Chapter 16 – The Void

Here is chapter 16. So with this, the Battle of Tarbes is officially over. Also, sorry about the drop in length but I thought that this was a good stopping place to build up for the next arc. On a side note, I graduated from high school a few days ago and is currently on my summer break before starting college in the fall. Yay me... I'm not excited for college at all as you can probably tell.

Levitation is a Dot class Wind spell

Explosion is a Void spell

As always, read, comment, enjoy.

Disclaimer: I do not own Dragon's Dogma or Familiar of Zero.

Tarbes

Karin glared at the way her youngest daughter blatantly ignored her as she rode off with Karin's familiar. The manticore had always liked her youngest daughter the most after her so it wasn't surprising that he would obey Louise. As Louise took off towards the Armada, Karin chased her. The woman who Karin had seen with her daughter also followed as well.

Karin had volunteered to go to battle when the Princess had released the news that Reconquista was invading. Even though she had been retired for about a two decades now, she was still the best Wind mage in the entirety of Tristain's history. She also had a long history of serving in the military and it had ingrained a sense of nationalism in her that was greater than the average Tristanian. So it wasn't surprising that she had been one of the first nobles to take up her old armor and defend her country.

What she hadn't been expecting was to find her youngest daughter running around the village that was soon to be the epicenter of an invasion. She had hoped that her daughter would have stayed within the safe confines of the Academy. With the previous commander of the Tristanian military there, the Academy was one of the safest place in the whole country. When she saw her daughter in the village, she just had to confront her. As soon as the enemy was routed, she was going to have a long talk with Louise. The only thing that she could commend Louise for was that she was smart enough to acquire an adequate bodyguard.

Speaking of bodyguards, the woman who accompanied her daughter was a curious sight. The bodyguard, a blonde woman, was either a rich mercenary or was backed by a noble. Either way, the woman was clearly used to warfare. The way she carried herself spoke volumes of her experience despite her relatively young appearance, probably in her late twenties or early thirties. This was later proven during the fight with an assassin.

During the fight, Karin had to hold back as much as possible to not level the village. However, she was still impressed by the opponent. He was competent enough to stand against her even though he knew who she was. Most enemies knew that it was suicidal to even consider facing her alone without backup. The blonde bodyguard also performed adequately. She was taken by surprised and was not a mage but had still put up a decent fight. Most commoners would have been dead within the first minute against an enemy of that level. Yet, she held out until the end and had even managed to injure the man and forced him to retreat.

Everything had returned to a semblance of normality until she saw her daughter on her familiar flying towards the enemy. And so she had no choice but to follow her. Many people assumed that Karin was a cold-hearted mother and that she may have not actually loved her children, but the fact was that she adored them. They were the reason why she had retired in the first place. Granted her eldest child was actually unexpected, but regardless of the events that followed, she thought that her girls were the greatest gift that she ever received. Their safety is her first priority no matter what and her husband shared that view. They would rather die before they let their children suffer harm from anyone, even themselves. That was why she had enacted the Rule of Steel within her household. She didn't want her children to go off and do something that would cause them harm. It also coincidentally protected the Valliere name from any incidents or scandals as well.

As Karin sped herself with a Wind spell, she eyed the battlefield. A mysterious army had shown up during her fight with the blue-robed man and routed the enemy. She knew that the battle was not going well from the numerous retreat signals that she heard. Now that a new army had shown up, things were getting even more complicated. Why were they here? Were they allies? Were they only involved to eliminate a mutual enemy? Were they opportunistic and here to route both armies? The questions were quickly growing in numbers, but she pushed them into a corner in her mind to deal with her first priority: prevent Louise from killing herself due to stupidity. Times like these were the ones that made her hate introducing her daughters to her familiar. Her daughters had built enough rapport with her manticore to be considered his other Masters. And he would never listen to anyone else when one of them took the position of Master, even if Karin herself counter-commanded it.

