Disclaimer: I do not own ZnT.

"Saito" -Talking

'Louise' -Thinking/ Human-Human Telepathy

"Explosion!" -Spell

:Master: -Master/Familiar Telepathy

Chapter 6: Investigations and Discoveries

The Next Day - Morning

Louise and Saito's Suite

Saito woke up slowly, a bout of confusion coming over him as he looked around the unfamiliar room in a sleepy daze. Why was he in a stone room built in an antique Western style?

Looking over at the other bed in the room, he saw a petite pinkette in a white nightgown curled up like a cat in the middle of the large mattress. Upon seeing her, all his memories of the previous day came flooding back, making him frown.

'So, just to summarise, I've been summoned to a parallel world, enslaved by that cute girl over there as a Familiar and there is no known way for me to return to my own world.' Saito thought with a kind of resigned sigh, 'Not to mention I used more magic yesterday than I used in the last year and seem to be suffering no ill effects, which is both puzzling and gratifying.'

This was something that continued to puzzle him as he dressed in the spare set of clothes he had brought along in his backpack. Judging by the way the teacher Colbert had blasted away at him the previous day, the Mages of Halkaginia had at least three-times the magical reserves of a regular Onmyoji from his own world, which was ridiculous.

"Mhmmm…." Louise grumbled as she sat up and peered blearily at Saito.

"Good morning, Louise." Saito greeted her politely, "I hope you slept well?"

The pinkette blinked as Saito swam into proper focus for her. She blinked once, twice and then thrice as her face steadily reddened until she looked rather like a red Christmas light.

"KYAAAAAAAAAA!" she screeched and started pelting Saito with assorted items that was within reach. A pillow, a china jug and several assorted brushes, combs and sponges were sent flying at Saito, who dodged them with a deadpan look on his face.

"As she predicted…" he sighed as he sidestepped away from a flying chamber pot that was thankfully empty.

Flashback - The Previous Day

After calming Louise down -which was neither easy or short- Saito led the way into the suite, Siesta clutching him from behind in a death grip and Louise stomping after them, her eyes narrowed at the maid menacingly.

Flying around the bedroom was a six-winged crow with crimson eyes. Saito just looked at it for a moment before sighing in mild exasperation.

"Emereldas, kindly don't randomly pop up and scare people." he said in a monotone, sounding as if he had said the same thing dozens of times before.

"But Master, this world has almost as much magic as my home dimension!" the crow replied excitedly, "I could sense it through our link, so I simply had to come and see for myself!"

Saito shook his head and beckoned the crow, which Louise noted also had three legs, to land on his arm.

"Well then Master, I suppose you should meet my first Familiar as she decided to appear without permission." the Mystic said in a resigned tone, "This is Emereldas, a Rokuyoku Yatagarasu (Six-Winged Eight-Span Crow) who is my Protective Demon."

"A Yata-what?" Louise asked in confusion.

"A Yatagarasu, girl." Emereldas said snootily, "A Sun Crow. I protect my master with the power of the Sun itself. And you as well, I suppose, at least until he is rid of your runic shackle."

Louise bristled at the dismissive tone the small bird had taken with her, but Saito rapped Emereldas lightly across her beak while he scowled at Louise, making both of them look at him.

"None of that, you two." Saito said sternly, "We are going to have to get along, so Emereldas, no snide remarks from you, and Louise, don't take everything she says so seriously. She's fond of needling people."

"As you command Master, but I am rather unhappy that my Master has a Master of his own." Emereldas replied somewhat sulkily, "And you know what that Ginki is going to say once you and she reconnect."

"'If she's in the way, let me kill her and be done with it, Aruji (master).'" Saito quoted with a sigh, "Yes, Kaede is likely to say something like that, as well as try and carry it out unless I order her not to."

"EEP!" Siesta, who had been listening to all this in a kind of petrified silence, let out a loud squeak of fear before collapsing onto her knees.

"Miss Siesta?" Saito kneeled down next to her in concern, "Are you OK?"

