Hello everyone, and welcome back! As promised, we're back to the usual update schedule. And, also as usual, I don't own anything- I'm just a fan writing some fiction. Please enjoy!

28- Tip of the Iceberg

"Lina!"

The sorceress opened her eyes, trying to figure out where she was and what was going on around her. Gourry had his hands on her shoulders, as though he had been beside her the entire time. That was right- Auntie Aqua had said that she hadn't moved, hadn't she?

"Lina, are you okay? What happened? Did you talk to him? What did he say? Did he give you any information? What did you learn?" Pestis suddenly began battering her with questions.

"Hey, hey! Can't you see she's confused? Give her some space." Lyos interrupted, pushing Pestis away.

"I wasn't trying to hurt her! I was just trying to figure out what was going on-"

"Just don't crowd around her, would ya? You've caused enough problems already-"

"Me? Problems? Just what are you-"

"Be quiet you two!" Gourry barked, and Pestis and Lyos snapped to attention. "Calm down and let her speak."

By this time, Lina had oriented herself back to the world around her, and she took a step away from Gourry to address the whole group. "You guys… I… I got it. I found it."

There was a brief moment of silence.

"You found it?" Gourry breathed. "Like, as in, you know where it is?"

"W-well, I… I know who has it." Lina could only nod in response.

"Are you kidding me? Do you realize what this means? Th-this is fantastic! Lina!" Pestis' yelling echoed through the cave. He jumped excitedly, running to give Lina a forceful hug.

"Be gentle!" Gourry snapped, trying to shield her from the professor's enthusiasm. ""This is great news and everything, but…"

"But what? We did it. We found it. We won." Lyos argued. "Aren't you excited?"

Gourry gave Lyos a very serious glare. "You realize what this means, don't you? We won't ever have won until the key- along with all the humans involved in this fiasco- is safe from Azarel. This isn't the end of our mission. This is the beginning of our fight."

Lyos seemed to wilt, backing away from Gourry sheepishly. Clearly he hadn't thought it all through the way Gourry had.

"And, unfortunately, it's a fight that I can't join." Lina added gravely. "But I will tell you everything that I know. I trust you all to see this through."

"Who would own such a powerful relic, though?" Pestis asked. "I never once thought it would be in someone's possession. You said that it belonged to someone, didn't you?"

"Y-yes," Lina replied. "But the thing is, she-"

"Miss Lina."

The conversation stopped abruptly. It was the first time that Auntie Aqua had spoken since Lina had returned to consciousness, and it was unexpected . Pestis jumped and Lyos flinched instinctively, surprised by the harshness in the old woman's voice.

"This is not the time or place for that kind of talk." Auntie Aqua continued, stepping forward and holding up her wooden staff as though she were trying to protect them from some sort of danger. "You never know who might be listening in a place like this."

"…listening…?" Lina looked around suspiciously. "But who would be-?"

"For shame, Auntie. They were all so excited, and then you had to kill the mood."

Azarel had swapped disguises in the short amount of time it had taken to sneak up on the group inside the cave- not that any of them would have known what had just transpired at the entrance anyway. This Mazoku looked just like the Azarel that they had encountered the night before- well, minus the injuries. Those were gone now, and in their place stood a forced smile that was trying to be self-satisfied, but wasn't quite there.

"A-Azarel?!" Pestis stammered. "How did you-"

"Get in? It wasn't difficult." Azarel lied nonchalantly. "Your guards were pretty useless."

"Wait! What happened to them?" Gourry demanded. Lina could feel his grip on her shoulder tighten. "Don't worry so much. They're not dead… yet. I had a good mind to kill that man out there. He was just too difficult to deal with. But… I left him alive for your sake, Lord Pathosmaster."

Pestis' eyes narrowed in disgust. "You're lying. You'd never do anything for my sake."

Azarel just shrugged. "Try me."

"Why you-"

"Both of you! Take this fight elsewhere. The realm of the gods is no place to a quarrel of Mazoku." Auntie Aqua stepped between them with a fierce expression. "Fight if you must, but do not do so in the presence of the Claire Bible."

Pestis gave a deep sigh. "I'll be glad to take this outside if you will, Azarel."

"That's Lord Hellmaster to you." Azarel responded curtly. "But… I'd, uh, rather not fight. I just came here to see what was happening- to see whether or not you would get the information that we've all been seeking. Congratulations! You heard it first!"

"This is not a place to joke, Azarel."

"Joke? Who said anything about joking? I'm happy for you, I really am." Azarel's eyes narrowed. "This means much less work for me. I can strike whenever I want to. And nothing you can do would change that."

Lina shook off Gourry's protective grip again and stepped toward Azarel. "You didn't have to reveal yourself to us, you know. If this was all you wanted to know, you could have just left when Auntie Aqua cut me off. All of these dramatics serve no purpose whatsoever except to feed your overinflated ego. Picking an argument with Pestis, flaunting your supposed victory over our friends- it's all to make you feel better. I have a feeling that it wasn't so easy to get in. Zel and the rest of them gave you a good beating, didn't they?"

