It was a beautiful morning at the capital town just like any other day for the citizens of the Melromarc kingdom.
However, no one expected to see a armored man covered in blood with a broken spear in his hand. His armor is one that no one as ever seen with ancient design not found in that world. His face was masked with a stoic face made of steel, which was a part of his helmet. And on his back was a cape with an emblem of an unknown legion waving in the wind.
Marius pushed through the crowd looking for someone, snarling and grunting wherever he goes. He scanned around looking for a victim to sink his weapon into. Everyone ran away from this dangerous man. Marius then spotted someone familiar amongs the market goers.
He hasten his pace towards the young man, pushing and shoving people away. The young man with a casual hoodie and a shield on his arm was oblivious of the approaching warrior until the Marius grabbed him by the collar and turned him before pulling him closer.
"What did you do!" the armored man shouted.
"W-What?!" said the young man, confused by the situation.
"I know you did something!"
"W-Wait, who are you!"
Marius lifted his steel masked and it revealed his face full of rage, "You took everything from me!"
"I don't even know you!"
Enraged, Marius was about to kill the young man until he was shot away by a bright force.
"Father! Are you okay!" said a taller younger man with red tunic and a spear.
"I'm fine... Thanks, Motoyasu-kun."
"I'm sorry! I didn't get to get here on time! I let that man touch you!" Motoyasu said on a verge of tears.
"N-No, it's fine."
"I'm glad... Now then." Motoyasu's face turned sinister.
He turned and approached the stranger who was getting up on his feet.
"How dare you harm father! You Ugly Bastard!"
"You!"
Marius pulled down his mask and charged at the Spear Hero. With one single swipe, Motoyasu quickly disharmed him before tripping his feet with the spear.
Marius tried to use the Flames of Ares but it would not come out. Motoyasu pointed his spear at the armored centuriom but before he could say a word, Marius grabbed hold of the spear and kicked Motoyasu's crotch.
Motoyasu grabbed hold of his spear as he felt the pain on his groin. Marius took some sand on the ground and threw it at Motoyasu's eyes. He then tripped Motoyasu with his legs before grabbing the spear and pinned Motoyasu to the ground.
But a green ethereal shield appeared out of nowhere and bashed Marius away before another one pinned him on the ground.
Motoyasu got up and wiped the sand off his eyes. Motoyasu and Marius stared at each other as he tried to free himself.
"Who is that?" said the young man with the shield. "Is he one of the assassins?"
"Yeah... He is... Father, you need to get out og here quick!"
"What about you?"
"I'll catch up with you and the rest. Don't worry about me."
And with that, Naofumi left the scene. Motoyasu's cheerful demeanor quickly faded away.
"I though after I changed everything, you would not even reach here!"
"You... You did this!"
"I knew you also experience the Time Reversal. As if the spear also recognized you as a second wielder... But still..."
Motoyasu pointed the spearhead at Marius, "Doesn't matter what happened, I'm still the Spear Hero! And I will be fated to save this world and return to Filo's embrace!"
"Filo... Where is she?"
"Incase you don't know, my Filo-chan is not born yet. But as the Love Seeker I will find her and marry her!"
"Do you realized what you have done! You have interfered with fate! She will never be born because of you!"
"You're just saying that so you can have her all by yourself!"
Motoyasu heard guards coming towards them. He then immediately ran away, leaving Marius behind. Marius got up as the guards started encircling him.
"You there! Halt!" one of the guards shouted. "You're under arrest for disturbing the peace!"
But Marius immediately attacked one of the guards with his fist. More of them start pouring in to stop the raging centurion. One of the guards hit Marius's head with the pommel of his sword and knocked Marius out to the ground.
"Marius..."
He heard the call from his beloved filolial queen. Marius saw Filo facing away from him.
"Come on, Marius. Our child is waiting."
Without hesitation, Marius walked towards Filo to reunite with his fiance only for a row of spears emerged out of nowhere surrounding him.
"Marius... Where are you? Why are you not here?"
"Filo! I'm here!"
"Marius... You never care for us..."
Darkness suddenly surrounds her.
"You didn't... Protect me..."
Filo turned her head but her face was all decomposed.
"Filo..." Marius dropped to his knees, "I'm sorry..."
The decayed Filo walked towards Marius and looked down on him.
"I thought you love me, Marius."
Marius looked up to see the terrifying sight of his dead lover. Tears flowed from his eyes, unable to accept her death.
"I still... I still love you, my love."
"And what about our child?"
Just after she said that, the spears dug back to the ground and the decayed Filo disappeared from Marius's sight.
