Disclaim: I don't own Elsword nor its characters, except my OCs.
Elsword - Rune Master (Age: 22)
Eve - Code: Sariel (With part of Code: Ultimate's weapon)
Kazuki Yuuki – Soul Reaper (Hidden as Assassin) (Age: 21)
Lily – Unknown Spirit (18)
Sakura – Former Hunter / Current Supporter (22)
Chapter 5: Invasion & Revelation
- Altera Kingdom - Elsword's Room -
A Red-hair Magician was sleeping peacefully on his bed. His body was half naked, wrapped in medical bandage. He could have slept a little longer had it not for the alarm to go off. A small groan escaped his mouth and reached to turn it off. He opened his eyes slowly to meet the white ceiling of the room.
"My… room?"
He moved his body to get up, but still on his bed. Another groan came out from his mouth as he felt the muscle pain, and found out the bandage. He wondered who did this until he saw another presence beside his bed, a black drone.
"Moby?"
He touched Moby and shook a little, which woke the little drone up.
"Master…? You're awake." Moby jolted up and cuddled into his laps.
"H-Hey Moby." Elsword chuckled and held the drone despite a little hurt by his forceful cuddling.
"Wait here. I will call her!"
He watched Moby leaving the room. Moby was still the same. He was Elsword's little buddy when he was still the leader of El Search Party. Every time Moby wasn't training with Eve, he came and played with Elsword to kill time and he grew fond of him beside Eve. To him, Moby acts like a black cat. He likes how Moby was purring when he patted his head.
A moment later, the door slid again and the Queen stepped inside with her medical kit on her hand, her drones floating with her.
"Yo, Eve." As usual, he greeted her, waving his hand.
"You sure are dummy." was her first words when Eve saw him. Of course Elsword was jokingly hurt by her cold words and stayed down while he let her check his health. She opened the old bandage on his arm that was stained with blood by the wound from Alterasia and applied medicine before rewrapping with new bandage.
"This will do." She told and put the box down "You never change, still the reckless dummy."
"Aw come on, Eve. You always say that many times." Elsword winced.
"Only when you like putting yourself in danger." She retorted.
Elsword chuckled weakly at that. While Eve wore the cold mask on her face, he could tell she was worried about him, but not letting her know that he knew. Moby leaped from her side to cuddling Elsword, earning a smile from magician.
"Anyway, Eve." Elsword called "What happened to Alterasia?" Last time he remembered, he was injured by that spore knight and infected that made him losing his strength and then fainted.
"I managed to destroy it as well as the main core of the abnormal power. It took me a while to redirect the infected core out of the Altera. Once it was destroyed, I told Moby and Remy to carry you back and ordered my men to clear out the remains of the Alterasia in that tunnel for further use." Eve told.
"Souka… (I see…)." Elsword nodded, part of him relief that the problem had been resolved, yet another still worried him. He still remembered her acting out of character. He asked "How's your feeling now?"
He didn't miss her body's flinch and was interrupted before he could ask further "I'm better, Elsword. I have run a full scan on my body. Nothing is wrong to me."
Elsword knew one thing that Nasod didn't lie to anyone, and yet, her iris seemed to move a little bit upon saying that. He knew something was off with her, but then again he decided to shrug it off before lying down again, a sigh escaping his mouth.
"Well, at least Altera is safe."
For now…
- ? –
"Have you located the Valkyrur?"
"Yes, sir. We found Valkyrur in other dimension." A man with glass on left eyes reported "However, we can't be sure to retrieve this without fight. Our scout detected Valkyrur in a small castle and is well guarded."
"Hn…" the man looked out of the window and spoke up after a few minutes of pondering "Then send them to capture her. Remember, we need Valkyrur alive. I won't show tolerate to any of you if it died."
"At your command."
- 3 days later –
Another peaceful day came to Altera. The island seemed to float more effectively after the Alterasia Clean Up. Eve directed the contaminator team to kill the remains of Alterasia and cleaned up to retake the tunnel, thus removing the threat to the Altera Core. Right now, the village went back to their usual day full with crowded people, children playing with each other, and-
"Hyaaa!"
-sounds of sparring… look like someone want to test out ability on a certain Red Hair Magician.
"Damn, Eve. Slow down, will ya?" Elsword gripped his sword and blocked every strike Eve was making on him.
