Lucky Souls

by Mushy Peaches

When Konata's father mysteriously vanishes, she and her friends brave the baneful fog of the kingdom of Boletaria, a land of demons, in search of him. Out of their minds, and in over their heads, they fight for love, one another, and to survive. Konami

22. Silence

Lucky Souls

---

Chapter 22: Silence

For Konata Izumi, to maintain a quiescent air was insulting to the very core of her character. Patient inaction to her was a foolish prospect in any situation, regardless of the overly dominating circumstances, the abysmal odds, or her own stakes in the matter.

It never occurred to her that this was a foolish trait, an immature philosophy that in the land of Boletaria might possibly place her and those she cared for in danger. Her taste for adventure and reckless neglect of her own safety didn't help, and usually unbeknownst to her, hindered everyone involved.

Were it not for her actions up until this point, her dear Kagamin wouldn't be in the dire straits she no doubt found herself in. For all the bluenette knew, she was dead or worse. It was for this sole reason she decided now that she deigned it imprudent to act considerably flamboyant as per usual.

Their tight group was, at the moment, broken and scattered. With just her own dry wit, amateur sword hand, and Miyuki's magic to depend on, she'd need all the mature concentration she could muster. And while the others were no doubt dealing with treacherous trials of their own, Kagami was in known mortal danger, with nobody but herself to depend on in her hour of darkness.

The chilling fact still remained however, was Kagami even present within the shadowed temples? The Monumental couldn't have been wrong, telling a tale of a place beyond its scale of sight. Miyuki, oddly enough, knew of such a place, and Konata certainly trusted her judgment and knowledge far more than a demon's.

On the topic of Miyuki, even Konata remained ashamedly observant. The mage's arcane origins had never bothered her, and she trusted the girl she considered a sister with her darkest secrets, deepest desires, frightening inhibitions, and wildest aspirations. However even the stoic Konata was a tad shaken up by Patricia's tale of woe, the terrible things of which she spoke concerning her friend.

Miyuki had never once mentioned anything of such a magnitude ever occurring in her life. She had told extensively of her time within the hallowed walls of the temples, her former home, and her salvation at the hands of her own father, Sojiro, who took the battered and amnesiac-induced girl to his humble town to nurse her back to health under his guidance.

Konata remembered her long-time friend much differently back then; she was shy to a fault, barely able to look anybody in the face without melting into an intense rosy blush and shielding herself. An adorable trait really, now that she thought about it. In fact the day the magician had been brought back to their home she hadn't said but two words to anyone but her.

"Izumi-San." Miyuki spoke calmly, alerting her mentally preoccupied friend to a passing cadre of skeletal aggressors, motioning for her to dip her body lower to the ground and stall movement.

Konata understood, forcing her wriggling mind to think lucidly for once, she refused any screw ups on her behalf during such a hectic time, she needed to be on her absolute best behavior, regardless if she was struggling to force herself to do so. It just wasn't in her nature to act so collected, to remain aloof and chronically cynical and sassy helped ease her nerves, to steel her convictions in the face of death, to act composed was to open herself for a blade.

A shifting mind wouldn't make for a keen mind however. She needed a distraction, if she couldn't act as she wished, she'd do the next best thing, recall a time where she was characteristically sound.

---

"Konata honey, I need you to watch over her for a bit alright? I need to go fetch some things, that fever of hers is taking way more of a toll on her than I thought it would." Her father Sojiro had commanded to his daughter an early autumn morning so many years ago, long before the mystery of his disappearance, or even the known destruction of Boletaria.

Along the road to their hometown of Kasukabe the Izumi's had noticed a most peculiar sight, a heavily tarnished and malnourished girl, no older than Konata herself. The child's clothing was stained with blood and shredded profusely, Sojiro had believed at first the poor thing had been beset upon by some wandering beast of the wilds, but the lack of injuries and the sheer volume of blood soundly diminished the credibility of that theory.

The man and his cordial daughter wasted no time in attending to the girl's dire needs, and decided it best to bring her to their home until they could locate her strangely absent parents. The location of her family was second hand to her health for the moment, especially considering the strange heat that seemed to pulse from the young girl's head without warning, she wasn't nearly in this bad of shape when they had apprehended her from the wilds.

Feeling unusually benign in her ways, Konata ran a cool rag over the unfamiliar girl's head, brushing her cracked and stained glasses before she continued to her fluttering eyes to wipe away the fussy bits of grime.

Alarmingly, the bluenette saw an air of stifled breathing commence within the girl, quaking her tiny form as she struggled to take a much needed gasp of life. Worried her body may be in duress on the inside rather than the out; Konata immediately ripped a line down the girl's loose collar of her robe and planted an ear onto her heaving chest, making sure her faint heartbeat was still steadily ticking away.

It dawned upon her during her examination, that the girl oddly enough had unusually perky breasts for a child her age. Konata sneered with sleaze as she rubbed her face into them without shame, halting her foolishness when the slumbering girl awoke with a thundering cough, sending her glasses clear off her face and sending them flying into the unknown.

"Holy crap you scared me!" Konata nearly shouted, collapsing backwards onto the bouncy bed and grasping her shuddering heart for good measure.

With a still heavy doze the sickly girl looked around the room in a glazed confusion, rubbing her foggy eyes and attempting to discern where exactly she was, or what was even happening at that moment. Something vaguely resembling a person trenched underneath a sea of blue locks focused within her jittery vision, she reached out to the figure and cupped her cheeks, rolling the soft flesh between her fingers to determine if it was in fact a human being.

Under the girl's searching touch, Konata couldn't help but wickedly snicker; she had never seen such an innocent creature in her few years of life. Hesitantly she removed herself from the coming fingers after she had milked the situation for all it was worth, skipping to the other side of the room to locate the girls missing spectacles, which she found after a brief moment of destroying the messy room.

Carefully she clasped the metal latches over the girls' ears, positioning the frames upon the bridge of her nose perfectly and laughing even harder when the weakened girl did a disservice to her condition by doubling over backwards against the headboard of her bed in embarrassment at their close proximity.

"Haha! Oh my god, you are so moe. Are you even real? You can't be real; no kid has boobs this big." Konata proclaimed as she grasped her hands roughly onto her companion's chest, reeling them back when she began squirming in displeasure.

"P-Please mind your own personal space! It's very…" Curiously the young mage stalled herself from expending her feelings on the matter of sexual harassment, instead examining her surroundings with an almost frightened look.

A worn down house flaked with dust, rickety and barely held together, it even dawned upon her only then that her bed was nothing but blankets cushioned with piles of fresh hay. The child who sat at her front resembled the dirty and shambled house, scruffy and torn, her oversized clothes shadowing her petite body, riddled with the holes made by hungry moths. Her somewhat boyish clothing was offset by her ridiculously long hair, which almost wrapped about her like a protective coating, shielding her hazy look under a tuft of bangs.

The uncomfortable silence was deracinated by the arrival of a man, old and kind looking, his hair just as deep as the ocean like his child's. In his arms were bundled a mess of strange looking stitched dresses, his daughter groaned at the sight and promptly hurled a pillow at him in response, he laughed in a knowing fashion and turned to reveal a medical bag hiding underneath the piles of clothing.

"I brought that too! I just…you know, wanted to see how she might look in a few of these." The wily old man had suggested, to which at first his daughter seemed against, but in no time at all it seemed as if she wore that same devilish grin he did.

Miyuki looked between the daughter and her father as they tossed the medical supplies away without a thought, instead showering the befuddled young girl with an alarming pile of expertly crafted dresses and frilly clothing. The mage coddled herself in fear as she pushed back to the edge of the bed, looking between the two with hope she wouldn't be their next victim, with whatever it is the they did to young girls they brought to their home.

"W-Who are you people…?" Miyuki begged for a response, shielding herself with her hands as the two exchanged glances, returning their emerald gazes to her with a perfectly symmetrical thumbs up.

"We're the Izumi's!" They chimed in unison, converging upon the poor soul and forcefully tugging the selective clothing over Miyuki's head in a flash.

---

The daydream reinvigorated her mind far more than Konata had anticipated, she couldn't have imagined she'd recall such a distant memory so accurately, she had almost forgotten that her family was the reason Miyuki ever took up resident in Kasukabe in the first place.

The amnesiac magician had told her so much that day, what she was, where she came from. Miyuki had explained she was born in a far off and distant land, a land of light and dark, deep in the southern most reaches of the world. A land named Lordran, sanctum of lords. She explained that this is where her mysterious and magically-talented people hailed from in the dawn times, and took passages across the great seas to reach the northern lands, specifically a small kingdom known as Boletaria.

During the long sea passages Miyuki herself was born from her mother and one of the fishermen, who died of an unknown illness shortly before they reached mainland. Now a child, she and her mother journeyed to the very shadowed temples their troupe now skulked within, where she had learned the ways of her people, magic.

Beyond this, the extent of her life as a mage seemed a mystery to even her, something within her had made her forget whatever transpired in the foggy gap of time. Forgetting her life as a mage, Miyuki slowly settled into her new life in Kasukabe, leaving behind a mother, her practices, and a host of other things she wished she could recall.

And now the missing pieces presented themselves to both her and Konata. A lifetime of hatred, a duo of demons, the destruction of a city and a massacre on a grand scale, these were things Konata never could have guessed transpired in the life of her friend.

Miyuki halted their advance for a moment as she attempted to discern the nature of the waterworks before her, she had known they existed during her stay in the temples, but never questioned why it was absolutely forbidden to enter.

