"YOU STUPID MEAT WITTED IDIOT! YOU HAD A HOLE IN YOUR CHEST BIG ENOUGH TO FIT MY FIST THROUGH!" As Angelica had said, Leon had a injury that on any one else would've been fatal, and if they weren't in a place that the mana was so dense that Leon basically had a unlimited supply of mana to pair together with his hair patching his internal organs it would've been. He was left in a state in which he was literally hanging on by a thread. But now he was alive and whole which means that the time for 'worried out of her mind' Angelica had passed. Now was the time for 'pissed beyond understanding' Angelica. "WHO IN THEIR RIGHT MIND FIGHT'S ARMOURED KNIGHTS ON FOOT!?"
Olivia put Angelica's Kimono on her shoulders, a fact that managed to pour a bucket of cold water onto Angelica's head and remind her that she was straddling Leon's waist and slamming her fists into what was left of Leon's chest while butt naked.
"Needless to say I am quite crossed with you!" Angelica got off of Leon and put her Kimono on as she continued. "I hope you have a good explanation of the semblance of a plan you executed."
"Well sense 'abandon everyone but you and Olivia and bail' got taken off the table." Angie was mildly concerned that it was on the table to begin with. "So I went with plan B which was 'arm classmates, wipe Principality, go home and order a pizza.'" A vein visibly popped in Angelica's forehead. "Needless to say that plan went the way of the ancient civilisation the moment the Black Knight and his Kilometre long cleaver showed up."
"To be fair I'm given to understand he has that effect." Angelica looked off to the side awkwardly. "You're not off the hook for making us worried by the way."
"Got it got it." Leon stated as he let out a sigh. "So we talking about what we're going to do about the Principality now?"
"Um Excuse me." Olivia was already wearing her own Kimono, someone, probably Jenna, had left hers and Angelica's outside their door for them. "We almost just died now. Can we take a breather for a while?"
Both Angelica and Leon breathed a sigh at the same time, Leon falling backwards into his bed.
"Are you okay?" Angelica asked looking at Leon suspiciously.
"It would be faster to list the parts of my body that don't hurt than to list the ones that do." Leon complained with the eyes of a dead-fish. "You two?"
"Normally going that close to sea level would give us both a serious case of mana poisoning. Luckily we had an absurdly efficient mana gobbler sucking up all the mana in the area." Leon put a finger on his chest. "Yes you!" Angelica snapped her eye twitching. "Do you know how many people are looking for you so that they can go to the ocean and salvage ships and Armours?"
"Can we not talk about work for a while?" Olivia asked in a whine. Leon and Angelica looked at each other for a moment before turning back to Olivia.
"Do we do anything for fun other than run dungeons?" Leon wasn't exactly in the best shape to go into a dungeon at the moment. It took Angelica a moment to think about it.
"If I use the other girls as a reference point then the answer is sex with their servants-" Olivia turned beat red, not at the thought of those people having sex, but rather having it with Leon or Angelica. So strike one. "-beating up and mugging the male students-" Leon thought about it but it didn't seem like a good idea. "-and finally a Tea party." A few moments later the three were sitting around a table that the Twins had brought in, eating snacks and tea that they had prepared. And while it was obvious that Olivia and Angelica were enjoying themselves Leon was not. So strike three.
"There's also the option of trying on new clothes and jewellery but..." But they all were already wearing new clothes, as for new jewellery there was one that had come to mind.
"Ready Angie?" Leon was currently sitting on the chair next to his bed, Leon using a needle to pierce through Angie's belly button. Angelica, piece of wood in her mouth as something for her to bite down on, nodded before she cringed uncomfortably as the needle was put through. "Livia, if you would." Olivia applied healing magic to the wound, not to close the hole but rather to let the natural process of making a hole for the piercing to occupy accelerate and take place. "And done." For the final touch Leon replaced the needle with the piercing. Angelica went to the mirror in the room to admire herself and the heart shaped piercing dangling from her abdomen while Olivia took her place. "You look nervous." Leon replied and Olivia nodded as she bit down on the gag she had shared with Angelica. "Don't worry I'll be Gentle." Leon stated as Angelica walked back over and sat on the foot of the bed, her good mood suddenly ruined as she noticed a change in Leon.