Instead of answer, he faced another spear attack from above and dodged it. He triggered the flame and swept upward on the ground, created and Sword Wave and attacked her. To his disappointment, Eve did the same but with her El Energy. Both Sword Wave collided each other and exploded. Eve, however, didn't detect this and saw Elsword charged through the smoke. She raised her spear to block his sword but then her weapon got thrown in the air and found his sword near her neck.
"Nice fight, but I'm still better than you."
He was sure he got advantage on the sparring, yet something was off. Realizing her, he pushed her away before Eve shot out electric ray from her finger which was supposed to shock him on his chest.
"Hey, that's cheating!"
"Sorry, Elsword." Eve spoke up after recalling her spear "But I'm still the Sariel. I have more advantages on beating you, one way or another."
To prove that she meant it, she called out Thousand Stars and a small gate behind her which was used to call out Energy Needles. Worse, her spear was acting up as Eve channeled her energy into it. Elsword looked at her, realized that she went a little too far for a sparring.
"Woah! Woah! Woah! Time Out! Time Out!" Elsword crossed his hands in T shape to stop her just as the clock for the sparring went off, which saved his life from the Wrath(?) of Nasod Queen.
The Queen, though, seemed unsatisfied by this and turned off her devices and disabled the spear. She wished she could go all out on Elsword.
"Do you have to be serious?" Elsword pouted.
Eve approached and touched his face with a smile "I know what I do to protect my precious." And ran her index finger to his chin before returning to the throne. Elsword stared at her, not sure when she learnt how to flirt. He shook his head and muttered 'women…' and followed her with a smirk. They both decided to talk a walk throughout the village. The Red Hair Magician could take a better look at the civilians: a mid-tall Nasod carried stuffs for an old lady, who seemed happy, a small human-like child playing with other children.
They then arrived at the church, where everything started. Both didn't want to speak, simply they can't because they lost themselves in the memories of their wish, a wish of their fate. Elsword knew that it's still a long way. The circumstance didn't allow them yet.
"After this, you will leave for Ruben, right?" Eve asked after a long silence. It's hard to notice but her voice is trembling.
Elsword nodded "I have to visit the rest of the villages. You know I haven't seen them for a long time-"
"But you will come back, right?" She interrupted with a frown. For unknown reason, she wished he would stay with her.
"… I don't know. I'm use to travelling around the world so I can't stay in one place for a long time." He hesitated but returned to his grin "Why? You will miss me?"
In return, she spun around and slapped on his shoulder, but that didn't help her hide the embarrassing face. Said to double when she saw the stupid grin on his face and slapped on his cheek that he fell on the ground.
"Stupid Elsword."
"Tee-hee."
He stood up and continued accompanying Eve.
- Actual Base –
The team was still waiting for order from the HQ and yet, they heard nothing. Both Kazuki and Sakura focused on something under the basement while waiting for the experiment the blonde was planning.
"It is done..." She muttered. Before her was the capsule which contains the artificial body of the young girl with white long hair.
"Are you sure she can use this body?" Kazuki asked.
"I thought you trust me." She faked hurt "I modified a device on its neck to help her easily control the body, though it takes her some time to get use to walk around or doing activities."
He looked at the body for a short time and turned his head to the spirit and asked "You like it?"
Lily nodded but teased "Just not getting any funny idea when you stare at my new body."
"Ugh! You two…" He groaned, having both females teasing him is troublesome.
The team then snapped out as they heard alarm from the HQ. They quickly rushed and interacted the monitor which showed the woman with brown long hair.
"This is HQ to Actual Base. Do you copy?"
"Solid copy, HQ. What's your order?" Kazuki replied, standing firmly.
"The Empire starts moving out to Valkyrur. We found out the Empire wants to capture her." The woman told in a hurry "I have one group assigned to stop them, but I don't think they will make it in time. Expect heavy attack toward Altera. ETA: 30 minutes."
"What will we do?"
"Change of plan. Your objective is killing many of Empire as much as you can and preventing them from retrieving Valkyria Code."
"Roger." He nodded.
The monitor then shut down. Kazuki let of a sigh. This would mean another troublesome work he had to do.
