Chapter III
Presence
Shido landed on his butt. He was back on the [Fraxinus], but Mitsuru wasn't with him. They were together just a minute ago. Stepping out of the room, Shido was immediately confronted by Kotori and Reine.
(-)
Mitsuru looked all around him, troubled by the strange, advanced-looking metal walls. Computers on the desks were endlessly running code. He had been teleported inside a chamber, which he assumed was the teleporter itself. This was bad.
I fell for the trap! Why am I so stupid?! Mitsuru walked up to a door in front of him, but there was no hand. The door unexpectedly slid open, and two people stood right behind it, startling Mitsuru. The boy stumbled back and instinctively raised his empty hands.
"Calm down. We're not like the A.S.T." The person on his right spoke. She had red hair that was tied with black ribbons into twin tails. Her attire, a bold red coat over a white uniform and tie, indicated a sense of authority.
"...Ratatoskr?" Mitsuru quietly and slowly spoke. His eyes were waiting for sudden movements, but he returned to a normal standing position soon after.
"Mitsuru! There you are." Shido ran up to the girl with red hair.
"I am here, but where is...here?" Mitsuru pointed all around him, never keeping his eyes off the two new people.
"You are aboard the [Fraxinus], an aerial ship owned by the Ratatoskr organization." To the left was a woman with pale blue hair and bags under her eyes. She looked like she hadn't slept in a while.
"Ratatoskr aims to deal with Spirits through non-violent means."
Spirit…non-violent means. Mitsuru glanced at Shido. "So, Ratatoskr sent you," Mitsuru pointed at Shido, "to deal with me, a Spirit. Am I one? I still don't know because I don't know what that looks like." Mitsuru turned his finger toward himself. No one answered. The red-haired girl gave a small sigh and then said,
"Come. We're taking you to an interrogation room. Let's continue talking there." She and the tired woman turned around. Mitsuru slowly walked out of the room.
As they went, Mitsuru asked, "So who are they?" He still wasn't sure if he was being fooled, but he tried not to lag behind.
"The red-haired girl is Kotori, my sister. She's the [Fraxinus] commander, and the woman is Reine Murasame, the head analyst."
"The commander…" Mitsuru slapped Shido on the shoulder. "Your sister…commander? Of Fraxinus...an airship?"
"It was after the fire five years ago that Ratatoskr recruited her. I only knew about it a few months ago when I first met the Spirits." They stopped in a large room with a big box in the middle. The transparent walls showed an inside resembling a living room.
Mitsuru walked around the perimeter, examining the room. This earned him an insult from Kotori.
"You're like a headless chicken. Get back here, so we can interrogate you."
"..." Mitsuru was about to say something before dropping his hand and closing his eyes for a moment. He reminded himself of his circumstances. "Alright."
He walked first into the living room alongside Kotori. Inside, the transparent glass panes turned out to resemble a beige home interior. It looked like the kind of living room his home had. To his right were a dining table and two chairs. Mitsuru sat on one side, and Kotori sat on the other.
"These walls are soundproof. Well, people looking inside can see through; a console outside is recording our conversation. It should come close to a private setting."
"Yeah, if you ignore everything you just said about one-way walls and recording." He muttered under his breath.
Mitsuru sat still, vigilant. He had his own questions but wasn't sure how to ask them or if he was in such a position.
Maybe she asks first, then I ask. They are interrogating me. Kotori began talking.
"I'm Kotori Itsuka, commander of the [Fraxinus]." She introduced herself.
"Mitsuru Kano…that's it." He gave a slight bow.
"So, to answer your question earlier, no one is sure of what kind of being you are. Spirits are magical beings from another world, but they are all girls. Spirits cause spacequakes upon appearance, but you did not. Furthermore, [Fraxinus's] instruments, called Realizers, could not gather Spirit waves or emotional levels."
"Emotional levels?" They tried to monitor me earlier? He realized that it was likely when he met Shido. But why emotional levels? Shido's explanation of Ratatoskr's goals played through his mind.
