Mylene Rapha Holfort: I don't appreciate having to clean up your mess John.
John Fia Marmoria: I understand milady.
Mylene: I don't think you do. Not only have you managed to worsen our already rocky relationship with the Blackmores but you have endangered the life of my daughter in the process.
John: I'm aware. Not even offering you my severed head would be enough to make up for our failure.
Mylene: No it won't. As of this moment you are being taken off of both the Fanoss and Blackmore situation. In fact I'm diverting and directing the sum total of the Marmoria's resources towards the Alzer, Rochelle and Repard fronts. Hopefully you lot won't trigger another massive diplomatic incident before your son has graduated.
John: Actually I recommend focusing our forces on Rochelle.
Mylene: Excuse me?
John: The Blackmores were living in Alzer until their recent move, and our own intelligence says that the Blackmore's matriarchs are in Repard though we don't know why. If your goal is truly to prevent us from encountering them anymore...
Mylene: Fine. Rochelle it is. I hope to see a return of the competency that your family is usually known for.
John: Understood Mylene.
Excerpt from a conversation between Mylene Rapha Holfort and John Fia Marmoria shortly before the latter's departure to the Rochelle front
Nick had soon returned to the Blackmore compound, of course he left Leon's minder Umbra behind instead flying back in the XJ-9.
Leon let out a loud yawn as he made his way over for the weekly Adventurering classes.
"Why are you still wearing that thing?" Angelica eyed both the power draining accessory Leon constantly wears and the neon orange armour that he normally wears during his dungeon diving activities in the capital. "I thought Umbra was going to let you off the hook if you brought back most of the pirates alive?" Angie and Livia were also dressed in their own adventuring gear.
"Doesn't count." Leon clicked his thermos open and downed another shot of the hot stimulating liquid inside. "Umbra did most of the work. Four out of Five Pirates I actually fought against are all dead."
Livia on the other hand was slightly uncomfortable with the casual mass murder talk going around, though actually meeting the survivors in question somewhat quelled those feelings. Listening to their various crimes of Rape, Murder and Pillaging listed off had pretty much exhausted even Olivia's saint like sympathy to the point that she only healed them to the point that they could move on their own and won't die.
"Still there are more people today." Livia looked around at the class, the boys were joined by the various demon girls that Leon had brought over for the Coffee house. Apparently being inside the dungeon was calming for them, and they needed the materials, the Red Orbs, from the dungeon in order to help develop their abilities. Just one of the things that they overly stressed out boys apparently needed to do to keep them sane.
Greg had the unfortunate distinction of working as a desk jockey right now, his family was the one managing the adventurers guild after all, it seems that he barely got into his family's good graces to the point that they gave him a job here.
"Hello will you be going into the dungeon today?" Greg was listless, as if he had seen the hell that was paper work, administration and customer service and witnessed it full frontal. The evidence of his fearsome battle could be seen all around him, as so much paper work had been piled up around him that it was as if he had been intentionally boxed into his desk. What was worse was that he was being made to do this work by Marie in order to accelerate paying off the group's debts to Sarah. "Would you like to take a request for a specific item or material?"
"I'd like to kill angels." Leon didn't know how he should feel about one of the people he despises so much being put to work that he was obviously so ill-suited for.
"We have a variety of Angel slaying related quests to go around today sir." Greg handed Leon the appropriate flyers, or rather to say he handed Leon the stack full of paper indicating the quests in question, Leon picked up a sheet of paper from the top and read it, noting that it was the Winchester Family requesting materials from the dungeon. In fact the entire paper was requests from the Winchesters for materials, all in relatively small amounts.
"I don't get it." Leon stated as he scratched the back of his head in confusion. "Shouldn't this all be just one request?" As Leon said that he saw Greg start trembling.
"Yes. That's the way it should be. And who do you think is being made to process all of this?" A dark aura hung over Greg's body that was trembling with rage even as he forced a smile onto his face.
"That's rough pal." Leon didn't have any sympathy for Greg. Maybe some time in administrative work would make him appreciate what it means to provoke the economic powers that be.
