Lance's Role

by Thrudgelmir2333

A 'shonen' fic that sequels Next Dimension and Lost Canvas. In 1960, the Pope of Athena receives three prophecies from an old enemy that irremediably set the course of his reign over Sanctuary's tragic history and almost two decades later a Saint of Pegasus finds himself put through the unfolding of a new age of violence caused by the Pope's actions. Please enjoy and review.

24. 1A: The Goodbye - Part 3 of 5

Notable OCs: Pegasus Lance's Bronze Saint Generation, Heracles Aguilon's Silver Saint Generation, Gemini Akassius' Gold Saint Generation, Daemon Lucifer, Maiden Elisa, Priam's Black Saints;

Notable Original Concepts: Training Ground, Sanctuary Court, Teos & Athenian Empire mythology, Isle of Gardens; Stardust Prison;

Recurring/Cameo OCs of Jenny DeVic: Mrs. Schafurwatt;

Recurring/Cameo Concepts of Jenny DeVic: Great Bodyguard Legend, Golden Line Heritage, Sanctuary Orphanages, Andromeda Island's Geography & Tests, Sanctuary Nobility, 88 Knights Festival;

Author Notes: I'd like to extend an extra thank-you to my beta-reader for the expedient job in looking over this chapter. She worked extra hard and is now on a much deserved vacation.

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Please enjoy and review ^_^

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"All I ever wanted was to fulfill my duty. Why is that so hard to understand? Instead, my most trusted men turn on me, attack me, call me a maniac, a tyrant, and all the other things I fought so hard to not be known as. Now my city is burning, my Coliseum lays in ruins, my people cry for revenge and my Saints fight each other.

And because of what? A 'bad talk'? This is intolerable. Athena would weep at this.

Hunt them down, Akassius. You have my full authorization to do whatever is necessary to bring me justice! Find these traitors, smoke them out, burn their hideouts, get my Gold Cloths back and give me a neck to hang at the arena they destroyed! These are my specific orders! I don't want a single one left alive! Do you understand?!

Good… I knew I could count on you. May the Goddess have mercy on you, Galaxy Breaker, for she knows you'll offer none to the Black Saints."

-Arles III, to Gemini Akassius Steiner, on the day after the Third Civil War breakout

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Thirteen Years Earlier (1963)

Golden Zodiac, Taurus House, Roof Garden

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Pisces Austrinus Guardnia sat on the grassy balcony of the temple, breathing, wheezing and sweating like someone just out of the Sahara. He was bleeding a lot too, his entire skeleton hurt and all his senses blurred into a mess of sensations that tortured his young mind.

After a while on the first day of training at the Taurus House, he was just glad he wasn't dead.

The workout regimen of the Second House had been everything Guardnia feared and beyond. The Saint of Taurus himself had been adamantly ruthless. It took everything Guardnia had just to get Saint Daniel's permission to be trained at the Taurus House, as the Gold Saint had every reason and more to refuse taking in a trainee in the midst of a war outbreak. Guardnia practically had to grab him by the legs in desperation to convince the Gold Saint to teach the Bronze Saint, ignoring all reasonable warning, all threats of violence and all pleas for sanity. It was just something he wanted too hard; Priam had hurt him so much that now Guardnia's heart burnt with the desire to prove his loyalty and dedication to Sanctuary. This anger was practically the only thing making him walk on his own two feet by then.

Maybe the Saint of Taurus thought the first day of training would convince Guardnia to leave; Guardnia had been trained in all sorts of ways during his path to acquire the Pisces Austrinus Cloth, but never, even in the dreaded dueling blood circles of death, had he had to face such brutality as he did on the Taurus House's plaza. At times Guardnia thought Daniel was really trying to kill him, steamrolling the young boy with the attacks over and over while subjecting him to horrible weights, insults and stresses as he ran up and down the longest staircase in the world all morning just to warm him up.

Daniel told him how stronger kids had died on that first day and how even stronger kids gave up Sanctuary altogether, only to be killed for fleeing their duty. Now that he thought of it, it didn't make much sense to tell him if Daniel was really trying to get him to leave.

The blonde Greek boy wiped the blood and sweat off of his face. With his body so utterly exhausted he felt his restraints shattering and the crying he held back flooding up to his eyes. He had not given his situation much thought till then, had he? Nothing but pure, absolute hell awaited him from then on, being trapped between training in an insane House while his friends risked their lives in the war or face the music of his first teacher being on the enemy side and die himself trying to get the bastard to justice. Maybe Cynthia was right and Guardnia was really stupid for cornering himself like this.

The gigantic man and his magnificent long blonde hair walked by him. "Why are you not resting? Do you think tomorrow will be any better? It won't; things have just begun to take a turn for the worse for you." the Taurus Saint eerily warned. "I don't want to see crying either. All men bleed, break and die and you are no different. Stop crying, you wanted this training and now you have it."

Guardnia could feel in the Gold Saint's tone about how little he really wanted to bother with having a trainee. Still, he stood up to the best of his efforts and nodded, "Yes, s-sir."

Daniel, however, only shrugged and looked at the horizon, where buildings of ruined roofs and broken roads could be seen. "Your teacher sure did a lot of damage, didn't he?" Guardnia gulped, barely able to look past his own swollen face to the Gold Saint, but stayed silent. "No more lashing out at the mention of him? Guess you learned some self-control today, after all."

The Bronze Saint only remembered his own screams during that day's training. He had acted recklessly, spouting ugly things when Daniel asked him about Priam, and it earned him new sets of running, pulling, pushing and being kicked the crap out of by the Taurus Saint. Now the idea of acting like the spoiled kid, like the one his friends accused him of being, was accompanied by the memory of Daniel's teachings and made him hold his tongue.

"Y-yes, sir." he meekly answered.

Without taking his eyes off the burned Sanctuary Town, Daniel sat on the steps. Even like this, his height still surpassed Guardnia's significantly somehow. He seemed to muse with himself for a bit as his blue eyes surveyed the destruction.

"How many people did you lose?"

Guardnia was a bit startled by this question. "I… I lost a few older friends who tried to fight them,… sir. No family, though."

Taurus bit down on his own gauntlet, a bad habit he had acquired during his anger management days. "Of course not. They didn't target civilians, only their friends, empty buildings and people who got in their way. Why waste energy on further atrocities when you've already thrown everyone important to you under the bus?"

Guardnia thought about this, mildly intrigued. It really didn't make much of a point for the rebel Gold Saints to target the powerless. It wasn't like they were fighting real Black Saints. They still destroyed a lot of streets in the fighting, though.

Daniel took a rock on the ground to his hand. "If I wanted… I could have smashed them to smithereens the moment your teacher punched the Pope." he claimed, crushing the rock promptly. His aura glowed faintly for a brief second. "I wonder how many lives I could have saved if I acted sooner?"

Guardnia thought about how clear it was that Saint Taurus was holding back a lot of anger. The young Bronze complained his teacher betrayed him, and yet here stood a man with much greater burden who saw half his friends do the same to him but still had the strength to seem calm and do his duty. It was humbling to see the giant stay quiet, humiliating even. Guardnia never felt so much like a brat.

"There was no way you could have known, Saint Taurus."

"Exactly, young Bronze… Guardnia is it? I'm sorry, but your name is rather strange. I get it mixed up."

"It's fine, Lord Taurus." It wasn't the first time a person was upfront about the strangeness of his name. Many people just called him 'Guard' for short, so the Bronze wasn't insulted at all.

"Eh… you're really just a normal kid, aren't you? You had no idea this would happen." Taurus remarked "Well, like I was saying, I suppose the whole point of what went on was that no one would see it coming. You wouldn't go around telling kids you're gonna punch the Pope. I bet a lot of people don't think the same, though, judging by the bruises you already had when I met you."

Something irked involuntarily in Guardnia's lip.

"Tell me, Guardnia, why are you so angry at your teacher?" asked Taurus. Upon being seeing the look of surprise on the kid's face, Daniel elaborated. "I just want to hear your personal reasons, something I haven't heard a thousand times already."

"Well,.. he was my teacher, he betrayed Sanctuary."

"Yes, he betrayed all of us." Daniel said, as if unsatisfied by this.

"He hurt so many people." the youth argued, but Daniel almost laughed at this. "I mean, he hurt innocent people, sir! People he swore to protect!"

Once again, the Taurus Saint seemed unsatisfied, folding his arms and brooding at the sight of reparations. "It's not the first time someone has attacked Sanctuary from the inside, certainly won't be the last."

"Lord Daniel, why are you asking me this? Did I do something wrong?"

Daniel raised a brow. "Ah, some Taurus you turned out to be. Are you the kind that constantly blames himself at the slightest sign of disapproval from others? Nah, you didn't do anything wrong." Taurus looked up at the stars, trying to imagine how many months this war would last. "In fact, I think it will be some time before anyone knows for sure what's wrong or right. I just sometimes like to think about what's going on my enemy's head. Don't you?"

Guardnia sat back down somberly. His body couldn't take the effort anymore and even his head felt dizzy. "If I did, would I have been able to foresee what my teacher did? And even if I did foresee it, what good would it do to me to humanize someone so despicable? I don't want to relate to Priam in any way anymore!" he confessed.

"It's fair. Sanctuary doesn't actually encourage empathy for its enemies."

Guardnia never agreed more with Sanctuary's methods. "Lord Daniel, do you think we'll defeat these bastards? Do you think… my friends will die?"

For the first time since they met, Saint Taurus' expression softened. "I can't really answer that second question. I do know we will win, for sure."

The youth blinked. He didn't expect such a straightforward confirmation. "Why are you so sure? Aren't there Gold Saints on their side too?"

Taurus chuckled, but with a sudden deep choke in his voice that sounded almost tragic, as they were talking about fighting and killing his old friends. "We have more Gold Saints, more bases, more men, more money…" he then casually glanced over his shoulder at the Gemini Temple "... and, as much as I disagree with him, we got the best leader in the war, by far. Only thing they really got on their side is determination. It's really only a question of how much that will make them last…"

Guardnia's face brightened up. "So… you mean it's alright, right? None of my friends have to die! We can win this easily!"

Taurus's face paled and turned to him. "Easily? There isn't anything easy about this war, young Guardnia. There isn't anything easy about any war. Just a week ago, these men were our friends, our brothers in arms, people that guaranteed us we would not have to worry about manpower shortage for the Holy War twenty years from now. You do not yet understand what's going on if you think victory alone can give us peace." Taurus shook his head. "Oh no, young Guardnia, the consequences of this war will be bloody and will echo beyond its end, mark my words."

Shaken by the mood shift in the aging bull, Guardnia took a second to absorb his words. After learning of the Taurus Saint's identity, Guardnia came to know he was the oldest member of his current generation and had been present in conflicts dating back to World War II. The knowledge of this, combined with the sight of the gigantic splendor of the man's armor, size and faint scars gave an invisible weight to his prophecy Guardnia had never seen even in Priam. If this man, of all the warriors Guardnia had met, seemed so worried about this rebellion then something truly frightening was going on that no one was fully aware of.

And thus it was then, after three days of fighting, that Guardnia remembered to ask the most important of the forgotten questions. "Lord Daniel… why did my teacher attack the Pope? Why did so many Gold Saints take his side? What… what in Athena's name just happened to us?"

Daniel raised his chin with a satisfied smile, at last seeing a Guardnia that was calmly processing what was going on. Maybe if he could just guide this young boy properly something good would come out of the rebels' mess.

"I don't know. Everything seemed fine just a while ago. I wish I knew the answer to this puzzle but I have a feeling that only a certain masked old man really knows the whys." He patted Guardnia's shoulder and walked away. "Maybe if you can figure them out you won't be such an inept student of the Taurus House… and maybe you'll really make a better teacher than Priam."

"Wait, Lord Taurus-"

Daniel picked an apple from his garden and tossed it over his shoulder to the starving kid. "Go rest, Guard'. I need your strength up for tomorrow's training. I'll probably be called to combat soon so we can't skip days. Just like my good doctors say, an apple a day keeps the stretcher away."

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Present

Golden Zodiac, Pope's Chambers
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The lights of the candles in the corridors of his temple felt dim and blurred as they flashed past him. The Pope was carried away on his side in a stretcher by a screaming Aiolos and a multitude of Papal Guards trying to take control of the situation. His hand was pressed against a bloody part of his chest, the white fabric of his robe was a mess of dark red shades, his entire head let out beads of cold sweat and his throat cried out inside the black Pope mask harshly, trying to breathe in air.

The Pope still felt the hotness of the arrow that charred through his flesh and lung, a hit meant to kill. Aiolos had pressed the Pope's hand against it along with a piece of cloth to contain the blood loss and the movement of air so the organ would not collapse into something the Sagittarius called a pneumo-hemothorax reaction. Had it not been for his Crystal Wall it was likely the shot would have hit his heart instead. He would admire the speed of the precise aiming the assassin took in those fatal fractions of seconds if he wasn't fighting for his life. Shion fought to stay conscious, free hand firmly grasping Aiolos' fist for comfort. He tightened it suddenly when the pain returned with a vengeance, twisting his face into a scream that chilled everyone.

