The long night continues

[ASG1: The Long Night Commences]

It was around three in the morning when they returned to the bridge. GV had watched as the Amakusa mages had prepared various spells that he wouldn't be able to take advantage of.

He was playing an ancillary part in the plan, just keeping Acqua distracted while the rest of them set up their spellwork.

They'd walked him through the plan, the route they were going to take. There was no doubt that they would lose in a straight, face-to-faec fight, even with all their tricks. However, by uniting their tricks together and baiting him into the proper place, the impossible became possible.

And GV's role was simple; don't die.

They'd given him one of their outfits, though with most of the magic stripped away. He could wear it over his normal clothes and it would hide his identity slightly. Acqua wouldn't know he was there until he was ready to begin the attack.

The was only one hole, as they didn't want to risk teaching him actual magic, they couldn't teach him how to move with them in formations. That meant that if Acqua's attention fell on "this one random Amakusa member" he'd be able to tell there was something wrong.

In return for their help, he told them about his hair trick and if they could stick one of his hairs to Acqua, it would trap Acqua in a way that would make him unable to escape the azure lightning. After he'd said that, some of the Amakusa asked for small bits of hair to test it out. If there was any group that could figure out how to sneak a small lock of hair onto someone, it was these mages.

Now that everything was ready, they headed forwards. To try and avoid being spotted, GV hung at the back of the group as they walked onto the bridge where Acqua was waiting for them.

[ACMI3: Interrogation]

"Have you come to a decision yet?" Acqua asked as they approached.

"Well, when you make a demand as impossible as this one," Tatemiya muttered, standing ahead of GV "it tends to eliminate the need to put too much thought into it."

"You currently stand to have two billion members of the roman orthodox church as your enemies, you have the chance to avoid that for the price of one arm. I would think someone of your intelligence would call that a bargain." Acqua noted.

Tatemiya locked gazes with the man "The roman orthodox church is not our enemy, it's people like you who regularly go out of their way to exploit and prey upon those who earnestly believe in God."

Acqua closed his eyes for a moment, though he still seemed to have complete control of the situation.

"Does this mean our negotiations have broken down?"

"Is there anything else it could possibly mean?"

Acqua looked sharply at Tatemiya "Don't forget that I am a saint. I also possess a vast amount of power as a member of the right seat of God. If you truly understand what that means and you still insist on fighting me, I will use this opportunity for a demonstration. I will prove to you that battles are not won or lost by good or evil but by strengths and weaknesses. The least you could do is try to force me to use one of my last-"

As Tatemiya looked at Acqua without fear, GV inwardly chuckled. Strengths and Weaknesses, huh?

But there was someone who cut off Acqua's words more forcefully.

Itsuwa charged forwards as fast as one of GV's own metal-boosted dashes, her trident-spear charging forwards like a knight's lance. At the moment of inpact the spear seemed to explode. There were flashes of light as some sort of spell erupted in the saint's face.

"Um, Itsuwa?" Tatemiya muttered, a little surprised by how quickly she'd attacked.

The dust her attack had thrown up was scattered by Acqua's mace.

"I didn't even make it through my sentence." Acqua complained "Could you not have waited for me to finish speaking?"

"Whatever you have to say to us can wait until later." Itsuwa declared, her voice raising in volume as she continued "That is, if your jaw is in any condition to help you speak! It may not be after I've beaten you to a bloody pulp!"

Damn. GV was actually impressed. The other members of Amakusa around him were muttering in a worried tone about how she'd snapped while blaiming Tatemiya for setting her off.

"Impressively put." It seemed even Acqua gave it a shred of respect before he continued "But I'd like to see if you could back that up with worthwhile action."

"Is that so?" Itsuwa ground out, her voice constantly shifting between barely controlled anger and a rage that made her yell "Rest assured that even if you reduce us to slices of meat, we'll still make you regret this after beating you to a meaty pulp!"

A single bead of sweat dropped from GV's forehead as he tried to smile, at the same time, the other members of Amakusa were freaking out.

"We have to go that far?" One of them mumbled.

Even so, the battle was ready to begin. The Amakusa's spells were ready and now would be the best time for them to act, apparently.

End of chapter.

Didn't start the fight properly, was mostly mixing the anime and LN for the dialogue. Ah well, I had to write this chapter at a different time than normal this week. At least the fight starts properly next time.