Leon's proposed training methods were effective, but too crude. Brad knew that he could do better. As a start, Brad had broken down the individual movements that he was picking up from Chris into individual spell components for his arms, legs and torso, with this he would be able to move more easily and fluidly. At the same time he was chaining together multiple strings of spells with the detection spells that Leon had instructed him on. Of course, casting three complete elemental detection spells was ridiculous, but Brad was able to save on time and mental processing by eliminating the redundant parts between the three spells, and he improved his reaction time by chaining the stimulating support spells directly to his detection spell so that when his opponent moved Brad could move appropriately in a instant. It would be better if he could add a liquid detecting spell into the mix as well but he had no affinity for water. No matter, his magic was far away from reaching its peak and with Umbran techniques for efficiently manipulating multiple elements at once he would soon grow in potency if not power.
Chris was under the impression that his father was a strict teacher, he now knows that he was mistaken. The Sword Saint had long since given up on Chris's training, his efforts on the level of humouring someone far below his level. Alastor showed no such mercy. The blade had seized control of the electrical impulses in Chris's body, stimulating his muscles and making them move to his exact standards. Even if the sword perfectly controlled it's lightning magic to the point that it's electricity would not burn Chris's body his muscles were still under so much stress that they were being unravelled at the seams.
"Heal!" The vicious sword broke no argument in its tone, no chance to disobey, either Marie would do as she was told or he would continue to put Chris's body through endless abuse until he died.
Alastor liked absolutely nothing about the lot he had been dealt, not being stuck with this third rate swordsman nor having to draw out his atrophied lightning affinity using his own limited supply of magical power. Every time Marie healed Chris and put his body back together the Arclight heir inched closer to the demon's high standards, and he would rise to meet them if Alastor has to rip his wretched soul of his body and raise it as a demon.
"You should at least break for food." Marie stated as she let out a sigh. "You're building muscle like crazy."
Marie choose her words carefully, Chris wouldn't take kindly to being told that he's training too much, and chances are good neither would the silver and red ball of death that's watching her as they speak.
"Fuelling is also a part of training." Chris nodded as he stiffly walked away.
Brad wasn't forcing his body's muscle memory to match the demon's demented whims, but he was Chris's training partner, and the young mage was using muscles that he didn't even know that he had. While the two of them ate the mineral and protein rich stew Marie had prepared for them Marie was mentally reviewing what she remembered from the game.
Brad never managed to overcome his physical inability to the very bitter end instead continuing to develop his magical abilities, which was fine so long as you could keep him contained and not pull off a Leeroy Jenkins. Chris on the other hand never touched his apparently rather potent lightning power instead focusing solely on his swordsmanship, Leon was right to be mad at him for swinging around a hunk of steel when he had lightning magic at his finger tips!
"I never knew that you could do lightning magic?" Marie stated vastly more calmly than what she was screaming in her mind.
"...it's not right." Chris stated bluntly. "It's their power, not ours and not mine." Magic was the act of beating a round peg into a square hole, the fire balls, the lightning and so much more was about enforcing your will on creation, and Chris knows for a fact that the peg in question wasn't human, wasn't of this world. Chris wasn't the only one that recognised magic for what it was, there was a reason why magic wasn't part of the mandatory courses for the students despite its power and versatility.
"Eat." The sword barked apparently annoyed with Chris's self reflection.
"You could try being nicer you know." Marie replied as she looked directly at the talking sword.
"I am a demon child." The grouchy sword stated bluntly. "If I was not ordered to do so, I would not tolerate this third rate swordsman's continued existence let alone partnering with him."
"Third rate?" Chris stated sounding flatly offended. "My sword might not have a demon inside of it but-"
"How long have you been practising with the sword?" Alastor questioned, it was hard to read the sword, it had no face, no normal body type or tells, at most they had it's voice to work off but even that was a artificial construct created by vibrating magic in the air.
"Eight hours a day for 10 years." In the mean time Chris's father can maintain his legendary skill with a mere single hour of training every day.