"Don't worry, your Holiness! We'll get you help, I'll save your life myself if I have to!" He turned to a guard. "Call the other Gold Saints right now! Tell them the Pope was attacked!"

"N-no…!"

Everyone turned to the Pope and Aiolos widened his eyes. "W-what? Your H-Holiness we have to let the Sanctuary know-"

Pope Arles, however, shook his head with many trembles. "They… they must not know." Shion gasped between pained breaths. "Akassius must not know… that….they're alive! AGHHH!"

Aiolos and the Papal Guards stopped what they were doing. As a young hospital volunteer, Aiolos was used to emergencies, so he kept his cool, but he would be lying if the circumstances didn't bewilder him.

"You guys, I need a syringe to decompress the chest. Return to my House and look in my metal cabinet on the main area on the second shelf. There is a metal case full of them. I need the large one with the red band! Go quickly!" Aiolos asked one of the Guards, who blitzed away as fast as he could under Sanctuary's protections to find a first aid kit. Aiolos focused back on Shion and pressed the fabric on the lung hole by himself to relieve the Pope's effort. "Shion… how can you say that? The adults have to know."

"Do NOT…. disobey me!" Shion demanded, struggling to speak. "Their ceremony must go… unhinged….*cough* they cannot know! Akassius must… not know! Patch me up, Aiolos… and call the Cancer Saint here immediately! *cough*"

The Sagittarius Saint's jaw dropped for a split second. What on earth was his Holiness saying? Sounding like something between absolutely terrified and uncontrollably angry, the aged man could probably just be in shock, so Aiolos tried to keep a reasonable argument.

"Saga is on his way back here already with Cancer and Andromeda." he confirmed. "Your Holiness… this is too serious. Someone attacked you in the heart of your domain! The Cepheus Saint was taken right in front of our eyes!" he tried to stress. "I don't understand how you're just brushing this off. We have to find these people and rescue Saint Guardnia and the adults-"

"I said NO!" Shion roared, paralyzing Aiolos into a wide-eyed gasp. "G-get Lance here now! C-close my wound! And g-get me to the Coliseum! I'll deliver the laurels… to my Gold Saints… I will not be disobeyed!"

A moment of tense silence fell down on all of them, Aiolos in particular. He failed to recognize this person he was tending to, looking at the shaking old man with dazzled brown eyes of a youth who's never been yelled at by a parent. So tense was this moment he nearly jumped when the doors were heard opening and a group of people was escorted inside by the Papal Guards.

This committee was a startling sight, being composed of a small group of men in hooded 'chubas', a set of long sheepskin coats typical of Tibetan people and similar to Mu's everyday attires. It was led most surprisingly by a woman with red Lemurian dots above her brows, of stern look on wrinkled face and smooth greyed hair tied into a single long tail reaching down her waist by a pin shaped like a crane's beak. Her chuba differed from her group for being less conservative in the arms, limiting itself to sleeves so as to expose the jeweled bracelets on her forearms, and a sash at the waist by what seemed to be a very aged red scarf.

Shion lifted his head at the woman's approach. "Y-yuzuriha… you're here."

"Move out of the way, child."

"Whoa, wait a minute-" Aiolos tried to protest, but the woman suddenly brushed her hand as she walked past him, making the Sagittarius step away with a strange force even though Aiolos could swear she didn't actually touch him or burned her cosmos.

Her experienced visage showed only the slight sign of wariness at Shion's state. "Your student, Mu, allowed me inside the temples earlier. I was calmly making my way up the temples and was on the Pisces steps when I saw a lightning bolt strike the same place twice... but I had no idea that… What happened here, Shion?"

The Pope Arles turned to his Papal Guard captain, who returned with the supplies for Aiolos, for a bit. "Maximus, order an immediate shutdown of the temple until Cancer gets here. I will have the head of anyone, who lets out what transpired in my room without my consent, on a plate!"

Captain Maximus banged his chest plate with fist. "Of course, your Holiness."

"Now leave us be." he signaled before holding Aiolos' hand. "You can stay, Sagittarius, you've already seen too much."

Yuzuriha also spared her committee a glance. "You head down as well. I want to speak with His Holiness."

The three of them waited till the room slowly vacated itself, leaving them to their discretion. Aiolos still sweated like a bullet, not understanding a single bit of what was going on and feeling intimidated by the occasional stares of this newly arrived lady. Did she know the Pope personally?

As soon as the doors closed and all signs of eavesdroppers were clear, Yuzuriha knelt down by the Pope and asked. "What happened here, Shion? I saw this young man rushing past me and I find you like this?"

"It's him, Yuzuriha. He survived. A-all these years we thought he w-was gone and he's been hiding… plotting the w-whole time, c-curse him *cough*!"

The woman widened her eyes, putting two and two together. "You don't mean…?"

"Y-yes…. Akassius failed! Priam is alive and so must be his goons!"

Patient as he was, Aiolos was sick of the mystery. "I'm sorry, but I have to know; who was that man? Why was he using techniques from my House?! What is going on? Why did someone try to kill you, your Holiness, and kidnap the Cepheus Saint? How did he even get up there on your throne room?!" he demanded to know, though some hints from his own temple's books about techniques of the Sagittarius House already told a dark tale about the possible answers.

Yuzuriha was stunned, her aged face losing a bit of color and her eyes looking away somberly. "After all these years of silence… and now he makes such a big splash return." The Lemurian woman stood back, fingers on her forehead dots. "Shion... this is grave. I can keep our Colonies at peace through our Council, but... if the other six find out about this… Thorkell might hold his God Warriors' hands, but I doubt Cetus or Aezrel would hesitate to take up the sword! It could mean a rebirth of the Civil War on an even greater scale."

The mention of all these strange names threw Aiolos into an even bigger loop, but he did his best to focus on the task at hand, making sure the equipment was in working order before exposing the Pope's chest to it.

Shion winced as Aiolos pierced his lung with the needle, letting out the air through a tube to a spare drainage box, but felt enough balsam at the warmth of the Sagittarius golden cosmos to speak further. "They w-won't find out… but my Cepheus Saint has been taken. He has very sensitive information. I need him retrieved immediately before they can torture it out of him." He then turned to his young medic. "I'm sorry, Aiolos, but I can't answer any of your questions …. not yet at least."

Yuzuriha turned away, hand characteristically on waist. "What a mess. I get the feeling things are worse than what you're telling me, though, because I can sense your student's cosmos heading up the stairs, Shion." she looked him straight in the mask's eyes. "What has happened to your temples defenses? I thought the 6th and 7th senses were suppressed in this place."

"I don't have time to e-explain. Aiolos please don't let Mu see me like this," the Pope begged. "Help me get back on my feet and play my role! P-Please! Peace in Sanctuary is at stake…"

The young boy took hands to his hair, overwhelmed by the mind-boggling demand. His eyes closed down and his head lowered.

"I… yes, of course, your Holiness, as you wish."

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Two Hours Later,
Andromeda Island

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Far away from Sanctuary, in a damp secluded room that was illuminated only by a lamp above his blonde head, Cepheus Guardnia bobbed his head in pain as he regained his senses. The pain from the head butt that knocked him out still seared above his eyebrow. He wasn't sure because of his dazed state but something told him that blood was searing from it. He groaned angrily because the room wouldn't stop spinning on his head. What happened?

His blue eyes darted at his bound legs when he realized he felt his entire body chained to a chair by his own Cloth's links. His wrists wrestled around but a stardust padlock seemed to be holding him in and draining his cosmos. It was just as Guardnia felt the adrenaline of fear rushing to his head that the memories of what happened at the Pope's temple returned!

The Pope, his prophecies, Cynthia calling him, the cosmos burning far away behind the Pope, the sudden lightning bolt and…

...and Priam!

"Priam... THAT BASTARD!" Guardnia roared and rocked his chair "WHERE ARE YOU?! YOU TREACHEROUS, DISHONORABLE, TWO-FACED COWARD! FACE ME-AGHH!" the searing pain in his head caused the chair rocking to tip over all the way to the side in a suddenly flurry of rage at the memory of the man appearing before him, causing him to fall over to the side on his arm painfully and putting him in an even more difficult situation. He tried desperately to calm himself down but his repressed youth side screamed out in pain and wrath, filling the room with a shout of demand for revenge as memories of the war tortured his mind back into action. "You won't get away with this! YOU HEAR ME?! Sanctuary knows I'm gone and they WILL track you people down!"

The room however did not answer, of course, so the Cepheus Saint was forced to calm down, breathe slower and assess his situation. He was chained to a chair, had fallen to the side like a goddamn idiot and had been stripped of his Cepheus Cloth asides from the gauntlets his chains originated from.

This was bad, especially if his former teacher was walking around nearby."Darn it! I can't lose my head like this; I have to find a way out of here. Where even am I?"

Where was he, indeed? He had to find that out before he could make a move, and had to make said move as soon as possible! The Pope was injured back in Sanctuary and for all he knew the entire town was under attack by the rebels! A war could be breaking out as he laid there! His eyes moved up and down, left and right, trying to analyze the room for a way out and hints to his own location. There had to be one of the two.

It was then that he noticed the familiar volcanic heat below the dismountable plates the floor was composed of. The simple electric apparel of the lamp, the standard, lame design of the chair and the door, the simple patterns of the stardust veins in the walls blocking his 7th sense and the lack of decoration hinted him that he was in some sort of movable base. What really made his face go pale was the fact that he recognized the rumbling below the ground and the hot dampness of the air blown in from below the door, as well as the leftover black sand by the entrance from people stepping back and forth, things he had been exposed to for so long he'd recognize them in an instant.

"The bastards, we're somewhere in Andromeda Island!" he concluded. "They've been hiding out and spying on me in my own home for goddess knows how long, maybe months or years!" His face went pale, especially at the thought he had the entire island under check from his regular patrols and base knowledge of it, but Priam had somehow eluded the new Master and hid right beneath his nose, just waiting for his opportunity. "Damn him! I should have cut off his forsaken head when I had the chance for it!"

The Cepheus Saint wrestled against his bounds again on the floor, trying to find some weak point in the chains around his wrists with his fingers, something he could use to untie himself. The stardust was sapping his cosmos so it wasn't like he could break out with force. As he tried to do this, however, steps were heard outside, probably belonging to someone who heard his earlier screaming. Sweat beads filled his head as he realized he still didn't know what Priam intended to do with his hostage and that Cepheus could very well be killed if he refused whatever offer the traitor intended to give him.

But that fear subsided when a sensation of how momentous the occasion that approached was; Guardnia was about to see his first Master again for the first time since the War thirteen years ago, at least without a hood covering it. The man he hated the most in the whole world was about to confront him, so a combination of billowing hatred and readiness to jump the gun drowned the previous nervousness, replacing it with a set of narrowed eyes at the door. They saw the shadow of feet below it and heard a hand unlocking the room's only getaway. Guardnia growled and prepared himself to bite the man to death if he had to!

The man walked in.

He was not Priam.

Guardnia's face was agape..

The man wasn't even part of the rebellion!

"OY, what's the big idea?!" The man folded arms and snickered. "Hm, hm, hm, hm, hm, hm…. GYAH, HA, HA, HA, HA, HA!" he obnoxiously laughed out loud, staring amusedly at Guardnia's stupid looking figure on the ground. "Well, well, well, what went wrong, Houdini? Forgot the escape trick key? Look at yourself, you're pathetic!"

"You… you are-"

A sudden kick then exploded on Guardnia's floored face, taking a muffled scream out of the Saint and nearly shattered his nose. Blood gushed out to the floor and the world span around the Silver Saint's head before a hand grabbed him by the blonde hair tightly to lift his face up.

The thug, once upon a time known as none other than Scorpio Paris, gave him a psychotic stare right in the eyes.

"Well get your shit together, Cepheus! You got a long day ahead of ya and getting caught trying to run away is the least of your problems! Ugh, I need a cigarette!" Paris complained, scratching his bearded neck and purposely stepping on Cepheus hand upon noticing the stare. "The hell you lookin' at? Ya think I look interesting or something?!"

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Chapter 24

First Arc

Episode 15

The Goodbye – Part 3 of 4

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Standing at five feet nine inches and boasting wavy-brown hair smudged with the remains of blue dye and tied into a long ponytail, Paris was known for his brutally sloppy appearance. It was trademarked by a pasty tanned skin, a set of blue, slightly bloodshot eyes, one of the shadiest five-o'clock shadows Guardnia had ever seen on a Saint on one of the most rectangular jaws he had ever seen on a person. Along with a shit-eating grin combined with face smudges, a pair of dense, pointy-ended eyebrows and a sickening stink of booze coming out of his breath every time he talked that could be smelled half a mile away, Paris was the living example of a creep.

To the top this all off was the aberrant attire he wore, consisting of a colorful Hawaiian shirt that revealed the slim, heavily haired, tattooed muscular arms ending in black leather gloves that would make a biker gang proud, a set of baggy pants topping a pair of brown, round shoes around purple socks with yellow skulls woven on them, a leather belt with a golden, scorpion-engraved insignia for a lock and, finally, a cape with ornamented shouldering dressed around his neck that made him look like someone who either gave no shit about looks or was desperately trying to look cool.