"Ratatoskr aims to deal with Spirits through non-violent means." Diplomacy?
"So while Shido and I were running around, you were watching and trying to set up your instruments to monitor the conversation," Mitsuru concluded, partly shaken from the realization.
"Well, you caught on to how we operate. If only my idiot brother could catch on to things as fast as you. Yes, we handle Spirits by sending in Shido to…negotiate with them while the [Fraxinus] crew monitors from above."
"And what is this negotiation? I mean, he doesn't seem like an extraordinary guy. How can he convince these supernatural beings?" Kotori gave a smirk.
"My brother has the ability to seal a Spirit."
"Seal?" Mitsuru straightened up and leaned forward.
"To do that, he has to gain their trust. We monitor that using our Realizers. You might have heard of them being used in classified military operations. The public thinks they have an idea of what they are, but leaked info means nothing." Mitsuru slowly nodded up and down. "Then, when the Spirit has his trust, he kisses them. Like lovey-dovey."
Mitsuru paused.
"Huh?" It wasn't immediate, but his mind's gears turned. Connecting the dots in his brain led to one conclusion. The whole time he was talking to Shido, Shido was–
"But you said that all Spirits were girls! Then you said that you couldn't monitor me for emotion and Spirit waves. So how do you deal with me? I can't be a Spirit!"
The girl in front of him seemed amused, laughing with her mouth covered. "I can't believe how flustered you got trying to prove that. It's okay, we have nothing against you if you are in fact g–."
"I hope not!" Mitsuru stood up and made a flicking gesture with his hand.
"Besides that, you're right. You aren't detected as a Spirit, so we aren't sure if sealing you is even an option," Mitsuru tensed his face with reprieve, "so you're going to answer some stuff. Anything you know about your powers would help us a lot. It'll be beneficial for you too. You want answers as well, right?"
Mitsuru held his breath slightly, hesitant. His flustered grin faded. "Okay, so where do you want me to start?"
"Five years ago. You hinted that you got your powers five years ago and that you were in the fire. When you got your powers, were they given to you?" Mitsuru looked at Kotori strangely when she asked that. The nature of the question seemed very specific.
"No, I wasn't given my powers, I think. I didn't actually get them in the fire. I got them...after the fire." Mitsuru quietly uttered the last part of his sentence, emphasizing a reluctance to mention something. Kotori noticed that when he said it, his eyes drifted away from her and to nothing. He was deeply thinking about something, worried.
"So you got your powers after the fire. You said they weren't given to you by anyone, so how did you get them?"
"Uh…uh…I don't really…uhh…can I think for a second, please?" he politely asked, sitting down. Like before, he seemed to be thinking greatly about what to say. Kotori was intrigued, ready for his response. Mitsuru began tapping his fingers, then said,
"About that fire. There wasn't really an after for me…no not really. Please believe me when I say that…I died in the fire. Falling debris, I think. Then…" The room went silent. Neither of them moved. While Mitsuru looked anxiously, Kotori's eyes widened with horror. She quickly stammered out of her seat.
"Stay here." She then unexpectedly left the room. Mitsuru simply sat and watched her exit. Her reaction left him unsure of how to react himself. He saw a mix of disbelief and horror, but he didn't expect her to leave. He nervously sat back down in his chair but kept his eyes on the door.
Kotori felt her chest tighten as she hyperventilated. Shido had rushed to her side the moment she stepped out.
"Kotori, are you alright? Why did you suddenly–" Shido realized the problem.
"He…he died in the fire that I caused." Kotori was the Spirit, [Ifrit] that caused the fire in Tengu City five years ago. Origami believed that it was Kotori who killed her parents. That accusation alone made her freeze up, even in the face of certain death. It was only the fact that Shido convinced Origami that it could have been the fault of the mysterious being, [Phantom], that Kotori was still alive. Now she was again hit by the reality that her uncontrolled power had led to someone's death.
Kotori clutched Shido tightly as he comforted her.
"I'll go inside," Reine said as she stepped towards the door. "The crew can help if Kotori's emotional levels spiral. Stay by her side, Shin."