"Y-Yes…" Siesta blushed at the honest concern Saito was showing as he helped her back to her feet.

"Now Emereldas, kindly apologise to Miss Siesta here for scaring her." Saito directed his Familiar, "She has been assigned as Louise's maid and so she'll be around us both fairly frequently. Please try and get along."

The eight-limbed crow shuffled down Saito's arm and looked at Siesta for a moment before bowing her head slightly.

"Siesta is it? I am sorry for frightening you." Emereldas said softly, "I neglected to take into account that Yatagarasu were unlikely to be native to your world, so my appearance must have been shocking for you."

"I-It's alright." Siesta replied, somewhat taken aback by the fact that a bird was speaking to her, "You weren't to know that."

"No, I should have considered it." the Yatagarasu replied with a shake of her head, "It was foolish of me and I still apologise."

"Think nothing of it." Siesta replied with a smile, "Anyway, I had better return to the servant's quarters. Goodnight Mistress Louise, Master Saito. Miss Emereldas."

The maid curtsied politely before turning and exiting the suite, the door clicking shut smoothly behind her. Louise then turned her attention to Saito and raised an eyebrow questioningly at him.

"If memory serves, neither of your Familiars are crows." she observed quietly.

"Quite right. Emereldas, return to your original form." Saito ordered.

The crow flapped off his arm, onto the ground and glowed a pale red before vanishing in a burst of white light. Standing in the same space the crow had been was a girl about the same size as Louise. Her skin was lightly tanned and had various mystical and intricate tattoos etched across her skin, which was almost entirely bare to the world, save for a loincloth of some kind and a bronze breastplate that enhanced her figure as well as preserving what little modesty the girl had.

What drew Louise's attention however were the pure black bat-like wings on her back, long sinuous forked tail emerging from above her pert rear and elegant pair of horns atop her head. She was the very picture of a female devil.

"Allow me to reintroduce myself," Emereldas spoke in a low sultry voice completely different from her bland voice as a crow, "I am Emereldas, a Succubus of the Eighth Circle. A pleasure to truly make your acquaintance, little girl."

Louise was struck dumb by the being before her, the charisma coming off Emereldas had her transfixed, utterly unable to look away from her. Saito rolled his eyes and threw his Familiar a look that clearly said to stop what she was doing.

"Oh, alright, Master." Emereldas pouted as she fluttered her eyelashes at him. Louise gasped and looked around in shock.

"What in the Founder's name was that?!" she asked.

"That was the most basic level of the specialty of a Succubus. An ability called {Phantasmal Allure}." Saito replied, "It transfixes and focuses the attention of all men and women within range onto her, leaving them helpless to my magic and the attacks of both Emereldas and Kaede."

"I thought Succubi could only seduce men." Louise said with a frown.

"We can only feed off the energy of men, similar to how Incubi can only feed on women." Emereldas said in a bored tone, "Our auras, however, do not differentiate between male and female. Anyone who retains the base desires to breed and feel pleasure can and will be ensnared by my power."

"It's why I assigned her the role of Protective Demon." Saito explained, "Her demonic sorcery combined with her power of allure make her an almost invincible shield for me."

"Also so you could keep me close to you, my dear Master." the Succubus purred seductively. Saito turned red and spluttered a denial.

Louise shook her head slowly and moved to the next question on her mind. "Why did you conceal yourself behind a Glamour then? And why did you spin that story about Yatagarasu?"

"A Glamour? Oh please, I wouldn't soil my magical abilities with such a lowly spell." Emereldas scoffed disdainfully, "My father was half Onimodoki and my mother was half Doppelganger, so I inherited the unique ability to shift into any being I have touched or seen. Like so."

She then vanished into white light again, transforming into an exact duplicate of Louise herself before reverting to her original form.

"As to why we deceived Siesta…" Saito interjected, "You almost had a heart attack when you heard I had a Devil and an Ogre for Familiars, so did Osmond, for all he hid it well. I think it is prudent to keep her actual form hidden so no-one other than those we tell know about her."

