my mother was very beautiful and kind and very brave. My father, according to Cullen-kun, was very brave and always was trying to protect us all. He left us about when I was six, two years before Albert-kun's father left. When my mother was just about to die, she said that she and my father were royalty before Koronus came and destroyed everything."

"She said that you and your older brother should have been royalty?" Amelia gasped.

"Yeah. Royalty from some far away kingdom. That was all Cullen-kun or I could get out of her."

"What about your parents Albert?" Gourry asked. Albert looked up from his soup nervously, as if he really did not want the attention shifted to himself.

"My parents were always fighting," he said softly. "They loved each other and they loved me, yet they always seemed to find something to argue about. That is it mainly. When my father left for our protection and died, my mother seemed to become really depressed. It had become truly apparent that she was in love with my father, even though they fought. They could hold week long grudges over the last piece of chicken and not make up until both forgot what they were fighting about. Stupid really."

"At least they did love you, as well as one another," Amelia said. "Some people do not have that."

"Yeah. I guess it was alright as long as they made up," Albert agreed.

"How would you know that Amelia?" Lina asked. "You had both parents growing up until your mother passed away. They both loved you and from what you've said, they never fought or anything like that."

"I just know that, alright?" Amelia answered defensively.

"Can we get on to a different subject?" Zelgadis asked out of the blue. Everyone else agreed that the current topic was a bit too sad.

"We should all get some rest," Albert suggested, standing up and stretching.

"Good idea," Lina agreed.

"Come on then, follow me," Bianca said. Lina and Amelia willingly followed and Bianca led them out into the eerie corridors. "Stick close. I do not know how much twenty-five years has changed the scenery in here. You could get lost."

"Thank you Bianca-san," Amelia said softly as she looked around the hall the three of them were in.

"No problem," Bianca replied. "Oh, and please do not cast any lighting spells, otherwise we could be caught by passing mazoku spies."

"The mazoku will find us whether we have a light or not," Lina said casually. Bianca just stopped in her tracks.

"It will be harder for them to find us!" she hissed.

"Fine, fine, have it your way," Lina sighed. She was silent the whole rest of the way to the room, even though it was very hard to be.

"This is where the three of us are going to sleep tonight," Bianca explained when she came to a stop. She pointed to one of the nearby doors that was still on its hinges and she led Lina and Amelia inside.

"Oh my God..." Amelia gasped. It was her bedroom. Nearly every bit of detail that she could remember was thrown out of whack. As if an earthquake had rocked Seiryuun, the bookshelves were toppled over, her bed on the other side of the room, the drapes and furniture all torn up and destroyed. It was positively horrid. This was supposed to be her space and it had been cruelly demolished when the mazoku Koronus came and destroyed everything, including those poor soldiers.

"Bianca," Lina whispered. Bianca came over to the wary Lina, who was watching Amelia's shocked expression.

"What is it Lina-chan?" Bianca asked as she came over to Lina's side.

"Why did you pick this room?" Lina hissed quietly. "This was her bedroom! It was bad enough she saw the ballroom!"

"I'm sorry Lina-chan," Bianca whispered back. "I had no idea."

"Fine then," Lina said loudly. "Let us fix this place up so that we can sleep!" She went over to an upset sofa and put it upright. She did the same to a chair and then put blankets over both pieces of furniture. With a deep sigh, she fell into the chair and looked over at the speechless Amelia and Bianca. "Well, are you two going to sleep?"

"Oh, yes," Amelia said softly as she went and laid down on the blanket-covered sofa. Bianca took the bed and soon all three girls were asleep, dreaming about what the next day would bring.

Review Replying (In Order of Review Time)

Niele-Mzk: Thanks for the insight of Jupiter's moons and paradoxes. Also, yes, chimeras are supposed to be gloomy. That is just a requirement. They are stone-emotioned! Made of rock! At least the ones that we encounter are. -grins-

cyberimp6: I am too uninformed with the whole incantation thing to write out the entire rant. Eight characters? Who told you? Oh, shoot. Yeah, I guess there is another character! I was going to make it a surprise, but I'm horrible. Bryant. Go Bryant! Wh00t! My classmate told me I was nutters for naming Cullen... Cullen, but what the hey!

Gerao-A: Ah, my faithful Portuguese reviewer-buddies. -glomp- Thanks for coming by. Albert, Cullen and Bianca will make themselves useful in time and you have just read the reason for the destruction of Seiryuun. You will see everything in due time my friends.

Things To Know

The carnage: Yes, I made them all skeletons! -timidly- Please don't kill me.

"Zaker": This is actually a spell from the anime Zatch Bell, which I also am not owning.