"Are you going to tell him?" Shido asked, with Kotori close to him. He hugged her tight, feeling the guilt his sister had to carry.
"We'll see. If we can understand what happened to him five years ago, maybe a way to seal his powers will come up." Reine said before entering the room.
When she saw Mitsuru, his head was only slightly raised, but his eyes followed her as she sat down in Kotori's place. She was suspicious of Mitsuru, no doubt. As the head analyst, having no data to work with was not a comfortable situation.
"Did I say something wrong?" Mitsuru murmured.
"No, she was caught off guard by what you told her. I'll take her place for the rest of this. To continue, you said that you died in the fire five years ago. Was this the cause of your powers?"
"Ah, uh, maybe. There's more to it than that. When it started, I just saw the fire in the distance and all the noise, right? So I tried to get out, but I stopped to help a mother who was trapped under rubble, then…" Mitsuru struggled to recollect, fiddling and waving his hands around to remember. "Right! This wooden beam just flew through the air. I didn't see where it was coming from–and just…" Mitsuru made a whistling noise with his mouth as he used his hands to visualize the wooden beam falling right over him.
"So that's how you died, but you are here now. How is that?"
"I just opened my eyes, like I was waking up, and everything around me was black. Then this Voice was talking to me out of nowhere." Reine readjusted herself. "The only thing I know is that he was the only one there. That was about three years ago because the Voice told me I'd been dead for two years." Mitsuru spoke like a storyteller. "So for the next three years, I kind of stepped in and out of that empty place. About my powers, I have no clue. The only thing I can do is make weapons, or really anything, appear if I just think hard enough about it–" Mitsuru went dead silent.
"Did something happen?" Reine asked as she looked around. Nothing was out of place.
"...Something cold in the air. Do you feel that?" Mitsuru's eyes flew around as he anxiously spun around. He pointed right. "It's somewhere outside. I don't feel good about this."
At the bottom of the staircase, both of them were suddenly enveloped by a bright yellow sphere.
As the light faded, the boy with curly, brown hair looked all around him as he stepped out of the teleporter, leaving behind a black mass, free to roam the [Fraxinus].
Kotori drank the cold water from her cup.
"This time, there's nothing that can hide me from what I did. Because of my powers, Mitsuru died." She looked at her reflection in the cup.
"But that was when they were out of control, when [Phantom] gave you your powers. It's true that it was your powers that caused the fire, but it's not like you wished for it."
"But, still–"
"It wasn't you!" Shido cut her off. "If he figured out, Mitsuru would understand!" He would never believe that Kotori, his little sister, would ever kill someone. Kotori only glanced back at Shido before she finished drinking.
"Mm. I should get back. You can go, Shido. I'll stay back for a little while longer."
A loud banging sound emanated outside the room. Both of them ran to investigate. The visage of someone large stepped around the corner. Turning that corner, they found nobody.
"What, but we both…"
(-)
Mitsuru peaked his head outside.
"Ms. Murasame. I promise you, I think something is coming for me."
"That's impossible. Nothing else is on board other than us and the [Fraxinus] crew." He only shrugged, keeping his eyes on the door as he stepped back. Reine could see that the initially relaxed teen was on edge again.
"It's really close–"
The wall behind them was shattered as a large black sword punctured through. On the other side of the wall was an inhumanly large knight, clad in black raven-like armor that was covered in ash. The moment it spotted Mitsuru, the knight quickly turned around.
"Get away from the door. It's coming around." As quickly as Reine said that, the knight's large and jagged greatsword ran across the wall, slicing into Mitsuru's leg.
"Gah!" Mitsuru collapsed to the ground. Reine rushed over to help him up and slung his arm over her shoulder.
"Shin? Where are you and Kotori? Something is on board the [Fraxinus] and attacking us in the interrogation room. We need assistance immediately." The door was kicked open as the raven knight entered, standing twice as tall as a normal human would. In its left hand was a gigantic sword that looked like a sharpened slab of slate.