"I've no memory of this place beyond a restricted entry; we should be cautious Izumi-San." She alerted to the bluenette, who trusted the mage's judgment without question, she was the expert on the situation after all.

As they entered the tunnels, the ascendant calm that lingered between the two placed a cold hitch in the air; Miyuki had noticed it ever since their run in with the crusaders of Umbasa. She knew how her friend must feel discovering her true nature, a disposition that was unknown to even her, for she could not remember it. And yet to know that your friend of many years is a murderer, tool or otherwise, willingly or not, would be nothing shy of unsettling. Miyuki had to be sure there was no lingering apprehension.

"Izumi-San, I don't want there to be any doubt between us. Do you believe I did the things Patricia accused me of?" Miyuki blabbed outright, neither averse in her tone nor frightened in its substance. She now recalled what she had done, and she would face up to it in time if she had to, but what was most important was how those she loved now viewed her, she prayed their viewing of her would be at least neutral-minded.

Konata had anticipated the questioning, and she had no qualms about engaging in such a heavy conversation either. However she didn't wish to lie to Miyuki, to say she was not disturbed would be a lie, and to say she didn't believe Patricia would be equally foolish.

Patricia had no reason to lie, and Miyuki did not deny the crimes she accused her of. And while the situation did not concern her, she wished dearly to be a part of it, to understand her friend's mind at that moment.

"I don't really know, Miyuki. I mean, yeah, that's pretty zany stuff…I certainly have a hard time imagining someone as docile as a baby deer carving down an entire town in cold blood." She began as she met Miyuki's eyes directly, holding them with a desire to answer her outright without interruption. "I don't know if Patty's right, or if you really did that stuff, or even if those crazy crusaders had anything to do with it. I've got stories to go on and nothing more…but I look at it this way." Drifting in between her words Konata heartily clasped her hands on Miyuki's shoulders, tenderly grinning. "Regardless of what you did in your past, you can't let it affect you in the future. What you did in the past is past. The Miyuki I know today and have known for years wouldn't do the things Patricia spoke of, not on purpose. So regardless if I know the full story or not, or even if I ever know it, I trust you Miyuki. We're friends; I wouldn't let something dark that happened in your past impact that friendship now." Konata's resolute credence calmed Miyuki's faltering heart unbeknownst to the former, but the thankful smile offered a hint.

Miyuki was nothing but a victim of circumstance, down to her very dawn of life and the core of her being. She was a mage, untrustworthy and demonic by nature, even if she hadn't been the progenitor of Yoshimizu's destruction, most folks would've believed the stories without a doubt. While Konata would never truly know the depth of Miyuki's heartfelt thanks for saving her life, and taking her in and nurturing her into the woman of today, the mage would pay her back each and every day by rectifying her mistakes, and following the example of the benevolent Izumi family.

---

"Umbasa guide us…" Carrot muttered as she declined herself to her knees, anointing the bloodied dust at her feet with a curled religious symbol created from her hands, signifying the glory and essence of the dead god Umbasa.

"Jeeze, almost makes you wish she would." Hiyori dejected, using Carrot's hand to lift a severed skull from her spiritual vantage point and examine the blunt trauma that had pierced the bone. Rudely she dropped the remains to the dirt and continued her processing; noticing the copious amounts of ceremonially ravished sacrificial altars in the area, still illuminated by a legion of allayed candle flames, some even still gracing the bodies of the condemned.

Carrot reprimanded her with a sigh for her distasteful attitude towards the dead, slowly lowering the fading Kagami from her shoulders so she could bless the deceased properly. Hiyori watched silently from within their shared vessel as she traveled from corpse to corpse, touching a hand to the remains and mumbling out a brief phrase for each, it was troubling to say the least.

"I'm not usually the intolerant one, but uh…Kagami-San is dying, we don't have time to sanctify these bodies." Hiyori warned, grumbling when she saw no stray from the cleric's actions. "You know the gods don't exist anyway." Her antipathetic statement sent Carrot into a grazing fury, or as much as the kind soul could muster, fruitlessly furrowing her brow into something that vaguely resembled anger.

"And how do you know this for sure?" Carrot squeaked, her voice cracking under the harsh tone she attempted to apply to her words.

"Well, Umbasa for one wasn't a goddess, she was a mage. The idea of a god is so obscured by time that anything could fit the description, is a king a god because he's respected, praised and takes care of his people? Is a mother a god to her child because she nurtures it, carried it with her and let it feed upon her? Huh, how primal and sexy that sounded, feed upon her." Hiyori's theory on the nature of gods ended as expected, with a bit joke, which only furthered her companion's heating conniption.

"Well…if it's all the same to you, in a world of demons, death, and destruction…I like to believe there's a little something more out there, a purpose to the chaos. And if what you say is true, then Umbasa is still my goddess regardless. She was saintly, revered beyond imagination as a soul so astonishingly kind she'd forgo judgment on the most heinous of criminals…everyone deserves a second chance." Carrot abruptly ended her rant with a gargle of her throat, scratching it profusely as she cradled Kagami into her arms once more, off to pursue the miracle cure to save her waning life.

Hiyori inhibited herself from reciprocating an attack on the faith-laden argument, instead using her sight to feast upon the various symbols plastered on every inch of the wall. The mages as a whole were a very agnostic people, ironic considering they absorbed power directly from an ethereal and disputed essence, souls. The embroideries were of Umbasa, a bloodstained cross lathered in the thorny bristles of wilting roses, a symbol of death.

Much of the religion of Umbasa centered around the concept of death, and how it sheds the mortal coils to revive into a new instance of being. Many religions based this upon concepts such as recreation, or a kingdom of paradise for the soul, but the faith of Umbasa believed that men lived on in the form of undead, a living body devoid of the soul essence that allows it to function, requiring the constant acquisition and absorption of others souls.

The agnosticism of the mage society, a people closer to gods than anyone, stemmed from the belief that the power of souls was created by none other than man. Mage records dated back to the prime evil times of their world, in which a gracious priestess named Umbasa used the power of magic, an ability siphoned from the hearts of demons, to do the same to mankind. She used the ability to remove the entirety of a human's life essence in the form of magic, a soul, and the stronger the mind of the individual, the more powerful the soul energy was.

In her time, such an ability was unheard of, and worthy of a godlike status amongst the populace. To the day many still believed Umbasa was able to achieve godhood, and did not die as a human like so many say. The contradiction to her absolute supremacy was the common mage belief that Umbasa was not the first to discover magic, but that she simply rediscovered the lost art and brought it to the majority of mankind.

The true origin of magic was likely many eons before her, in which the Monumentals, beings of pseudo magical powers somewhat resembling modern day mages, created demons, but since no man ever conversed with a Monumental in known time, such a claim could never be refuted or proved.

What disturbed Hiyori regarding the scenery though was not symbols of death, it was the existence of torture devices and sanctuaries in a place where gods and religion were all but disregarded as myth. Religious symbols and paraphernalia were allowed only for the purpose of study, and these devices and flags were clearly set up for a far darker purpose, one that satiated Hiyori just enough to reconsider her silence.

"Ironic that Umbasa, a goddess of peace, is used as an excuse to commit atrocities like this don't you think?" Hiyori questioned, not trying to offend per se, but wishing her statement to have that dry ooze of sarcasm to prove her point.

"Hiyori-Chan just-" Carrot halted her futile advance in the conversation to focus on the abnormally painful ringing in her ears that had seemingly sprouted from nowhere. Shakily she dabbed a finger to her throbbing eardrum, and felt the gooey essence of blood within, she cringed slightly, offhandedly healing the injury with her arts and waiting momentarily for a catalyst to present itself to explain her ruptured ears.

The agitators revealed themselves as shadowy extracts born from the victims of sacrifice, lanky and clarion, what visible remnants of form there were painted a dull black across their non-existent skin. Tattooed across their gangly bodies were a series of vein-like symbols, standing out from their darkened form and emitting a sparkling cyan hue, striking like lightning across their bodies leading up to the facial regions, where a single globe of swaying light beat ominously, reminiscent of a heart sending blood to every corner of a body.

While seemingly intangible, the creature's mammoth feet seemed to excrete a gooey coal-colored substance with each step they took, ushering in an orchestra of squishy slops and squeaks. Yet the noise that vexed Carrot so seemed to expunge from the swaying mass of light in the creature's face, a whisper of gargled words, almost like a faint echo.

The lumbering shadow men slowly advanced on the lone Carrot, devoid of any combat training or survival skills in the face of death, she knew only to run, scooping up Kagami mid-jog as she began her sprint.

"Yeah, my thoughts exactly! Run, anywhere, just go!" Hiyori called out from within, her own bodiless existence on the line at that moment as well. The situation was even worse for her, all she could do was helplessly watch through Carrot's teary eyes as she swayed back and forth, pumping her feet into the dust and covering as much ground as her dainty body allowed.

And yet her impending doom seemed absolute, the very shadows casted across the stony walls seemed to bubble and twist, unearthing more of the specters from their camouflage to join their brethren in the hunt for the souls they craved.

Carrot's legs buckled from exhaustion as she burst through the only door in sight, evoking a cry of frustration when the door led to a profoundly vertical cliff side, with a jagged and aged stairwell being the only noticeable path to escape with.

"I can't make it, not with Kagami; we won't all make it across." Carrot messily uttered between her sobs, coming to grasp with the hopelessness of the situation and giving in to defeat, steadily relieving herself of the unconscious burden that was Kagami and turning her eyes to her death, the legion of shadow men.

