Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail.
Chapter 16: Fashionable & Fierce For A Rescue Mission! Save Yukino Aguria! Kanata, The Priestess of The Cult! Kirie Luster, The Rebel!
Lucy stood in line at the fashion store of Kogane Town with Risa, smiling at the pink-haired girl as she watched Risa open up the newest issue of Sorcerer Magazine to show her the newest fashion trends for this week, and Lucy liked how Risa marked certain pieces of clothing in the magazine by drawing Sabertooth's insignia above them in a pink marker. The clothes were supposedly part of a sale that was going on right now in the town of Yamabuki, and Lucy got to interestingly see how they were all in different shades of yellow. The high-heeled shoes that Risa wanted to buy were in a blonde shade of yellow while they appeared to have lightning bolts designed on the front of them, and even the heels had lightning bolts on the ends of them.
Lucy personally didn't care for those shoes, but she did seem to like the yellow crop top. That yellow crop top was off the shoulder with gold trim, and the Capri pants were in the color of lemon yellow. That page of the magazine also featured some lacy yellow panties, which Risa would buy because of how they were trendy, and there were even some gold bras that looked as good as the lemon yellow dress that had ruffles at the bottom of it. Lucy wondered why the color yellow was now in fashion, as even Kuchiba Town's likeness for orange wasn't fashionable enough to be in any magazines, and she hoped that the sale would be awesome.
As Lucy continued to look at the magazine, she got to hear Risa cheer happily about this day. It had been almost two weeks since the last time that Risa got to partake in shopping for clothes during a sale, and she would hope to find the best clothes before any other girl got to buy them. Lucy didn't seem to worry about it too much, though, and she smiled at how the page on the left informed her about how the sale would be happening for an entire week. That gave Risa plenty of time to try and get all the clothes that she wanted to buy from that store, so they wouldn't have to hastily go to the fashion store in Yamabuki Town.
Although, Lucy started to look a bit curious about why they were now in Kogane Town's fashion store. She watched Risa close the magazine and put it back into the left pocket of her mid-length Capri pants that were in the normal shade of orange, and Lucy watched Risa look over at the store's gold shoe rack to see that they had the black knee-high boots with bubblegum pink stripes on them. Lucy thought that those boots looked very familiar, and she recalled how Risa wore them on the first day that they became friends.
"Risa, you already have a pair of those boots. Are you trying to collect them for when they'll be a rarity?" Lucy told her in a calm tone, before nicely asking that little question to Risa.
Risa responded with a nice smile on her face, "No way, Lucy! It's just nice to have an extra pair of your favorite boots, you know."
Lucy kindly replied to her while thinking about the upcoming sale, "Just make sure that you watch your money when it comes to buying extra pairs of things, Risa. Not all stores are very friendly."
As Risa moved out of the small line to go get those black boots off of the shoe rack, Lucy started to think about how the only place where she saw anything about Yamabuki Town was on the request board. Lucy hoped that the job for that town wouldn't have to make her and Risa be in another place that had shady stuff going on, since Lucy considered her friend to be quite lucky that she wasn't getting ripped off for the money that she spent on that kimono in Kuchiba Town, and she wondered if the task would be easy.
Speaking of tasks, Lucy remembered that her friend Yukino hadn't come back from a job with Rogue yet. That made Lucy start to feel curious about where Yukino and Rogue could be, and she hoped that her friends were okay. Yukino didn't seem to be the type of Celestial Spirit Wizard who would try to handle jobs that were too difficult for her, even with help from Rogue, and but Lucy did start to wonder about how there were jobs that would be quite tough. She thought about how the rings that could help her get back in her body weren't always going to be held by good people, and Lucy began to view her last enemy as just one example.
She wanted to be ready for the situations where tougher opponents would come along, and that meant Lucy had to make sure that Risa was also prepared to deal with enemies who could be extremely dangerous. Lucy glanced at Risa to see that she wore a red tank top with those orange Capri pants, along with a light pink headband that was behind her sunglasses, and she also wore a light pink belt with a dark pink heart on it. Risa also wore some red wedges with crimson red straps on them, and Lucy started to look concerned as Risa came back to reclaim her place in line. However, she decided to not make Risa feel like she ever prioritized fashion over her fighting skills.
"Now that I have a new pair of these boots, I'm twice as fashionable when it comes to making the boots be part of a stylish outfit!" Risa told Lucy with a happy smile on her face, before quickly getting up to the counter after the customer in front of her was done paying for some clothes.