It was about the cleave Reine and Mitsuru before a loud pop rang and the raven staggered back, sparks of lightning coursing in and out of its helmet.
"Ms. Murasame!" Mitsuru tugged on her. She immediately got up and they both ran past the knight. She looked at Mitsuru's hand. In it was a large rusted and rotten yet intricate crossbow with three sets of arms loaded with lightning bolts. Once they ran out of the room, the door behind them shut and locked.
{[Fraxinus's] emergency protocols are active. They should buy you time. Get to the medical wing.} Kotori spoke through Reine's earpiece.
"Roger." The doors behind them were slowly being smashed open as the knight pursued them. "The medical wing is close by. Do you know who that is?"
"I don't know. Don't go to the medical wing. I think my leg is good." Mitsuru let go of Reine. Looking at his leg, it was completely healed, and Mitsuru was able to walk normally again. "Hot hell." He muttered. "Yeah, I can repair wounds really quickly. I don't think I need medical care now. Where do we go?"
"We should be close to the main control room. A barricade there should be able to hold it off." As they passed each door, they quickly noticed that the sound of shut-off doors being ripped apart had faded.
"Did he stop following us?"
"..." Mitsuru got a quick shiver down his spine, and his mind screamed something. Look left! A tear in the wall separating reality from a black void ripped open, and the blade of the raven knight thrust through.
Immediately, Mitsuru thought of a shield, and the same gargantuan stone shield that had barricaded the door in the warehouse earlier dropped right in front of him. Mitsuru braced himself as the knight's blade slammed into it. The force was so strong that it knocked the shield back, sending Mitsuru down. The shield then fell over Mitsuru and pinned him.
The raven knight slowly stepped out, first holding onto the edge of the portal, then revealing its hollow helmet. Once fully out, it was so tall that the knight couldn't even stand up straight. With a single hand, it pried the shield off Mitsuru and grabbed him by the throat.
He wriggled futilely, trying his hardest to pull at least a finger off his neck. "I…can't…breathe." The knight began to turn around. It was bringing Mitsuru back through the portal.
"Hyah!" A girl shouted and jumped out of nowhere. A mighty sword with blue lines running through it struck down and wedged itself right into the shoulder armor of the raven knight. It grunted hauntingly, letting go of Mitsuru, who collapsed, coughing. The person who had saved him was a girl with dark plum hair. Her attire was a fusion of civilian clothing and a strange, purple dress-armor.
"You're that girl from the park!"
"You were the guy on the bench!" She pushed her sword against the knight but jumped back when the knight suddenly reached for its sword, swinging it horizontally. It went straight into the wall. "What is that thing?"
"I have zero idea what the hell it is, but it's after me." Mitsuru backed away as the knight retrieved it sword from the wall. Ignoring the girl, it turned on its knees and slashed the sword at Mitsuru. "Alright, so in this situation, what would I do?" The knight was slow. He could outpace it if he needed to.
That crossbow… Looking behind the knight, Mitsuru saw it by the plum girl's feet. Maybe I can think it back into my hand. Mitsuru willed it to happen, and it appeared that it was, but when it was supposed to fall into his hand, the raven knight thrust its sword into the rift that was forming and shut it. The crossbow remained on the other side No go. I still need that crossbow.
"Mitsuru, we can turn back. We'll meet with Tohka in the bridge room, and you can get your weapon." Reine advised. They began backing up as the knight began to lurch towards Mitsuru. Besides the cling of the black armor and the crashing of the blade, there was no sound of life in that knight.
"Tohka. Alright! Bring that crossbow with YOU!–" Mitsuru dodged another slash from the knight, almost tripping as he turned one-eighty and bolted down the hall alongside Reine. The knight followed, sinking into the ground.
(-)
Tohka ran through the halls as portals opened up around her. The black knight's sword thrust outward, always trying to knock the crossbow out of her hand. At first, the knight clearly turned towards Mitsuru and Reine, but Tohka quickly found out that it could attack both them and her. Even from her room in the Spirit Complex, Tohka felt a shocking aura hit her. She didn't know whether it was from the boy or the knight. Both seemed to emanate that same unknown presence, but when it hit her, Tohka immediately went into action.