As Louise grew increasingly closer to the enemy airships, she noticed what was currently going on: the ships were under attack by ten massive dark tornadoes. The sheer power of just one was impressive, and with ten going on at once, the destructive power was close to rivaling her signature spell at full power. That made it even more dangerous for Louise.

When the spell ended, there were just a few ships left in the air. She noticed one ship in particular retreating as the others simply floated there. The retreating ship most probably housed the commander of this invasion and Reconquista. The other ships were too damaged to even fire off a shot, being too busy trying to just stay in the air.

She ran as fast as her Wind spell allowed and quickly closed in on the battlefield, which was standing between her and the remaining ships. She then heard a sound that was similar to someone running. That was strange as she was running faster than a wind dragon could fly. She looked to her left and was surprised to see the bodyguard slightly behind her. The bodyguard was keeping up with her and the shocking thing was that Karin couldn't feel any trace of magic on the woman. Choosing to disregard this information for now, she turned back towards her objective.

She was running through the battlefield now, the soldiers a blur as she sped through it. The battle was wrapping up and she watched as some of the soldiers were not even fighting. Some where just running around reporting to their superiors. She then ran past a flag of unknown origin. It was completely black except for a red dragon in the center. Putting that image into the back of her mind, she continued on to her destination, briefly seeing a man with white hair before running past him. She noticed that the bodyguard was no longer following her as she exited the other side of the battleground. It didn't really matter, but it definitely lowered the woman's standing for Karin.

Karin was just about to reach Louise when she saw her pointing her wand at the ships. Now she knew that her youngest daughter had some trouble casting magic. She had hired some of the best teachers to educate her daughter in controlling magic but no one had succeeded. In Louise's latest letters home, she had stated that a new person had been able to successfully taught her how to produce magic properly. Karin had been ecstatic about the news even if she did not show it outwardly. However, Louise had also explained that she only had the ability of a child who had just started on the path of magic. Nevertheless, Karin was still happy.

So when she saw her daughter pointing her wand at the ships, Karin wondered what Louise had intended to do. Any Dot-class spell was useless here.

"What are you trying to do?" Karin mumbled to no one. Just as she was under Louise, she felt a sudden surge in the ambient magic. With wide eyes, Karin watched as the magic coalesced into the tip of her daughter's wand, the normally-invisible magic actually visible to the naked eye. And then she barely heard an exclamation: "Explosion".

"Shit!" Karin cursed. While she normally don't use vulgar language anymore, this situation more than made it appropriate. Whatever her daughter had done, it was big and it was powerful.

Karin immediately shot into the air with a Levitation spell to grab her child. After casting the spell, Louise had apparently fallen unconscious as she fell out of the saddle. Karin grabbed the girl and then mounted her manticore.

"Move!" she yelled. Understanding the urgency in his Master's voice, the manticore shot into the distance as fast as its wings could carry them. The nearby soldiers seemed to have also heard her as many turned their heads in her direction. Their leader, the white-haired man from before, instantly took command and ordered his troops to take a defensive position. Many of the mages who were attacking the ships also raised a defensive barrier around themselves. Karin assumed that they also belonged with the mystery army because she didn't recognize any of them.

She turned around to see what her daughter had done when she was suddenly blinded by a flash of light followed with a loud boom. A shockwave caught up to her and was nearly blown off the manticore. The beast was also thrown by it but soon regained its stability. When she regained her vision, she witnessed a huge crater on the ground. The mages near the crater were safe but many were injured as their barrier broke. The army had withstood the blast admirably as only a few toppled over when the shockwave made impact. The remaining ships of the Armada were completely destroyed, with many of the ships consisting of only fragments of their former self. The only ships in the sky at the moment was Prince Wales ship, which was already retreating before Louise had even took off with her manticore, and the enemy command ship. The enemy's ship did not get hit by the blast but was grounded by the resulting shockwave.