"Cute. Cute." This stupid child spends so much time honing his skills and he's still so bad at them? "Leon has been training since he was ten years old, fighting for his life against multiple demons at the same time each of them trying specifically to kill him." Alastor remembers because he was the one who was training Leon and his siblings. "His family uses such an abusive training method!?" Chris was shocked. However...
"Abusive?" Alastor laughed at that. "You've deluded yourself that he was ever in danger in the first place."
Madama Khepri: A goddess of Inferno who controls time and the sun and one of the oldest and most powerful of the Demon Lords.
It is said that she can determine a person's fate by gazing upon the long shadow that forms between their body and the light extending from the land of the dead.
The entire Umbra Clan is in a contract with Khepri, the Lion's share of Halos earned by killing Angels and the Red Orbs harvested from their demons going to her in order to maintain their immortality and power over time. By paying Orbs and Halos at the Shrines dedicated to Khepri or her followers one can earn knowledge of the future techniques that they will would otherwise only be able to grasp with time or power in the form of refundable star tokens of vitality or magic to heal their injuries or restore their magical power.
By binding a contract with Khepri and forfeiting their soul, one can gain an almost infinite knowledge of time and the secret technique to control it, however only the strongest witch in the clan, known as the Left Eye of the World, is able to contract with Khepri.
Excerpt from Lemegeton's Book of Demons
"The Clan's healing and training methods are beyond you. Beyond all of you. For all that you claim yourselves as his pupils you have earned only the bare minimum of the Clan's wisdom. Finish your food and get back to work, you haven't earned any mercy yet!"
Leon slammed his fist into the mouth of a Grace, black spikes spreading out from within to stab through the angel's skull. A few moments later the Grace's claws fell away as the creature itself turned into a pile of Halo's. In the mean time the Glory was having a hard time moving, having been frozen solid by Angelica before she tore it apart with a Salamandra Chainsaw.
"Catch." Leon tossed Angelica the set of fiery claws that they were able to take off their targets.
"An Angel arm? Seems kind of useless in the grand scheme of things." Angelica stated as she looked at the claws with suspicion.
"You're not using it, you're gonna drain it dry." Leon stated as he broke no argument. "With Salamandra you're leaning a little bit towards the demonic, which runs the risk of destabilising you emotionally, especially since you were possessed once already. With some angelic energy-"
"I should be brought back into balance and increase my level as a by-product." Angelica had already clued in on the sum of the situation.
At once Angelica started to drain the angelic energy from the weapon and already she felt the demonic power that was inside of her from the Salamandra crystallise and her own innate crystals grow larger and larger. Several benign tumours located in major organs around Angie's body would eventually backfire on her, but you only live once as they say, and if push came to she could have them removed or cut down, maybe she can even get Olivia to deal with them some how. Of course Angelica suspected that Leon and his family have methods of dealing with the cap too. In any case Leon had a quota of Halo's that he needed to meet, both for the Quests he was taking for Sarah and his own demonic contracts.
"Blackmore? What about him?" Jilk asked as he looked at the man from the royal family that had approached him.
"He needs to be watched no matter what the Queen says. That said, do not act against him. His brother has already been caught in one assassination attempt already, and a rattle snake is at the most dangerous when cornered."
"How exactly would you like me to spy on him without acting against him?" Jilk asked as he looked genuinely curious.
"Three of your fellow heirs have already approached him for training, a fourth wouldn't go amidst. Take the Crown prince with you it'll make it look less suspicious if you go together." The spy turned around to leave.
"Is there specific information that I need to obtain?" Jilk inquired suspicious.
"'Fighting style, Weapon Arts, Movement Based casting, Multi-element casting, Devil Arm based technology schematics.' The kinds of things that you'd probably obtain by being tutored, keep us informed if you think he's going to attack the royal family, but don't do anything to bring him harm unless you'd like to share the fate of your uncle." Jilk nodded his head and turned around to leave.
Hopefully that would be Jilk's and the Prince's lesson plans taken care of for the near future.