Lucy responded while smiling softly, hiding her concerned feelings, "You could probably kick enemies in the face, too, Risa!"
Risa asked Lucy in a snarky manner, as she stepped forward to place the boots on the counter, "Do you think that enemies would feel an extreme amount of pain from me kicking them in the face, Lucy, or do you want me to do that as a way to show them up close about who has better fashion sense when it comes to shoes?"
Lucy started to comically look a bit irritated at the thought of Risa making enemies look at her boots as she kicked them in the face, thinking that she would rudely be making the enemies care for her designer boots instead of them trying to kill her, and Risa could even harshly step on her enemies' heads to really stomp her high level of fashion sense into their minds. Lucy would hope that any jobs that they took for Sabertooth wouldn't get that violent, though, and she only wanted Risa to have fun at the sale in Yamabuki Town after they finished today's job.
Lucy wondered if she would also have fun at the sale with Risa, since there was nothing wrong buying the newest cute clothes that were trendy, and she looked down at her current attire. Lucy wore a cherry red woolen tank top with a scarlet red jacket that had a crimson red stripe across the chest and cuffs, and Lucy wore a plaid skirt in the normal and crimson shades of red with candy apple red lace trimming to match the other parts of her outfit. Lucy also wore black leggings underneath the skirt, too. The leggings went well with her pair of crimson red wedge-heeled boots that had to be laced up while they had candy apple trimming on the heels, toes, and edges of the boots. Those boots were laced with simple red ribbons, and the laces led up to scarlet red bows that were at the top parts of the boots. As Lucy's green hair was down, she hoped that Risa could run fast with her to reach Sabertooth's guild for their next job that would have to be taken care of before they went on a shopping spree.
The girls would hopefully get to the Sabertooth guild after the male clerk with short black hair was finished with totaling up the price of the boots, and Lucy watched Risa take out five-thousand jewels from the left pocket of her pants. She handed it to the clerk, who accepted all of the money, and Risa watched the clerk retrieve a gold grab bag with yellow handles from the lower shelf of the light brown counter. The clerk put the gold bag on the counter, before putting Risa's boots into the bag with the receipt next to them, and he gently pushed the bag towards Risa.
Risa grabbed the bag with her right hand, and she proceeded to walk towards the door with Lucy. Lucy nicely smiled at how Risa was happy to start shopping on this fine morning, as that was probably Risa's way of preparing for the sale in Yamabuki Town, and the fact that the snarky girl didn't even take long made Lucy feel quite happy about how her friend was getting better at shopping. Risa probably wouldn't take a long time with getting her clothes at the sale in Yamabuki Town, and Lucy just hoped that the job associated with that town wouldn't be anything too dangerous.
15 minutes later, at the Sabertooth guild...
After entering the Sabertooth guild, Lucy took Risa over to the request board for them both to see a yellow flyer that required a job to be completed in the far-off town of Yamabuki. This job that pertained to Yamabuki Town came with the description involving how a priestess in that town was causing a horrifying amount of trouble to where her cult was killing anyone who showed any sign of disloyalty, and the client claimed how they were writing this note while trying to not get caught by the church's border patrols who would kill any possible defectors on sight.
This was the job that would take place in the same town where the sale was occurring, which made Risa smile in a confident manner from how taking down a religious priestess couldn't be that tough, and she watched Lucy unpin the flyer from the request board. The flyer came with the reward of 700,000 jewels, which was an impressive amount of money, and the client classified this as an A-Class mission for skilled mages. Even though Lucy looked a bit worried from how she only had two of the legendary rings in her possession, Risa believed that they could win.
Lucy recalled how the last major fight left her and Risa feeling exhausted while they couldn't even use anymore spells to defend themselves, and she would hate to see that type of situation happen again. The feeling of anxiety entered her eyes as she wondered if this job would be too tough for them to handle, even with Sting coming along, and there was the option of putting the job back on the board. However, that would only result in Risa having to take another job while she probably wouldn't be able to spend her money at the sale. Based on the description of the job, though, Risa was probably better off not going anywhere near Yamabuki Town.