"Sensible." Louise remarked before yawning, "Oh dear. It's getting late. We should turn in, Saito."

"That sounds like an excellent idea." the Onmyoji agreed, "Emereldas, return to your own dimension and contact Kaede. Tell her about everything that has happened and tell her that I forbid her from acting unilaterally regarding my…situation…with Louise and she is to contact me the next time I'm awake."

"By your command, my Master." Emereldas bowed before him before fading into nothing.

"She just vanished!" Louise exclaimed with wide eyes.

"She used her innate demonic nature to return to her own dimension." Saito said after he yawned, "It's called…dimension slipping, I think. Oh boy, am I going to sleep like the dead."

"Saito, I should warn you, I am…not a morning person." Louise told him, a faint dusting of pink on her cheeks as she admitted this, "I'll likely overreact to seeing you in the morning and throw things at you, so I'll apologise in advance."

"I sincerely hope you don't, but I'll prepare myself just in case." Saito told his diminutive master as he slumped over to his bed in search of forty winks.

Flashback End

'She said she wasn't a morning person; boy was she understating things!' Saito thought as the tiny pinkette finally ran out of things to throw at him.

"…Let's try this again." Saito said after a moment of contemplation, "Good morning Louise."

"Saito?" his Master finally realised whom she had been throwing things at and flushed bright red at the mess she had made. Scattered pieces of pottery and fabric littered the floor and Louise could only imagine how long it would take to replace all of the items.

"Before you move, allow me to clear the room somewhat." Saito said as he drew a talisman from his coat, making Louise wonder exactly how many of those things he had readily at hand. He must have used at least fifty of them the previous day.

"Talisman of Light and Dark, come to my aid!" Saito intoned, "Onmyōjutsu: Heya Ippai: Kōmoku Shūri! (Yin and Yang Technique: Full Room: Item Repair!)"

The talisman in his hand emitted a pulse of light that made all the broken, ripped and torn items glow slightly before they flew back to their original positions, fully and seamlessly repaired to the point you couldn't tell that they had ever been broken.

Louise looked relieved. Saito had, with that one spell, just saved her about fifty Écu in fines and the cost of replacing the broken/damaged pottery and bedclothes.

"I'll go and have a look at the training room while you get dressed." Saito said, blushing lightly as he noticed that her nightgown only fell to midway down her thighs. He rapidly beat a hasty retreat out the door and into the training room/former sitting room.

His first impression of the room was that it somewhat resembled an old-fashioned Western fencing Salle. Obviously, it had been designed with duelling in mind, with a padded floor and walls designed to cushion people who took a tumble from a hit or a spell.

"Leather…not a bad material, but not a good one either." Saito muttered. Leather was physically tough, but not magically resilient by any means. A half-decent fireball could burn right through leather without stopping, so it was usually magically reinforced to some degree.

Unfortunately, leather was also the absolute devil to enchant as it had once been a part of a living animal and thus still had a remnant of the animal's life force that resisted any attempt to magically alter it in any way. Blasting through it with an offensive spell wasn't an issue as it wasn't trying to alter it, merely destroy it, but enchanting? The damn material was more stubborn than a herd of intemperate mules with toothaches.

"This is going to take an entire day to reinforce to the standards I'll want." Saito bemoaned.

"You seem to have a lot of apprehension about this, Mr Saito." Osmond observed from behind him, making the young magic user leap a foot into the air with fright. He hadn't even heard the door open.

"Please don't do that." Saito said as his heart raced, "I might launch a lightning bolt at you on reflex."

"I am an extremely old Mage, Mr Saito." Osmond reminded him, "On top of that, I have been Headmaster of this Academy for more than twenty-five years. If I were feeble enough to let a youngster's lightning bolt -regardless of whether that youngster is qualified or not- get by me, I would quietly retire. As I have not, you can be assured that I can deal with pretty much anything you can conjure."

"I'm sure." Saito replied dryly. Although he had known that such was a probable fact, it still hurt his ego to hear the old man casually brush his abilities off like that, "Anyway, I'm so 'apprehensive' as you put it, because leather is as hard to enchant as basalt is to carve; immensely difficult, time consuming and exhausting."