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The massive Albion Army of 211,000 men had been reduced to a measly 2,300 men within six hours of fighting with all but three of the commanding officers killed in battle. Of the three, one of the captured commanders was none other than Oliver Cromwell, the leader of the Reconquista. Cromwell somehow later escaped when security was the lightest.

The Tristanian Army had suffered roughly 33,000 casualties during the battle, with the Musketeer Squadron being wiped out save for the ones guarding the Princess. The entire Albion Armada was destroyed while only half of the Tristanian Navy was destroyed due to the other half not arriving in time. The mystery army had not sustained any casualties but was treated with suspicion by everyone else. No one would just show up for a battle with such huge numbers for no reason. Because of that, the Tristanian Army did not relax even after an ambassador from the mystery army proclaimed that they came in peace.

Prince Wales returned to base camp with numerous injuries and had to be treated immediately. The Princess held in her worry for her former lover and dealt with the needs of her military first. The villagers were busy repairing Tarbes as the village had been hit by cannons multiple times. They were also tearing down the barricades that had been set up throughout the town. Kirche and Tabitha returned to the Acadmey when they saw that everything had settled down. Siesta stayed to help rebuild her home while Louise was still unconscious. Karin had volunteered to look after her and the blonde bodyguard had also returned soon after to look after Louise.

Mikhail had dismissed the Pawn's Legion soon after the battle had ended and joined up with his wife in guarding his Master. The woman who was already there kept on eye on the two of them throughout the entire ordeal.

Overall, the majority of the Albion military was defeated during the Battle of Tarbes. Although Tristain suffered heavy casualties, only about 13,000 were killed. Even if Tristain was officially declared the victor in this battle, many argue that the losses were simply to great to be considered a victory. If it weren't for the mystery army showing up when it did, Tristain would have lost. The second half of the Tristanian Navy arrived shortly after the conclusion of the battle; the Germanian reinforcements never came.

Tristanian Palace, Tristania

"How do we know that that unknown army is not hostile!? With our nation currently recovering from such a pitiful victory, we are easy pickings for them!" yelled Marquis Baroque. He was one of the commanders of the Magics Companies and so he had seen first hand what had transpired.

"Peace, Marquis Baroque. I have already spoken to their leader and have come to an agreement with them," Princess Henrietta said. After the battle, she had spoke with Sir Serolius. It was then that she learned that Sir Serolius was actually the Supreme Commander of that unknown army, which he had called the Pawn Legion.

"After some discussion with their leader Mikhail Ecto Serolius, Sir Serolius has agreed to lend his army in the protection of the nation of Tristain under one condition: the Pawn Legion will only protect the nation from invasion and nothing else. It will not conduct war for the nation and it will not police the nation. It also will not protect the nation if any actions were done to deliberately provoke any other nation into attacking," Henrietta explained.

"That does not mean that they are harmless. In fact, that only gives them the chance to scout our nation before they invade us," Cardinal Mazarin agreed with the Marquis. While Cardinal Mazarin would usually like to think the best of people, this scenario was just too convenient for it to not have a hidden agenda. "Foreign nations, especially ones with such a large army, are rarely ever altruistic towards other nations. It is made even more unlikely due to the fact that the only country with an army that could even rival this one in numbers is the Germanian Army. To support such an army, the country must be quite big just like Germania, and the only way a nation could get that big is through invasion. Also, country's rarely go to war with their entire military force so it could be possible that they could have even more on standby. Your Highness, while I would like to believe in them, it is too obvious that they have something planned or at the very least have an unknown goal to help us."

"The fact that they aren't telling us what country they hail from makes them even more suspicious," said Duke Lafayette.

"Cardinal Mazarin, while I do trust for you in regards to most things, this is one of the subjects that I must be adamant about. I understand that most of all the arguments put forward here today are due to a lack of information. However, I have given my word that I will not reveal what I do know of them lightly. I you wish to know the answers to your questions, then I must ask that you take an oath of silence," Henrietta explained. Mikhail had already told her about some of their origins although she knew that the man withheld some information. She couldn't really blame him though. Mikhail had also stated that the only person who could order the Legion into a war was either his co-commander or himself. What he didn't reveal was the fact that since Louise was his Master, Louise could also command the Legion through him.