She didn't seem to mind the dangerous situation, as Lucy had helped her see that dark mages weren't going to be incredibly tough, and Risa smiled at the flyer. Her eyes looked up from it for a moment to see Sting hastily walk out of his office with the light blue Communications Lacrima Crystal in his left hand, and he clenched his teeth tightly as his face displayed a mix of urgency and shock. Lucy also looked up from the flyer to see that the white dragon slayer was talking with Rogue, who let out a pained groan, and she walked towards the situation.
Sting asked Rogue in a stern tone, looking very concerned as he didn't see Lucy approach him, "Rogue, where's Yukino? Did she flee Yamabuki with you?"
Rogue responded with a worried look on his face, as he appeared to be panting and standing somewhere with Frosch on his shoulder, "Sting, they... They captured Yukino. I tried to save her, but... they all ganged up on me and Frosch with Lightning Magic. Yukino... told me to run. I... I can't leave her to die."
Sting told him in a serious tone while narrowing his blue eyes, "Rogue, I'm running over there right now! You need to come back to the guild, and you need to rest! I'll handle it!"
Rogue yelled with a horrified look on his face, as he appeared to sniff out a feminine person who could be heard laughing evilly in the background, "No! No! You're not going to make us experience what you did to Yukino!"
The shadow dragon slayer accidentally tapped the blue orb to turn it off, and Sting hoped that his friend would be on his way back to the guild with Frosch. Sting had seen the bruises and blood on Rogue's face, which made him see that Yukino's job of finding a mage's lost ring in Yamabuki Town turned into a dangerous task because of how she was spotted by the cult who ran that town, and he started to sigh in a worried manner while thinking that he should've taken Lucy and Risa out on any jobs yesterday that involved the unsettling town.
His thoughts about Yamabuki Town were interrupted by the startling sight of Lucy suddenly being next to him, which made Sting comically jump high for a few seconds, and Sting only looked startled for a few seconds. He exhaled a soft breath while being glad that it was just Lucy standing there with Risa behind her, and he could see that they were listening to his conversation with Rogue. Sting felt that he had to take care of this serious matter today, so he couldn't accompany the girls on their mission today. Sting decided to just take the flyer to see the type of job that Lucy picked out, thinking that she and Risa could truly handle something simple on their own, but seeing them have that job about the priestess made Sting push it back towards Lucy's hand.
He gave her a strict look that told her how he refused to let her and Risa go to that town, as it seemed to be more secret than the shadiness that was occurring in Kuchiba Town, and hearing Rogue's message yesterday was the first time that Sting had heard of a religious cult having control over a town. Sting wondered if that woman who frightened Rogue was the priestess who had been mentioned in the newest job that Lucy picked out, he started to back away from her while thinking that this rescue mission wasn't suited for her or Risa.
"You two have gotten tougher, which I really admire, but you're definitely not strong enough to handle a vicious priestess or a cult that presumably uses electric attacks." Sting told them in a calm tone while giving a worried look to Lucy and Risa.
That prompted Risa to reply with an offended facial expression from hearing Sting's words, as she walked towards him, "Master, we're not weak amateurs! It's true that I may still be a rookie who needs to learn some things, but Lucy and I recently took down a powerful criminal! In fact, Lucy's taken down two people who seemed fearsome! If you think that a little bit of lightning will scare us, then you're wrong!"
Lucy added with determination in her orange eyes, as she clenched her right fist, "We're not afraid to go rescue Yukino, Sting! She's a fellow mage of Sabertooth, and we can't let them kill her or do any other horrible things to do our friend! Rescue missions may not be what our team usually handles, but I will gladly let this be our first one! It's true that the rescue may be too much for Risa and I to handle, but we're still mages who have the task of helping anyone who's in trouble! We're not going to be afraid!"
Sting simply placed the orb in the left pocket of his black pants, before he folded his arms, and he started to give his friends a small smile of approval from hearing how they had so much determination. Sting wasn't just proud of Risa for being a rookie who could have enough bravery to take on enemies without much information, but he was very proud of Lucy for backing up Risa's words of experience with the knowledge of how mages always had to fight hard to protect their friends or any people who were suffering from the harm that a vile person was inflicting on them.
Since Lucy and Risa were so ambitious to help Sting save Yukino, he felt like they would need to be informed about one crucial difference from their past jobs. They would not be taking the train to Yamabuki Town, since Rogue's message from yesterday had informed Sting that any mages or tourists who stepped off the train in Yamabuki Town were immediately attacked by wizards, and he imagined the instant hostility to be something that must've been frightening for Yukino and Rogue to experience, That must've been especially bad because of Rogue being motion sick, and he must've tried to fight hard to rescue Yukino after recovering from being sick.