But the completely unbalanced clothes were not the most despicable pinnacle of the man known as Paris; his obnoxious, obscenely rude and upfront attitude, even around respectful people like the Pope, was known Sanctuary-wide back in the day and it was often joked the Scorpio Saint spent more hours putting himself in jail through drunken stupors than Sanctuary enemies and ruffians. His Holiness often had to beg him to stay away from ceremonies and meetings, or so Saint Daniel once told Guardnia, and his ties to the aristocratic family that often passed the Scorpio Cloth's tests was probably the only reason he got and kept the job despite years and years of being reprehended by his fellow Gold Saints.

Strangest of all, however, was the fact that Scorpio Paris had not been part of the rebellion. Instead the man had fought the Black Saints on Akassius' side, and, after the war, stuck by Sanctuary till at least 1968 when he one day decided to, quote on quote, 'fuck it, dump the stupid armor at his House, announce his retirement and never come back to that land of prudes, naggers and fluffies ever again'. The man had all but vanished after that, with not even his immediate family knowing of his whereabouts, and there were rumors his only nephew was the current Scorpio Saint candidate.

All of this contributed to Guardnia's shock at seeing him there of all places, part of the ambush that attempted to assassinate the Pope. His head rushed a thousand miles per hour, trying to make sense of the unpleasant man's presence, but all his instincts narrowed his eyes and gritted his teeth at the conclusion that Paris had drunk the bleach and joined Priam's blasted crusade.

The retired Scorpio must have deduced this conclusion by the look on the young adult's face and he gave out the most pronounced frown of disgust most people had ever seen, showing off gritted yellow teeth in an insulted expression of disdain.

"Hey, hey, HEY! Don't you look at me like that. I'm not part of Priam's stupid operations; that little justice warrior and his helping hand shits wanted my muscle and I was bored and out of beer cash! If you go around saying I've gone soft I'll stomp your peppy nose for good, ya hear me?"

Guardnia rustled against his bindings. "T-then what in G-goddess's name are you doing here, then? Where is he?! What the hell do you people think you're doing?!"

Paris knelt down with an excited grin, letting his index finger dangle over the Silver Saint's face.

"Gyeh, eh, eh, eh, Priam wanted to make a comeback! And he picked the date of our old compadres' going-away-day to scare the shit out of the Pope, maybe even whack him for good measure. I thought it was a ballsy plan for a change, and not the worst thing he's asked me to do, so I accepted the pay."

"W-what?! And what do I got to do with all that?"

"Eh! Excellent question, I asked that myself; I have no idea what he wants bringing home a useless scout boy, but I guess he has a soft heart for his former student and wants him out of harm's way for what's to come." Paris noticed the searing hate in Guardnia's face at the mention of this last little fact and raised a brow. "Get any ideas, little Silver, and I'll pick your eyes out with a spoon."

It was as he laid there feeling his life in danger, eyes widening at the man's face, that Guardnia noticed something in Paris he did not recall from the time the Silver Saint saw his unmasking at the retirement ceremony eight years earlier. A large, deep, set of three parallel scars had carved down his face over his left eye to his cheek. It looked absolutely nasty, like something out of Aguilon's collection book of battle disfigurations, and it seemed to have been obviously caused by a wild animal attack. Guardnia, however, had barely ever heard of any creature capable of leaving such a wound on a Gold Saint, especially one tempered by the notorious Civil War. What kind of monster had assaulted him?

The door opened loudly once again and a pair of people walked in. "Paris, what are you doing? Lay off of him!" a young female voice demanded, before the owner pushed the man away from the captive. "The situation is tense enough as it is, don't make it harder for Priam by beating up his student." her green eyes turned to the Silver and the young woman lifted his chaired body upright. "I'm so sorry, Cepheus Saint. Don't worry, we don't want to hurt you, but you have to listen to us."

This person Guardnia did not recognize. Appearing to be not much younger than himself, but still older than Shinta and Lance, the blonde, shoulder-length haired fighter of green eyes and fair complexion looked quite northern European in appearance, had an elegant but muscled frame akin to that of Amazons like Cynthia and a cross-shaped scar on her left cheek as well as a myriad of much smaller and unnoticeable ones on the exposed skin in her arms and neck made by what the Silver Saint easily identified as sword slash wounds.

The rest of her body was covered by a set of armor that he did not recognize at all! The glint was greyish metallic in color, pointy triangular pads rested on the top of her shoulders, waves of metal folded from her back beneath her arms into a reinforced triangular chest plate, a waist line segment with a front insignia of a winged sword pointing downwards, two additional triangular pads protecting the side of her legs and a silky white gown beneath it all with a skirt with black, gold-patterned outlines and split front raining down to her ankles, where a set of metallic greaves protected her feet all the way to the knees.

The forearm guards of pointy elbow protrusions ended in gauntlets of reinforced knuckle pads. She did not wear a helmet or headpiece of any sort, but the armor plates were all carved with ornaments in patterns he had never seen before but looked almost runic in appearance, hinting at a Celtic heritage. He would have probably confused the young woman with an Asgardian warrior were it not for the slightly knightly appearance of her protection. It looked like something a castle warrior would wear if he had to fight lightly, with a touch of feminine style and in a scenario of cosmos warfare.

It jarred him slightly as most of the people he had interacted with this light armor were the amazons like Cynthia, who always had their faces covered with mask.

She looked him straight in the eyes, serious as death. "I bet you're very confused and these aren't the most… respectful of circumstances, so I beg your forgiveness, but unfortunately we have to be expedient with you, Silver Saint. Sanctuary is already looking for you. My name is Daese." she introduced herself, touching her chest plate with her fist side and slightly bowing her head, as if in a military gesture. "You don't know me, but I am a friend of Priam."

"So h-he is here." Guardnia concluded. His head lowered in defeat, feeling completely surrounded but having no interest in cooperating. "Tell him I don't want to talk. If he wants to do me any favors, then he can surrender to Sanctuary right now before they come k-knocking on the door!"

Daese shook her head. She had already expected these difficulties from the Cepheus Saint. "I'm afraid that's not an option for us, Guardnia. It may not be the fairest thing to ask, but I urge you to be reasonable. Maintaining peaceful negotiations are not exactly the top priority right now."

"Look, little paladin bitch," Paris rudely interfered, folding arms and lowering his voice threateningly "I don't care how much of an 'endangered species' you are or how much in Priam's good graces you've placed yourself into since we met in that mountain; touch me one more time like that and I'll cut your fucking head off with my fingernail!"

Daese completely ignored the retired Scorpio but upon seeing the blood on Guardnia's nose from Paris kick she frowned frustratingly. "Priam's not going to like this, but I warned him about Paris." she thought to herself before wiping the Silver Saint's face with a handkerchief. "I'm sorry, but unfortunately we cannot unbind you until Priam gets here. Please stop struggling and shouting, you'll only get Paris to punch you harder if you don't cooperate."

It was as his blood was cleaned off that Guardnia looked down and noticed something truly bizarre; a sword hilt, consisting just of that from the pommel to the cross guard without any metal blade at all to attack with, was strapped with a cord to her metal belt line. What kind of weird weapon was this that just dangled harmlessly on this woman's side? It was inscribed with the same symbol as her waist protection, implying the two objects were part of the same set.

It was time for clarifications. "Who are you? You're not wearing any Cloth I recognize. How do I know that traitor hasn't associated himself to some Specter in disguise, or worse?!"

Daese blinked in hesitation at the prospect of answering this. "I told you, I'm Paladin Daese." she merely repeated. "But if it makes you feel any better, the people I come from haven't been a threat to Sanctuary in almost a decade."

Paris chuckled. "He, he, yeah, extermination and all, it does that to you."

Faced with this haunting description, a pretty clear idea of who this person really was actually came to Guardnia's head, but more important questions assailed him more and more. Since he was obviously talking to the 'good cop', Guardnia managed to relax his breathing and open up.

"I already asked what you want from me. Bring me Priam or explanations and I will cooperate." he demanded, realizing he was outnumbered and outmatched. There was absolutely no way he could fight through at least two Civil War Gold-ranks plus this girl with strange armor and a suspiciously hidden weapon. He either played along and got some answers or risked an unproductive beating.

She chuckled happily. "Ah, ah, see? That wasn't so bad, was it?" she looked over her shoulder guard and stepped aside. "Priam, he's ready."

Guardnia's heart beat sped up a bit as he saw a hooded man approach the scene, walking between Daese and Paris. Almost as if in slow motion, his scarred hands grabbed and pulled back his hood, letting out a head with the wavy dark brown hair, the set of plastic goggles around the neck and the pair of blue eyes in tanned face the Master of Andromeda Island forever associate his mind to the man who taught him how to feel cosmos.

The same man who told him of values of honor and caring for loved ones.

The same man who attacked the Pope and waged years of war against Sanctuary.

The same man that the whole of Sanctuary, and Guardnia in particular, blamed for every drop of blood that had been spilled in what had been the darkest moment in their nation's recent history. And this man was scarred, as the burn marks covered most of the left side of his face and a portion of its bottom right like a violent, stomach-turning map.

Guardnia's heart sank, split between sorrow and hate, not knowing if the Pope was even still alive after what the man in front of him had just done. Already picturing what siren song, what false freedom Priam would offer him, his own face was a mix of emotions hammered by reeling sensation of sitting before the man he hated the most in the world. Guardnia braced himself for the first conversation with his Master since the day Cyrus died.

It was a situation of such momentous tension that Guardnia wondered if it really was Priam standing before him behind all those scars and not just a ghost trying to cloak himself in his fame.

"Uh... Hi, Guard'. Long time no see, right?" Priam anti-climatically and awkwardly said, self-consciously scratching his own head. "Well we just saw each other at the Pope's place so… Well, it doesn't matter; I bet you got a ton of questions… I don't blame you. How's Cynthia, Kass and Nam doing?... umm, yeah, I guess you don't want to talk about that, either." he admitted, putting hands in waist. "Oh boy, this is… not how I practiced my hello."

Paris shrugged his creepy face. "You're a fucking screw-up, Priam, you know that?"

Guardnia closed eyes, sighing. Yeah, this was Priam, alright.

{======================|0|======================}

Meanwhile,

Sanctuary, Golden Zodiac, Gemini Temple

{======================|0|======================}

Aiolos stood by Yuzuriha as her telekinetically charged mind discreetly held the Pope up, and the youth tried to look imposing in front of Saga, Shinta, Lance and Mu without giving out the fact he just witnessed an infiltration, an assassination attempt and a kidnapping before having to patch a hole in the lung of the most powerful man on Earth. The situation was difficult, with the Andromeda and Aries Saint fiddling their eyes all over the place in fear of what might have happened while Saga and Lance made sure to let be known through their squints and lowered chins that they definitely knew something had happened.

But nothing happened, at least according to Shion, nothing at all.

"Your Holiness, I have reason to believe someone may be plotting an infiltration." Saga started, sharing occasional glances with Lance, both feeling the atmosphere of secrecy in the two old Lemurians. "I've been diverted away from my Temple on false pretenses and I was able to temporarily communicate with Aiolos using the 6th sense while he stood in his temple. You were on your own in your Halls and-"

"O-on my own?" asked Shion, who, upon noticing his own stutter, cleared his throat "Dear Saga, I am not unguarded. I am followed around by squads of loyal, brave guards, you have no reason to be concerned. I appreciate it, but you really didn't have to rush back to the Houses. There must have been a fleeting communication barrier flaw that let your message through, or maybe your Gemini powers have grown too much for everyone's good, ha, ha, ha."

Saga grunted discreetly and traded looks with the Sagittarius and Cancer Saints. He knew enough about Sanctuary's security to be absolutely sure that 'fuckery', as Lance would put it, was going on and knew Aiolos for long enough to tell when his rival was trying keep his own tongue tied. Mu, who knew his master better than anyone, was visibly on edge, unable to put his finger on what was different about his Master's tone and posture.

"He's lying!" Lance short-range messaged.

"Yeah, I can tell, and Aiolos is in on it." Saga added. "Something is on his mind, I wonder what it is?"

"He's lying straight to our faces, that's what it is! What the hell happened up there with those lightning bolts?"

"I'll handle this, Lance, don't blow a fuse or anything." Saga affirmed, stepping forward to lead the gang. "Your Holiness, I must insist on calling some of the Gold Saints back to their temples for safety reasons. Also, you did send for us, did you not? The guards were requesting Saint Pegasus' presence."

"Yes, I have, but n-not because of…" The Pope touched his own chest and coughed "...an infiltration, as you put it?"

"Your Holiness, I'm sorry to intrude, but-" Shinta apologized, getting on his knee. He would ordinarily not dare to intrude between two important people talking, but this doubt haunted him. "I must ask; where is Saint Cepheus? He told me he'd be meeting you but you just came down and… your Holiness?"

The reason Shinta stopped talking was because of the strange, brief tensing all four of them saw on the Pope. Mu widened his eyes. "Mast-… Your Holiness, are you alright?"

"D-did I say something wrong?" stuttered Shinta.

"Saint Guardnia has left the premises two hours ago." Shion said.