(-)
"Jesus!" Mitsuru screamed. He narrowly ran past the raven knight, falling from the ceiling with its blade going straight through the ground. Those portals look just like mine. "Where is the bridge room, Ms. Murasame?!"
"We're almost there." As they passed by a door, the raven knight's blade burst out from behind it, blocking the way. "He can appear through portals, but only one at a time. Can you summon any other weapons?"
"No, I'm not fast enough, so he just gets to it quicker than I do. It's like he knows." The knight's blade was stuck. The metal walls bent in a way that kept the blade from being pulled out. Mitsuru stepped forward, seeing an opportunity to turn the table. If he could grab the blade, he could temporarily turn it against the knight, maybe even kill it. It looked impossibly heavy, though. Give it a try. Those words echoed in his head.
"Ms. Murasame, I'm going to try to push away the knight's hand. Then I'm going to try to grab the sword. It might give you time to run. Is that alright?"
Reine was skeptical of the idea, warning, "If you fail, you might be captured, and only you know where that place is. Are you sure that you can do it?"
"Well, you can never be so sure." Mitsuru braced himself with one foot back, ready to sprint. Knock the arm out of the way. Then grab the handle and pull up. Easy. Mitsuru dashed, first running into the warrior's arm. It lost grip of the blade, trying to swoop him off his feet. He jumped right over the arm. Wait, that worked. He then grabbed the handle with both hands and pushed it upward. Reine ran past him, reverse-roundhouse-kicking the knight's arm from grabbing him.
With the most amount of physical exertion he had ever given in his existence, Mitsuru pulled the blade from the wall. It crashed onto the metal floor. The knight pulled back its arm into the room as the door was ripped open. Rushing out, trying to grab him, Mitsuru brought up the sword and thrust it into its gut. The knight howled ghoulishly in pain, being flung backward. Oh, my God. It worked! Mitsuru dropped the blade as he and Reine escaped.
Now the ambushes were imbued with red and black flames.
(-)
"[Sandalphon]!" Tohka's Angel manifested again in her hand. The knight's sword plunged from a portal into the floor; from it, orbs of fire flew out and locked onto her. [Sandalphon] sliced through them. The flames, though fading, were so hot that Tohka felt close to being burned on multiple occasions, even in her Limited Astral Dress.
"Where did these flames come from? I can't sense any Spirit power from them." Tohka entered the bridge room.
Shido ran up to her, relieved, as they both hugged each other. "Tohka, I'm glad you're safe. I'm glad. Is that Mitsuru's crossbow?"
"Yes. He dropped it, but the knight kept him from getting it." Kotori brought up the many cameras in the halls. On the center camera, the one right outside the door opposite where Tohka entered, Mitsuru and Reine ran down the hall. The knight hauled itself from a portal on the floor and swung its blade across. Reine slid under as Mitsuru jumped over, the flame grazing both.
"Where is it?!" Mitsuru hollered the moment they barged into the room. Tohka tossed him the crossbow. Right after, the door entered, and the knight rushed in, standing at full height with its sword over its head. Mitsuru aimed and fired. With thunderous bolts in its face, the knight stumbled back and onto one knee. Its blade fell to the ground. The wound Mitsuru inflicted earlier was visible, showing a hollow nothingness. One more time.
The [Fraxinus] crew cowered, standing back and spilling questions. "What is that thing?"
Mitsuru tightened his grip on the blade. Dragging it right in front of the black warrior, it slowly began to get its composure. Mitsuru brought up the flaming slab of rock, his eyes narrowing into its abdomen. The raven knight cried out one last time, trying to grab for its sword as Mitsuru pierced into its stomach.
Stillness The knight's arm went limp. It took a step back and fell on its knees, slumped against the weapon.
"How are we going to dispose of this?" Kotori said as she cautiously stood up to see the limp corpse from the front. A black cloud of gas exited from the knight's wound and rushed at Mitsuru. It jumped onto his hand and up his hoodie sleeve.