"So you can't even give a reaction to me but Olivia makes you hard?" Angelica stated indicating the bulge in Leon's pants, thoroughly insulted of course.
"Truth?" Leon asked making sure that this was an answer Angelica wanted to hear.
"That is what I'm asking for." Angelica made her displeasure known.
"I'm a sadist." Leon replied as if he was talking about something obvious. "I enjoy embarrassing my partner and I like the idea of using pain to stimulate them."
"Implying that you have slept with other women before." Angelica questioned bluntly.
"More accurately read the act being done while pleasuring myself." Angelica of all people is quite aware of the power of the written word. "My parents having the hobbies that they do encourages all of us to do some self exploring, so that we don't hurt ourselves or our eventual partners." Leon explained as he shrugged his shoulders. "You two?"
Olivia blushed profusely as she shook her head in the negative.
"...I've been encouraged to explore myself." Angelica blushed lightly as she talked about something that didn't concern her. "I was expected to sleep with Julius while we were at the academy together, producing children when we graduated." With that Angelica dropped her Kimono altogether. "Perhaps I should use this as a opportunity then, since you're stimulated and all that. I even have a piercing that you seem to like playing with, and perhaps some stimulation will help Olivia over come her shyness." Angelica laid down on the bed, Kimono opened up along with her legs. As Leon was about to take her up on that offer.
"Waka." Left's voice accompanied a knock. "The Queen is here to see you." Of course she is!
Mylene stared ahead at one of the most dangerous opponents she has ever had to face off against on the battlefield of politics. Blackmore was wearing the injuries of the recent battle on his sleeve, which had been folded up indicating where his family had to amputate his arm. There was red glow underneath his white shirt, some kind of demonic treatment by his family she presumed, along with a black eye patch over his face, according to Olivia one of his eyes had been gouged out during the brawl that took place on the ship before the Principality revealed itself. That was another political headache that she would have to deal with, as opposed to Leon's internal argument with his cousin or the fight with the Black Knight the majority of his injuries were incurred as a result of fighting with his classmates, nobles of her country, at least one of which has severely impacted his ability to fight against the Black Knight.
Angelica and Olivia were wearing the Gold on Red and White on Blue Kimonos that they likely picked up in Yamatai, Angelica already placed orders for their replacement uniforms, hers burnt from her magic and Olivia's torn from fighting the Fanossian monsters and her classmates, they had no visible injuries but they also had the singularly strongest healer since the Saintess.
"For one thing. What happened?" Mylene didn't forget that this meeting was taking place on Leon's ship, a heavily fortified warship that was possessed and controlled by a demon under his command. But Leon was that badly injured that not even the healers brought in from the church wanted to risk moving him far.
"As I understand it while we were all still in Alzer Two of my followers were approached by people working with Fanoss." Angelica started the conversation off. "They claimed they were part of Frampton's faction but we have nothing but their word to go off by." The word of Two Traitors. "My father is planning to punish them harshly."
The Convenient thing about Leon pissing off so many women was that so many of them, the ones who were still alive, were being gathered into one place near a active war-zone, the likelihood that they'd be wiped out soon anyway was high.
"I suggested going easy on them." Leon raised his remaining hand in order to speak, Olivia nodding her head in agreement.
"I find that surprising." Julius was nearly beaten to death from Leon's grudge but two self admitted blatant traitors were deserving of Mercy? Mylene was questioning the double standards at play here.
"Fanoss has weapons designed to screw with people's minds on a massive scale." Leon stated bluntly. "The kinds that rip out happy thoughts and leave behind the worst possible parts of you."
"Similar to the exorcism that you performed on Angie?" The Queen questioned and Leon nodded in response.
"To be clear: father has only spared their lives." Angelica clarified bluntly. None of Angelica's former followers who were on board the ship would be returning to the academy, not the two girls who lured in the Principality, not the boys who attacked and crippled Leon, not the other girls who attacked Olivia. None of these individuals would be receiving the position of heirs to their respective families that they once were promised, most of them would likely ride on their recent achievements in battle into the military, but at least they wouldn't be used as sex slaves like Antoinette and the others. The ones that weren't Angie's followers would likely be getting promotions.