"We lost a chance to get rid of Hertrude." Erica summed up the take away from the situation. "Not only that, but with the events being as unstable as they are we may not get another chance."
The Warlock Route after all was a NG+ route after all, they should assume that Leon's presence will amplify the negatives of the situation as they will not only have to deal with the usual problems of the other routes, but also the problems that Blackmore will drag into the fold as well.
"Do we have everything prepared for the school trip?" Erica asked looking to Luxion. Erica could offer little but idle speculation about how events proceed in the game and their relationship with Blackmore. She after all only ever learned about what he chose to share with Olivia, or what the developers thought would fit in with their T for Teen rating.
Regardless of Blackmore's competency, his presence is one of the most dangerous signs in the game. To trigger it, the Protagonist has to progress the level of her relationship with each of the capture targets to 'interested' (which it should be noted can be more accurately translated as 'Obsessed') and then do everything she can to avoid them.
In the process she runs into Blackmore who protects her and that is the start of their relationship. Unfortunately in the process Holfort will be destabilised and left full of weaknesses, the people who smell the blood in the water will act ahead of schedule. I suppose this is what you would call the butterfly effect.
The worst part of all of it is that the events of the third game end up happening within the first year and not necessarily in the right order either. Our schedule has been messed up with him here, and I don't know if we can get it back on track and come out ahead at the same time.
Excerpt from Diary 1
There was an upcoming field trip planned for a couple of weeks. Yamatai was a island chain of three medium sized islands that functioned as one of the countless minor countries that surrounded Holfort proper and who relied on the Winchesters for weapons to defend from monster and pirate attacks, which appeared to be fine by them since they basically sunk their entire industry into tourism instead. Getting to whatever island that you wanted required that you book your ticket in advance however, and Leon found himself assigned a job while he was supposed to be on vacation.
"A wellness check?" Livia asked sounding concerned as Leon spoke. The three of them were still delving the dungeon together, unlike Angelica who had to go through Several Angelic arms to balance our her demonic and Angelic intake Livia had both the Gilgamesh Gauntlets and Greaves and Carmilla's Bane. That said she was confused by Leon's take away from the pamphlet for the field trip.
"Yeah. One of my cousins lives in Yamatai, my family will probably want me to check in on him while I'm over there." Leon explained while he examined the condition of his weapons.
"I'm more surprised that you have cousins." To be more accurate Angelica was more concerned that Leon's family was bigger than she had expected, considering how dangerous and powerful he himself was.
"Yeah. On my Mum's side." Leon stated bluntly and Angelica narrowed a glare.
"Your mum as in-" The one whose mother was locked in a cage since her daughter was born up until she was drafted and killed fighting someone who was trying to rescue her.
"My family is more complicated than you can imagine." Leon stated bluntly. "Half the time it reads as a horror story, and the other half of the time a deluded fever dream and right now neither of us have time for that." As Leon had said, their next target had appeared. Fairness and Fearless were angels that usually appeared together with large griffin type bodies, one was wreathed in flame and the other in lightning. "Angie."
"On it." Angelica made a motion of reaching out, grabbing something and pulling it close to her, she was draining the heat from the Fearless's body, of course the fiery monster had a lot to give so that alone wouldn't incapacitate it. Nothing was stopping the lightning spewing Fearless, until something did that is, Olivia's shining barrier manifesting to pin the Angel to the wall leaving Leon open to deal with the Fairness in a not very fair manner.
"You want to suck this one dry too Angie?" Leon asked as he cracked his knuckles to deal with the Angel.
"I think I've accumulated more than enough angelic power, but I want to try something so hold off on finishing the fiery one for a bit." So Leon went to deal with the Fearless, in the mean Angelica continued to focus on the Fairness, this time she wasn't sucking it dry, but rather pumping into it the demonic power that she received through Salamandra before she pulled out the resulting mixture into the air and attempted to concentrate it, and instead watched it burst apart as the unstable mixture that it was.
"Experimenting are we?" Leon asked as he finished off the Fearless. "I don't disapprove but I would recommend more caution personally."