"It is tiring, true." Osmond acknowledged, "But surely it is within your capabilities?"

"Oh it is." Saito replied, "But once I do it, I'll be out like a light until the next day. I don't even have any idea of how strong Louise's magical backfires are, so I need to at least see one and takes some readings first, so I can tailor the enchantment to her magical signature."

"An excellent idea, although I suspect Miss Vallière will not be eager to show you her 'backfires'." Osmond remarked.

"We'll see." Saito replied, "Now, I should warn you that Louise is less than happy with you for your little joke with Siesta yesterday."

Osmond chuckled dryly. "So I surmised from the blood-curdling shriek I heard yesterday."

"Yeah, that was mitigated by you helping Siesta get out of that Mott guy's clutches and by dragging Kirche and her stooge in for a telling off." Saito said wryly, "Still, you should expect an epic-length rant and dressing down from her, if I'm right about her personality."

Which he was. Louise let loose at the Headmaster a veritable river of passionate denunciations, rants about the stupidity of telling a servant something so inflammatory and topped it off with throwing the chamber pot at the old man, smacking him right in the centre of his forehead.

After Saito had fixed the pottery potty (again) and Osmond was no longer seeing stars, the three of them sat down and thrashed out a reasonable system of punishments and a code of conduct for both Saito and Louise to follow.

There was one particular section that neither Louise nor Saito were happy about and Osmond was only able to offer commiserations to them about it: the Deflowering Punishment.

"Why is…that…even a necessary punishment?" Saito demanded, "It's practically rape for Kami's sake!"

"The basic terms were set forty-five hundred years ago, Mr Saito, by a set of perverted -even by my standards- old men." Osmand said wearily, "These basic terms have to be in place for the Contract to be legal, and as distasteful as it might be, this punishment has to be included in the list for that to be the case."

"Are there any guidelines for precisely what level of discipline it has to be at?" Louise asked with a scowl.

"No, but this is a good thing as we can set it for something completely improbable but entirely possible to happen." Osmond replied, "It has to be something that the Apprentice could conceivably do in order to be written down as a punishment, but it can be something so unlikely that only a very unlucky set of circumstances could possibly lead to it happening."

"How about her deliberately casting ten consecutive explosions at me within the space of five minutes with malicious intent, followed by hitting me with a whip?" Saito suggested, "At the moment, Louise can't cast at me maliciously and once we figure out what's up with her magic, she just has to avoid using explosion spells. And buying whips."

"Sounds good." Louise agreed, "I don't even own a whip anyway, so that's easily avoided."

"Actually, you will have to actually own a whip in order to include that in the contract." Osmond put in, "Why not simply make it 'strike you with weapons'?"

"Because she is not a morning person and threw everything but the kitchen sink at me this morning before she realised it was me." Saito replied dryly, making Louise blush furiously, "Those could be classed as improvised weapons, so would count. I do not want to punish her for a perfectly natural reaction to an unknown person being in her room."

"So by making the choice of weapon as specific as possible, you vastly cut down on the likelihood of the punishment being invoked." Osmond said, slightly impressed by Saito's reasoning, "You must still own whatever you designate as the 'forbidden weapon' though."

"Whip? Riding crop?" Saito looked at Louise enquiringly.

"We can have a look in Tristania on the Day of the Void." Louise said, "Even if we decide on a whip beforehand, it will take at least four days to fully enchant the Contract for it to be binding, and the Day of the Void is in a couple of days time."

"An excellent point." Osmond said approvingly, "Although I would also advise you to buy Mr Saito here a weapon as a form of camouflage. Most people will see him with a sword over his shoulder and assume he is a bodyguard of some sort rather than a Mage."

"I have no idea how to use a sword, though." Saito pointed out.

"Lessons can be arranged if necessary, but those runes on your hand tell me that such a happenstance will be unlikely in the extreme." Osmond said with a smile, "You see, Mr Colbert did some research last night and discovered that your runes mark you as the Gandálfr, the Left Hand of God."