- Altera Island -
A soft yawn from the pink hair secretary Mio as she let her body relax after dealing with a stack of paperwork. She wanted to leave the table and go after the couple (Elsword and Eve of course) but her plan was ruined by another presence beside her, Proto. She had been assigned to look after Mio in case she did something to the majesty.
"Ah… so boring… Proto, don't you have something to do?" Mio groaned, trying to find the way to escape.
Unfortunately, Proto maintained her guard and spoke "My order is keeping you here Mio. Don't try to run away." This earned another groan from Mio and smirked when she saw her slammed her head on the table.
"Do you have to be so serious?" Mio pouted.
"Not after what you did to them." Proto frowned. Mio just 'tee-hee' while scratching behind her head, recalling the memories when Elsword and Eve went to the park. Mio, with her 'great' plan, tried to make them closer. In the end, she got them fell on the pool. As the punishment, she had to deal with stacks of paperwork all day.
"But you have to admit it. They will be a good couple, right?" Mio said. She watched as Proto pondered.
"My opinion, yes. But I doubt none will make a move. You should know that rumor will go wild if your majesty is with him." Proto commented "But it's their personal matter, not ours. So back to your job, Mio."
Once again, Mio slammed her head on the table. She gave up finding way out and continued her work, though it was cut short as an alarm went off all of sudden. Instead of the signal of the harbor, it was Security's. Immediately, Mio raised the hologram to view the camera surrounding the island as well as sonar radar. Proto look at the screen when she heard Mio gasped and saw something that made her narrow her eyes, multiple red dots advancing from the Northeast. On the camera feed…
"We got company." Proto spoke "I will alert the island. You tell the Queen Altera under attack."
"Attention All Civilians. Altera Is Now Under Attack By Unknown Force. Evacuate To Center Of Island. I Repeat, This Is Not The Drill! Evacuate To Center Of Island!"
This got all Altera people panic and rushing to the specific location. Among of them, Elsword and Eve were confused what was happening. Their comm started connecting to Mio as Eve asked "Mio, what's going on?"
"Security Feed caught an unknown force on their way to Altera. They are armed with Battleships and Airstrikes." Mio said in a hurry. Eve could hear chaos on the other side of the comm and opened her hologram. She could see a huge army going straight to Altera.
Without second thought, she ordered "Mio, activate Defense Level 4."
"Roger! Air Defenses online! All Automatic Cannons set! Security Layer covered Altera!"
Right after Mio received order, Elsword saw a blue shield appear all over the sky and covered the island, the ground shaking due to all weapon set.
"All Defenses Online!"
Eve wasted no time and switch the comm to another place, the barrack. There, she called all soldiers available to prepare for incoming war before she turned to Elsword, asking "Elsword, sorry for sudden. I need your help to prevent the invasion from Altera. You will be put in the frontier with other knight."
Elsword narrowed his eyes, knowing how serious she is. He nodded and returned to the castle to arm himself along with Eve. Soon, war began with a loud explosion outside barrier, Air Cannon firing non-stop at the flying drones which shot back. The target, however, floated too fast for the cannon to aim properly. Mio had to resolve this by calculating the drone's movement and manually control one of the cannons and shot down the drone. She smirked and went to the next target.
Down below the island, war is waging between two forces, sounds of gunshots and sword collisions came. Among of them, sight of the wild red flame was burning.
"Out of the way!" Elsword laughed madly as he continuously slashed all the targets on his way. He raised his sword to block the charging one with shield, his sword triggering small flame. He knocked the shield upward, uncovered the weakspot behind it and rapidly Air Slashed, killing the invader. He found another wave advancing and threw a few explosive rune tags just before they stepped on them.
"Binding Rune!"
The tags glowed and released a large circle rune, locking the invaders in one place. Above them were the crystal blue blades hovering with their tips aiming at them before striking down. He advanced along with the others and retook the shore, raising barrier and ground defense. This would buy Altera some time to prevent the infantry. Elsword turned back to one of the fallen invaders, a human-like android. It was more advanced than Nasod. He touched the blue core on its chest and took it off. Eve sure will examine this after the war is over.
"Elsword. The Defense got trouble with battleships. They disarmed first and second AAC (Anti-Air Cannon). Our weapons can't reach to them. I need you to eliminate them before they can destroy the cannons."
The Magician looked over the sea to see a few battleships aiming at the island.