"Oh no, please don't say that! Come on, up and at 'em champ! Remember? Impossible is just a word people use to make themselves feel better when they quit! Remember my super cool and inspiring phrase? Oh please god say you remember it so you can get your ass in gear and move!" Hiyori urged from within, not wishing her life to be dashed by some aimless demon in some forgotten temple.

Carrot was never one for inspiration though; she preferred to be stubborn until the end, even if it was literal. Caving to the horrors around her seemed so easy compared to the daunting task that lay ahead, maybe it would be simpler just to succumb to a simpler death.

The shadow men stood over her crumbled self, almost pityingly looking upon the mentally absorbed prey; surely they would be doing her a justice by ending her now, Carrot thought, if such creatures were capable of cognitive thought. Her mind was befuddled, a chance at death she almost wished to take, out of her reach, for the strength of her love for another kept her mind in full service.

"Please." Carrot sputtered, half under the weight of a bemoaning sob, to anything that would hear the call. Be they gods, humans, or even the monstrosities before her, surely somebody would beseech her will to live, and grant her the gift of aegis.

The damned men converged upon her huddled form nonetheless, deaf to her sorrows, delighted by them in their hunger, another token to further enrich their demonic powers. And had they had their lustful ways come to fruition, a grand meal that would've rejuvenated them nicely, but not this child, not at this moment.

Carrot's savior was a lofted spear, wrapped in ageless vines and the buds of newborn flowers, accurately perforating its way into the jelly-like skull of the lead shadow man, piercing through its single unwavering eye and melting the beast into a bilious glop.

The priestess' mouth hung open sharply as the bearer of the spear came to rest next to the lance with a hop of almost avian quality. A warrior now stood before her, skin of an almost amber-quality darkness, and eyes as mercilessly gold as the sun. She turned for a moment to look in the uncertain eyes of the alarmed cleric, before silently tearing her extension of power from the ground and spinning it like a top, systematically beheading each and every shadow around them, resulting in each and every demon collapsing into a formless puddle like the first.

Carrot's gloom was quickly coddled into a tweaked grin at the sight of the drudge, leading a collective of exotic looking warriors at her back. Whether her lord was authentic or not, it seemed somebody had shined their good will upon her in her darkest hour, she couldn't help but praise them with a fulfilled huff.

"Praise Umbasa."

---

Shadow had an effect on the body not unlike a reverse photosynthesis, draining it of its energy to the point of a strained, heavy feeling. Was it the oppressive atmosphere, the bone-chilling whispers of faceless maws in the darkness, or recent developments that twisted Konata's mind to a constrained status? Her body swooned liberally under the squeeze of the silence, inconsistently interrupted by a shuddering cough or wipe of a now heated brow.

Miyuki had noticed her friend's iron resilience beginning to at last fade; she couldn't help but wonder when the bluenette had last slept. Disheveled hair, a seeping paleness of the face, and rough baggage cresting her eyes gave hint enough, and unfortunately for the two, the mage's inherent nurturing nature couldn't allow such physical deficiencies.

"Izumi-San, I'm feeling a bit faint, may we rest a moment?" Miyuki lied with a tender smile, knowing full-well that if she advocated it wasn't she, but the azure knight that seemed ill, a long-awaited rest would never come for her.

Konata's shivering eyes lingered unhurriedly in Miyuki's direction for a faltering moment before they conceded, and almost immediately the fatigued warrior allowed herself to drop to her knees in a grunt of pain, as if she had been secretly waiting for her friend to suggest such a thing.

Konata had always hidden her pain well, both within and out. Behind that somewhat mysterious ceaseless grin, a thousand unspoken emotions, just the way the would-be adventurer preferred it. To those who searched past the naïve veil, they would find an abysmally deep chasm of unreleased emotion, of both tortured and serendipitous natures, sealed away for the good of those around her.

A lifetime of friendship removed this barrier of enigma between these two however, and Miyuki of all people could see when even the one of limitless energy had pushed themselves to reaches far beyond their capability.

A motherly hand drifted to Konata's drenched forehead, slicked with sweat. The magician's face was distorted with disappointment; she had feared her friend might do this.

"Izumi-San, how long has it been since you last slept? Or ate?" She questioned broodingly, not attempting to aggressively pry, knowing all too well the rule of similar forces opposing, in this case, Konata's tempered emotions conflicting with her own.

Konata's eyes rolled at the question, and she seemingly brushed it off as she cupped her throbbing head out of sight, out of shame Miyuki surmised.

"I'm fine, don't worry so much. It's only been a few days." Konata brazenly suggested without a hint of worry in her voice, endeavoring to stand and push her limits further, only to fail before her buckling ankles gave way, her profuse anger stifling her clouded concentration.

"It's not fine. How are you going to rescue Hiiragi-San if your body is continuously betrayed by such brash thinking?" The mage cautioned as a batting hand of protest dissuaded her from further interjection on the matter.

At glance of the warrior's hand, Miyuki couldn't help but notice the bruising callouses upon her dirtied palms, painted with dried crimson streaks of waste, most of which did not likely belong to her. Under her now filthy, ratty hair, she wore an expression of burned out anguish, the sheen of her eyes could nary be seen buried beneath the sunken orbs. Such a weathered appearance adorning the face of a maiden so young, Konata truly held the face of an avid adventurer now, whether she realized it or not.

Miyuki exhaled a sigh bereft of any sternness, for she could not bring herself to stall a will so adamantly emboldened by love. Yet the bluenette's unfailing convictions would be her downfall with such forward tactics, even Konata likely realized such things bordered on hopelessly naïve. Naivety, unfortunately for both them and the tsundere in distress, was a trait carried only by the butchered corpses one found littered across every stone-beaten path of Boletaria.

"I know how you feel, I desperately wish to see her again too…I'd even take a witness to one of her verbal thrashings at this point." The sorceress chuckled more to herself than her companion, scraping her fingers across the swords-woman's clothes to pull her shaky frame to its feet. "However if you find indomitable willpower to be your only weapon against the dangers to come, I fear you will fail." Miyuki urged without falter, her harsh words slid from her tongue minus pause and breath, austere advice always required an ambience correspondent to the adherent of the situation. Oddly in this case, the pupil was Konata.

A shuddering anger took the bluenette, but it did not break her, only silence her. In her eyes, if Kagami, in her state of despair and danger, was not allowed a reprieve of body or spirit, neither should she be allowed such a gift. This was the way she had looked at it, until now, the lack of better judgment being the cursed perpetrator.

How lowly would it be by Konata's perception, to suffer a fate brought about by fatigue, to have the story of the Azure Knight end by a rumbling in her belly? A self imposed will of cocksure gullibility is what had landed them, to some involuntarily, in the role of saviors of the dying world in the first place. Maturing wasn't exactly on the perturbed knight's to do list, but she wouldn't be caught dead acting so foolishly if it endangered one she cared deeply for, she had promised herself this.

Caving in as her wavering stamina gave way, Konata surrendered to the gracious ache that reminded her of her limits, she reveled in the abrupt pain that forced her back to reality as her rump made friends with the crumbled stones at her feet.

Awkwardly the begrudging warrior offered a heartfelt smile of thanks to her friend, even though it was more herself that convinced her of her dangerous pushing. Her lifting, dried lips declined steadily into composure, the first true relaxed expression the sorceress had seen upon her in some time.

It took mere moments for cognition to leave her as her brain space flamed violently, and just as hastily was washed with darkness. Miyuki almost broke loose a strained giggle as her friend collapsed onto the ground, heavy snoring akin to some displaced creatures call erupting from her gargling gullet.

Such vociferous moaning would madden the senses of any sane individual, but to the mage it brought only a fulfilled smirk. Like the mother of a flourishing child she came to be so very proud of her dear friend, how she grew and developed soundly each passing day, especially since they had come to Boletaria on their fated quest.

She like Konata, were both still very juvenile in their ways despite the many things they had learned since their arrival to the damned lands. Willfully ignorant until forcefully taught or bothered was the way Konata presented herself, and for one such as her it surprisingly worked out well. And yet Miyuki could not live this way, the knowledge and dogmas that escaped her gaze in the growing world would not fall to something as pointlessly apathetic as philistinism.

Konata chose to see only what was right in front of her, whether out of fear of what may lay beyond, or just common disinterest, Miyuki wasn't sure. What she was sure of though, is that such focus gave Konata the will to far surpass any she had ever met, in terms of smarts, athleticism, whatever the case was, the bluenette didn't have a limit. In her geared ways, the very concept of the limit was nothing but a roadblock to be overcome, a mental stickler that dissuaded the weak from succeeding on their chosen paths.

It was this carefully guarded philosophy that allowed Konata, past mortal limits, to go without food or sleep for days on end in her pursuit of the missing Kagami, to the point where it may even gravely impact her immediate health. While at first glance a detrimental ideology to most, those who looked past the veil would find a deep pool of wisdom, and should they choose to rectify the wrongs and sate themselves in the belief, they may find an attitude more than possible of avid succession in any case.

It would require a lifetime of reflection and obstinate contemplation, but with her magnificently crafted will, Konata would learn the mistakes of her principles as she grew. And until she was able to see such things on her own, Miyuki would gladly offer a helping hand where it was needed most, the warrior's enduring heart.

Nurturing one another's dynamic egos would take a lifetime of unwavering friendship and dedication, something the downtrodden mage realized would continue to elude them should haunting whines of unnamed things revel in their horror as they rung in her ears.