Mu blinked. "Wha… but Your Holiness, I was climbing the stairs and… I've been at the temples since he went up and I didn't see him-"

"You must have missed him, Saint Mu. The stairs are wide, the temples are big and you were in a rush. Saint Shaka confirmed to me he has left. Saint Andromeda, please accompany Saint Mu to the entrance of the Golden Zodiac, I'll be leaving to head the ceremonial procedures soon. Saint Pegasus and Saint Gemini, please join me in the Temple's inner rooms, I have a task for you two."

All the young ones looked at each other for a moment in worried, suspicious expressions, but everyone obeyed eventually and made their respective ways through the House.

"Don't worry, I'll ask him about Guardnia." Lance assured Shinta through the 6th sense.

"Thank you, Lance." Andromeda nodded.

{======================|0|======================}

Followed by his Saints and the Lemurian woman up to the rooftops of the Third House, Pope Arles looked out the balcony of Saga's temple to the city, imagining what sorts of hidden horrors Priam had seeded in Sanctuary Town over the years. Only Yuzuriha's presence calmed him, as she was one of the few living memories of the Lost Canvas War and his sibling disciple of the deceased Master Hakurei. This was something that gave him strength and stability to now address his two Gold Saints with a much needed task.

"S-Saint Lance, I trust that the Cancer Gold Cloth is still resting in your House?"

Lance nodded. "Yes, your Holiness."

"Good, I need it to stay there. I have a mission for you that you must carry out without it. I didn't want to bring this up in front of Andromeda, b-but Saint Cepheus has been kidnapped."

While this was shocking by itself, Saga and Lance both looked at each other with resigned, darkened expressions; their suspicions that the Pope was hiding something further were not quenched.

"Can I ask what in God's name is going on?" Lance requested.

"The system that sustains the Golden Zodiac's defenses has been breached, and a man has successfully attacked, captured and taken Saint Cepheus while he was still inside the complex." Saga concluded, drawing from his theories about how the Pope maintained such powerful defenses. "I've been wondering for a while, but we've never had more than six Gold Cloths away from the Temples at any given time, have we? They are the pillars to the Temples' blessings, are they not?"

"I will neither confirm nor deny any of that, you will simply follow my instructions, Gold Saints." the Pope sternly affirmed, making an effort to not let his wound weaken his order.

Yuzuriha spared him a side glance. "You know that kind of talk in these extraordinary circumstances will just draw their ire further, Shion. These two youths already know you're lying to them. Do the right thing before it's too late."

"Yuzuriha, I cannot-"

"Shion, remember what the War taught us." she pleaded with him. "Lie to them now, and Priam will have their heads spun by the end of the day."

Pope Arles took his friend's words to heart. "A group of dangerous Black Saints has managed to indeed infiltrate the Temples temporarily, but that is the end of it. You two will… have a two-phased task; reorganize our defenses to prevent further a-attacks and carry out an operation to rescue the Cepheus Saint." Shion took a pause to catch his breath "If the Silver Cloth he possesses and the secrets I and the Island of Andromeda entrust him with are stolen, Sanctuary will be directly put in danger."

Lance raised a brow. "I know we can't just let them take Shinta's teacher, but why is he so important?"

"Every Saint is important to Athena." Arles misled. "And Guardnia has added importance due to his position."

"What his Holiness means is that Cepheus occupies a particular importance in the Silver Saint Order due to his ties to King Cetus of New Lallybelle," the Lemurian Elder woman elaborated. "Letting the Cloth that decides to whom the crown passes on be taken on the day the King is present in Sanctuary would be a diplomatic catastrophe. Greater war will spark if you young Gold Saints do not carry out this task. The Cepheus Cloth must not be lost to the Black Saints like so many other Silver Armors like Aquila."

Lance folded his arms reluctantly. "Alright, fine, I'll track these guys down. Not the first time I've dealt with Black Saints and not the first time I've rescued Guardnia either."

Yuzuriha stepped forward before Shion's exalted state could spout more careless words. "These are not ordinary Black Saints, Cancer. We have reason to believe they possess at least one very experienced Gold Rank with them that surpasses you. Engaging them frontally is not acceptable."

The Cancer Saint would be lying if he said he wasn't a bit offended by this. "I'm sorry, but who are you again?"

Her fists rested on the scarf-belted waist "I'm the elected head of the Lemurian Colonies, Elder Yuzuriha, or as I was once upon a time known, Crane Yuzuriha of the Silver Dance." she announced, raising her chin proudly and sternly. "By extension, I am also a member of the Seven Allies that support Sanctuary, along with King Cetus of New Lallybelle and King Thorkell of Asgard, and I will not have the interests of my league be jeopardized even if I disagree with the attitudes of some of our members."

Lance was taken aback and noticed for the first time in her eyes the same warrior glint he had seen in men like Dohko after transforming. He had no trouble believing her claim.

"Shion, are you sure this is wise? These two young boys-"

"They are my most trusted warriors, Yuzuriha. Lance is trained by Dohko and Saga has inherited Aspros' spirit. I can rely on no one else; Shaka would not give any importance to my strategy and Aiolos is needed here to continue treating me. Besides, there is something I want to test in this situation."

"Test? Shion, this is not the time for games, what are you planning?"

Arles folded his hands behind his back. "Priam is not the only one with cards up his sleeve. I want to know just how much he has peeked on my hand," he word-played, referring to Hecate's prophecies "No doubt by now he is interrogating poor Guardnia, and truth is, this whole operation could mean little if Priam flees with what I have entrusted Cepheus with. This is a test to how much information they have stolen already." He then addressed Lance. "Your mission will also be of reconnaissance. I w-want you to determine the size of their gang and how they engage you back, understood?"

These orders were typical when dealing with Black Saints, so Lance simply nodded, "Sure, no problem."

"We will support your assignment from Sanctuary by monitoring your movements." Yuzuriha added. "These enemies have the habit of capturing defeated foes alive and at least this way we can track you back to their base."

"How the heck are you gonna do that?!"

Yuzuriha smirked and touched her forehead Lemurian dots. "We'll use our heads. Try to stay out of jammed areas until you engage them."

{======================|0|======================}

The Cancer Saint, having made sure his Gold Cloth was back in its Temple, now huffed back and forth in his Bronze Saint disguise over the exceeding amount of bullshit he sensed all over the place.

"What the hell is really going on here?!" he asked out loud.

Saga folded arms, leaning back against wall, "a breach of security and a kidnapped Silver Saint during a major retirement ceremony day."

"I know what the Pope told us! I want to know what the hell he is hiding!"

"You know that walking around angrily is no way to find it out. Let's take a deep breath and come up with an attack plan-"

"Wait a minute!" Lance interrupted, now angrily walking towards Saga. "That whole 'armors maintaining defenses' shtick; is it true? Do we really have to keep at least six Cloths here?"

"In theory, yes. You saw the Pope would not confirm it."

"... Then where the hell did you go?"

Saga blinked, startled. "What?"

"You left your post with your armor, right? Where the hell did you run off to?! Who told you there was an attack?! And why didn't you leave your armor in your temple?! For all we know if that theory is true then you leaving your post might have caused this whole mess!"

Saga sweated bullets, having not even thought about this. "I… I had no idea Mu left his post too! It was after I left myself! And Aldebaran went to the Aries Temple too! There was a lot of misplacing! Besides, even now, the Pope will not confirm to us the theory is accurate. For all we know the rules are entirely different."

Lance calmed down, faced with the first semi-reasonable explanation of the day. "Okay, then who told you there were Black Saints in Sanctuary? Who even managed to make you think they were important enough to leave your post with your armor?"

Saga gulped imperceptibly.

{======================|0|======================}

"You saw me where?!"

"Lord Saga, I was just saying I just spoke with you near the market." the nervous Guard explained himself. "I was just surprised to see you back here so quickly."

Saga's eyes widened in horror. Who else has seen Kanon walking around the town by now? How did the vicious bastard get away from Saga's sight without the Gemini noticing it? Had someone helped him?

"Oh… I just light-sped my way back here and put on my armor for the festivities." Saga lied. "That reminds me though that I do need to go take care of business outside. Keep the guard up here while I'm gone."

"Yes, Lord Saga. Are you taking your armor, though?"

Saga touched his own chest. Against Kanon all precaution was not enough, it was best to keep the advantage over his equally powerful but deranged twin. "Yes, I'll be right back, though, just a loose end that may go haywire today."

{======================|0|======================}

"I… cannot tell you. It was an anonymous source." Saga lied again.

"Saga, I swear to God, if you're lying to me too -"

"I'm not, don't you dare doubt me!" Saga upheld, steeling his facial expression considerably. He feared nothing more than his secret being leaked out so there was plenty of motivation available for him to hide this.

"Ugh, fine, okay, I'm sorry I doubted you." Lance made the effort to accept this, knowing what it felt like not to be trusted by others to the point of everyone blaming everything on him. "Okay, so let's formulate a plan. We can't count on Aiolos because he is apparently busy somewhere up in the temples and we can't let what happened be spread to the Silver Saints. Shinta was asked back here too, but if he finds out Guardnia was kidnapped he'll flip… Fuck, what am I gonna tell him when he asks what the Pope said about Cepheus?"

"And Shaka can't be bothered to help out, as always." Saga commented.

"Hmm, do I detect a hint of ingratitude?" asked none other than Shaka, walking on the two of them without his armor and wearing a white Greek toga. "I apologize if it irritates you that my powers can't be turned from their proper service to Sanctuary to these assignments and missions, as you call them, but I was called for Sainthood for my role as the One Closest to God, not the service caller of the Golden Zodiac."

"Speak of the devil. 'Guessing you was on your way out to the Coliseum?"

"I'm required at the ceremony, yes. The Pope has just ordered me be present there to ensure a proper farewell to the veteran Gold Saints."

Lance folded arms. "Hey, Shaka, you were here the whole time, right? What the heck happened in the Golden Zodiac? Can't you do some of your karmic mumbo-jumbo stuff to help us out?"

Shaka was agape. "Rather crude way to put it, but putting that aside, it is a fascinating question, is it not? Two lightning bolts striking the same place twice for the second time in two decades and the Pope acts none the wiser. But, if he chose to tell you nothing more than what he has already, I really don't see the reason to enlighten you any further."

Lance grumbled. "Jesus Christ, just help us do our job! All we want is a goddamn hint."

The Virgo Saint touched his own chin in reflection. "I can tell you that the attack was perpetrated by a single person, who indeed took away Guardnia. Judging by the static fluctuations of his karma right before vanishing, the Cepheus Saint was completely unaware of the enemy's intentions. Wherever he is, it's likely he's on our side."

It crept out both Saga and Lance that the blonde child could blindly determine things like this with such little hesitation and difficulty.

"That's great, I guess, at least we won't have to worry about him being a hostile. Are there any other of these pricks walking around Sanctuary?"

Shaka held fist at waist as if insulted. "There are at least ten thousand people in Sanctuary Town as residents alone, not to mention another half of those numbers in visitors today, do you really think that I would be able to tell apart the sins of the entire collective of people in Sanctuary this instant? You must be joking."

"Well, fuck, I don't know how your powers work! Besides, we only got a few hours to find these guys and we lost two of them already on account of the Pope taking his sweet freaking time to come meet us! We can't afford to go around sniffing at random hideouts even with light speed!"

Shaka smirked. "Why do you not ask Aiolos? It was his temple's technique that got the infiltrator in and out."

Both of the Gold Saints widened their eyes. "Wait, what?!" asked Saga. "You mean whoever attacked has Sagittarius Saint techniques?"

"The Lightning Arrow, to be more precise, if the chronicles in my House are to be trusted. A difficult and demanding trick, from what I read, and not entirely useful, but one that allows you to warp yourself to a far off spot. Only a senior Sagittarius could execute one on this scale of distance, and it would be a rather redundant move in any other circumstances considering we move at light speed, so it's hard to believe someone took the time to master it." Shaka faced his closed eyes at the sky. "Notes also indicate it leaves an electrical trail behind, but it has vanished by now, not that you would be able to sense it without unlocking the element yourself."

"Well, that explains the lightning bolts."

"But it doesn't explain where they went!" complained Lance. "I can't track down something that warps itself! They could be anyw…. wait -" It was right then that the Pegasus Saint widened his red eyes in realization. "- where would be the best place to hide if distance wasn't an issue?"

Saga guessed what Lance was talking about. "Since everyone is searching as far out as they can, the best spot would be right under the enemy's nose. And if they kidnapped Guardnia right in front of the Pope then they've been watching both of them for a while, which means they're..."

"They're somewhere where they could observe either Guardnia or the Pope! While Sanctuary has many secrets, if I was kidnapping someone, I wouldn't want to stay in a place where there are just too many people who could sniff them out in a second. But what about a place that belongs to Sanctuary and is heavily isolated? I bet I can find clues in Andromeda Island, if not the culprits themselves!"

"You sure?"

Lance shrugged his shoulders. "Not really, but I gotta start looking somewhere and I've been on the Island before, so I kinda know the layout."

Saga nodded in accord. "Then I'll search other locations related to the Pope, for all we know there's something to be found at his Halls themselves. I'll also try to get something out of Aiolos of what happened." Saga looked around for something and pulled a set of long-range walkie-talkies from a nearby desk. "Here, since the defenses are back up and we don't know who's watching we'll keep each other in touch with these. Me and Aiolos used to communicate with them to talk without Mu or the Pope listening in, back in the day."