"Right then." That was a horror show waiting to unfold. "During the battle itself. One of you led the defensive battle against the Principality, a second of you destroyed the Principalities fleet, and a third managed to duel the Black Knight, and somewhere along the way you three thought it was a good idea to take the Princess of Fanoss hostage."
"I didn't lead the defensive battle." Olivia corrected, though she wasn't looking Mylene in the eyes either. "I just erected a barrier and blocked all of the monster attacks, it was Leon's weapons that did most of the damage." Olivia pointedly ignored how she deliberately created choke points in her barriers, directed the capture of several enemy monsters that she then used as a energy source, and slaughtered a vast number of enemies using the weapons loaned to her, which were empowered by the Red orbs that she had gathered together during the fight.
"That's not what your fellow students seem to think." Mylene stated tapping her fingers on her folded arms. "At this point in time Knight Hood is the bare minimum that you deserve." Olivia squeaked in horror at those words. "Now than Angelica. I've heard that your extensive training with magic under Blackmore are paying off."
"Yes, it is. I believe that I've grasped wind and ice fully and I understand how to manipulate Lightning as well now." Which was impressive, as Rodin didn't even give her a wind manipulating Devil arm to train with, though it was on the list he had given her. "I'll need more practice with Lightning as well though, it doesn't always work the way that I want."
"That's not what I meant." Mylene just let out a sigh as she face palmed herself.
"After we were hit with the effects of the Principalities weapon they arrived at the ship itself looking for hostages and intent on eliminating the people that had no value for them." Which included Olivia. "I stepped forward to protect them, and for the opportunity to converse with my captors and derive some means of determining their purpose." Angelica explained, the air about her that of someone knowing that they did no wrong.
"Did you?" Mylene asked suspiciously.
"Yes. I determined that they wanted to slander my family's reputation, execute a promising batch of adventurers and future noble men-" Leon Snorted at that comment. "-and I was able to find the artefact that they had been using to control the monsters, which I destroyed during my rampage. I took Hertrude hostage in the chaos and used her as a shield as well, between myself and the defensive battle Olivia has been fighting we were able to eliminate most of the monsters and most of the Fleet. That would've been when Leon came in and snatched up both of us, in the case of Hertrude it would've been because I was holding her close at the time. For the How I applied the magic I showed you before, absorbing the heat from the environment to freeze up the enemy forces, wind to wreak havoc, and a new one that I've only just been able to grasp: lightning."
"Right. How did you get lightning from fire?" Mylene asked brow twitching. "You generated such a huge storm we had thought that the Principality was avoiding the area, instead of the storm being dropped directly onto their heads."
"I filtered the energy in the fire, one I painted onto the enemy ships, and later the Black Knight, while spreading the rest among the clouds which triggered a chain reaction with the environment." Angelica stated leaning her chin into her fist.
"Can this be taught?"
"It's not easy to learn but I believe it's doable. Leon was able to prepare excellent aids for me to study." Angelica stated lightly.
"Which now leads us to the most troublesome individual here." Mylene stated as her eyes landed on Leon.
"After getting the snot kicked out of us by your esteemed noblemen me and Olivia were locked in a cage, I broke us out, but at a considerable cost." Leon held up the stump of his arm.
"How does losing an arm correlate to escaping?" Mylene was just confused by this turn of events.
"The limiter my god father slapped on my wrist to keep me from killing your worthless noblemen was attached to my wrist, I had to remove it, and attempted to rather crudely reconnect it, not only did it snap off during the fight but the strain damaged the rest of my arm too. By the way I won't be getting another limiter." Holfort could no longer be trusted to keep Leon, who had been weakening himself, safe, let alone trying to heal and recover from his injuries.
"Where did you get the weapons from?" Mylene asked making her blatant suspicion known. Angelica had warned Leon not to share the 'instant transportation magic' at all costs. No it didn't matter that it had limits, no it did not matter that it was only to and from Rodin's bar, he absolutely, positively, could not reveal this to anyone, and Angelica knew that Olivia wouldn't too. Even if Angelica trusted Mylene, and given how she had attempted to manipulate her feelings in the past that trust was waning, she didn't trust the members of her inner circle nearly enough to share such important information with them.
"I have lots of weapons that I carry around with me." Leon waved his remaining arm around and produced a familiar shotgun.