The noise came as an impending doom to those in its midst, for the bearer of such a gnawing wail was surely death itself when the shaken mage had beheld its gruesome splendor.

The demon stood at least ten feet tall, its lithe figure hidden beneath a ragged cloak of pure black, the entire figure of the spindly mini-giant was obscured sans an intimidating pair of attenuated hands rotted coarsely to browning bones.

A diseased fog poured from its hidden maw, corrupting the very air around it into a static-like aura, causing Miyuki's fidgeting nostrils to convulse forcibly in disgust at the repugnant odor. The obnoxious gas all but concealed an oaken stick shoveled over one of its cloaked shoulders, cast with an iron sickle braided to its neck.

The troubled enchantresses first thought was to motion for her sickly companion to arise, but silence was any warrior's greatest asset. The prey of the duo of belligerents was only so as long as long as they held fear within their hearts, and the last of the Takara blood-line held no such qualms. Fear was only as such subjectively in the mind of the beholder, and it had been a long, long time since she had feared the presence of devilish beings.

Ready as she was to effortlessly tear the beast asunder amidst a weaving cloud of magic, she stalled her ritualistic hand motions when her glare caught the sheen of raven bristles of unkempt hair hanging motionlessly underneath the arm of the demon, adorning a seemingly dead young girl, whose body seemed coated in shards of patiently dissolving frost.

How curious a sight it was, and while she didn't intend to allow the impersonator of death to keep the body for its foul purposes, she wouldn't allow her plan to awaken Konata from her blissful hibernation.

A pair of twinkling orbs in the hollow hood of the creature's head fixated themselves on the magician as she voluntarily made her presence known, stepping forth to caution the fiend from further continuation of its foul purposes, it did not heed as expected.

Without a roaring grunt or aggressive stance, the demon shed the lifeless girl from its arms and allowed her to flop to the ground noisily, but not enough to wake the debilitated Azure Knight.

It aligned its scythe to the ground, scraping it menacingly across the now decaying earth, pairing the taunt with a distended finger of bony cartilage aimed in her direction.

Death tolled for her and yet Miyuki was not afraid, for to be a mage, one was always hounded by such a prospect. It was at that passing thought that she wondered if the evil being was even genuine in its existence, and not just some deranged personification of her inner thoughts regarding the fate of the mage society. A stretch for even her, Miyuki realized, but she appreciated the symbolism nonetheless.

A thunderous beating of her heart alarmed her senses that she had entered the euphoric state of spiritual possession, a phase many skilled mages regularly found themselves in during moments of inner tranquility, a nirvana reached only by one at peace with oneself. The state required total obedience of the mind and body to another, an unknown spirit, to take her body as its own for but a brief instant.

The drenching sweat that covered her palms only amplified as they were encompassed by a plumage of auburn flames, dancing wildly from her fingertips to the center of her palms. The erratic movements of each whirling blaze attracted itself to its siblings, converging into a perfectly round orb of fire.

With a grunt of tire the conjurer hurled one of the whistling projectiles at her target, chafing her two jaw lines together grittily as the reaper grabbed the accelerated concentration of magic mid air and squeezed it within its crushing grip, popping it like a balloon.

To falter was to die, and Miyuki did stumble not in the least, instead hurdling the secondary missile at the beasts head with expert precision, charging in cautiously when the mess of fire collapsed into the demon's face like a mask of pain.

The crackling snap of fire was not enough to wake Konata still, and Miyuki intended to use her copacetic blessing, likely the only she would receive.

While doused in the blanket of the sorceress' raging fire, Miyuki clutched beneath the reapers leathery capote and harshly clutched its skeletal spine, embroiling it with raw heat and sending the hungry fire throughout the creature's body.

Detaching herself from the essence of death, she swung her closed fists forward, allowing an arcane gust of slicing winds to twirl like a tornado towards her enemy. The blades of zephyr did their duty, cutting cleanly through the thick bones of the reaper and tearing it asunder, ridding the demon of life as the flames doused whatever spark of existence it still held.

Almost as if it were choreographed, Miyuki gyrated her spine and seized the falling scythe mid-air, beholding her expression of momentary satisfaction in the glint of its bloodied shank.

As she pirouetted to see if Konata had arisen from slumber during her battle of silence, she breathed several different airs. One of overwhelmed relief to see that she was indeed still in delighted repose, and one of imminent doom at the sight of a squadron of intangible shadow beings, human in body, cracked with a host of throbbing veins culminating in a glorious eye atop their featureless head.

These shadow-men indeed resembled the reaper short of the cloak of shadow, but something about them filled Miyuki with far more than uneasiness. They didn't seem intimidating to her, or even aggressive, the first wave of feelings she felt as she regarded them was nostalgia, a frightening sense of nostalgia.

It wasn't as if she didn't understand why either, these shadow-men, lurkers of the dark places of the world, were not something she was unfamiliar of. Nay, she had learned of their existences long before Boletaria was consumed by the colorless fog, from none other than her master of magic.

She recalled he was a stern man, never hesitating to reinforce law standard to mage society, a set of principles relying on sacrifice and pain to achieve self satisfaction. If one were to become known wholly to oneself, a pact of dedication had to be made with ones heart, a loyalty extending far beyond mortal coils. The absolute adherence to mage culture was something Miyuki never understood, for it only seemed to further prove to the world mages were just another danger, by achieving what all men desire in their heart of hearts, immortality.

Never ending life was not something unknown, or even rare in mage society. Archaic tomes of times past, and by extension of the sorcerer's omnipotent foresight, future, showed many examples of mages that had achieved such a status in a variety of ways. Demonic transformation, forcible magical infusion, time recession and possession, the ways to attain demigod-hood wasn't nearly as impossible or numerically deficient in ways as many claimed.

It was this prospect that brought about these remorseful memories, but the catalyst of the reminiscence was the single, fluctuating orb that the specters shown so brilliantly. The arteries suffused with dark energies formed a certain insignia she identified as the Eye of the Black Demon, a significant design among the mage culture.

The Black Demon was the savior known to mankind, a human that surrendered their will to the Old One and took the beast into their own body, hosting its almighty power. In reality, no records of such an event taking place exist in any tome mankind possessed, for the mages searched far and wide for any such indication of the event. They found what they had sought, in a book of secrets not meant for man, a guide to the gods, implying that the Monumentals, the observers, were the ones who in actuality sought the aid of the human and tricked the individual into an unwilling sacrifice.

Such a recording was, as such, taken lightly, existing in a creed of the gods, and therefore to the mage society something to be taken only metaphorically no matter how clear and literal its utterance. The Black Demon, authentic or not, was nonetheless regarded as a badge of mysticism and a symbol of hope to the mage community. Where even Umbasa, the proclaimed creator of the new age of magic, failed to destroy the Old One, it seemed somehow another individual of far lesser power was capable of such a feat, even if it were just in a fairy tale.

It was this hope, this dismally desperate ambition, of a mere mortal reigning supreme over a god, that led the mage society to begin a new manic race to immortality. Miyuki's mentor was indeed, the most devoted canonist to the belief that immorality should be the true goal of the mage society, for with it they could remain in the realm of men and extend their prosperity across the ages.

After the mysterious events within the Yoshimizu valley, the young Miyuki Takara had never heard of her mother, her master, or her clan in any capacity for the remainder of her days until her return here, at this sorrowful time. And yet the picayune dread that captivated her innermost thoughts and reminded her of these figures and teachings had remained within her since their arrival in the shadowed lands, culminating in the realization of a horror she realized but was lax to admit until now.

The black smog that enveloped the shadowed mountains was not only a barrier to the outside world, but to the opposing magical entities of lands near and far. It didn't so much as shield the temples as it did displace them entirely out of the immediate realm of space, where they truly were, only the highest mages of her order knew.

This is the reason Miyuki knew, perhaps all along, that her clan, and the shadowed temples had never truly fallen to the demonic miasma of the Old One. No, it was their own undoing that rendered the never ending gardens of her home to the wretched state they now held, far past the boundary of sickly decay.

As the Old One consumed the world, the mages consumed themselves, apparently with the ancient demon freed, it didn't take long for the mages main hub of society to collapse entirely. Only remnants of what had truly happened within the ancient caverns and temples of the mountains remained.

Men fallen to a demonic curse, the dead rising from their very graves, the bawdy air that ached the lungs. The signs of battle shown everywhere, the haste of those who fled in the chaos, their bodies piled upon one another in a rush as if to escape the coming catastrophe.

Tomes of great wealth and knowledge blown to pieces to rid the world of their influence, or perhaps to stop lesser mages from common thievery, Miyuki didn't know, nor did she wish to.

The greatest sign of the mages clout turning to destructive error were the remnants of the people themselves, surrendered to a force beyond their insignificant understanding, to something they could never hope to control with their frail, human bodies.

Perhaps this was the immortality they had so longed for, an existence free of the hate of the world, or of the burden carried by their titles as protectors of it, a lost answer to an even more absent question. Miyuki knew one other thing, that whatever had happened to her in the Yoshimizu valley, whatever had happened to the people there, her family, and the crusaders of Umbasa, all lay at the center of the mystery.

Assuring herself that her sprawling imagination would at some point be satiated, Miyuki wasted no time in telekinetically ripping the gelatinous apparitions to pieces, raking her hands through the air, and the flailing scythe with it, and shutting her eyes to the apathetically cold tears she shed for these abject souls, yet still her kin. Any survivors fled squeamishly, cooing in defeat as they melded into the absolute black of the cavern and vanished from sight.