Sting felt like he certainly couldn't risk being sick, and a plan needed to be created for rescuing Yukino from the church. He felt like Risa would probably have to use her magic to distract some of the cult's followers while Lucy would assist her with keeping the cult's attention off of him, and Sting would barge into the church. He thought that it would easy for him to get Yukino out of that church, and Sting wasn't going to let that priestess kill Yukino. In fact, he would gladly be the person who ended up killing the priestess for kidnapping Yukino.
20 minutes later, in the church of Yamabuki Town...
Yukino Aguria got down on her hands and knees while being in front of a white altar that had three large steps, kneeling and bowing in front of the altar as she was fully nude like a prisoner who was stripped of everything to where they resembled a bare animal, and she bowed her head as she slowly closed her eyes to start silently saying a prayer. Yukino heard someone get off of a chair, and she raised her head to gaze up at the woman who sat down a regal-looking yellow throne that had white edges around it. The lady who sat on the throne had long hair that was part of her Hime cut hairstyle, as her front fringe of blonde hair slightly hit her eyebrows while her side locks ended at her cheeks to make her face seem softer. Her hair reached down to her breasts, and this woman had eyes that were in a lemon shade of yellow.
She got off of the throne while her footsteps could slowly be heard going towards Yukino, and this woman wore yellow knee-high boots that had golden soles. She also wore a strapless white dress with a circular yellow brooch in its center, and the white dress had two horizontal stripes going across the bottom of it while they were in a shade of yellow that seemed to be associated with the electricity that pertained to Lightning Magic. The woman watched Yukino gaze up at her, before motioning with her hands for two nearby female mages who wore white robes to take Yukino's clothes away, and this leader of the church grinned in a menacing and sadistic manner at how Yukino now shared a trait with the cult's other members.
Even though Yukino wasn't clothed anymore, her eyes that were once in a hazel color were now lemon yellow while those eyes were pupil-less. As this priestess looked down at Yukino, she gently placed her right hand underneath Yukino's chin. She gently squatted down in front of her while feigning a genuine smile about how everything would be okay, and she placed her left hand in between Yukino's large breasts. The priestess made a small amount of lightning surround that hand, before sending the lightning into Yukino's body, but she began to evilly smirk as she moved that hand away from Yukino's body. She aimed it up at the church's skylight, hitting a specific part of the glass, and some lightning was fired from her hands. The lightning bounced down from the glass to strike Yukino with more speed and power, causing her to scream in agonizing pain.
The attack ended quickly, though, and Yukino's skin was brown and charred as she sweated from the hot burns that were created by that lightning. She lowered her head while still staying on her hands and knees, not minding how more bruises covered her body while small amounts of blood dripped from some of them, and Yukino felt the priestess gently place both of her hands on her bruised back. She stayed silent while the priestess' hands gently stroked her back, before she groped Yukino's ass, and Yukino sweated more as she elicited a moan. The priestess wanted her new possessed mage to feel relaxed, especially when she wouldn't be going back to Sabertooth, and she wanted the rules of the church to be forever etched into Yukino's mind.
"Remember, my young mage. People who don't think the same way as us are individuals who must either be forcefully influenced or killed. In fact, killing anyone who defies us is good. You will only serve and obey me, Lady Kanata, and you will be part of the congregation who cannot think for themselves without my brilliant guidance." The priestess calmly told Yukino while feigning a kind smile.
Yukino responded in an obedient tone, as she looked up at the priestess, "Yes, Kanata-sama. Lady Kanata, I shall obey you and never think for myself."
"Also, anyone who goes against the Yamabuki Church is a horrible human being. Anyone who uses their magic against us must have that magic extracted from them before they die. We don't want magic to be in the hands of evil people, my young child. In fact, using our lightning to leave them powerless and dead is the only way that we can express our constant resentment for such trash." Kanata explained to Yukino with a stern facial expression while going back up to stand in front of her throne, before hearing the church's yellow wooden doors creak open.
Kanata told Yukino with an evil smirk on her face, as she saw two of her followers enter the church with them tightly two children in their arms, "Well, we can now express our pleasure from how today's child hunts proved to be successful."