Shaka 'watched' Lance take his walkie and tune it into the frequency noted on the bottom. "Hm, is this what 'field work' looks like? Interesting, but it doesn't seem like there's need for so much secrecy. You two are sure you know what you're doing?"

"That lady, Yuzuriha, said she'd be keeping an eye on us for support." clarified Saga. "Something tells me she's trying to control us, instead, and I want my own answers to this mystery."

"Yeah, I'm not a big fan of her eavesdropping either." the Cancer Saint assured before turning to Saga "I don't mind her keeping track of our positions, but I'd rather not give that person any extra rope to hang us by should something go wrong. If she's keeping tabs where we are then she's watching our mental messages too, but I'd like to see her tune in to pure radio waves."

Shaka chuckled. "And yet you trust me? I'm flattered."

"Don't be, it's not like we can hide it from Mister I-know-when-you-sin, anyway." Lance clarified. He made sure his belongings were in place and walked out of the temple. "I'll be going, keep me posted, Saga." Lance then blitzed away with a sudden blur, heading off to Andromeda Island.

Saga waited until the Cancer Saint was out of immediate premises of Sanctuary before walking the opposite direction. "I'll be going too, Shaka. Anything you pick up on will be appreciated."

"Oh, I thought we were going to talk about what happened with you leaving your post." Shaka casually spoke out.

Saga froze in place, eyes widened. He then narrowed them fiercely, tightening his fist, and feeling sweat beads form in his temple. "I... don't recall asking any of that."

The Indian boy smirked. "You mean to say you didn't go to check on what your brother was doing just before the attack? I must be losing my touch."

The Gemini Saint cursed every god, Buddha statue and karma nut bag in India between breaths and turned over with a look of death in his eyes.

"You will remain quiet about this!" he threatened.

"Of course. What's the name of this little devil you're keeping in the dark?"

The Gemini Saint didn't appreciate letting the Virgo know more than he already did, but something told him Shaka would have his ways of finding it out anyway. "It's Kanon."

Shaka's mouth formed an o. "Like the island?" The intensification of Saga's stare was the only answer. "Oh, ah, ah, I see, you aren't interested in talking about your sins. I'll be going my way then."

And so the Gemini and Virgo Saints departed from the Third Temple, letting the invisible threat stand in the air.

{======================|0|======================}

Meanwhile,

Sanctuary Town, MMC

{======================|0|======================}

The Mission Management Center, where Sagitta Nam worked at and where Saints were given their assignments, was still a mess since the morning on account of most of the Saints going to goof off at the festivities. While Aguilon had kept his promises of whipping some back into work, Sagitta Nam was still barely keeping things flowing well, owing nothing to anything but his innate ability to focus on the tasks at hand and a good degree of military background to draw discipline from. Still, he was yet bewildered to find one of his oldest friends, Cassiopeia Cynthia now somewhat frantically asking him for information on what was going on at Sanctuary.

Orpheé stood back self-consciously, trying to not get dragged to a mess bigger than he could handle.

"I just want some decent answers."

"Cynthia, I told you, I haven't even left the building. We've only received orders to keep things tidy for the 88 Knights Festival." he repeated, though the masked Amazon seemed unsatisfied if her glancing away and tapping of foot were any signs of nervousness. "Do you mind telling me what's really going on?"

"I don't know myself, Nam, but Pegasus and Shinta were called back to the Zodiac over some emergency. I received a message from Saint Andromeda on the way here saying the Pope told him Guard' has left the Zodiac more than two hours ago, but I know that's not true!"

Nam raised a quizzical eyebrow. "And you're saying it's because you talked to him? Cynthia, not to sound mean, but you know that's impossible! The place is locked tighter than the Wailing Wall to Elysium! Heck, I wish I could talk to the Zodiac from here on the line and I work directly under them! I have to take their orders via courier. Look, I'll be out in a few hours and we'll go both look for him. I'm sure he's just laying back at the Coliseum with the Taurus Saint. He trained under him, right? He wouldn't miss the man's retirement party, no way."

The Cassiopeia Saint tried, indeed, to stay calm, but every sign screamed at her that a cover up was going on and Guardnia was in danger.

It was then that she remembered she was responsible for someone that day. "Sorry, Orphée, I got us both stuck here."

The youth shook his head. "It's alright, it seemed pretty clear that today wasn't going to be ordinary at all." he turned to Saint Sagitta. "Can't we contact Pegasus? He's not answering our messages, but maybe he knows something."

The Sagitta Silver Saint, however, would almost roll eyes at this. "I wouldn't call that exactly suspicious, considering the operative's history."

All of a sudden none other than Kastiel walked on the two of them, escorting a pair of kids he found outside. "Hey, Nam, what's the hold up? I need to know what to tell these two about their- Oh, hey Cynthia."

"Kastiel? What are you doing here?"

"I found a couple of straggler kids causing trouble outside the Coliseum. Something about being involved in ticket swindling."

Elda rolled her eyes, puffed her cheeks and stomped the floor lightly. "I told you! We had nothing to do with it! It was those other two Zodiac kids, the older one was pushing us around!" She pulled in her Argentinean friend. "Hey Albiore, seriously, stop fiddling with that and back me up. I swear to the Goddess if we don't get out of this because you keep daydreaming I will punch you to the moon!"

"Ow, knock it off, okay! Just relax, Elda."Albiore rubbed his arm. Elda was really damn strong for a girl. He doubted he would ever find any Amazon as powerful as her. "Sorry, Miss Silver Saint, we weren't doing anything wrong. We'll be on our way back to the orphanage."

Kastiel completely ignored them. "They wandered off their group and I was just trying to find out through Nam here where to drop them off."

The Amazon widened eyes behind her mask. "Wait, Elda and Al'? Are these two the ones…"

"Yeah, they are gonna be your backups." Nam confirmed, looking over the paperclip with their files. "One for you and one for Guard'."

"Ugh, don't mention that guy, bet he's all puffed up his teacher is getting retired today." Kastiel complained.

"Kass, no, this is serious, I'm kind of in the middle of looking for him." Cynthia urged. "Have you seen him around town or anything?"

"Of course not!" he pointed at the two kids. "I was doing my patrols and ran into these two, and been putting up with them for the past two hours. Also, I'm pretty sure there's a pair of gold rank trainees out there somewhere causing a ticket contraband mess! So what happened to Guard', did he fucking vanish at the Pope's Chambers?"

"Yes! He might have!"

Kastiel blinked. "Um… shit, I was just joking, but…"

Elda and Albiore both blinked, not sure what they were dragged into. It was then that Elda noticed the Silver Saint kid standing by Cassiopeia. "Hey wait, I know you, don't I? You're that kid Orpheé!"

The lyre toting Saint pulled it close to his chest, feeling accosted. "Um, yeah, do I know you two trainees?"

Elda rested her fists on her waist. "Don't act like you don't! You're the one that left the orphanage a year earlier than us to go play music at some 'Dolphin' school, right?"

Orpheé winced. "Delphi! It's a school in Delphi." he stressed.

"Yeah that!" Elda affirmed, smiling like she got it right the first time anyway. "So you got a new lyre and everything, bet you feel pretty cool right now." She bumped her elbow on Albiore's. "See, I told you Saints could carry tools like this without them getting in the way. When I become a Saint, I'm totally getting a motorbike, I don't care which Cloth I get."

Albiore shrugged disgruntledly. "I never said you couldn't, I just said you wouldn't need a bike anyway because you'd be much faster on foot."

"Ughh, that's not the point, Al'!" she complained, sighing. "You don't feel the breeze on your face when you go at the speed of sound, you just pop into where you wanna go."

"You two are… very weird." Orpheé remarked.

Elda didn't miss a beat. "Well look who's talking; you went to a school named after a fish and are carrying around a string instrument. We all got our weirdness. What are you doing in that armor, anyway? Cosplaying?"

"What, no! There is so much wrong with everything you've said! First of all, I'm the actual Silver Saint of Lyra!" Orpheé clarified. "Those other guys earlier didn't believe I was the Saint either, but I am, like, almost four ranks above you."

Albiore's eyes darted at him at this revelation. "Wait, for real, you can become a Saint so early?" The musician nodded in confirmation. "How? How do you do it?"

Lyra grumbled exasperatedly. "Well, it's not like you can skip right to it in every case."

Meanwhile, Nam scratched his head in bewilderment at how little sense the adults around him made. "Wait, you said Andromeda told you the Pope said he left! Why would the Pope not tell him about this?"

"I don't know, Nam, but I saw two lightning bolts striking the Zodiac twice just a while ago and apparently no one there saw that either." Cynthia pointed out sarcastically.

"Two lightning bolts, okay, now you're just….Cynthia, you do realize how off the hook that sounds, right?"

Albiore raised his hand. "Actually, um…. sorry to butt in, but I saw those, too." Elda stared at him with a 'why are you making this worse' look and he just shrugged his shoulders. "I was bored waiting outside with Saint Kastiel and Elda and I just happened to look at Athena's statue. I kind of wanted to draw it and all of a sudden, bam, something came flashing out of that bigger mountain behind the Zodiac and those lightning bolts happened."

"I bet there were more witnesses, Nam." Cynthia remarked.

Once again, the Sagitta Saint scratched his head. "Well, darn, what the heck am I supposed to do about it? Hey, what's wrong, Kass?"

The Kerberos Saint grabbed Albiore's shoulder. "Are ya sure of what you saw, kid?"

"Um… yeah. I mean, they were pretty clearly lightning bolts," Albiore argued, kind of unnerved by Kastiel's stare. It reminded him of his dad's when he was really focused on a court case back home.

Cynthia saw the ghostly look on Kastiel. "... Is there something wrong, Kastiel?"

Feeling his brain go down memory lane, Kastiel stepped back and rubbed his short grey beard.

{======================|0|======================}

Kastiel panted in fear and exhaustion, his eyes opened wide and fists rose tightly at the threat before him. He didn't think he would survive the sudden bombardment and now he was face to face with the pair of enemies that had just stormed the battlefield. Some of the breaths he took were squeezed tight by terror and the cold, but a training instinct made him stand on his two shaky feet despite the zero percent survival chance he now stood.

A score of gold-rank Silver Saints had just been laid flat right in front of the Bronze Saint feet. These were his superiors, the guys that told him they would fight at the frontline while he could just sit back and cry like a scared little girl. All Kastiel saw was them trying to rush the two men and a series of electric warps going up and down all around them, instantly defeating the light speed-level warriors.

What in Athena's name had just happened in front of him? How did so many powerful warriors just completely fail to catch Guard's teacher? How the hell was he gonna get out of that one?! Dear Goddess, he didn't want to die like this!

The goggle-toting former teacher scratched his own head embarrassedly. "Ah, I really didn't want to fight scared kids. Come on, Akassius, this isn't okay at all."

The other one, having significantly more effeminate appearance, made a rose sprout around his hand. "You don't have to. I could just kill him for you, you know?"

If there was any answer to this Kastiel did not hear it, "D-DAMN YOU!" Upon hearing these words his kamikaze instinct took over and he dashed at the Gold Saints, screaming bloody murder, praying to the gods and raising a fist immersed in cosmos.

Upon contact, however, his knuckles merely grazed a fleeting lightning bolt that blitzed for the sky before crashing right behind him and Kastiel barely had time to turn his head before a karate chop to the nape knocked him straight out.

Last thing he heard before the darkness took over and he passed out on the snow was some weird argument between the two over needlessly scaring him.

{======================|0|======================}

"Goddamn….I think Cynthia is right." Kastiel announced. "I don't really wanna go into details, but I've seen this once before, in the war. And it ain't light speed movement, I'll tell you that much."

"Well, what are you saying, Kass, that someone just blitzed by and took Guardnia?" Nam asked, trying to get his friends to see the ridiculousness of it all. "Why are you all still looking so serious?"

"I'm going to look for him," announced Cynthia.

"Me too, something is going on. The timing is just too suspicious." Kastiel saw the two kids just staring at them like someone caught in a hurricane. "Shit, what am I gonna do with these two little jerks? What am I gonna do about my freaking schedule?"

"How about you two don't act like you're still teenagers and wait?!" The blue-armored Sagitta hesitated to follow through with this tone when both Silver Saints darted their faces at him. "I know you two never listen to me, but can you just… wait a few hours to see if he turns up by himself before going off to Goddess knows where and leave me stranded with your workloads? Even missing people get forty-eight hours before the police start looking for them, for crying out loud!"

The reasonable side emerged in Cynthia with these words. She moved her hand in a reassuring and apologetic manner. "Sorry, Nam, you're right. It's not okay for us to ditch our posts like this, but I am still worried - hey, wait, Kass, where are you going?!"

"Come here, boy!" Kastiel whistled his bloodhound to his side. "Told ya, I'm gonna go look for the prick. Take care of those two for me, will ya? I'm going hunting while the rest of you can sit there for 48 hours and babysit."

"What?! Wait - Ah, there he goes off! Darn it!" Cynthia sighed as Kastiel blitzed out the door. She looked at the three children, who were locked into some argument of their own.

"WHY won't you just tell me how you got it?!" shouted Albiore.