With her tormentors dismissed, the silently weeping magician fixated herself on the recently deceased soul at her feet, the bespectacled, straight-haired girl. However dead she might've been, Miyuki's heightened awareness of irregularities of a magical nature sensed something decidedly amiss. The body was indeed dead, the internal organs within had ceased their normal functions some time ago, but the barren void she felt permeating from it suggested a different theory.

While in training, Miyuki was forced by her mentors to be schooled in the profound idea of the soul arts, or that all living beings are inhabited by an essence of magical infusion that can be displaced, absorbed, or placed by the practitioners will. Why humans held such a considerable nucleus was never discovered by modern mages, but many theories were made regarding Umbasa and whatever she had done with the humans of her time, and how that may have throughout the ages evolved the very core of human makeup.

It was this knowledge that allowed Miyuki to realize that this girl's body was willingly separated from its soul, or not, but regardless this was the case. Instead of killing the body in the traditional sense, the body would be placed in a temporary stasis until the essence of the soul, or any soul, returned to the decaying shell. Should the soul not be returned, the body would eventually mutate into the zombie-like monstrosities the world called Dreglings.

The crisp nature of the skin, warmth of the body, and relaxed muscles gave queue that such a transformation had yet to alter the girls' body into a demonic state of being. While time was of the essence regarding every fiber of her life at that moment, Miyuki couldn't turn face to a helpless soul in need.

Cradling the girl dotingly, the doe-eyed mage smiled with content at the proposal of hope amongst the flaming, wind-torn bodies around her. Her people had destroyed themselves, just as the Old One's wrath had consumed the world twice-over, but for every misdeed perpetrated by her people, this tragedy included, she could only hold onto the hope that her own judgments might one day redeem the fallen.

The meaningful repose of reflection was halted as a wispy, salmon strand of hair swiveled past her nose and into her nostril, discharging a powerful sneeze that rung throughout the caverns in a delightful echo.

Without pause Konata was launched from her curled state of body, bloodshot eyes of anger steering themselves in the direction of the one who dared disturb her slumber. Instead of accusing the perpetrator of mental sabotage, she instead racked her brain to repair its muddied senses at the sight before her, an absurdly dainty mage nestling an unknown girl to her bosom, clasped in between the pillows of softness without hesitance.

Surrounding this scene, an exhibition of violence and confusing plot devices she was unaware of, whatever had happened here it had done so without her knowledge or consent. She grasped herself in several areas to make sure she hadn't been touched inappropriately either, everything was positioned as she remembered, nothing was amiss.

"What the hell?" Konata stuttered sleepily, yawning a tearing yawn as she allowed herself to submit to the reasoning that it was only a dream, falling backwards lethargically to the uncomfortable wet stone bed below her.

"Only a dream." Miyuki mumbled under a grousing smile, astounded it was naught but her own callous behavior that awoke her friend.

"Miyuki, shut up…your face…up…" A series of half-lidded words escaped the fidgeting knight as she rolled to her side, apparently hearing the supporting tone from the depths of her sleep.

A smile so cordial in nature there would have to be ramifications concealed Miyuki's willing frustration, she took things like this in stride if it meant the happiness of others, she reveled in it. Haste was indeed mandatory if Kagami, and this mysterious soul in her arms were to be saved of the dangers that clutched their fates so tightly, but perhaps following her own advice would suit her better for the time being.

How hypocritical she felt, lecturing Konata on the importance of resting your body like a mother to her child, when indeed she had spent many more restless nights than the Azure Knight ever had. Circumspectly she deadened her ears to the horrors of the world, if only for a brief amount of time, but not before affectionately huddling the shell of the raven-haired girl to the floor and kneeling by her side, eyes sealed in a fainted trance.

Entering a spiritual possession, she allowed her consciousness to be beset upon by some unknown saboteur, forging the pact with the entity with unspoken words as her sensibility iced to a numbed state. Life truly was just a dream, for the constantly assailed and broken mind of a mage. Only in the deepest dream state, where the lucid dreams of exulted silence produced that ever infrequent element of serendipity, could reality break through the fog.

---

"Ignorance is both clout and blunder for mortals; their greatest strengths and failings can be made into a most ambrosial gift, or an incompetently erected downfall. And yet this will achieved around the concept of frivolous choices is something I choose not to understand." Hardened and unfeeling were his words of choice as he relayed them to his chief pupil, and he meant as such, there was no more room for dishonest warmth in her teachings. Why this vision came to her now, in her dreams, this memory of a forgotten instance bewildered her, and yet she welcomed it with ardor.

"But is it not choice that separates men from creatures? It is that power that allows us the freedom to grow as we see fit, what gives us our clout and craving to erase blunder." Wise were her words despite her budding age. Her master took note of them, but seemed more absorbed in this own dialogue to study them at length.

"To crave is to err, to want unheedingly even after the transgression offensively is even worse. Man makes such breaches of law and sense due to not having the years to properly cast his mind forward in the aforetime preceding these incidents. And yet…were man to defy the all abiding rules of death itself, he would have infinity as his instance, and he could use such a breadth of life to learn from lapses in judgment before they even befell him." Eerily her master proclaimed in an obsessive tone, not as if it were mere speculation or hope, but foreshadowing of events to come, the student could not discern due to the absentminded tone of his voice.

"Master, you speak of…immortality? Such things are forbidden-" Aghast was her voice as the pupil began her rebuttal, but her master offered no room for argument with a forceful palm to cover her quivering lips, and a consummate answer of his intense eyes.

"Such things are forbidden by those who err, to want unheedingly. You and I are of a kind, young Takara, so unlike them. We will bring about an age of calm the likes of which mankind only dreams of, but the Old One impulsively stagnates these fantasies with its own will of never ending illusion. The seal of the Old One is deteriorating…slowly, fading…as the world will follow if it is not repaired. The immortal growth I…we, search for, will only be a possibility if this sin of man is sealed back to hell." The calm and consolatory voice her master offered made the words he spoke seem all the less distressing, and more enticing.

So regrettable was her choice, but the young Miyuki offered her resolute hand in agreement, so utterly confused by her own choice it almost brought her to tears. However the master did not weep, he grinned a devilish smirk, for his own actions would better all of mankind in their wake, with he and he alone would be proclaimed as the savior.

"And yet by my actions, for whom will sin be exonerated? Myself? Mage-kind as we know it? All living things? Perhaps even the Old One. I know you will be the one to show me."

---

Miyuki's hypnotic state was broken by choice, for the disturbing memory brought to her a feeling of urgency, one that did not allow her body to rest any further. For the common soul, dreams were but a perception of memories, fantasy, emotions, and sensations brought about by desire, urge, recollections or imprinting thoughts of recent events. Despite these causes of dream logic, many mages found their dreams to be more prophetic, sometimes esoterically and other times precisely.

The final statement her mentor whispered to her was not a fragment of the memory, it didn't happen at all. Baffling shards of remembrance were often subjected to fathomless contemplation in mage society, for whatever hope or ills they may bring about. As Miyuki had no scholars or confidants to confide in for the time, she had only her own mind to assist in remove the hindrance of doubt.

Something deep within this place of mysticism called to her, with such a lusting need it breached her most private of realms, her very dreams. Concerned of its temperament, how could she refuse it? Her allies vendettas and ideals could not be put off, yet neither could her desire to understand the fate of her people.

With thoughtful duty, she tore the shifting cloak from her body and fashioned it into a temporary sled, complete with cloth pulleys that would be purposefully adorned to her waist. Before working her way into the now vehicular garment, she dragged her idle companions sleeping bodies upon the ragged thing and wrapped them up like newborns, attaching the obstinately waving tendrils of cloth to her hips and wrists simultaneously.

Heaving the generous weight from her mind, she focused a spell on her body to interrupt the immediate exhaust that would be upcoming should she continue on, one that would temporarily harden her body's composition in such a way that would allow it to exert beyond its natural limits.

The charm worked agreeably, and wordlessly she began to mush along, dragging the duo of sleeping maidens behind her.

As she dragged on, strung up like a beast of burden, the silence cruelly mocked her. Its superfluous attention brought about the woes of her augural nightmare, a coming fate she could no longer avoid. The sentiments of the past all pointed towards her master being the cause of her enigmatic upbringing, and even more inexplicable life thereafter. It was that sodden man that virtually retuned her entire world to his liking, removed any and all warmth she felt during her youth in favor of rigorous training, but for what?

While she kept all but the where hidden to her companions, the true reasoning behind Miyuki's sudden knowledge of their missing companion was yet another vision from her dreams, this one of a poor bedraggled girl, wearing a face of deceit under her beckoning gaze. This dreaded being was in fact, Kagami, but it was the location that perturbed her, not the images.

Never could she mistake the hallowed halls of her youth, where arcane masters would draw hungrily from the lavish wells of magic at their disposal. Truly a place where the blind would begin to see, or the deaf would learn what it means to listen.

The coursing roots infused with denotations of magical orders carved throughout the temples, built literally into uprooted trees and underneath the very earth, this is what she saw then, and indeed what she was seeing now.

Yet the specific place where Kagami lay in her vision was unknown to her, requiring her to take a path she had not yet undergone, a hidden cavern leading far below any normal students reach. The purpose of this trench eluded her, but mysteries are but truths yet to be learned.

"I knew you would come, I had foreseen it." A voice spoke warmly in her mind, as if the emotion of tenderness should have been synonymous.