Kanata watched her followers walk past the brown benches to set the two children down at the top part of the altar, smirking down at them while they appeared to be very scared of her, and the priestess recognized the small girl with long blonde hair. She recalled seeing her wear the same simple orange dress and orange shoes yesterday while she appeared to be hiding somewhere with her friend, and these children who now had to deal with their parents being possessed to where they were like malicious husks of their former selves were now trembling from how their attempt to escape from Yamabuki only landed them in a situation of horror.
The young blonde-haired girl who resembled Wendy Marvell had fear in her dark blue eyes from standing in front of Kanata, utterly terrified of how the priestess was viciously smirking down at her, and she watched Kanata charge up a light yellow wave of Lightning Magic in her left hand. The young girl was paralyzed with fear from seeing Kanata throw the attack at her, and a yellow blast of Lightning Magic occurred! The young child screamed in pain, before the smoke cleared up to reveal that only ashes were left behind, and the other girl who had witnessed that tragic event widened her eyes in shock.
She tightly clutched her green sweater with her hands, before glancing down at her red skit that complimented her black flat shoes, and this brown-eyed girl who had her orange hair tied back in a ponytail didn't want to suffer the same fate as her friend. She watched Kanata kick the ashes off of the altar, which caused her to loudly gasp in shock, and Kanata simply turned to face this girl while starting to frown in a displeased manner. She merely placed her right hand on the young girl's forehead, and a yellow aura began to surround both of them. However, the young girl screamed in pain while the aura around her began to go into Kanata's body. The priestess smiled sadistically, enjoying the screams of someone who defied her orders to not even try to escape, and some lightning that appeared around Kanata's body was simply showing how she drained the young girl of her Lightning Magic to where she had no magical power left. Kanata watched the girl's body fall off of the altar while she was unconscious with her eyes open, but her brown eyes soon became yellow to indicate that she now had the punishment of having an existence that involved being possessed.
"Ah, the child hunts are rather enjoyable. These young mages who chose to disobey me are horrible children, and they must either end up dead or have their Lightning Magic be free from belonging to such garbage. My followers, we shall expand outward to make the entire kingdom of Fiore bow down to only our beliefs. As your goddess, I am the deity who assures you that we shall create a perfect world with only our Lightning Magic and our ideals being valued above the trash!" Kanata explained to her cult of followers with a stern facial expression, before raising her left fist upward and starting to have an evil smile on her face.
Yukino and the other cult members replied in unison, sounding quite calm as they stood in front of the benches with their pupil-less eyes continuing to be yellow, "Yes, Lady Kanata. We must kill any enemies who threaten us in Fiore, and you are our goddess and savior. For you, we'll kill them with no mercy."
Kanata responded with a pleased smile on her face, as she giggled with joy, "Exactly! You're all thinking in such a good way! Always follow the priestess, since I am powerful enough and beautiful enough to help you weaklings find some joy in your lives that have been wasted before crossing paths with me!"
The evil priestess sternly told a female follower who came back from an adjacent room in the church, as she noticed her presence on the corner of her left eye right before she shifted her attention back to Yukino being nude, "Get the white robes for this girl, as well as some other clothes, and show her to where she'll be staying. Oh, and try to find that man who went into the shadows before I could kill him."
That follower nodded in an obedient manner while Kanata kept looking at Yukino, and she thought about how those golden keys wouldn't aid Yukino on jobs as much as the new Lightning Magic would. Kanata recalled seeing her in the Grand Magic Games, but seeing Yukino be so weak against Kagura Mikazuchi made the priestess feel like Yukino could really use some lightning that she was influenced to wield. Not only would she be stronger, but that Lightning Magic even possessed Yukino to where even the tiniest bit of displeasure of Kagura would be enhanced to an immense amount of resentment that could make Yukino unleash more power than necessary as she electrocuted Kagura. Kanata hoped to see great work from Yukino, especially after she tried so hard to put up a decent fight against Kanata and the cult.
Yukino slowly stood up while obeying Kanata's hand motions to come closer to her, and she walked up to the top of the altar to be right next to the priestess. Kanata lowered her left fist down to her side, before using her left hand to stroke Yukino's arms, and Kanata even made that hand move over to be under Yukino's breasts. It trailed down to her stomach, before her fingers lightly touched Yukino's vagina that was surrounded by a light blue field of hair, and Kanata made a yellow aura engulf her left hand. She moved it down to Yukino's legs, sending magical power into them, and Yukino felt her body start to become strengthened. In fact, this little enhancement spell even gave Yukino six-pack abs because of how Kanata had touched that part of her body. The priestess believed that all of her followers needed to be beautiful from her sole perspective of beauty, but something that seemed strange about her left hand caused Kanata to suddenly get it away from Yukino's feet.