Then he felt a dark presence behind him. He turned around and saw a dark winged figure with red glowing eyes. And suddenly, the figure stabbed Marius with its talon.
Marius woke up in a cold sweat. He found himself in a damp dark room made of bricks lit by a light coming from the small grilled opening of a metal door. He was stripped of his armord and was left wearing his tunic and his trousers.
And at the other end of the room was a man with short slightly red hair.
"Ah, you're awake. I though they threw a dead man here with me."
"Where am I?"
"Of course they didn't tell you. You're in prison."
"What?!"
Marius quickly got up and ran towards the door. Marius tried to pry the door open with his barehands.
"Eager to get out? Sorry, buddy. They're not letting anyone out here. This is where they kept the worse criminal. Or whoever the royals wants taken care off."
Marius then tried to punch his way out until his fist caked the metal door with his blood. He tried to once again use the flames but still, nothing came out.
"Hey! You stop that right now!" said one of the wardens.
"You should listen to him." said Marius's cellmate.
But Marius ignored them and kept on beating the door.
"That's it! I'm not giving you another warning!"
Two wardens approached Marius's cell. After they unlocked the door Marius started charging at them but was pushed away by an electrical force by the warden.
"There! That'll teach you a lesson!" said the warden.
"Now shut up and let us work in peace!" said the other warden.
The wardens then close the door, leaving Marius on the floor bleeding from his hands.
"Filo..." Marius muttered silently, shedding one tear from his eye.
It's been almost a week since Marius's imprisonment. He neither talked nor move from his spot on his side of the cell. Everything he has before the time reset was all gone.
He lost the Flames of Ares, that would have helped him against Motoyasu. He lost the very girl, Filo, his fiance and the child he never got to see hatch. Not even a single feather from her to keep him happy. And he lost another family.
"Look, friend. I know it seems gloomy this few days." said the other prisoner, "But that doesn't mean you should give me the silent treatment. We just met... Few days ago."
But Marius just laid on the floor with his hand where he would held Filo whenever they slept together.
"Come on, friend. Lighten up abit."
Marius got up and walked towards his cellmate. He grabbed him by the collar and put him against the wall.
"You do not know what pain I am going through! And I am not your friend! Leave! Me! Be!"
"Okay."
Marius let his cellmate go and went back to his spot.
"I guess you don't wanna hear my escape plan then."
Marius turned his head, "You have an escape plan?"
"Yeah. Been planning it this whole time."
"Then why didn't you told me earlier!" Marius gritted his head.
"Friend, you were too depressed for this plan to work. It requires two people for this plan and you don't look like you're in a good state."
Marius calmed himself down, "Fine. What is your escape plan."
"Alright."
The man walked towards the door first and peeked through the opening before going back to Marius.
"Here's the plan."
"Help! Somebody help!"
The warden heard the man's cry for help. He ran towards the metal door and looked through the door window. Inside, he saw the man on the ground in a fetal position.
"Help! He tried to kill me and got away!"
"What?! How?!"
"Please! Just help me! I don't have much time! I'm bleeding to death!"
The warden frantically reached out for the keys and unlocked the door. He ran inside to check on the man, oblivious by Marius who hid in the darkness.
Marius sneaked behind the warden and grabbed his head before breaking his neck.
"You really don't need to kill him."
"I do not care. It will not matter in the end."
The man nodded, "Good point. By the way, before we proceed to the next step, I'm Henri."
Henri reach his hand out.
"Marius."
Marius didn't shook Henri's hand, and they both stared at each other for a few awkward seconds.
"Right. Not a hand shaking fellow."
The two exited the underground cell, with Henri disguised as the warden while escorting Marius. They moved pass several wardens who were oblivious to the escape prisoners amongs them.
"Alright." Henri whispered, "We need to get to storage where they keep our stuff."
"Do we have time for that?" Marius whispered.
"I don't wanna face whatever is hiding in the woods when we escape without proper protection."
"That is not a problem for me"
"But it is to me."
"Stop!" said a warden with higher rank, "What's going on here!"
"Uh..." Henri tried to think, "Prisoner transfer, sir."
"To the storage room?"
"Yes sir. It's mandatory."
"Strange. I don't remember writing that down."
The warden reached his hand on his sword.
"Malaka." Marius mumbled.
Marius grabbed hold of the warden's head and punched his throat. He took the sword off the warden's scabbard and then he sliced his neck.
"You are terrible at this." said Marius as he stripped the warden's armor off.
"Seriously. You're gonna get us caught. And you could told me you wanna disguise as well."
"The one you are wearing will not fit me. But this one will."
"Right. Now hurry up."
Henri turned around and scanned behind him to make sure they are clear.