"Al', stop it! What the heck are you yelling at him for?! This isn't like you!" Elda tried to intervene but the Lyra Saint wouldn't stop either.

"Cause it's none of your business what my Path to the Cloth entails! It's private!" replied Orpheé.

Albiore just grabbed Orpheé's wrist instead to stop him from backing away or touching those lyre strings. "I just want to know how I can get a Cloth so fast! What's wrong with that?! I need to find out, so tell me right now!"

"Hey, back off, trainee, l-let me go!" Orpheé screamed, but somehow unable to shove himself free instead just making Albiore angrier and burn his dark blue cosmos even hotter. Lyra sweated bullets, grabbing Albiore's fingers but refusing to tell him anything. "I won't tell you! S-stop it before I-"

Cynthia tried to step in. "Hey, what are you doing-"

"Just TELL me!" Albiore growled when his shoulder was grabbed and pushed Lyra against the wall in retaliation, twisting the wrist to the side by accident.

"ORPHEÉ!"

"AL, WHAT THE HELL DID YOU JUST DO?!" Elda screamed.

{======================|0|======================}

Meanwhile,
Andromeda Island

{======================|0|======================}

"Guard', we've gone over this, we can't-"

"I told you… A MILLION TIMES not to call me that!"

"Okay, okay, I get it, just... just put aside everything that happened and… Darn it, I missed my pace again. Where was I?"

"You were asking me for the millionth time to join your blasted banner, you air-headed murderer!"

"Oh yeah... wait, that's not it at all! Guardnia, I'm not trying to put things in those terms, I just -"

"You are always just trying to do the right thing, isn't that right? I'm sick of your excuses, Priam, I've heard your scratched record over and over and it's not gonna change my mind!"

Walking about in impatience just outside the detainment room, Paris had heard the whole racket for so long that he could barely take it anymore. Not that the conversation was any sort of heartbreaking to him, quite the contrary; he was so embittered by how much of a pansy Priam was being with his loud, obnoxious brat of a former student that he could walk in there and shoot them both in the head just to shut them both up.

Tapping his foot, he looked at his wrist watch nervously and shrugged. Paris always knew Priam's carelessness would get him killed someday, and maybe this was going be it. Strong as he was, he didn't want to stick around to greet Kirin, Malta or even one of the seven douches that the Pope kept up his sleeve. They were supposed to have moved the base already by then. Heck, Paris was counting on already being on his way home with a fist load of cash to waste.

Most irritating of all was the sight of Daese's determined, stoic stare at him as she stood guard by the door. "How the hell are you so damn quiet and composed?"

"I spent my childhood in my city's battlements watching for suspicious activity. They wouldn't even let me sleep. I could stand here for days." she explained, almost like it wasn't a big deal.

"... No wonder we wiped you people out!" Paris insulted, letting out a bit of toxicity, but either the impassive Daese was used to him being a jerk or she was drilled into a steel beam harder than he thought. "What the hell is taking him so long?! We're gonna be swarming in Gold Saints up to our noses if Priam doesn't finish his business!"

"Everything is under control, have faith in him." Daese assured.

Paris took out a toothpick and casually picked his dirty teeth right in front of her. "Oh yeah? Vat makes you sho shure?"

She tried to look past the gross display. "Cause Akassius is at the Coliseum. If it got out Sanctuary was attacked, he'd already breached the perimeter."

The toothpick was dropped to the black sand on the floor. Paris' face went white. "W-What did you say?"

"I said Akass-"

"A-A-A-A… AK-KASSIUS-S?! He's there?!"

Daese looked at him weirdly. "I thought you knew."

Paris ran at the door behind her and banged on it wildly. "PRIAM! HURRY UP IN THERE, YOU INCOMPETENT, HEAD-IN-THE-CLOUDS SONUVABITCH! YOU NEVER SAID ANYTHING ABOUT FREAKING AKASSIUS BEING ON OUR TAILS! IF YOU DON'T GET YOUR ASS THROUGH IN THERE I'LL SPIKE IT WITH NEEDLES TILL IT'S ON FIRE!"

Daese pushed him away from the door. "Stop that, what in Athena's name is wrong with you?!"

"You stupid freedom-fighter NIT! Do you have a freaking clue what kind of mess Priam has got us into?!"

"Of course I have, the former Saint of Gemini is very famous." she assured, though her green eyes looked away self-consciously. "Though I've never actually seen him..."

"Of course you haven't! Now I see why you're so freaking calm; you have no idea of the guillotine that's hanging over our heads right now!"

She rested hand on waist and looked at him sternly. "Priam has fought him before. I'm sure it will be fine."

Paris scoffed ironically loud. "Yeah and look how well it turned out for his face! Bet the darn Cepheus kid didn't recognize him through the burns. Listen well and listen close; if Akassius knows we just tried to kill the Pope, he's not just going to kill us, but annihilate the fucking island beneath our feet! Shit, if King Cetus didn't rule New Lallybelle he'd probably blow that up too for good measure."

Normally she would find this fear strange for how exaggerated it seemed, but now Daese blinked at the person who was expressing it instead. "Paris… I've seen you take on worse and live to tell about it. Why are you so scared of Akassius in particular?"

The normally above-it-all former Saint looked away in fear. "Ugh, ever heard someone say how badass someone has been in a war?"

Daese nodded at this. "It was a pretty common thing to brag about at my hometown."

"Well… that guy is different; everyone seems to think they understand how scary he really is just because they saw him do 'something' during the war, some old war story, everyone's got their own. But those are nothing. All men do all sorts of hard choices on the battlefield or the war room. It's no measure of who they really are on the inside!" Paris's face trembled as he looked up at their hideout's ceiling "...but I've seen… what he was really made of even before the war, even before Cancer went nuts..."

The paladin would lie if she said the way Paris was talking didn't unnerve her. Her faith in the man inside the detainment room, however, was unshaken, so she repeated her point. "Priam has met him on the field and survived; I'm sure he has a contingency."

Paris frowned at her, a bead of sweat dripping down his temple. "Come on, it's Priam, he has no contingency. I bet he's counting on talking his way out of this."

{======================|0|======================}

The goggles hanging around Priam's half-burned neck were completely foggy from the heat of the island and the man himself suffered in particular. He had been stuck in that room for two hours facing his worst nightmare; talking face-to-face with Guardia after all these years pretending to be dead, waging war against everything he had taught Cepheus and basically making his life harder every way he could… unintentionally, of course.

This had been Priam's lot in life; screwing up without realizing, not knowing how to patch things up and just make everything go from bad to absolute worst despite not wanting anything but the best for his loved ones. At times he thought he was cursed, while with others he thought he was just plain dumb.

Being forced to flee from the battle and hide for so many years, and throwing away his pride as a warrior, taught Priam a few hard lessons on what it felt like to be humiliated. He could imagine what Guardia was going through back in Sanctuary, tackling on the Path to the Cepheus Cloth while being remembered as the traitor's pupil, enduring pain after pain, defeat after defeat, seeing his dreams crushed, his ego broken and his will to fight wane. Worst of all Priam knew Guard' would have to face the False Freedom Test and be forced to decide the fate of countless unwitting students, a feat that was not meant for someone who favored emotional bonds with those he encountered.

Of course Priam realized he had no right to stand there justifying himself after everything that transpired. Of course Priam was adamant in his belief that it was all his own fault, and no one else's, and that Guard' had every right to wail at him for days, months, years…

But Priam only had a few hours to spare.

With a bit of hesitation, he untied Guardnia from his own chain links after the Silver Saint was sufficiently drained from all the yelling. Priam knew he wouldn't do anything stupid so long as his emotions were out of the way.

Guardnia rubbed his sore wrists beneath the armor padding. "Just...what do you want from me? Tell me so I can go back to Sanctuary and my life without you again. The sooner you let me go, the less damage my reputation will suffer."

Priam shrugged. "The Pope saw you being forced by me. He won't think you're a suspect."

The hatred in Guardnia's ensuing glare was chilling. "You know it won't be that simple!" he hissed. Priam only scratched his head again, though, and Guardnia sank his face in his hands. "You always, always do this… You always miss the point or act like nothing is a big deal. Do you even realize how much you ruined my life?"

"'Guard, of course I do, there's not a day I don't think about it."

"And yet, you come back and make things worse…"

Priam shrugged shoulders. "I'm just trying to have a conversation. A serious one. Don't you think thirteen years is long enough a wait for it?" he held up a finger when Guardnia was about to bite back. "And don't cite the students you've had to kill during your time as the Cepheus Saint. You knew it would be a difficult duty to uphold and could have easily been happy and dedicated as the Bronze Saint of Pisces Austrinus."

"It was the only way to wipe the shame you smeared on me! I had to do everything I could to show that I was dedicated to Athena and not a traitor like you. Every life pointlessly sacrificed felt like it was chipping away my soul, even if someone had to do it."

"Ahh… your sacrifice?" guessed Priam, his face and tone making an effort to not show any indications of sass. "It's true; sacrifice is often the only way to wipe your slate clean with others, and no Cloth better encapsulates that philosophy better than Cepheus. You weren't even born under its protection. That Cloth constantly insults you, and yet you managed to get it! I'm… I'm proud of you, Guard'," Priam confessed, softening his expression considerably. "I never got to tell you that, during all these years we've been apart."

Guardnia shook his head, exhausted. "What's there to be proud of?"

"A lot, and I am proud. I'm proud of the way you picked yourself back up and showed… everyone what you were made of. 'Silver Saint Guardnia of Cepheus'." Priam titled, waving his hand horizontally in the air as if running it through a phrase. "Who was there to put you down after you got the Cloth? No one. Who was there to call you student of a traitor after you showed so much sacrifice? No one! The Pope, of all people, entrusted you with some of the most valuable armors in all of Sanctuary! He was entrusting you with more and more students-"

"And we are probably within a hundred yard radius from their graves." Guardnia growled.

"Not all of them!" Priam remarked, pointing a single finger at Guard's face. "There is one who lived, is there not? Who pinched the Andromeda Cloth! So many teachers throughout the world who just neglect or even abandon their kids… Paris told me he met one in Mount Olympus back in '73 who was a see-it-to-believe-it case. But you made it, Guardnia, you showed the world you are a better teacher than I ever was!"

"Quit the flattering!" Guardnia interrupted. "You think I don't know what you're doing? You think I can't tell how you're shifting the conversation away from what you've done?!"

"And why is what I did thirteen years ago still vital to what we have to talk about today?!" Priam asserted. "Guard', have you already forgotten what happened? The Pope called you, a Silver Saint, to his Halls… to tell you the secret to his last decade and half of governance."

Guardia awed in horror. "And that's what you want to know, isn't it? You want to find out what he told me! That's why you waited like a fox, watching me for YEARS..." Priam laughed at this. "What's so funny, I don't get it!"

"Guard'... I've known for years the Pope has gone mad, that he's looking after this future war and these… old friends of his. In fact, I'm just about the only person he's shared this with," he nonchalantly revealed, scratching his ear. "It's kind of part of the reason I did what I did."

Once again, Guardnia was in awe. "... W-what? You knew?!... The Pope confided to you his motivations and yet you-wait, what do you mean, part of the reason?!" Guardnia grabbed his blonde hair. "My Goddess, what the hell is really going on?! Has everyone gone insane?"

"Pretty much, yes. Hence,… well… the Civil War and everything." Priam awkwardly pointed out.

Everything was just too much for the Silver Saint, who covered his face for a good minute just to help him process everything that was being revealed to him that day. From the retirement day of his second teacher Saint Daniel and seeing Shinta follow his own footsteps in become a successful Bronze Saint to being entrusted with these maddening secrets by the Pope, kidnapped by Priam, beaten up and find out about this huge cabal going on so many years after everyone thought the rebels were dead was quite the drop for him.

And it was as the blood rushed to his head that Guardnia recalled one important thing… something the Pope was showing him while he was distracted by Cynthia's calls.

By the Goddess, that puzzle box! The Pope said it was important. Did Priam know about that too? Guardnia calmed down and watched for any signs of this.

"I knew the Pope favored you for working so hard to prove your loyalty. He has valued Saints like you, who've had problems and suffered with the way he has done things. Winning them over has made him feel justified in his actions." Priam went on, completely oblivious to Guardnia's observance. "And of course I was keeping an eye on Kirin, Malta and the others… He didn't share his secrets with them, but I knew one day Arles would call you to his Halls to reveal his prophecies, even if just to prove me weak."

"So you're saying he's been grooming me for his ego." Guardnia concluded.

"Yes! I couldn't have said it better. I don't think he does it for spite, Arles is very old and has seen many generations of Golds come and go with the wind so it's not like we're so darn important to him, but… I do think he does it because he isn't sure what the right thing to do is, anymore."

Guardnia remembered the Pope's mannerisms as he revealed his secret. It was true that Arles spoke and acted in a manner that reminded the teacher of a student justifying his screw up. It was part of why Guardnia was so shocked, since he never thought the Pope would act so vulnerable all of a sudden over something so crazy, endlessly asking Guardnia for forgiveness and understanding over what seemed to be, for all intents, a trio of fortune cookie nonsense.