Kanata closely looked at her left hand, specifically seeing the ring finger, and a certain item of Holder Magic wasn't on it. Kanata checked to see if it was on her other hand, but the item wasn't there. She looked at the church members, who all frowned while standing in front of the benches, and she took notice of how the church's front doors were still open. Kanata gazed closely at the doors to see a familiar person thinking that they were sneaky enough to crawl out from behind a bench with the gold strap of a yellow bag slung around their neck, and that prompted her to use a spell of Lightning Magic to manipulate the actions of the other woman who came out of the adjacent room. Kanata watched her loyal follower throw some clothes in Yukino's direction, before running to pursue a girl who had clearly stolen from the church, and Kanata went back to sitting on her throne while wondering if that person's theft occurred when no attention had been on them at all.
Concurrently, in Yamabuki Town...
The person who stole the priestess' precious item was a fair-skinned girl with long platinum blonde hair in a Hime-cut hairstyle, and two braids were on the left and right sides of her face. She appeared to be around the same age as Yukino, and she wore a simple yellow dress that had straps. This girl also wore a gold blouse underneath her dress with a miniskirt that was in the shade of pastel yellow, and her flat shoes were gold with lemon yellow soles underneath them. The female who ran away from the church quite fast had fear in her pastel yellow eyes, and she wore an elegant-looking white hat that had gold ribbons on two sides of it.
The girl adjusted her hat to prevent it from falling to where it would be directly in front of her eyes, and she hastily ran down the street that featured the bricked road being in different shades of yellow while the bricks seemed to form lightning bolts that were in patterns that alternated between the different shades of yellow. She couldn't admire the streets of her own town, though, and the fearful girl sent magical power into her feet. As her shoes became engulfed in a yellow aura, she felt herself run quite fast to where taking the eastern path out of the town was a risk that she felt like taking.
This path led straight out of Yamabuki, but the fact that the female thief quickly exited the town to see how it came with the serious consequence of being on a mountainside above the forest of pink trees made her start to look quite careful. She didn't want to accidentally lose her footing and fall down into the forest, as she would probably die, so she simply ran down the mountain trail as fast as she could. She held the bag tightly with one hand underneath it while striking the side of the rocky mountain with a small beam of Lightning Magic from her other hand, and she smiled a bit from hearing some rocks break apart to end up being behind her.
She didn't even think of turning around, as that would probably make her stop for a second to see who was chasing her, and she had to keep running. Her legs allowed her to run quite fast, as she was hastily going to the section where the mountain trail reached its end, but that was no cause for celebration. She soon heard the blockade of rocks break apart while the sunrise allowed her to see the dark shadows from the yellow blasts that quickly occurred, and the fact that they obscured her own shadow caused this girl to apply more Lightning Magic to her feet. She ran much faster to avoid what seemed like a mob of ten people chasing her, and hearing them begin their ominous chanting wasn't making this situation be any better.
"Kill the defector! This act of treason must be punished! To see the beautiful light of our goddess, we must kill Kirie Luster! Death by lightning to Kirie Luster!" The cult ominously chanted with anger in their voices, before they all disturbingly hummed the hymn that Kanata used for Yamabuki Town's public executions.
Kirie exclaimed aloud with a look of sheer panic on her face, as she could unfortunately hear them catching up to her, "You're not getting this back for her, and you won't kill me! You won't execute me in Yamabuki! I can't put up with these horrible things any longer!"
One woman aggressively shouted in a vicious tone, "Death to Kirie Luster! Kill the defector! Kill the rebellious sinner!"
Kirie's eyes were filled with fear as she kept on running, seeing the end of the mountain path within sight, and she hoped to run into the nearest town while remembering that the cult members weren't allowed to go outside of Yamabuki Town's boundaries yet. Kanata never gave them that order, which made Kirie have to put her faith into her running speed, and she continued to run. Every step that she took would lead her closer to freedom, since the cult members did actually stop at a certain point before being forced to go back to their goddess, and Kirie's heart palpitated with so much anxiety as she was being chased.