Masters of the magic arts could deafen themselves to these voices, these heralds from their mind proclaiming hope or dread. Miyuki was not that skilled however, she still had much to learn concerning spirits and in this case, disembodied voices in her head.

Dispassionately she grumbled, wishing only for the meddlesome murmur with its odd inflection to dally away hence forth, and forever more. It had stood its ground ever since she entered the temples and the now mentally strained mage knew it would not leave until confronted as per its request.

The concave tunnel around her began a steady constriction, becoming slimmer and smoother by design as it descended into strangely enough, an alluring light.

Overwhelmed by its sparkling brilliance she heeded its humble invitation, engrossing herself in its confusing color palette as she stepped into the annex of its shadow.

As her eyes adjusted to the severe beating the brilliant light gave them, she became painfully aware of the shadowed temple of her dreams, where Kagami lay, alone and perverted with clouded dusk that encircled her previous beauty.

Despite her dream, Kagami was nowhere to be found. Instead Miyuki came to see the room as a grandiose hall of dusty relics and aged grey hue, enchanted only by the torn and weathered flags draped from the ceiling ceremoniously, the Eye of the Black Demon adorning each. A series of clay pillars rested on either side of the hall, which seemed more and more elongated the more Miyuki ran her eyes down it.

Apart from these immediately noticeable features the room resembled nothing but a lavishly decorated hallway, leading to a column of stairs that in turn, led to a blinding obscurity of light, nothing more could be seen beyond it.

Yet in front of the light stood the testament of the mages immortal sin, their very immortality, a demon chained like a prisoner to the walls. It was gargantuan, and alarmingly human looking, its ashy skin wrinkled with copious aging and crawling with a spider web of bulging, black veins that had long since carried blood. The giant's body was naked aside from a loincloth of corroded, moth-eaten drapes and several bands of golden jewelry gripping at each limb, the only remnant that it was once a human.

The garb belonged to a mage, and definitely her own clan by Miyuki's notice. The same lavender patterns enhanced the brooding robe as her own had, the same thoughtful stitching of unique design for each and every student, teacher, and master.

Upon the cyclopean head of the beast, it bore a bloody handkerchief tightly gripping at its eyes, held in place by scraping barbed wire that seemed to cut into the heavily scarred skin with each movement, even though no cries of agony were heard.

The distended fingernails, chipped and broken, loosely hung from the soiled hands of the demon, threatening to fall at any moment. The pattern of rot continued to the very blade the monstrosity made its namesake, a sword that looked as if it had been lathered in smoldering magma, hardened to a gritty core, and allowed to form into a stony maul.

Casting her burden from her aching shoulders, the dauntless magician lay her companions to rest directly next to the entrance of the hall, sure of their safety.

With bathos bolstering her heart, she led herself mutely to the voices that desired her appetite for truth to be laid against their ignorance. As she approached the ensnared demon, she knew of its origin, and boldly decided to lay out a claim of cessation.

"I have come, as per your request. What do you wish of me? Because I wish only for you to die." Miyuki struggled to relay, fighting the mantic boost in her chest that would lead to tears.

The demon sat silently, carefully contemplating its next move before it wrenched its stiff neck in pain, indifferently subduing its anthropological soreness.

"To die now would be a welcome comeuppance, but I fear such a punishment would damn us both to hellfire." The blinded creature suggested equivocally, turning its head in aimless directions as if to get a sense beyond sight for the maiden before it.

Miyuki was unafraid by the beasts words, she had familiarized its presence as a father-figure in place of the one she had never known, even now, under the frenetic tone of a monster she recognized its boreal brawniness.

"I would welcome such a hell if it meant the truth, and for your pain to end…master." Grievously Miyuki begged, not saddened, but furious at the turn of events that led to the inhuman sight before her, a demon born of a man she had come to call master during her time in the shadowed temples.

"Defiant to reason as always, like a true mage would be. Don't plainly accept what is placed before you as inevitable, but strive to change the absolute end for yours, or others, benefits. Miyuki Takara, it is good to see you again." Cheerfully content was her master's response, with a tinge of grief laced within buried far too deep to perceive by all but those who had come to love him.

"Master, what happened to my mother…our people? Why…why did you do this? Were you also behind what befell me at the Yoshimizu valley? How far has your treachery spread in your quest for immortality?" Miyuki beseeched the demon for answers to a thousand questions, and knew each would come in time regardless of her stern advance, it was for this reason she belittled herself immediately after asking.

There was little deliberation required for the now immortal master of her temples, he knew of the crimes she accused him of, and to present untruths to his final pupil now, at his end, would be the very definition of poor teaching.

"I dreamed that our people might one day be redeemed in the eyes of the world for our selfish crimes, it was my only wish. If we achieved godhood, we could bring about a paramount way of life for all, peace on earth as we once knew it in times when the flowers of our temples still bloomed." Woefully her master began, passively leaning in closer to his tear-jerked student below him. "And yet our lust for this harmony came at a cost not even I could have perceived, our people, and our very way of life." He explained without much explanation at all as he had apparently distressed himself into complete silence.

"What do you mean, master?" The sorceress asked dismally, expecting anything but her preferred answers.

"The head of our order made a pact with demons…she said it was the only way to bring about the endless epoch of armistice between man, mage and demon we so longed for. I was blind to the truth…the truth that shown itself in my own dreams each night I lay to rest. The Old One did not precede mankind, we…created this beast. How or why this happened, she could not tell me, in my soiled mind I could only blindly accept her answers as truths in my despair, to this day I believe in her." Trustfully he continued, listening to every hushed breath his student returned as payment for his tale, it was beautiful to him. "The Yoshimizu valley incident was required…their people were a people that would not be missed in the grand scheme of the world, those who could be used as a sacrifice for the greater good. And you…were the scapegoat of this atrocity. The pact you made with that duo of demons, it was to save the planet, to erase the Old One's fog forever more by making that priestess of Umbasa the seal of its eternal hatred." Her master hurriedly explained in a further strained gasp, as if he was expending the last of his humanity on this final colloquy.

"I…scapegoat for what, master?" Miyuki asked urgently, noticing her former masters failing strength with each word, knowing she had little time.

"Mephistopheles was not mistaken in her intent…the sacrifice of Yoshimizu gave the duo of demons more than ample strength, more sustenance than required to seal the Old One away once more, but she did not foresee your potential of the soul, the soul arts which you used so plainly like a breath from your body. This is why you were chosen to be the catalyst that would release Umbasa's crusaders hidden strength, to allow them to claim the souls of the fallen as their own, so they could in turn bear the burden of the Old One on their shoulders and preserve mankind for all time." The account of the now age old events racked the masters body painfully with a series of grotesque phlegm-filled coughs.

"I see…and your immortality? The temples, my mother…what of them?" Miyuki urged once more for his continuation of the tale, even if it meant further harm to him physically, by this point she had ignored such things in favor of the truth, for the time being ignoring the named individual, Mephistopheles.

"Our immortality…and subsequent demise was the result of my own callous way of thinking. The pact our order's master made with demons granted us our un-death, but at the cost of our humanity. So is the punishment for fools who dare step upon the toes of the gods." He explained, suffering from his own words, and further so when he drew breath heavily for the shocking revelation he was forced to relay. "As for your mother, this was all her wish. She never told you, but…your mother was the master of our sect, the teacher of the Black Demon's will. Your mother, heartbroken as she was, used you as the catalyst for this catastrophe…knowing only one of her blood, yet pure and innocent, could be used as the tool in question." The downright deadpan vocals he provided only further showed the immense layer of guilt he wore as painfully as the barbed cloth that had destroyed his vision.

Miyuki's baffled mind numbed her tongue, abandoned its sense of worth and shut her out from any words she wished to speak, yet she would not have to.

"So this seal, it's what kept the Old One trapped, and that girl Yutaka is the seal? Try making sense why don't you." A voice of reason called from behind Miyuki, revealed to be a reinvigorated Konata boldly standing heel to heel with the demon as she approached its corrupted figure.

"Izumi-San, how long have you—" Miyuki began before she was hushed with a flattened palm to her face.

"Long enough. From the sound of things this seemed like a personal matter and I didn't want to intrude until it got dramatic enough, and well, here we are, with mister dramatic over here blaming the deaths of hundreds of people on my good friend. I thought it was a good as place as any to step in." The Azure Knight reassured, patting a heartfelt slap onto her friends sinking shoulders.

"Yes, I thought it time to interject as well. I got more than enough data for my master-student carnal relations series due to your back and forth here." Yet another voice suddenly infiltrated into the conversation, this one belonging to the black-haired maiden who was apparently not as dead as she seemed.

"But, y-y-you were dead! And now you're…what?" Miyuki stammered confusedly, earning only a shrug of the shoulders from both of her companions.

"Nah, my soul was just taking a vacation in her body over there, thanks for finding mine though! You didn't, you know…touch it inappropriately, did you?" The lecherous girl questioned almost hopefully as she nodded her finger to yet another strange individual behind her, a kind-looking priestess with golden orange hair, carrying a bloodied and dirty individual, whom the sorceress recognized as Kagami Hiiragi, albeit heavily injured.

Yet even further behind this individual, stood a group of familiar faces Miyuki was all but sure were some grief-induced mirage, including the ever doleful Tsukasa, the guard-captain of her hometown, Yui Narumi, the tanned spear-woman Misao, and that wily assassin Nanako Kuroi. Hoping to grasp some sense of the situation, Miyuki turned her attention to Konata, who only absent-mindedly shrugged once more.