Priam relaxed back in his chair. "Guard', I… I don't want to conquer Sanctuary. That's crazy," he mocked, laughing at the idea of himself leading an attack on Sanctuary Town, as many people yelled he would one day. "Do you know what the last two Civil Wars were about? The first was a thousand years ago, over whether or not this crazy man calling himself 'Athenian Emperor' should rule like a king. The second one was over feudal rights! Sanctuary has been tearing itself apart for generations; I punched the Pope and people think I am the cause of something that has existed since before I was born? I just think the craziness isn't one-sided here."

The Cepheus Saint rubbed his temples, trying to focus on his self-imposed task of pretending to listen so he could get more information out of Priam. The problem was that Priam wasn't exactly sounding insane. "Why couldn't you at least try to negotiate with them? Why did you just went on and staged a coup?"

Priam stared at him sadly. "Who says I didn't try to talk things out?" He got up from his chair and walked about, recollecting painful memories. "The days leading up to my… rebellion... were the worst days of my life; trapped between being loyal to the Holy Father and doing what he had always said was wrong to do, it was… a heartbreaking experience. I tried to negotiate many times, Guard'... Having the Cancer Saint Massacre to look back on, I knew any rash decisions could be end up very bloody, so I… I tried so many times to talk, but…"

"But what?!"

"But every time, I was left with nothing but a damp 'no' and a knife in my hands to use on my loved ones. I'm sure you know by now what that feels like, don't you?"

This was obviously a ruse to manipulate him through his awful memories of conducting the False Freedom test, but the Cepheus Saint couldn't help but know what Priam was talking about. "What do you think, King Cepheus?"

The Silver Cloth merely flashed a cosmos shine through its chained hand plate and answered "I think you're extracting a good deal of information out of this deplorable situation. Keep at it, Guardnia, let the traitor talk and talk, and I may not have to ask the Pope for a new Saint if you come back with something useful, ha, ha."

Guardnia mumbled to himself silently over this for a moment. In his last encounter with Priam on the day of Cyrus' death, his former teacher had also suggested that Sanctuary had somehow targeted his loved ones, so Priam was being consistent, if anything.

He needed to know if Priam knew about the box, though. "What did the Pope do to you, after all?"

"I can't talk about that without putting more people in danger." Priam denied, shaking his hooded head. Guardnia could swear Priam glanced down at his Cepheus cloth chest plate.

"Then why did you kidnap me, if not to get me to join you?!"

"I guess… because I thought you deserved some justice from me. I wanted to let you yell at me." Priam said, before coughing out a contained chuckle. "It's funny, cause it's not like this makes anything better, and… like I said, the Pope told you about the prophecies. He was gonna dump all that guilt of what he's screwed up on you, I couldn't let him do that."

Guardnia's eyes blinked, staring at Priam in confusion. "So… this isn't about restarting the war?"

"Ha, Ha, Ha! Guard', do I look like I'm in any shape to fight?! I have third degree burns all over my body beneath these clothes! Goddess, no!... Enough people have died." Priam's eyes glanced embarrassedly. "Well, Daese keeps telling me that since the Pope now knows I'm alive, he'll send people after me, but I'll cross that bridge when I have to. But no, this isn't about restarting a losing battle; this is about… me asking you to come with me, not as a warrior to fight my battles, but as a man who just wants to live his life."

"... What?!"

Priam grinned. "Think about it; this is what you always wanted, right? Remember, when before I made you want to become this great teacher, you wanted to just do your part and go live your life? Arles saw you being taken; it wouldn't be farfetched to think I killed you too, like right after you refused to join me. You've already contributed to Sanctuary what you had to; they have an Andromeda Saint walking up the Silver ladder to take your place. No one leaves the army except in a coffin or a retirement home, so this could be your only chance!"

"My goddess, you're insane! I have friends, a family of comrades! I believe in Athena and what she fights for!" the Greek argued.

"So what? Are you gonna stick around another fifteen years, making more sacrifices every year, only to not be battle-worthy when Hades starts his Holy War? For a Goddess that may not even show up?" Priam asked, staring at Guardnia like he would at a dumb kid.

"You!… that's not the point! I have to-"

"You don't have to do anything. Arles is already gathering his all-star Gold Saint line and we'll be lucky if they don't replace you all in five years, much less fifteen! And do you really think Cynthia and Nam would blame you if you wanted a break from killing your students? Do you really think Kastiel would want you around, making him feel inferior? Guard'... you already live a separate life from them, tied to this blasted island, drowned in papers about trainees you don't know if you'll have to send to a deathtrap of a test or kill them yourself. You've done enough, and I'm giving you a chance of a lifetime to get out and make your life away from that blasted Sanctuary with your shame intact."

"I…" Guardnia tried to form words against this, but he couldn't. It was true he already seldom saw even Cynthia, who had a Cloth associated to his island. It was true that after years and years of sacrifice ending with the Pope telling him it was all about these prophecies he got from a random witch it was hard to take anything Sanctuary had to offer him seriously.

"Are you really gonna stick around to help Arles find your replacement, taking children from their mothers' arms just because they make a glowy energy when handed stardust, to go fight some goddamn gigantic war he obviously saw in a fever dream?" Priam pressed, sensing he had struck home. "And what about your friends, wouldn't you rather go into the real world and build a life and a real family, so you'll have something to show for unlike all those homeless former soldiers you see in Athens?"

Priam took a breath before continuing, letting his former student absorb all of this.

"I'm... not asking you to fight my battles, Guard' -" he reminded, touching his own chest. "My problem with Sanctuary is my own; it's Arles who will drag you into it with his…his blasted prophecies... if you don't take my hand, right now!"

Guardnia sank his face in his hand for the third time. He knew resisting Priam's words wouldn't be easy. They all took him by surprise, though. It was true that he had thought many times about leaving Sanctuary, and he had expected Priam would have some offer related to it, but not one so detached and uninterested. With over a decade of fighting, training and killing taking its toll on his soul in ways his younger self never had imagined, Priam wasn't even asking him to fight Sanctuary, just to leave it behind.

"As for your Cloth -" Priam argued, knowing King Cepheus was listening to the whole thing and would definitely tell Arles that Guardnia had abandoned his duty. "I'm sure breaking it down will jog its memory a bit. Most Cloths don't even remember what happened in past Holy Wars because of how trashed they got. Uh, hell, if we leave behind a 'killed' Cloth it will actually serve as further evidence of your death."

"Are you going to listen to this Black Saint, Guardnia?!" the Cepheus Cloth screamed on the Greek's ear, sensing something wasn't right with its owner. "This is treason to Sanctuary, no matter how you put it! If you accept this scum's proposal you will never be worthy of being the king, you hear me?! Cetus will remain the King of New Lallybelle until the day he dies, your precious friend Cynthia will continue to suffer and you will always be the weak, sniveling coward you always-"

"SHUT UP, CEPHEUS!" Guardnia screamed out loud into his hands, startling Priam, who just assumed what was going on. He tried to focus on what he had to do. Priam seemed fixated on the prophecies so there was a chance he didn't know about whatever Arles had on that puzzle box. The more he thought about this, the more his head hurt, though. "I'm so sick of all you people…"

The former Saint of Sagittarius looked down sympathetically at the exhausted Master. "You can take your time, if you need."

Guardnia sighed. "You heard your friend Paris screaming just now… The Gold Saints will be here any minute. There is no time. There's just despair. The war is gonna start all over again no matter what you say."

"Maybe. Question is, Guard', what are you going to do about it? Are you going to continue living in Sanctuary and fight for something you don't really believe in… or will you come with me, so I can hide you and you can start your life over?"

Cepheus stood up, having made his decision. It was the only call he could possibly make, everything considered, and it was so tough to do so after everything he sacrificed, but he announced it anyway.

Priam's lips slowly curved into a smile and he even bowed his head humbly. This was a moment of reconciliation he had waited thirteen years for. He got what he came for, now they just had to get the heck out of there before the Gold Saints came storming in.

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Meanwhile

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Amidst the shifting black sands of Andromeda Island's western acidic water beaches, the Pegasus Bronze Saint landed from his light-fast blitz, his feet making the dark pebbles dust the area with the force of his travel speed. Even after all these months he still had trouble handling the jump. Thankfully the Cloths shielded damage for untrained amateurs like himself, not to mention keeping him cool despite the searing 110 Fº the 'fresh air' that the beach greeted him with.

Looking up at his surroundings, Lance recalled his mental map of the island from the last time he was there; the twin volcanoes to the east where amidst a disk of black rock rested, an extension wasteland further to the north where the Cassiopeia carving lied, the northwest peaks where the Castle of King Cepheus laid in ruins, the Elysium Cliffs to the south shaping a chain out of rock and a myriad of boulder, crevice and dry lava rivers everywhere else. Finally there were the sea rocks to the southwest, where Shinta had obtained the Andromeda Cloth, from what he told Pegasus.

"Tsk… this place is full of hiding holes." None of these locations interested him, though. It would be a waste of precious time to search them all. Instead, he headed for the Living Area, a series of huts around a campfire and a round rock where the Master and the trainees would reside in. He ran straight there and only stopped at the Master's hut. "Everything is filled with ash dust… yup, place feels just like summer camp."

With a shove or two he snapped the lock and entered Guardnia's office. Walking over a carpet, by an empty fireplace and the book closet filled to the brim with test material, he quickly ran his hands through the desk drawers as fast as he could, sniffing for something.

"Come on, where is it?" he wondered, frustrated. He finally picked out a stack of papers. "Aha, here it is."

The reason why Lance was bee-lining straight to these papers was simple; he was absolutely sure a Silver Saint like Guardnia had a collection of notes made on maintaining the island, something that would include the patrols he would make daily or even hourly around the territory. As he laid them out on the desk and ran his red eyes through the walking schedule and the island map, he looked for something that would hint at a place not where Guardnia had been, but had not been very frequently.

His finger touched the volcanoes on the map. "This is where he tried to ambush the Specters and killed all those Skeleton soldiers, so people spying on him wouldn't pick the tunnels." He kept running it through possible locations, discarding them for one reason or another. He needed a place with a high probability to yield results, not just wild guesses. Eventually he reached the northwestern ruins. "The castle of King Cepheus…. The notes say Guardnia passes there every day so it's not like he hasn't watched the place, but that doesn't meant he goes inside it…" Lance bit his thumb in reflection to his time in the Mount Olympus temple.

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Once inside, he felt his foot stepping on something stony that caved inside the ground under his weight. He remembered widening his eyes as the sound of stone mechanisms worked within the walls of the temple. "SHIT! A trap!" he cursed, before he turned around to flee, but it was too late as the stardust-reinforced door of rock slid down the entrance, crashed with the floor and locked him inside the temple.

{======================|0|======================}

The memories from his experience in the Pegasus Temple gave him an idea. Lance looked at some personal notes that Guardnia made over Shinta's test in the castle of King Cepheus.

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"….for his penultimate test, Shinta was supposed to enter it with another person and only one would come out."

… in the end, he found a loophole.

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His experience on Mount Olympus's temple of Pegasus was compared to Guardnia's words to him about the Castle of King Cepheus and his notes. Was it possible that both ruins used the same mechanisms, so while Guardnia patrolled the location, he would not actually go inside so as to avoid getting trapped? Even Elisa's temple had tricky defenses of the sort.

From the look of the map the ruins of the castle looked large enough to house a small group of people. "They would have to be intimately familiar with the place, though, which kind of reduces the odds…" Something told him, however, it was worth a look on his way out.

After a final look-over on the place, he tightened his knuckle guards and made his way towards the ruins.

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The rocky rise of the island's northwest terrain was not the toughest spot of Andromeda Island, but it was surely the most desolate, protruding out of the territory's core to house what had possibly once been a shiny castle on a hill, now in ruins and with few alternatives for vantage points. As such, the Pegasus Saint approached the location on a crawl, stomach kissing the sand, raising his body only for sudden dashes between the rocks and trying to look ahead whenever possible.

As he tried to find the ideal point of vigilance, he irked, irritated, because his mind kept returning to Mount Olympus. Lance cursed the situation between teeth for reminding him of that place; probably because he recalled his visit to the Pegasus Temple, he now couldn't stop thinking about something he never really got an answer for; who saved his life from Bellerophon?

It was only when he met Shinta and learned from him that Cloths were sentient that he formulated the hypothesis that the Pegasus Cloth had saved him, but why exactly? Was it for accepting him as a Saint? If so, why? Now with years of experience on his back, Lance was absolutely sure that at fourteen years old, when he finally faced off against the hero of myth, he did it out of desperation instead of preparation. He was so sick of his miserable life in that mountain that he just wanted to throw himself at his deserved fate.

And how pathetic was it that his upbringing was so sloppy that, even six months after getting the Cloth, Shinta knew the simple fact that Cloths were sentient and he did not? The more he walked on Andromeda Island, the more Lance was reminded of Death Queen Island, the home of the Phoenix Cloth and worst training ground Sanctuary had.

He stopped for a second, stunned at this. He never thought about it, did he? Lance held his own past and Guilty's in a pedestal of pain, but Shinta had actually gone through something very close to the horrors of being alone in Mount Olympus, didn't he? Now that he thought about it, Guardnia was so good of a teacher that he got the most pansy and non-violent person Lance has ever met to survive the next thing worst to Death Queen Island for six whole years. That was a feat no matter how you looked at it.