"Wait! How can I go out there? Not to mention how I can destroy them." Elsword retorted. Right after he complained, another airship appeared on his sight. Elsword recognized this one due to his design and the symbol on the front.
"Fire!" On the ship, Raven, the leader of Black Crow, shouted along with cannon fires after that. The bullets hit the ship, but they only caused minor damage.
"Raven!" Elsword yelled "I need your help!"
As response, the ship floated close to the shore and the crew member threw out ladder which Elsword jumped and caught it. He climbed on board and saw Raven driving.
"Not a good day for your visit, is it?" He smirked.
"Eheheh…" Elsword chuckled at his joke for a short moment then turned back to his objective "Raven, can you drive your ship close to the largest battleship? It's risky but i need to do something."
"Hn… Consider it done. Grab something!" Raven accepted and began approaching the ship through rain of fire. Elsword asked Eve to scan the battleship that he will be in. Raven knew the ship will be under heavy fire if it's in range. He ordered the crew to prepare smoking cannon and launched at the battleship to blind them temporarily. Once they're close, Elsword quickly jumped off of the ship and landed on the target.
"I'm on the battleship." Elsword called "Eve, search the coordinate of other ships. I will use this main one as counter attack."
"Copy. Be safe."
As he turned off, be began searching the control room. Of course nothing went well without the fight. He engaged the crews of the battleship who were armed with guns. He raised Rune Shield to block the bullets and returned with Sword Wave, eliminating them. He had to let out a smirk as he faced the captain of the ship. Elsword launched runes at him which was easily evaded by sliding under them. In return, the leader fired bullets at him as distraction before he kicked him. Fortunately, Elsword managed to block it.
"Sorry, buddy." Elsword grinned "You need to be better than that."
He paid no mind what this man was saying and ended his life with a strike. Elsword banged into the citadel after searching over his body and getting a silver keycard, which he assumed the authority to control the ship. Inside was filled with heavy guard and sentry, which Elsword found it annoying. As he was in its sight, the sentry fired out immediately. What's more? Guards are assaulting him from both sides. Elsword had to throw Trapping Rune, which bound the targets in one place and killed them off with explosion. As for the sentry, he used one of those guns dropped from the guards and put a few leads on it. One of the bullets hit the camera, effectively blinding it.
Once he found the commanding room, he approached the hologram and accessed the authority through the keycard. Much to his surprise, the language he saw before was familiar to him, but shrugged it off. This would be another time.
"Magician to Queen, I got control of the battleship. Gimme the coordinate."
"Copy, Magician. The coordinate followed is 6-2 2-7 0-8."
"Got it-"
"Rrrgaaaah!"
Elsword couldn't insert the key into the slot as a man from his back attacked him with a dagger, making him dropped the key. The man pinned Elsword down, trying to stab him on his neck but it was stopped by Elsword's hands. However, due to his hands occupying to stop the dagger, he couldn't cast any rune spell.
"Damn it!"
All of sudden, another one approached from the first man and stabbed on his back. Elsword looked shocked for a moment, staring at the man who saved him.
"Elsword! You hear me? What happened?"
"Nothing, just a crew attacking me. I will launch those missiles."
Eve watched through hologram and saw the large battleship launched multiple missiles in the air and hit other ship, directly. She saw the Crow ship hovering above the ship as Elsword jumped on. At the same time, the missile launched and hit the ship itself. She sighed in relief as the threat in the air got eliminated and put the headphone down. Her mind then thought about those invaders. She planned on gathering all data from them for investigation.
"Eh? What do you mean another wave of invasion?"
Elsword, after successfully destroyed battleships, was shocked while hearing Raven's reason why he was near Altera.
"When I was doing guard, I found a wave of invaders heading to Altera. They were armed. I thought they were Eve's army until one of them fired at the island. I had no choice but to engage." Raven explained "Just as 'he' told me."
"'he?' Who else?"
"I have yet to inspect his identity but he's the one who warned me of an army planning to attack Altera." Raven said. The crew then landed near the harbor. Both Elsword and Raven left the ship and walked through the village.
"For now, let's leave this matter aside and see if the Altera is safe."
They both arrived at the castle and found it under heavy protection by Nasod Guards. Before the entrance were both Proto and Apple with her personal guards.