She looked relieved from seeing the nearest town in the distance, only to see a thin beam of yellow lightning pass right by her head, and a large yellow blast was created in front of her! That startled Kirie to where she stopped running, and the blast pushed her several feet backward while she heard the horrifying sound of the mountain trail in front of her loudly begin to crumble apart. Kirie widened her eyes in shock from seeing how the female cult leader was cruel enough to think of destroying the mountain trail, and she slowly turned around to see the pupil-less eyes of the furious-looking possessed members who were in their white robes. They aimed their hands at her while charging up their Lightning Magic, but they were ironically too slow to unleash their fast lightning attacks.
Kirie pulled out a yellow orb from the left pocket of her skirt, and she built up a weak amount of lightning into her palm. The electricity quickly surrounded the orb, and she threw it down at the ground. The orb immediately created a yellow blast that was quite large with waves of electricity going outward to electrocute anyone who was within range of the blast, but the orb's powerful blast sent Kirie flying high into the air! She looked extremely worried while one hand tightly held on to the bag, and the blast made her be sent to an area that would be behind the cult. She could see that she was about to land on the mountain trail and have a harsh landing, causing her to look very concerned, but the orb's waves of electricity to where Kirie felt herself get shocked. The electrocution made Kirie accidentally shift her body away from the mountain trail, and she ended up falling down into the forest.
"Ahhhhh! Oh, no! I'm going to die!" Kirie exclaimed with a panicked look on her face, as tears slowly welled up in her eyes.
One of the female cult members who managed to recover from the electricity shouted to Kirie, as they turned to see her fall as she looked up at them, "Death to Kirie Luster! Death to the defector!"
"Ahhh-" Kirie screamed out while closing her eyes, before her scream was interrupted by how she harshly hit the ground.
She made no noise as she coughed up a bit of blood, looking up at the pink leaves that were in a large tree standing over her, and Kirie just laid there without moving for a few moments. She stayed in the pinkish forest that was interestingly darkened during sunrise because of some of the dark pink trees concealing many things in this dense forest, and Kirie could faintly see the mountain trail. She simply gazed up at it to see the cult members watching the blast fade away while the electricity began to fade from being around some of their bodies, but the wounded cult members started to just walk back to Yamabuki Town. Only a few of them glanced down below to look at the forest, but they couldn't even see Kirie through the thickets of pink trees and bushes. Additionally, they wouldn't jump down there because of how Lady Kanata once influenced them to believe that the fall was not survivable for anyone.
Kirie clearly defied that belief, however, and she clenched her teeth while feeling a moderate amount of pain in her back. She slowly stood up straight while being able to move, which meant that nothing was severely broken from falling off of that mountain trail, and Kirie turned around to see that she had landed in a pile of pink leaves. That was the only comforting thing for Kirie to experience, since she started to frown in a saddened manner from thinking about how she sneaked into the church earlier today to fully see one of the horrible events that was associated with the madness of Lady Kanata's cult.
Even if she explained it to the people who were in that town, though, she started to wonder if they would believe her or doubt her enough to send her back to Yamabuki. Kirie didn't want to be sent back to a place where that awful priestess ruled as a wicked goddess, and she would only go back there if any mages could really help her get rid of that woman. The anxiety that was involved with thinking about what could go wrong as a result of her choice prompted Kirie to start walking in the western direction instead of heading east to the closest town, and she walked under the large trees to keep herself hidden from the view of anyone who was still above the forest. The western path out of this particular forest would take her to where there was a small town, and Kirie started to pant softly with exhaustion from running while thinking about how she needed to find a well-known person who could be able to help her.
How was Chapter 16? Feel free to tell me your thoughts on it. Sting is willing to let Lucy and Risa join him on a dangerous rescue mission that ties in with their job! However, even with their skills and determination, it may not be easy for Lucy and Risa to take on the cult that has abducted and brainwashed Yukino! Yes, the bright Lightning Magic is in the hands of a very dark cult that is doing some dark activities. That is why this arc's tone has shifted to a much darker tone than the past arcs, since I wanted the cult to seem very threatening. However, more about the cult and details on the town will be revealed later on in the arc! Furthermore, the fashion store that Lucy and Risa were in will get more detail. As for the town that Kirie avoided, details about that come later in the story. Finally, this is the start of the Gold Lightning Arc! This will hopefully be an exciting arc! I'll update soon. :)
REVIEWS!
FireBlitz: Thank you so much!
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Kiri-chan: Here you go!
Sena: Thank you! I hope that this arc will be awesome!