"Amelia! Zelgadis! Shizuri!" Pestis gasped. "Th-they might need our help! We have to-"

"Go ahead." Lina waved a hand in the professor's direction. "Don't worry about Azarel. I have everything under control. The whole point of all Azarel's visits to us is to get us worked up. Back in Ralteague, last night, today… all Azarel wants is to get a meal or two off of Professor Nisery's friends. And for what? To make herself feel like a real Mazoku? Why don't you get a grip and figure out that's not what being a Mazoku is about?"

Lyos was confusedly looking around, both at Pestis who was running off in another direction, and Azarel who seemed to be ready to attack Lina. "I-isn't Pestis the only one who knows the way out? Don't leave us behind!"

"Then come with me!" the professor called, and Lyos wasted no time in catching up with him. Meanwhile, Auntie Aqua had stepped up in Lina's defence.

"What Miss Lina says is true. Berating humans with petty insults such as this is not what the Mazoku race was designed to do. You call yourself Hellmaster, and yet you still don't understand such a simple concept?"

"Shut your mouth, old lady. You're nothing but the leftover remains of a fallen god. You've no room to be speaking to a Mazoku Lord that way."

"Then it's a fight you desire?" Auntie Aqua held up her staff with a smile. "If I'm such a weak old lady, you should have no trouble destroying me, correct?

"I- wait, what?" Azarel had not expected that response.

"Stand back Miss Lina, Mister Gourry. I think this Mazoku needs to be taught a lesson about the power of the gods."

"H-hey, hey, hey! It's not that I couldn't defeat you, but I don't have that kind of time!" Azarel backed away very quickly. "I've got places to be and things to do. I can't waste my time with silly matters like this."

"Suit yourself." Auntie Aqua took a step back as well, giving a nod. "You may leave, then."

"M-maybe I will!" Azarel spat. "I've got plans to make! You'll be seeing me again soon, anyway. I just thought I ought to greet you. I won't make the mistake of being polite again."

The Mazoku disappeared back into the darkness of the dimension, and Auntie Aqua lowered her staff with a self-satisfied smile.

"Something tells me that he won't be back here any time soon."

"That dummy. She's not fooling anyone." Lina sighed. "But thank you, Auntie. I appreciate your help in chasing Azarel away."

"You were the one who called him out on his nonsense. I was merely backing you up."

"Um… how are we going to get out of here?" Gourry looked around confusedly. "They left us…"

"I'll see you two out safely. Follow me." Auntie Aqua made a sweeping motion with her staff and began walking in the direction that Pestis and Lyos had gone. Gourry began to follow, but hesitated when he noticed that Lina wasn't moving.

"Lina? Is everything okay?"

She didn't answer right away. "…I don't know."

Gourry was by her side in a split second. "Wh-what's going on? Are you hurt? Is something wrong with the baby? Is there-"

"Stop it, Gourry. This isn't about me." Lina waved her hand in an attempt to quiet him. Her calm attitude helped to make him a little less upset. "It's about the information that Luke gave me. I'm worried that it won't be what everyone thinks it is."

"Why do you say that?" Gourry blinked in confusion.

"Because… the woman who owns the key went into hiding. She changed her name and her whole identity. I don't know who or where she is now. I only know who she used to be."

"So what? That just means that, instead of searching for an object, we're searching for a person."

"Yeah. Don't you think they'll be angry? It's like we're back where we started."

"No it's not. There's a huge difference."

"You think?"

"Sure. And I'm certain that everyone else will think so too." Gourry smiled brightly. "We're so much farther now than we were. And it's all thanks to you- I mean, I would never have thought of asking someone like Luke. I doubt anyone else might have had such a good idea, given the situation."

"Are you, uh, really sure about that?" Lina followed after him as Auntie Aqua led them through the rest of the dimension, the swirling chaos slowly turning back into simple stalactites and stalagmites. The old woman didn't say anything, knowing that Lina needed Gourry's assurance more than hers.

"Of course I'm sure!" he responded with childish enthusiasm. "We'd reached a dead end, but now, thanks to you, our search can continue!"

"Though," Auntie Aqua interrupted. "for Miss Lina's personal safety, I would advise bed rest right now."

"Y-yeah. I understand…" Lina nodded, avoiding eye contact with anyone. "I wish it were that simple."

"Remember that your first duty should be to your family."

"Right, but that's the problem." Lina replied. "Zara is family too. He's as much my child as his younger sibling is, and I can't just forget about him."

"What about Gourry? What will he do?"

The question seemed to be addressed to him, and Gourry gave a half-hearted sigh. "I wish I could tell you. I can't leave Lina on her own, but I can't leave Zara on his own either. I don't want to have to choose."