After Marius finished putting on the armor he hid the dead body inside a room filled with cleaning supplies.
"Does it fit you well?" said Henri.
"Move. Now" said Marius.
"Okay okay. This way."
Marius started following Henri until they reached the storage room. The two entered the room and started rummaging for their equipments.
"Let's hope they didn't throw it to the smelter already." said Henri.
Marius searched through the various armor sets until he found one he was more familiar with, the armor of the centurion. He took his helmet, pauldron, greaves and cestus then put it in a sack.
Then he took his cuirass and turned it around to see the cape with the Blackstone Legion emblem. He tore it off and toss it to the floor before putting it inside the sack.
"Finished?" said Henri.
Marius turned and joined Henri.
"Now what?"
"Simple. We walk to the exit and we're free."
"Are you sure they would not be suspicious?"
"As long as they don't find the bodies, we're good."
The two got out of the storage and carefully make their way to the exit while carrying their equipment in a sack. Then, they were stopped by another high ranking officer.
"What do you think you're doing?" said the officer.
"We are moving the prisoners items away. Nothing else." said Marius.
"Do you have any authorization?"
"I authorized it."
"Anything that goes around here is under my superivision and only authorized by me."
The officer got closer to Marius.
"And I don't remember seeing your face here."
Marius sighed and smack the officer's face with the sack of armor. He then took out his sword and stabbed the officer's throat. Another warden saw the action and ran off.
"Sound the alarm! Sound the alarm!"
Marius threw his sword at the running warden and it went through his abdomen.
"You're even terrible at this!" said Henri.
"Quite!"
Then they heard the loud bell sound and the whole building went on alert.
"Malaka." Marius mumbled.
"Front exit is out of the question now. We'll have to find another escape."
"We should just ditch our armor. It will only slow us down."
"Oh no! I paid big money for my armor set!"
Then they heard more wardens coming in their way.
"Fine!" Henri blurted.
The two of them dropped their sack and ran to the opposite direction. The two made their way through the building looking for an exit while avoiding the patrols by going through alternate passage and pretending to be one of the wardens.
After what felt like hours of avoiding and hiding, they found themselves in the frontyard and the exit just before them. Guarding the frontyard were more prison warden on high alert.
"That is our only exit." Marius whispered.
"I don't wanna look around here any longer. Let's just get outta here." Henri whispered.
"If we could try stealing one of their horses, we could escape here faster."
"Good plan."
The two exited out and walked through the wardens without raising suspicion.
"So far so good."
"Quite."
Then, Marius saw the warden he throw a sword at laying on the ground his wound tended. The wounded warden saw him and pointed his finger.
"It's them! They're the suspect!"
"Shit!" Henri pulled out his sword, followed by Marius.
They were immediately surrounded with archer pointing their arrows at them on the high walls.
"This is not going well!" said Henri.
"Do you have other plans!" said Marius.
"I'm thinking I'm thinking!"
"Then we will fight them!"
"Hold on! Let me just-"
Then, something big flew above them and the archer where suddenly hit by a powerful wind attack that toppled the wall they stood on. And another wind magic hit the wardens surrounding the two escapees, blowing them away like ragdolls.
"Okay, that was not in my plan." said Henri.
Then, out from the dust, two filolials appeared and stop infront of them.
"Filolials?"
"They are faster than horses. We should use them."
"Not my idea of a majestic mount but they'll do."
Henri and Marius quickly mounted the filolials and made their escape amongs the chaos of constant wind magic attacking the compound.
After they were deep in the forest and far away from the capital, the filolials stop and the two escaped prisoners dismounted.
"That was not in plan, was it not?" said Marius.
"I don't remember filolials nor sudden wind attack." said Henri.
"That was me." said a calm and polite male voice.
The turned their heads and looked upto see a winged man hovering in the air, donning a greek hoplite armor made of gold. On his left hand was a hoplon shield with the image of an owl and a long xiphos sword on his right hand.
Marius placed his hand on his sword incase the being planned on attacking him.
"I'm not here to attack. I'm here to help."
The golden winged man landed on the ground, his golden wings can be seen before it shrunk and fused into the back of his cuirass. He walked closer to Marius and two of them have matching heights.
"Glad I could make it in time." said the stranger.
"Who are you?" said Marius.
The man took out his helmet, revealing a young handsome man with long blonde hair almost reaching his shoulders, with all the strain combed to the back except for his split bangs and a single small cowlick on top.
Marius looked closer and noticed how the young man's blue eyes looked so familiar.
"My name is Icarus. It's an honor to finally meet you, father."
"Hueh?!"