"Proto, Apple!" Elsword waved his hand at them.
The said girls saw the Red hair magician and the Captain of Crow Mercenary and greeted "Welcome back. Is everything alright?"
"All good. I got the men defending the shore until the situation calms down." Elsword reported "Though I don't think they will come again."
"Then let's get inside, the Queen is expecting you."
"Hm…"
An hour after the invasion, Eve was staring at the component Elsword collected from one of the robot. She had it being examined to find out what it made of. Suffice to say, part of it infused with El Energy but the material is not from any continent, or Elrios. What she can learn that the design was similar to Nasod. She suspected it may came from Elysion. She contacted Adrian but it came to the shock as the Father of Nasod shook his head in denial, saying that he never saw this.
By now Eve and the other members gathered in the Hall of Audience for a meeting.
"We have confirmed that they were neither from Elysion nor Elrios. Where could they be and why?"
Elsword raised his hand and said "Eve, I have something to tell you." Eve nodded "I have a clue but I can't confirm it 100% until further evidence."
"Go ahead, Elsword. Who knows it can be a good lead to this?" Raven told.
Elsword asked Eve to open the map in the middle of the hall. He stared at the Elrios map, a sigh escaped.
"… A continent, on the far North of the map, isolated by the storm." Elsword spoke and pointed at the end of the Northern "The Forgotten Continent."
Eve looked at Mio to confirm the location Elsword pointed. Mio did as Eve told and moved the sonar. The radar then caused disturbing noises as the hologram went distorted, meaning the radar were in the storm range and jammed the radar. Any further movement and the radar will be lost into the storm so Mio had to move it out.
"I have a rumor that it contains the relic of the ancient Nasod," This, again, got Eve's and other current Nasod guards' attention in the hall "An Excavation Team went to discover it, only to find them missing. It's not ordinary storm, but EMP storm. It will stop any engine and makes them dead while in the range of the storm. Plus, the sea is deadly unstable. Another team planned on using airship to avoid it, but they shared the same fate as the first team."
Elsword paused for a moment to take out a large scroll from his pocket and opened it, revealing content with unrecognized language.
"This is what I found during my journey." He continued "A copy of the language found under the sea while I took a mission to find the missing crew of the Excavation Team. I tried to solve this language but so far, I found out its true name and part of its ancient time, which your Father, Adrian, was familiar with. It was-"
"The City of The Sky."
Immediately, Elsword looked at Eve with shock in his eyes.
"How did you know?!"
"… I don't know, but I feel like I have seen them before."
Elsword put the scroll back and continued "One thing I know more about. The City of the Sky was under protection by a guardian name Eltrion MK-2, A Nasod Titan. While the guardian was still active, no force dares to invade the City."
"Wrong."
A voice interrupted him on the ceiling. The team looked up to see the very same Assassin merging his foot on the ceiling. He landed before Elsword who jumped back. This alerted guards raising their weapons.
"What are you doing here?" Eve asked in a cold tone, her hand already charged with El Energy.
"Is that how you greet me?" Kazuki said with a smirk.
"Wait, Eve." Raven stopped her.
Eve looked at Raven with a frown "Why, Raven?"
"He's the one warning me about invasion and saved us from being destroyed."
Eve frowned, not sure if what Raven said is true. She still remembered him destroying data she got in the computer and almost killed her.
"Calm down, Eve." Elsword spoke up "He was also the one who helped me launch the missiles." / "Not you too."
Eve groaned in frustration and canceled her energy on her hand while calling the guards to lower the weapon. "Alright, I will let it off for once. But make it quick. Why did you say "wrong"?"
"Simple," Kazuki said "I'm one of the last citizens of the City of the Sky. I have seen my continent got destroyed by an invasion, falling apart. No one survived."
"What? What about Eltrion?!" Raven asked.
"Eltrion…? Heheheh… Haha…" a low painful chuckle came out from the Assassin, remembering the horror days.
"Eltrion… was under control by Valkyrur."
Yuu-chan: I think I will need for information for the next chapter. It's hard to write to another world outside Elrios and something not within El.
To Guest: You could say that, but I prefer it a new one with Elsword(DK) involved in another Time and Space problem. (*cough cough* Blame Glave *cough*)
Anyway, Read 'n Review, please OwO /