"We should start making our way back. You should be able to do about a quarter of the Quests for Sarah." Dividing the Quest into several smaller sections was probably done as an act of spite towards Greg, but it was also benefiting a lot of the other students as well.
"Perhaps while we have a lull in activity you can fill us in on your Mum's relationship with her siblings." That put Leon into an awkward position where he didn't want to lie but he couldn't tell the truth either. "I don't know all the details myself, and Mum doesn't either. The best guess I can make on the matter is that the five of them were separated at birth." Which wasn't entirely untrue.
"Five!?" Olivia looked more disturbed than anything else. "You're mother is lucky to be alive. For many reasons." Well, Olivia and Angelica had a misunderstanding about what really happened but Leon wouldn't correct it.
"Let's see here, Aunt Celine was living in Alzer last I checked, she didn't have a good relationship with Mum last I checked. Auntie Chiyo is in Yamatai last I checked. I don't know where Auntie Cleo and Auntie Cali are. Rodin should know though, I'll ask him the next time I see him." Leon felt satisfied that he had given an explanation that wouldn't lead to more questions for Olivia and Angelica.
"Does your Mum's name start with C too?" Angelica did have one question left though.
"Cereza." Leon replied bluntly as he broke into a jog. "C'mon I wanna get back to the school before Supper!" Even though Leon had said that a pair of individuals were already on their way to stall them.
"Why have you dragged me into this again?" Julius had fallen behind the others. Chris suddenly revealed his affinity for lightning magic, though it might've been better if he had done so during the duel itself, Brad suddenly managed to magic his way into developing swordsmanship, and even Greg of all people had managed to grow as a person and had gotten a job as a desk jockey at the Guild, even if Julius imagined that he was experiencing hell. He and Jilk couldn't be the only ones that fell behind.
The man they had been waiting for soon made his appearance known, lugging with him a set of duel blue claws easily big enough to be used as armour parts while Angelica and Olivia followed behind.
"Oh joy." Leon's voice contained nothing of the sort. "It's Idiot One and Idiot Two." It was hard to ask someone a favour when they couldn't even be bothered to remember your name.
"Watch your tone!" Jilk snapped. "You are speaking to-!"
"Two disgraced idiots with status below commoners." Leon didn't mince his words. "Is there something you need my help with or are you merely here to annoy me?"
"Jilk has it in his head that you have something worth learning from. I disagree but I came along for moral support." Julius and Jilk watched as Leon tilted his head backwards and faced the sky mouthing something that he won't dignify with remembrance.
"Booger Man-"
"Why has your insults gotten even worse?" Jilk did not approve the Designation of 'Booger Man.'
"-what's yours and The Prince of Idiots magic affinities?" Leon looked so utterly done with life right now that he was willing to kill somebody.
"Can you do without the insults!?" Julius snapped glaring.
"You attempted to lynch my friend for a crime that never occurred. Your emotional abuse was so severe that she developed a parasite in her soul. Worse yet you have yet to acknowledge your wrong doings and apologise to her." Leon listed off Julius's various crimes with a scathing glare. "You have to work your way up from insults to the point that you become worth remembering your names."
"Don't bother extracting an apology from him." Angelica stated her tone of voice utterly done with this situation. "It only comes when he wants something from me. Like his empty quotes from his mother's romance novels it has no meaning." Julius's face twisted in a scowl.
"I guess I shouldn't be surprised that you hate me." 'I cost you your shot at the crown' is what Julius was going to say spitefully but Angelica cut him off.
"You aren't worth hating." Angelica's tone was as if she had been commenting on the weather, a simple statement of fact. "We have to discuss the School trip when you're finished with these two Leon." Angelica stated as she and Olivia walked back to the school.
Being unable to retort Angelica's dismissal Julius and Jilk followed the two with their eyes for a few long awkward moments. And then Leon grabbed them both by their collars and started dragging them off.
Jilk's affinity was water, and his specialisation was in ice, Leon handed him a Rusalka and told him to learn how to spit fire. Julius dealt in Earth and Light magic and he mainly uses it to harden his body to block blows with his sword and shield combo, Leon couldn't even give him a compatible Devil Arm since there wasn't any that naturally took on the form of a shield and he didn't want to give the idiot Livia's Gilgamesh weapon. That sadly left him with one option.