"Yeah, while you were chatting it up with this veiny, monster-story reject, these guys woke me up with their bickering, heard it from a mile away, how childish right? And then a soul or something went into that dead girl's body or…I don't know, I kind of just stop questioning stuff like this anymore. Anyway, it was nothing but boring exposition anyway, right? We were all too enthralled in your emotional problems here to really bother mentioning it." Konata simply elucidated sans any actual detail, sense, or reasoning whatsoever, bringing only further confusion to the mage.

"Yeah, that was after Nanako-Chan threatened to kill me though." The mindless raven-haired girl conveyed without any dismay whatsoever, Kuroi removed herself from the crowd at the sound of her name, scratching her chin in agreement.

"It's true, I was pretty intent on killing her. Didn't really seem like the place to you know, get my assassin on though, this seemed important." Kuroi admitted to herself more than anyone, even though she vocalized it profoundly for all to hear.

"Oh and we found Kagamin, well, they did." Konata added finally as if it were something not even worth mentioning until now. "Yeah she's pretty banged up, but the priestess over there says she'll live, so I pretty much got over that in a matter of seconds. How like Kagami to almost die when I'm not there to save her sorry ass, right?" Konata muttered as she allowed herself to be lost in a world of romanticism.

Miyuki tiredly attempted one last attempt at a serious answer that she turned to Tsukasa in hopes of, but earned only barely visible giggles and blushes of embarrassment.

"Good company such as this in a journey like yours must make the journey all the easier." The now breathless master chuckled in his own amusement, wrenching his arms painfully from the walls, freeing the chains from their holds and himself from tenure as a prisoner. "But I know why you have come, you cannot hide it. You have come to destroy the Storm King, a fragment of the Old One, a portion of the seal in the hopes that you might eliminate the ageless sin once and for all…I can smell the benumbed desire within you all." Aggressively the master proclaimed, spreading his floor-dragging feet into a battle stance amongst gyrating clouds of ash and dust.

Konata was the first to step forward to acknowledge the accusations. "Yeah, pretty much. Explanations to what I'm doing and why bore me anyway, so I'm glad it looks like you've realized we've come for battle, not words. If you plan to stand in our way, this cadre of exotic women and I make you drown in your blood." Konata roared the sentence for not only the belligerent master, but any who would stand in her way that could hear its call. The reckoning spirited each companion at her back with her exuding resolve, as each and every one of them laid their steel and wits to bare against the demon. "Miyuki, I hope you have no problem with this? We attack at your word." The Azure Knight assured compliantly, awaiting the mage's command to assault one she seemingly cared for.

Miyuki's eyes fell one final time upon the face of a man she knew well, whom she may have once called a father figure. The decision was not a struggle, she had known the entire time the voice that plagued her minds begged for death, and she would be a hypocrite not to answer its call by this point.

"Master, thank you for all you have taught me, but the new way of the world has spoken. The Old One cannot remain, we cannot coexist. It must die, and if you stand in our way so too shall you!" Unflinchingly the mage proclaimed behind a monsoon of tears, menacingly curling her finger tips into proper spell formation and preparing to douse the demonic man with flames.

"No, thank you…young Takara. And may your convictions always be empowered by the inhuman strength you display now." Despite his genuine thanks and adamant grin, his first action after his noble sentiment was a swing of his crooked blade in the direction of his student, whom Konata crashed into in an effort to save her from its crushing slice that cracked cleanly through the dirt.

"Thank him after the fact." Konata insensitively claimed, although under the care of a joking smile. Miyuki did not disagree; she stood easily with her enduring resolve, and readied herself to give the order to kill.

"Show no mercy to your opponent, show him only appetite for change!" Miyuki called to the warriors at her back, who charged without hesitation at her words stabbing their swords, spears and poisoned daggers into every revealing piece of weakened sinew they could find, each laceration ejaculating a thin film of fog from the diseased innards.

The old master at last unleashed his pain within his sudden howls, seemingly grinning as he felt his body crumble beneath him, a silent thanks to both his student and death itself for finally coming to relieve him of his duty. This same oath was what bound him to his chains though, he could not escape it, he would fight until his final breath.

Shaking his broken hide he rid his body of the intruders and their steel, reciprocating the attack by blindly swinging his maul about in a rage, pulverizing the clay towers pillars around him and bringing down the very ceiling over his head. He took the pain of the gothic shards of stone that collided with his body in stride, setting aside the affliction and charging brutishly in the direction of the warriors, causing each and every one to trip, fall or be violently smacked out of the way into a nearby wall in poor Tsukasa's case.

As Yui ran to the younger twins' aid, she too fell to the flailing limbs of the blinded demon, that so unnervingly with haste collapsed against her breast-piece and send her hurdling into a pile of refuse. Carrot instantly heeded to her clerical duties and beset upon the injured Yui, gasping girlishly when she saw the knight had been knocked out cleanly. Tsukasa's mumbles of frustration at the despair of the situation, paired with an outstretched hand of assistance sent the witches servants to the injured combatant's aids.

Misao and Kuroi echoed one another's movements as they leaped into action, melding the contours of their conditioned bodies against one another, back to back, as they barbed their weapons at their foe passionately despite his disability of sightlessness.

"He can't even see us, why the hell are we prancing around like this was choreographed? What are we ballerinas?" Misao criticized with immense displeasure, gaining a heckling half laugh, half moan from the assassin, Kuroi.

"What's the point of fighting if you aren't going to look fabulous while doing it? You'll never find yourself a good man with that attitude." Kuroi related with a prepensely cynical air to her words, knowing such matters were far beyond the edge of matters Misao cared for.

In unison they catapulted from their stunted positions and twirled their tools of violence with a stinging wrath, burying the greater masses of their blades into the knees of the monk and collapsing him to his knees as planned. Almost meanly they continued their assault, dragging their blades entombed in the monsters flesh upright towards his hips, splitting lengthy strands of tightened muscle, bones as frail as an elderly man's, and unfortunately, the less than modest loincloth that covered whatever nether areas he wished to conceal.

Almost instantly a raucous, and not at all immature, release of contained laughter tore through the hall, jetting from none other than the bespectacled maiden who had just until recently been from a clinical standpoint, dead.

"Holy crap he has no nads! How does he pee? How does he…you know?" She laughed distastefully, to the point where the eliminator, Kuroi, could take no more.

"Tamura I am so sick of your shit!" Kuroi growled in understandable frustration, being heaved from her fighting position into the air by one of the capturing hands of the monk and bringing her to its unhinging jaw, where it apparently intended to eviscerate her with its now browning ivories.

Misao reacted instantly, tearing her spear from the beast's innards and jumping several meters in the air supernaturally, landing on the giant's hand, roughly her entire body length in size, and stabbing at it forcefully in an attempt to have it release her companion. The action was in vein as she desperately continued her assault to no avail, the tightened fingers would not move.

"I think he has rigor mortis! He's technically dead, isn't he?" Kuroi joked as the monster attempted to take a gracious bite out of both warriors, failing as Misao pronged her spear upwards and stuck it between each jaw line of the demons mouth, struggling to hold the gooey cavern of awful, indiscernible smells and saliva as brown as mud above her, despite her failing strength.

"I think your brain has rigor mortis! Konata, do something wonder girl!" Misao beseeched with terrible envy, feeling almost ashamed she would be forced to turn to her of all people for help, as it seemed time and time again the bluenette's uncanny ability to lend a helping hand in any capacity produced wondrous results.

Konata howled mightily from a distance, waving carelessly with a cheeky, red-faced grin as she threw herself onto one of the elephantine monuments of argil, slinking her way up the pillar like a snake until she reached its apex. "Alright, lead him over here Tsukasa!" She credulously wailed, contracting the help of quite possibly the least capable person for the job.

"W-w-w-w-w-what!?" Tsukasa shrieked and stuttered in deep distress at the notion, straining her now thoroughly whipped body diffidently in the pursuit of relocating herself indefinitely. The cause being, her hoydenish wailing had so expectedly lured the lumbering giant to her presence, perhaps just as Konata had planned.

Miyuki's far gone master began his focused march of death, spear holding his jaws apart, Misao and Kuroi in hand and all, for whatever reason his attention was forthwith drawn to the humble younger Hiragi's presence, unfortunately for the latter.

"Sweet!" Konata cheered animatedly under her breath, forwarding her beckoning to the nearest ally at hand, the magician Hiyori Tamura. "Hey, you, uh…mage with glasses! Knock this thing over quick!" She ordered vaguely, noticing a fumbling Miyuki run to her aid with a concerned expression. "Not you! Other glasses!" She fussed once more pointing to Hiyori, not even taking heed to the imminent death that awaited poor Tsukasa.

"Guys, he-he-eeeelp!" Tsukasa implored in her desperate horror, snuggling herself into a ball as the mammoth approached her with its killing intent.

Both the far greater cultivated Takara, and the flat out puerile Tamura ceased their passing confusion at the mere sound of Tsukasa's cries. On queue their bodies contorted like great mechanisms, hands curling downward and out in an attempt to channel mana, legs hardened to the ground for the much needed leverage, eyes fuming solid milk white in an effort to make contact with the forces that be. The cores of their bodies were so hot from the infusion a gentle hiss of steam drifted above them nonchalantly.