"What the–Where is it?!" Mitsuru patted all over, but it seemed to have disappeared. The knight's arm suddenly flinched as it weakly began to stand up.
"Again?!" Everyone in the room cried out. Mitsuru and Tohka drew their weapons. The knight, now standing again, slowly grabbed the giant sword embedded in its stomach, pulling it out. The edge slammed down, but the black fire was gone. It lifted its barren gaze at Mitsuru, and he looked back with a terrified, wide gaze. Dragging its blade behind it, the knight turned around toward the door. It slid open to a black nothingness, crouching over and disappearing into the void.
"He's not attacking us. Shouldn't he be angrier after you did that, Mitsuru?" Shido questioned him as he approached the portal. It emitted dangerously cold air.
Tohka let her blade disappear and reverted her attire to her normal clothing. She wondered, "Maybe it accepted defeat, but it seemed like it was able to continue fighting." Mitsuru didn't reply. He only looked deep into the portal. Something was calling out to him. He felt drawn in.
"Wait. Get back here!" Mitsuru dropped the crossbow and followed the raven knight through the portal before it closed on him.
"Here is what I propose. The Spirit, [Princess], is under the guise of a Japanese high school student! With that being the case, my secretary, Ellen, will go and capture her within the next few days."
"What is your plan? How do you expect to deploy a Wizard to kidnap a girl at school?" Board Member Roger Murdoch scoffed at the idea Westcott brought up.
"Simple. The school plans to take a trip. Through our subsidiaries, we can arrange a travel offer that the school will not refuse. Arubi Island should place [Princess] in an isolated position. Any further explanation is not necessary for the greatest Wizard in history." A smirk and sly gaze were imparted onto the director's face.
The door to the conference room suddenly opened, yet nobody entered. Everyone turned towards the door, and even Westcott gave a glance. One by one, each of the board members on one side of the table unexpectedly felt a chilly wind go past them. When Westcott's eyes moved down to the table, there was a note in front of him. It wasn't there before.
Ellen, standing beside him, grabbed the note and read it. As she read, her eyes narrowed with suspicion, then widened.
"Ike, you have to read this," she quietly said, handing the delicate piece of paper to him.
On it read:
Sir Isaac Ray Pelham Westcott
Director
Deus Ex Machina Industries,
For your and Deus Ex Machina's well-being, it is wise that you hold off on this capture mission of the Spirit, [Princess]. Arubi Island and all Spirit activities within it will be under my administration. There is no longer business for you with Spirits.
I will only make this warning once, Mr. Westcott. End your futile efforts. Abandon your dream. As you should have 40 years ago.
If not, prompt and utter destruction awaits any and all you send.
From,
Instantly, Ellen angrily pointed a finger at some of the board members. "How is that possible? Was it one of you who wrote this?!" They looked at her, perplexed. The members whispered amongst each other while pointing at the mysterious slip of paper in Westcott's hand.
Forty years ago. There was only one thing she could think of that happened forty years ago. Only she, Westcott, her sister, and Elliot knew about that day. No one else…
Westcott let the paper fall out of his hand. A light chuckle left his mouth and soon turned into a maniacal laugh that overpowered all the sound in the room.
"Very well! Ellen, prepare to launch the [Arbatel]. Paddington will be the captain, in case our friends at [Ratatoskr] get their hands on him. Use whatever resources you need to capture [Princess], and many times that. Prepare for an amusing surprise."
"A surprise from who?"
"Someone we both know from 40 years ago. Let's show how much we've grown since then, Ellen." Westcott ominously declared, spinning around to meet her gaze.
On the other side of the room, a shadow was cast onto the wall, one that did not originate from anything in the room. When the sun moved to cast its light over the wall, it disappeared.
Author's Notes:
This time, I referenced:
-Fume Knight - Dark Souls 2: Crown of the Old Iron King
-Avelyn - Dark Souls series
-Havel's Shield - Dark Souls series