"This was his idea?" Julius asked as he looked at Brad whose overall combat abilities had dramatically improved in the recent days.
"Quite." Brad looked the part of the warrior with his training fatigues and carbon fibre body armour. Not only that but Brad had a happy look of exhaustion on his features as he downed a flask of water, a far cry from the usual Brad who would be exhausted just from swinging his sword around a few times. "We had a surprisingly lovely discussion going over support type magic, though now that I've managed to bring my physical abilities up to par I plan to begin expanding my affinities a bit."
"Expand your affinities?" Julius never heard of such a thing in his life, on the contrary they've been getting lectures for months now about how it's impossible to learn magic that you have no affinity for and focusing on magic you have a bad affinity for is foolish. "I thought it was crazy too. But I saw Angelica freeze the Pirates out of thin air." Brad stated bluntly and Julius was shocked. Angelica, who could only exclusively use fire magic, froze the pirates out of the air.
"Oi." Leon called Julius over, having brought the items that he had went for in the first place. Stones, Metals, some pig Bones from the kitchen. "Earth mage." Leon for once didn't address Julius with a insult. "Come over here and study these." Leon held out a bone for Julius. "'Detect Earth' is a basic earth type spell designed to identify the contents of a mass of Earth, informing you of mineral content, presence of metals and soil quality."
"I knew that." Julius stated bluntly. Much as he despises it he was the 'crowned prince' after all, he's gotten nothing but the best of the best for private tutors over the years, after all it wouldn't do for him to get less than perfect for his grades and embarrass his family.
"If you want to learn from me I would rather you didn't interrupt me." Leon stated bluntly. "Understanding the composition of earth means that you can change it. What kind of material do you usually use for barriers?"
"Shields." Julius stated prompting Leon to raise a suspicious brow. "Actual Shields. You won't expect me to rely on a flimsy barrier when I'm protecting Marie do you?" Leon stared wide eyed at Julius for a moment, and then smacked himself in his face. "If the thought of training me is too difficult just say so. I already know for a fact that you're only here because you want a good relationship with the crown prince!" It was hard to tell Leon's reaction at first, with his hand on his face and all that. But soon Leon wiped his hand off of his face and started letting out a full blown laugh that sent him doubling over. "What's so funny?"
"You bloody moron, you think I want a good relationship with your whore of a father and stupid mother!?" Julius was upset at the insults directed towards his mother. "Let me get one thing straight: I hate you. You are a spoiled brat who bitches and whines about how hard his life is while his subjects die fighting monsters, pirates and across every border that separates these lands from the next ones over." There was no trace of the man who was doubling over laughing now. Just a set of cold dead eyes locked into a grimace of rage.
"You have no idea what my life is like!" Julius snapped in return, his eyes containing a familiar glint.
"A spectacular Fiance, a life in the capital with no expectations of manual labour or getting mauled by monsters or shot at by Pirates, vast wealth that you can spend on a endless parade of stupid shit? No I don't know what that is like, but you are going to learn what life is like for your subjects 'your majesty' the hard way!" Leon stood up and punched Julius in his gut and threw him across the room in the process. "Steel Rebar." Leon tossed the metal in question to Julius. "Concrete block." Followed up by a cinder block. "These are the materials used in building defensive walls, and you are going to learn how to duplicate them with your magic."
"You're just using this as a excuse to beat me up!" Julius snapped accusingly.
"What's your point?" Leon Punctuated his question with his foot in Julius's face. "I'm gonna count to ten, I suggest you get a decent barrier up before I hit you again."
Review Section:
RonaldM40196867: Fair. They have their pros and cons. Not likely, I have plans all the way up to the third arc in the light novel.
Chronos0305: No they won't. Not all of it no, but most of Leon's arsenal revolves around his demons.
hnh058513: Agreed.
Guest: Already taken care of.
RedRat8: They're considering it.