Lina said nothing, but she put a comforting hand on his arm.

Auntie Aqua continued to speak as she motioned toward the visible cave entrance. "When the time comes, you will know which decision is right."

"Y-yeah, but-" Gourry stammered, though he was cut off as he and Lina were almost forcibly pushed through the entrance of the cave, back out into the harsh sunlight. Gourry cringed and shut his eyes, but Lina turned back around to the cave to wave goodbye.

"Thank you for everything, auntie-" She stopped abruptly. Where the cave entrance had been , there was nothing more than a rock wall, just like the rest of the mountainside. There was no sign that a cave had once been there, save perhaps for the small area around the mouth that was free of snow. Lina lowered her hand with a sigh. "…well, alright then."

"Hey! No! Wait!"

Lyos, who had been part of the group sitting a short distance away, jumped up and ran back toward where the cave entrance used to be. He pounded on the rock wall angrily. "Open up! I wasn't finished yet! I still had some questions to ask you!"

"Lyos, stop that. The entrance to the Claire Bible here has been sealed away. There's no point." Lina tried to calm him down.

"But I never got any information about the Banisher! I need to know what's going on! How am I supposed to fight like this?"

"Calm down, Lyos!" Shizuri ran to his side, grabbing his shoulder in an attempt to calm him. Meanwhile, there was a petty argument going on between Zelgadis and Pestis, and Amelia was just watching in amusement.

"L-let go of me! I'm not hurt!"

"-'s all my fault and I don't know how I'll ever make it righ-"

"Pestis, calm down, would you? It wasn't anything that a few of Amelia's healing spells couldn't fix. Look at me- I'm fine."

"-that Azarel would have chosen to take this out on an innoce-"

"Pestis, please. You're the only one who's upset about this."

"-and I never should have tried to- huh?" Pestis stopped abruptly and looked around. "N-no one else is bothered by this?"

"I mean, I'm embarrassed by what happened, but we have bigger things to worry about, don't we?" Shizuri responded with a question.

"She's right." Amelia nodded. "So long as no one else was hurt, there's no need to worry about it."

"Yeah, but…" Lyos grumbled. "…now Azarel knows that we found the Key."

There was a pause.

"You… you found it?" Zelgadis stammered. "Like, you actually found it?"

"Lina did!" Pestis exclaimed. "The caretakers of the Claire bible had forbidden anyone to access the knowledge about the Key, but Lina came up with a completely unorthodox method of using the knowledge of the Claire bible and managed to find out what we need to know!"

There were multiple responses at once. "Wow, that's amazing!" You're kidding, right? Who would've guessed." "Oh, Lina, I knew you had it in you!"

Lina shrunk back, almost hiding herself behind Gourry. His words had given her a bit more confidence than she'd had before, but she still didn't want to be the one to ruin her friends' good moods.

"Lina? What's the matter?" Amelia asked in concern. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I thought you said that you found it. Is something wrong?" Shizuri added.

"Don't tell me- there's a problem with the information, isn't there?" Of course Zelgadis would be the one to figure that out first.

All eyes turned to Lina, and she took a deep breath, stepping forward to tell the truth.

"I didn't actually find out where the Key is- I found out who owns the Key. And, see, the problem is… that person has completely changed her identity. She's living a new life under a new name, and I only know who she used to be, not who she currently is. Does that make sense?"

"S-somewhat…" Amelia replied. "B-but that doesn't make any difference! Now we know that the Key does exist, and that it's in someone's possession! That's much more than we knew before. And, if we can figure out who this person is and where she lives, we'll be set! There's no problem at all!"

"Why didn't you tell us this while we were in the cave? We could've asked about her current identity or something." Lyos demanded.

"I couldn't, remember? Auntie Aqua cut me off because of Azarel." Lina replied.

"Do you have any clues, though? Any tips to go by?" Pestis asked. "Perhaps it would be better to discuss this back at home, but…"

"From what I understood, she was extremely wealthy, and pretty eccentric too…" Lina began, starting down the path back toward Pestis' house. "And, well, I know that I've heard her name before somewhere, but I just can't place it. It's, like… someone once mentioned it to me a long time ago… and…" She stopped abruptly with a gasp, turning around. "Lyos!"

"Wh-what?" Lyos stopped abruptly, looking around. "What's going on? Is there somethi-"

"You! You were the one who mentioned her to me the first time! It was that lady you told me about!"

"Lady? What lady? Lina, I don't know what you're-"

"The Hayze woman who was the proprietor of the mine. Soi Ren. Remember?"

Everyone looked confused except for Lyos, whose face turned pale suddenly. He took a step away from Lina, though he kept his eyes locked with hers.

"M-milady?" he stammered. "She… she's the one who had the Key of the Aqualord this whole time?"