Some of the nobles, most notably Cardinal Mazarin, Duke and Duchess Valliere, and Headmaster Osmond, agreed to take the oath of silence while others did not. Those who didn't were asked to leave the room until they were summoned once again.

"I must ask again that this matter must not be told to anyone outside of this room. While their leader did not exactly say it, it is implied that they will forcibly silence anyone who leaks this information. Do you understand the importance of keeping this under wraps?" Henrietta asked the remaining nobles. After they gave affirmation, the Princess began to explain.

"The leader of this unknown army is a man known as Mikhail Ecto Serolius. He is the Supreme Commander and very likely the king of this army and its nation. They hail from the distant nation Gransys although I speculate that this nation is more likely an empire. The army is officially titled the Pawn Legion and I have been informed by some of my aides that the army numbers are close to 600,000. That was all the information that he was willing to share at the moment. The last piece of information that the man told me before he left was a cryptic message: 'Nothing has returned'."

The remaining nobles were stunned silent. While some of them were surprised to find out about this new nation of Gransys, all of them were even more shocked to hear about the number of their military.

"600,000 men? I already asked myself this but how could 600,000 men cross into Tristain without anyone finding out sooner? It seems impossible," Marquis Baroque said. To suddenly see another army on the battlefield makes one wonder how they could have traveled so far into Tristain territory unseen.

"It is possible that they infiltrated as immigrants," Cardinal Mazarin offered.

"That would have taken years. Why would they show up now of all times even if they did do that?" Duke Valliere asked.

"… I don't know. With the current information that they have provided for us, we are still left in the dark regarding their intentions," the Cardinal said.

"What does his final message mean?" Princess Henrietta asked. That was the part that confused her the most. She felt that it was probably a warning of some sort but she just couldn't figure it out.

"Hmm… 'Nothing has returned.' I wonder…," Headmaster Osmond mumbled. Ever since the news came to him that Louise Valliere was possibly a Void mage, he had done some extensive research on the subject. He found out that no one kept any good sources of information regarding the lost element. He suspected that Romalia may have hid some texts about the Void but that was mere speculation.

"What is it Headmaster Osmond?" Duchess Valliere asked. She knew that her former teacher was smarter than what he led others to believe.

"Oh nothing. It's just that your daughter Louise seems to have acquired the most unusual familiar recently," Osmond said.

"Really? She never mentions her familiar in any of her letters home, only that she has one now," Duke Valliere said.

"How does this relate to what we were just talking about?" Marquis Baroque asked sharply. He has always had a short temper but it was even worse nowadays due to the recent events.

"Well, Louise summoned not a creature but a man during the Springtime Familiar Summoning. One of the professors there has told me that the man's familiar runes are very close to that of Gandalfr, one of Founder Brimir's familiars," Osmond explained. "If this is the case, then Louise could very well be a Void Mage; although that is just mere speculation."

"I see… void is synonymous with nothing," Duchess Valliere whispered. "But how would the man know of this anyways?"

"Your Highness, didn't you say that the leader of the Pawn Legion was a man named Mikhail Ecto Serolius?" Osmond questioned. The connection between the man and the Void were now becoming obvious to all within the room.

"Do you think that this man may be a Void Mage?" Henrietta asked.

"Possibly. In either case, I think that it is better to have such a formidable man on our side, don't you think?"

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Mikhail was standing outside the room where his Master slept. After the battle, Louise had been taken to the palace because her mother, who he recently found out was the pink-haired woman looking after her with his wife, had some business with the Princess.

He knew that news about an unknown army appearing in a battle between Albion and Tristain would spread like wildfire. He could only hope that his Master remains safe in the near future. Things were changing and he experienced many civilizations that crumbled because of it. Jopefully, this wouldn't be one of them.