Louise gasped. "As in the legendary Familiar of Founder Brimir? That Gandálfr?"

"Indeed. It is said in the legends that a Gandálfr is blessed by the Founder to be peerless with any weapon created for combat." Osmond explained to Saito, who examined his Familiar Runes with increased interest.

"Fascinating. I knew that Western Runic Magic could accomplish such things, but this is beyond my expectations." Saito remarked.

"Why do you keep mentioning 'Western' magic? Doesn't your world use pretty much the same kind of magic?" Osmond queried.

"No. Magic users in the far western lands use magic a great deal similar to your own, except they use a dead language to cast their spells." Saito corrected him swiftly, "In addition, their wands and staves are all custom-made for them with runes and a hair, heartstring or feather of a magical beast acting as an amplifier for their magic, as well as the simple conduit versions that this world uses."

"I will have to hear more about this at a later date." Osmond was fascinated by Saito's description of the wandmaking process of his world but reluctantly put it to one side, "To return to the matter at hand, do you agree that a whip or riding crop -both perhaps- should be written in?"

Both young magic users nodded in confirmation. Osmond scribbled down the specifics before rolling the Contract up and stowing it in his robes.

"It will take, as Miss Vallière said, four days to enchant the contract." he informed Saito, "Please make sure to be in possession of both a whip and a riding crop before then."

"We'll take care of it on the Day of the Void." Louise assured him.

"Excellent. Now, I believe Mr Saito has some things to discuss with you, so I will let myself out." Osmond said with a sneaky smile.

"Coward." Saito accused him without rancour.

"No, I merely know when to pick my battles." Osmond replied with a chuckle as he headed towards the door, "I would encourage you to listen to him, Miss Vallière. It will be good practice for when the contract is signed. I will let your teachers know you are unlikely to be in class today."

As the old man left the room, Louise looked at Saito curiously. "What does he mean?" she asked.

"I need to measure the strength of one of your explosions in order to craft the protections in the training room to be strong enough to resist them." Saito said bluntly, "It might be…somewhat embarrassing to try and purposely create an explosion, but it is necessary."

Louise nodded, reluctance to flaunt her magical inability in front of Saito very much obvious in her body language, but she agreed to it none the less.

"Breakfast first, and then we get to experimenting." Saito decided. There was no way he was experimenting with potentially powerful and dangerous magical explosions without a good breakfast under his belt.

"Fair enough." Louise agreed.

LSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLSLS

After Breakfast

Nearby Forest

"Right, this ought to be far enough away from the Academy." Saito said as he and Louise came to a small clearing. They were both mounted on horses borrowed from the Academy stables. Saito had deemed it necessary to get away from prying eyes for this experiment, both for safety reasons and so no one would sneer at Louise when she (inevitably) blew something up.

After dismounting, Louise looked around the clearing. It was devoid of any animal tracks, so there was little chance of harming wildlife once Saito put up one of his Kekkai barriers.

"Right, I'm going to seal the clearing, so keep the horses away from the edge of the forest." Saito called over to her from the centre of the clearing.

"Right!" Louise called back, tightening her hold on the reins she held in case the steeds were spooked and tried to run.

"Talismans of Wood, come to my aid!" Saito chanted, "Kekkai: Shizen-kai Hogo no Shōheki! (Barrier Field: Barrier of Nature's Protection)"

The black-haired Mystic threw sixteen talismans into the air, which flew out, attached themselves to various trees around the clearing, and began to glow a light green colour.

"That's that." Saito wiped his brow with one hand, "No wild or trained animal can enter here until I remove the barrier. Even humans will have trouble getting through it unless they are immensely strong willed or determined."

"You seem to be able to use quite the variety of spells." Louise observed, "Water, Air, Earth, Fire and now Wood."

"Most people can in my world." Saito replied, "Unless their talents are heavily biased towards a single discipline, the use of five to six different branches of magic by a single person is hardly unusual, as long as the spells are fairly low-level."