"No wonder Shinta loves Guardnia to death." Lance concluded. "Ha, Ha, if he finds out I let something happen to that guy, I may actually be the first one he'd ever raise a fist too."

He finally found a spot of elevated cliff facing the castle ruins and, taking off his white, metal horse helmet so the sun's hot glint on it wouldn't announce his presence. He dragged himself to its edge. He took out a pair of basic binoculars from his assault mission days strapped to his belt and used it to scope the castle.

The rock box cornered by ruined bastions was immense, having once been a fortress of blue-tint stone and now darkened everyday by ash and black sand in the wind. The corner towers were so damaged and fused with the environment they looked like vertical peaks instead of building sections. A set of twin plates carved with the constellations of Andromeda and Cepheus flanked a cavernous entrance that seemed more like a large wall crack than something that once housed a gate.

He then noticed something strange; the faint path leading up to it was sided by rows of decayed wooden swords carved tip-first on the ground. They looked like the crosses he had spotted on the Elysium Cliffs.

"Death count marks? Probably graves, even. Shinta used to tell me that Guardnia made him carry one everywhere during his training here. I know the place is dangerous, but I wonder what the guy was so damn worried about." Lance was about to try to look closer when, all of a sudden, he saw people come outside of the building supposedly abandoned since the age of myth. He frowned. "I fucking knew it… They're here." He half-heartedly thanked his own vast experience travelling to so many different Sanctuary locations. Without it, he would not have thought of checking this place.

For a while he watched what looked like a small group of grunts move in and out, carrying pieces of walls, like they had mounted some temporary base inside the castle and was now on their way out. Eventually, however, he even saw Guardnia himself escorted out by a pair of eccentric-looking people.

"Found him… but who are those guys?" One seemed like an unpleasant looking fellow, who looked at his watch and yelled like he wanted to get the hell out of there ASAP. The other person was… someone he almost skipped a heartbeat at. Lance widened his eyes. "Jesus Christ, I could swear that person was Sarah. Get your head together, Lance, she's dead." He took out the long-range communicator and tuned it in. "Hey, Saga? Saga?! You there?"

"*gzzzt* -es. Over."

Lance chuckled; being used to act alone or with Shinta always by his side made him unused to walkie-talkie manners.

"You wanna take a guess at where I found him? Over."

More static followed. "*Gzzzzztt* -serious?...*gzzt* -am, we lucked out! I already searched everything and was about to go interrogate Cetus *gzzzt* -need back-up? Where exactly are you? I can't find your cosmos. Over."

The ruins were probably jamming the 7th sense. In most of the Island you'd usually be able to sense others' cosmos. "I think some test usually takes place here so it must be protected. It's to the northwe-" Lance stopped himself when he saw a third figure coming out and doing something unexpected. "Saga, it's worse than I thought. Don't tell the Pope just yet, cause he'll nuke the place with Gold Saints if he finds out. Over."

"Geez, what *gzzt* -ppened? Over."

Lance sweated bullets, tightened his free fist and narrowed his eyes determinedly in preparation for a fight. "The Pope said Black Saints took him, right?! Well, I just saw Guardnia shaking the leader's hand. Something is up between the two, and I don't think they're planning on sticking around for long!"

"That sounds like collusion; yes… this is very serious! Lance, tell *gzzt* what back-up you need then, over!"

Lance stood up slightly, about to make his move. "I'm not sure yet what happened between those guys, but something fucked-up is definitely going on…" he took a good look at the escorts and tried to measure their strength, but the area's jamming was working way too well. "Okay, Saga, listen up, I need you to call -"

"What's going on here?!"

Lance almost yelped in startle, and turned around see none other than Shinta staring dead straight at him.

The walkie-talkie went on "*gzzzt* the plan? Over."

The Pegasus Saint sweated, feeling intensity in Shinta's green eyes he had never seen before. "Just a minute. Over." he then addressed the Andromeda. "What are you doing here, Shinta?"

"That's my question." he asserted. "But, if you must know… I felt your cosmos moving around the beach. I turned my attention to it because I ran into Saint Cynthia entering the clinic with Orpheé and she told me Saint Kastiel went looking for my teacher."

The mention of the Kerberos Saint put Lance on edge, but now was not the time for that. "I'm doing rounds. There was suspicious activity here-"

Shinta looked at him as if Lance had said something shocking. "Why are you lying to my face? I heard you on your communicator. You have your assault gear with you!" he confronted. "You were told to come here, or someone sent you to do something out of the ordinary. Which is which?!"

"I-"

"What happened to my teacher?! Why is he over there by the ruins with those people?! Did…." Shinta covered his own mouth. "Something bad happened, right? My Master did something wrong, broke some rule, so someone… or even the Pope told you to do something about it, is that so?"

Lance blinked, startled at this strange sense of boldness that he never knew Shinta had. "How would you jump into something like that? Yes, I am looking for him. Someone kidnapped the guy right in front of the goddamn Pope and now he looks like he's making agreements with these Black Saints. Shinta, this is very serious, these people attacked the Golden Zodiac!"

The Andromeda Saint lowered his head, completely conflicted.

Lance could already tell more or less what he was thinking. "If we go down there to just 'talk to hear their side of the story' and they turn out to be bad guys, we'll be overwhelmed. These are Gold-Ranks, Shinta, and at least one of them may be able to freaking teleport! I can't protect you from them, you're just a Bronze!"

Shinta's eyes closed, filled with anger. "No, he wouldn't do that, Master Guardnia-"

"Guardnia can't protect you from three possible Gold Ranks! Remember the Specter attack we stopped here?! You have to leave!"

The Andromeda Saint wasn't satisfied. "It's not like that! I can use Nebula Stream again and paralyze them! Then we can-"

"And what of your teacher? You think he won't be able to counter what you have up your sleeve? I'm pretty sure he knows about your powers." Lance argued, recalling his conversation with the Silver Saint after the Specter attack, the year before. "Shinta, this isn't a joke! There is a chance Guardnia is allied to these guys. The attack happened on the day he was meeting the Pope and he just happened to be taken by these guys for the ride home."

Once again, Shinta was more than shocked. "I… I can't believe what I'm hearing you say."

Lance was dead serious, though. "He has good reason to be pissed at Sanctuary from what I've seen of this place!" Lance argued, meaning the wooden swords with names he saw spread throughout the territory and associating to the one Shinta told him he once carried around. "People have revolted against less insane governments, but his convictions are neither here nor there! You know as well as I do that if I don't act to contain these guys now we may never get a chance again!"

The green-haired Japanese teen hung his head in bitterness. "... What are you planning to do?"

Lance glanced at the enemy. "I have Saga on the dial. I'm going to ask him to get Aiolos, Shura, Camus, Aguilon and some of the adults here. No reason to involve the kids; they aren't nearly trained enough to handle this. If they try to get away, I'll put my life on the line and stall them myself. Then…" he tightened his grasp on the radio. "... if Guardnia helps them out, I'll treat him like a hostile, too."

Shinta said nothing at this at first, trying to seemingly accept his powerlessness in the situation. He manned up, however, and made a decision. "Okay, Lance, do your best. I know you're a different person than from when we met. You won't try to kill my teacher like that Black Saint Ray."

"Damn, right, we need to know what happened, after all…. hey cheer up, Shinta, it will be okay. I'm sure this is just a misunderstanding, but I do need to treat this like a cautious professional. Then we'll go back to Sanctuary and enjoy the rest of the festival together."

The Andromeda Saint was surprisingly okay with this, silently nodding.

Lance picked up his helmet from the floor and turned towards the enemy. "Sorry, I wish things were simpler like you always believe, but... Okay, it doesn't matter… here goes nothing." His red eyes widened all of a sudden though. "Wait a minute! You said you left after hearing that Kastiel rushed off! How the hell did you get here so fast-"

*THUNK*

Lance irked, his eyes freezing into a blank, before the strength in his legs disappeared and he fell forward, knocked out cold. Andromeda Shinta walked over to him and let him down gently on the sand.

"No, I'm the one who's sorry." He stared regretfully at his unconscious friend. The chop blow had been executed perfectly, thanks to his training, and the fact that Lance had taken off his helmet helped out, too. Lance would be okay. He still felt horrible, though. "Don't worry, I know what to do. I learned a lot during our missions together. Saint Daniel taught me well too… but I guess you'll figure that out when you wake up."

The Andromeda Cloth cackled in his ear. "AH! Nice one! I bet he'll feel that when he wakes up, too. Though honestly, you should have done that earlier, especially when he suggested he was going to hurt father! Well, hurry up, then! That dumb horse Pegasus will get him to wake up really soon."

Shinta nodded, more determined than ever, before looking at the castle the so called Black Saints were leaving from. He never imagined he would have to fight his teacher in this place again. Was he really ready for what he probably had to do? "Of course. I'm a Saint… and this is my mission."

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Meanwhile

Sanctuary Town, Coliseum

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The people of Sanctuary erupted in celebration from their seats, all cheering, shouting and locking eyes on the three golden, caped figures in the arena standing in line at the Pope, offering their bow. Soon the population would know who these three masked heroes who saved them from the Civil War were. The Holy Father even had a pillow with three laurels and papyruses with him to present the Gold Saints, most likely titles.

It was an event unlike any other, the supernova of three great stars.

All the important personalities of Sanctuary, from nobles, ambassadors and wealthy to former warriors, officers and business owners, were all sitting in the lowest, front row, but even amongst these celebrities there were stars shining brighter than the others. In the VIP section, sectioned and segregated in the west seats from the people by curtains, soldiers and a veranda edge, seven chairs were lined up to face the celebration, but only five of them were filled. Usually an invitation to this event being refused was seen as lamentable, but given the eccentricity of this group, the people of Sanctuary looked the other way.

Elder Yuzuriha rested chin on fist, preoccupied. Her mind worked around the clock, half of it using its telekinesis to help both the Pope stand up all the way from her seat and the other half trying to keep track of what was going on in Andromeda Island. She lost track of the Cancer Saint all of a sudden there and the Gemini Saint, Saga, seemed agitated. Something was definitely going on.

"Something bothering you?" asked Akassius, the former Gemini Saint, who had entered the stand to help things go smoothly despite not being part of the group.

"Maybe the decoration is a bit too Hellenic for you, Lemurian? Would you like a few sheep statues or periodic tables on the walls? Ha, Ha!" asked Cetus, conceited as usual, sitting right by her side and seeing the microscopic signs of stress in her.

"Everything is perfect, your majesty, just pondering on the momentous occasion." she stoically assured, though this only seemed to amuse Cetus further and somehow make Akassius more suspicious. Thankfully the other three warlords didn't seem as interested in perusing.

Down at the arena, Shion did his best to endure the pain in his chest. Aiolos had alleviated a great deal and thankfully Yuzuriha was supporting him all the way. An even greater happiness took over him when he saw the smile on his three Gold Saints.

"My friends… my sons, even." he greeted. "Are you ready to say goodbye to your masks?"

Malta nodded. "Nothing would make us happier, your Holiness."

Shion let out a face of satisfaction and pride behind his mask like he had not done in years. "Yes, I won't let this Festival of the 88 Knights be ruined like the others."

And, as he stepped towards his Gold Saints, amidst the cheering of the crowd, the sound of a single drop of blood that did not dry was suddenly let out, one so microscopically quiet that nobody normal would notice it, as it pinged on the floor sand, darkening it.

And, like the cogs of an ancient, reactivated machine of destruction, the mind of Capricorn Kirin turned on at the sound of this, his falcon eyes looking down at the Pope's feet, where he saw the mark. His senses locked on the blood drop like a shark's.

Daniel glanced at him. "Something wrong, buddy?"

Kirin humbly shook his head. "Nothing, I just think it's going to rain soon."

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Chapter End

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Next Chapter: The Goodbye – Part 4 of 4

Description: Shinta confronts Guardnia and learns of his Master's decision regarding the Black Saints. Meanwhile, the three Gold Saints' retirement ceremony ends.

Author's Note: Another chapter complete and, if everything goes well, the next one will be the one to end the First Arc. I'm so glad I'm finally getting this arc almost wrapped up, but chapter 25 will be a handful as I will have so many plot threads to tie, handle and start in preparation for the storyline's closing.

For those of you who never watched or read LC, you now get to know the Lemurian known as Yuzuriha, who played the role of the Crane Silver Saint as well as Shion's fellow student of Hakurei in the Lost Canvas spin off. She was a supporting character of some prominence throughout the early parts of that story but lost relevance towards the end. As you can probably imagine from reading this chapter, she survives the Holy War depicted in Lost Canvas and, as a Lemurian like Mu or Shion, has outlived humans and survived to be part of LR's storyline.

Also, my beta-reader Jenny DeVic is on vacation, so wish her good luck on her trip, everyone (^_^). In other news, the English Saint Seiya Fan forum has been upgraded thanks to Newborn's tireless work, so give it a go if you'd like to meet the rest of the English-speaking Saint Seiya fan community.

Finally, like already stated, the first arc is nearing an end. I will delay any final commentary on it till chapter 25, but it's encouraging to know I'm almost near the end of my first arc and that soon I'll get to start working on revamping what is probably the most successful half of the previous edition of this fanfiction.