At the apogee of their séance, a cracking bolt of blinding lightning from Hiyori and a lusciously soft looking orb of flame from Miyuki rose from their bodies at in a flash, too quick for any to see. The fruits of their magical tuned labor collided with the nearby pillar Konata still stood upon, tearing it violently from the ground and by connection the decidedly mad warrior with it, surmounting against gravity's absolute dominion and zoning in on the monk's head like a colossal boomerang, doing its assigned duty as planned by splitting cleanly down his forehead and morbidly caving a fraction of the demons skull inward.

Konata's initial shellshock from the impact quickly subsided as she recalled her sense of sight, and with it, the target of her game plan within her grasp. Intently she scaled the meta-human's skull and peered inside, where a corroded slab of grey matter lay, her plan took the phrase 'use your head' to new heights.

The plan in motion, the Azure Knight prepared her vow of extent, quite possibly the eighth or ninth sword she had come to know during her time in Boletaria, and exposed it haughtily to the demon beneath her toes. "So a monster, a sword, and a loveable Konata step into a pub…I forget the rest, long story short the monster walks out with impaired motor skills!" She jeered aloof of the beasts negligent interest in her perceived comedic anecdotes, resting her silver blade deeply into the convulsing flesh of the creatures brain and jetting controlled steams of mahogany plasma in every conceivable direction.

While immediate death did not take the lumbering beast, it's now relaxed yet shockingly agitated muscles released, freeing Kuroi and Misao from their cannibalistic predicament as they gracefully landed with a feline's tact on the ground below, Konata soon followed.

In his now severely incapacitated, bumbling state, the old monks rage magnified tenfold. With the controlling rage came the unstoppable urge to collide with every object he could in a frenzy, destroying the bricked walls, the banners of silk, the pillars molded from the hands of abstract artists.

It was in this state of ultimate despair and outright helplessness that set Miyuki off once again, yet this time in unexpected fury. How she pitied the old man, now a fearsome byproduct of man's own mortal fears, but with her stalwart pity came an unsettling thought. Never had she considered hating somebody, even negatively assessing an individual without truly having known them seemed irksome to her, and yet here she felt as though hatred would be a correct use of the concept.

While the atrocities, betrayals, and stunning revelations the man spoke of still confused her, and held an air of a greater mystery, she didn't exactly need to hear anymore to be able to form a concrete reason to hate the man. He, and others, had used her and destroyed not only her life, but her people's entire modern essence; it was tainted more so now than ever before. Why was it then, that she bore him no seething emotions of any kind, in fact quite the opposite?

Her master was only a man who wished to heal the world of its pain, and distracted by his own ambitions he failed to see the disastrous end that awaited him on this path. Miyuki felt a loving admiration towards him for even attempting to redeem their people, for even trying to succeed where most would have accepted the impossibility of the task from the dawn of it.

The crimes he had committed could never be forgiven, and the lies and deceit that changed her life forever could never be erased, but it was here, at this critical moment, she knew amnesty was necessary, perhaps just to clear her own perplexed mind by doing the so called right thing.

"Master!" Miyuki harkened disconcertedly, scarcely understanding her own emotions on the matter as the dying demon momentarily interrupted its rampage at the notice of a familiar voice.

Trembling offbeat for only a brief instant, the sorceress assured herself one final time that she was doing the right thing.

"I forgive you. I forgive you for everything." Miyuki began under a heavy sob. "I believe you when you say you did the things you did for the sake of peace, and I wish to leave it at that, even if I truly believe your story to be a half-truth. Thank you for all you have taught me." Her blessing made known, the weeping sorceress knew the sound of her shaky voice would attract her teacher's aggravation, and it surely did.

The man-giant forged a path destruction and punctured earth in his wake, hell bent on eradicating the solemn gratitude regardless of whom it stemmed from, perhaps he had only held his mind long enough to be reunited with his student, the erosion may have already taken a full affect on his failing senses.

Bravely, and without a hint of indecision plaguing her, Miyuki denied herself an entrance to the border of the spirit realm, knowing this would be something that would require her own power. As her master approached she hurriedly concentrated on the very earth at her feet, telekinetically dividing a jutted pair of sharpened stalagmites from the bounteous earth as her master closed the gap.

The piercing lances of volcanic rock carved through either side of the old monks bulging neck as he approached, sprucely severing his head from his shoulders like a guillotine and sending the rotten crest flying, falling, and tumbling away behind some forgotten pile of cobblestone.

The silence following her masters inhuman wailing left a void, but it was a cleansing and uplifting feeling, she did not hate it in the least. Hand in hand she joined the silence, bathing herself in its unspoken kindness.

Not a word was spoken, not by anyone, they did not dare intrude on matters where neither their sentiments, or opinions were wanted. They would leave Miyuki be for as long as she required.

The questions left unanswered would not keep their inscrutableness forever, this the introspective sorceress knew for certain. To receive such answers would require meeting with those with the knowledge of the events, and with her master's death such a number had diminished from infinitesimal to but a fraction of that. The survivors involved in the incident as she knew of them, were only herself, her mother Yukari, Patty, an individual named Mephistopheles, and the crusaders of Umbasa, Yutaka and Minami.

When her paths with any of these individuals would come, if ever, she didn't know, but her anticipation for such a day could easily be contained for now. For now, she wished only to reflect, and to rest.

Konata struggled to disregard her grieving friend on purpose, but she managed, instead deciding to focus her attention on the increasingly ill Kagami that she hadn't had time previously to reunite with properly because of the chance meeting, and following events.

Almost shyly she approached her tsundere, a cumbersome racking of guilt weighing her down, she knew the state her friend was in was out of her hands, but she felt responsible nonetheless.

Lovingly she knelt by Kagami's side, taking her tremulous hand in her own and stroking it soothingly, gods forbid if she caused any more discomfort to her.

"Hey Kagamin…you're looking a little worse for wear. I take my eyes off you for one second and this happens, what am I gonna do with you?" Konata joked reassuringly; worrying that in her fractured state Kagami may not even be able to hear her words.

Whether or not she was aware anyone was speaking to her, none could tell, but her eyes fell on Konata's the instant they met, she was at least savvy to whom she was seeing, evident from an all but clichéd furrowed brow.

Konata disregarded the obviously facetious anger and looked to the nearby ginger-haired cleric, for assistance on the matter. Hiyori as well, didn't take long to make her presence known as she approached the two.

"She's got the Dregling infliction." Hiyori softly began, easing Konata into the reality of the situation. "Normally she'd be dead by now, but she's a fighter, she's holding on to that soul of hers something fierce." She consoled as best she could, not exactly being the chief individual to turn to in times of warmth of comfort.

The word stood out almost instantly, Dregling, she knew of them, and not just from her encounters in Boletaria either. Almost immediately she was drawn back to the days her father had vanished, where both she and Kagami had come across one of the shambling, soulless husks. Yet seeing her dear friends bared, razor sharp fangs, and eyes as yellow as the sun, she knew how the curse had befallen her. Her heart suffered almost dizzyingly, but she remained stalwart and brushed aside her judgment for the time being.

"C-Cure…?" Konata struggled to articulate, muttering only the single word that mattered, thankfully Hiyori assured her of an alleviation with an assuring series of nods.

"Yup, I can cure her." Hiyori confidently claimed, not leaving room for pessimism despite the simple nature of her assertion. "But it's gonna take a whole helluva lot of soul power to—" She began to recount as she was abruptly cut short by a jowl of repugnance from Kagami, so booming it sent all three huddlers around her aback with fright, and motioned for every onlooker in the room to behold in horror.

"K-Kagamin!?" Konata brokenly yelled, latching herself onto the seemingly possessed Kagami as she writhed almost elastically from an unknown agony.

Kagami's reciprocation to her worry was an assailing tackle sending both parties tumbling across the stone canvas, ending the roll with the Lilac Knight on top, bestial claws pronged and ready to bury them into her prey's neck. Konata stopped her at the last possible second as she recovered from her awe, booting her suddenly demented friend from her form and launching her onto her buttocks several feet away.

"Kagamin…" Konata whispered once more beneath adrenaline elicited gasps, hoping to break through to whatever delusion she had found herself trapped within.

Kagami reacted to her name humanly, but just as inhumanly wiped away the recognition with a series of saliva flushing chokes and wheezes. This final sputter of humanity took hold of her, and allowed her the clarity needed to vacate herself from those she cared deeply for; she would do anything to avoid harming them in the thick of her madness. She stumbled once, twice, before she regained momentum and sprinted from the room united with an aria of infernal, philistine cries.

She vanished behind the gleaming wall of light Miyuki's master had guarded, and Konata did not concede to the despondence the turn of events so heartlessly lay before her.

Not a thought, not a word nor objection, plan or any other measure of constructive sense would stall her impulsive and immediate action to race after her Kagamin; she would not lose her a second time.

A menagerie of cries and halts and criticisms of her foolishness erupted behind her from many voices and opinions, yet she was oblivious to them, her body wouldn't have stopped even if she willed it to.

She nearly crashed into the heavenly glow of the white, gaseous door after Kagami, feeling its sapping, dire disposition jolt her foundation strand by strand, such a mixture of ataractic euphoria that brought about unprecedented calm, and the inescapable torment she felt collided into a sensation she figured was not unlike being born. In the sense that there was dark, then light, followed by pain, and finally warmth, each emotion filled her as she passed to other side of the gate where she prayed her beloved Kagami would wait for her, enduring her dolor as concisely as possible.

For Konata held no doubt in her heart that by her words, or by her blade, Kagami would be free.

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Author's Note: I'm back, again. Here's a 16K word chapter for you. I won't begin to make excuses for my absence, but this story is going to be completed one way or another. Mark my words.