"That's because of your talismans, correct?" Louise asked.

"Partially." Saito replied, "Another part is that we undergo strict and rigorous training to encourage mental discipline and focus. Magic follows intent, so if our focus is strong enough and our intent to the magic is clear enough, there is little that you cannot accomplish."

"Impressive." Louise said, and she meant it. Most Mages were arrogant and lazy with their abilities, convinced that being able to use magic made them a superior breed of human and therefore needed no training or practice.

'If his world's Mages ever come here with the intent to conquer, the Nobility would be slaughtered like lambs.' the pinkette thought as she watched Saito create a very large Earth Golem as a target for her spell, as well as what he referred to as a 'Seimei-Index Measuring Field', what ever that meant.

"Right, that should do it." Saito looked pleased, "Now, step into the Seiman if you please."

"The what?" Louise asked in bafflement.

Saito lightly hit his forehead. "Sorry, the pentagram. Please step into the Pentagram and we can begin." he corrected himself.

Louise nodded and stepped into the five-pointed star Saito had drawn into the ground with a stick and anchored talismans at each of the five points each bearing a different symbol: (Sui/Water), (Ji/Earth), (Hi/Fire), (Kaze/Wind) and (Kū/Void).

"Now, when I say go, I want you to try and cast a fairly weak spell." Saito told her as he created a wall of rock to dive behind just in case, which Louise couldn't really blame him for, considering the fuss everyone had made about her explosions.

"Like what?" she asked.

"Levitation, candle lighting, cleaning…something along those lines." Saito replied, "Something that doesn't take much in the way of power."

"Levitation." Louise declared.

"Alright then, on your marks…go!" Saito said and quickly ducked behind his wall.

Louise raised her wand with a sigh, pointed it at the Golem and said, "Ar Lo Ra!"

The tip of the wand glowed, before a large [BANG!] echoed across the clearing in concert with an equally large eruption of smoke from where the Golem stood, making the two occupants of the clearing cough.

As the smoke dispersed, Saito peered around the wall. Louise was slightly ruffled by the explosion, but otherwise seemed unharmed.

The Golem on the other hand had a fist-sized hole in its chest, right about where Louise had aimed her wand. Saito looked at the small magical hologram he had behind the wall that showed him the readings being taken by the pentagram and frowned in confusion at the readings it showed.

"Odd." he remarked idly as he stepped out fully from behind the wall and walked over to examine the Golem's wound. It was as if it had been shot with an anti-tank rifle.

"What do your scans show?" his Master asked.

"Odd and inconclusive results." Saito replied, "It says you are displaying both a lot of power, yet none at all, simultaneously."

"That's stupid." Louise said with a light flush of anger, "I certainly did something. The hole in the Golem proves that!"

"I am not arguing." Saito replied, "Now, that was the weakest spell you have memorised?"

"One of the three weakest, yes." Louise said as she fingered her wand idly, "That particular one was designed for levitating a single sheet of parchment, a training spell really."

"I see…" Saito thought for a moment before shrugging and trudging back over to his wall, "This time, I want you to go the other way. Cast the most powerful spell you know without holding back on your magic. Let it loose."

"Are you sure?" Louise asked. The first explosion she had ever made was during her first lesson at the Academy with the encouragement to put as much effort behind the spell as she could muster. On a simple Pushing spell.

The classroom had needed an entire new wall after that day.

"Yup. I need to know how strong your explosions can become so I can make the warding on the training room correspondingly stronger in order to withstand it." Saito replied, "I'll be fine, so please choose your spell and be ready on my mark."

Louise nodded and thought through her repertoire for the only battle-class spell she had learned. It was not an especially powerful combat spell, but it should suffice for this, even although she had never attempted to cast the spell before. She nodded at Saito to signal that she was ready.

"Good. On your marks…Go!" Saito ducked behind the wall again as Louise pointed her wand at the Golem again.

"Err Melaeum Sar…Ruet!" Louise shouted.

[KABOOOM!]

This explosion dwarfed the previous one completely. The expanding wind pressure from the blast should have flung Louise into the trees behind her and would have were it not for the pentagram around her, which flared into life at the first sign of danger directed at the person occupying it. A shield of pure magic crackled into existence around Louise, shielding her from the blast.

The smoke from the explosion enveloped both of the magic users again, the shield around Louise ignoring it in favour of stopping the concussive force of the explosion. After a minute or so, the explosion tapered off and died

"…cough…cough…Louise! Are you alright?!" Saito shouted from behind his wall, which was cracked and pitted by the explosion.

"Y-Yes…somewhat." the pinkette said faintly. That explosion had far surpassed all of her previous failures by a very large margin. If Saito hadn't added that shield to the pentagram, she was certain that she would have been badly injured at the very least.

"Man…" Saito stood up and gazed in awe at where his fifteen-foot Earth Golem had once stood. In its place was a rough crater about three feet deep and five feet wide, as if a giant had reached down and scooped up Saito's Golem along with the ground it had stood on.

Mechanically, he turned his head to look at Louise, who was also gaping in shock at the crater she had unintentionally created.

"Master? What the hell did you just cast?" Saito asked calmly.

"I-It was supposed to be a mid-level fireball." Louise replied, still trying to get her head around the fact that her spell had caused this kind of damage, "The kind that is useful to distract an enemy while you come up with a plan, but not powerful enough to seriously wound or kill them."

"I'm familiar with the type of spell you are talking about." Saito said as he frowned, "Still that was no fireball, just as the spell before it was no levitation spell. Most bizarre."

He turned his attention to the readings his spell had gathered. After a moment, his jaw dropped in disbelief. He blinked, pinched himself and stared at the readings again.

They hadn't changed.

"What's wrong?" Louise asked in concern, "You look like a freshly caught fish."

"I feel like it right now." Saito said faintly, "According to the readings, your magic either doesn't exist or is immensely strong."

"Grrrr. Are you sure you cast that spell right?" Louise asked, one eye twitching in irritation at the contradiction given by the scanning spell.

"Yes!" Saito shot back irritably. He didn't understand how this was possible. There was only one, completely theoretical, reason this could be happening, but is was unlikely in the extreme.

'There again, so is being dragged across worlds to be enslaved as a Familiar. Saito thought wryly.

"Then what is the matter with me?!" Louise demanded, being unaware of Saito's internal thoughts. Her eyes were filled with frustration at this dead end.

"I…think I know." Saito said slowly, his voice unsure, "But I'll need to add another spell to the scanning spell first to make certain I am right. Hang on for a moment."

He pulled out five more talismans and began to chant under his breath in an odd language that Louise didn't know. It certainly wasn't the language Saito used for his other spells, 'Japanese' as he called it.

"Seiman Keisei: Naikaku Ken-sha! (Seal of Seimei Formation: Inner Core Examiner!)" Saito declared at the end of a solid five minutes of chanting in that odd language. He threw the tags into the air, which then circled Louise for a moment before flying to the side and a meter up and forming another pentagram in midair.

A column of blue light descended from the pentagram and within it was a perfect reproduction of Louise, down to the last hair. Rather than coloured like the original, it was filled with an eye-searing white light that made Saito gasp.

"What does all that light mean?" Louise asked as her eyes watered from the bright light.

"This is your magical core. The…the brighter the light, the more condensed the magic of the person is." Saito replied, disbelief edging into his face as he gazed at the image of Louise intently, "While the colour indicates how much magic you have. According to this, you have the densest, not to mention the most, magic I've ever seen before!"

"But then…why don't any of my spells work?" Louise asked in confusion.

"Let's see…." Saito made a handsign and chanted for a minute. The image of Louise flickered before changing. Chains appeared in the image, wrapping around her entire body, leaving very little of her visible.

"What the hell?" Louise shrieked, "Is this a joke or something?"

"No, I wish it was, but it isn't." Saito said as he glowered at the image of his master, "Thos chains represent a seal of some kind. Someone has deliberately sealed your magic."

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Next Chapter: Attitude Adjustment

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