"From the reports I've received you've only ever used three of them though." Mylene questioned suspiciously.
"It's only natural that I would use the weapons I'm most proficient with. I train with the others in my spare time and pick out the ones I like to use." Leon stated as he shrugged his shoulders. "Though I probably won't be doing that for a while." Several of the weapons he brought with him had been lost in the ocean, not to mention Olivia feeding them enough orbs to let them regain their former forms, so Rodin had the pieces of his collection he had to find and round up. "I flew over on Chimera to rescue Angelica after making sure the cowards weren't going to die or runaway."
"The reports mention your thoroughly insulting your classmates before throwing a bunch of weapons at them and flying off to fight the Principality." Mylene stated making her confusion known.
"As I said, I made sure that they wouldn't die or run away." Leon reiterated the sentence with annoyance. "After I grabbed Angelica that Bastard came out of nowhere and attacked me!" Leon suddenly looked like he was remembering something traumatic. "He kept attacking me over and over again, and when I kept blocking or dodging his attacks he turned that bloody sharp edged kilometer on the cruise ship instead!" Leon held his head as he let out his complaints one after another.
"But you were able to win correct?" Mylene asked and even she was scared of the words that were coming out of her mouth.
"You call this winning!?" Leon snapped as he gestured to his arm stump.
"Any battle you can run away from as the saying goes." An unfamiliar man entered the room, good quality leather armour and a sword on his hip.
"Cyrus I told you to wait outside!" Mylene scolded, she had already reached the limits of her stress for one afternoon.
"Forgive me my queen, I couldn't wait to meet the young man who had fought the Black Knight toe to toe." The man named Cyrus stated as he beamed happily at Leon.
"You should stay Sir Sword Saint." Angelica suddenly piped up. "Leon was just about to give the insights he was able to pick up while fighting the Black Knight."
"Huu. He has an affinity for Shadow magic like I do, both his armour plating and his sword are Devil Arms, if I'm not mistaken they should be called Masamune. He neutralises magic attacks by absorbing their energy and his sword eats things like halos, orbs and human flesh." Leon pulled down his shirt to reveal his heavily bandaged chest that was glowing. "The only way to beat him is with non magical attacks, melee, bullets and hitting them with natural disasters like Angelica did." So naturally, The Black Knight trained himself to be able to deal with his weaknesses, and had the talent to match, so now swordsmanship was his area of specially and his magic was nothing more than a tool to force people to play according to his rules. "There's more. Near the end of the fight he Devil Triggered." Though Leon said that, the people here didn't know what that means. "It layman's terms, it's a technique that only demons and demonic hybrids are supposed to be able to use."
"Implying that the Black Knight is one such hybrid." Mylene finished the thought for Leon. "You've done us a great service, and provided the Black Knight is still alive provided us with invaluable information."
"If Rodin and Kraken haven't found the body by now, then we should assume he's still alive." Kraken was the name of the demon Rodin was employing to search the bottom of the ocean for the Devil Arms, it was a demon that was native to the poisonous sea of Inferno, one of the few in their arsenal suitable to travelling the depths of the ocean. If Mylene hasn't already then she should make a request to search for the Black Knight's body or armour at the bottom of the ocean. Leon had told Rodin about the Black Knight's Devil arm, at the minimum Rodin would be looking to add the Masamune to his private collection. The worst case scenario for Leon though was if the Black Knight was dead. "If the Black Knight is being possessed by a demon though, then being dead means that we aren't going to be rid of him, it just means that he finishes his transition into a demon himself."
"Are you serious!?" Mylene went pale. Vandel Van Zim was enough of a horror as a human, let alone what he would be capable of as a monster.
"Left." A familiar black Mass emerged from the floor. "The transcript from the interrogation."
Hertrude Sera Rault: So is Lord Vandel Dead?
Angelica Rapha Redgrave: We don't know. We haven't found the body.
Hertrude: A pity.
Angelica: A pity? You are sad that your strongest warrior isn't dead?
Hertrude: At Vandel's own request, I have used the Angel flute to repeatedly extract all trace of angelic essence from his being, not only that but we have also repeatedly cut him with a sloth's blades of rage. Angel's are no longer born from his being, anything that ever resembles hope, happiness or a desire for peace has been ripped from his being and replaced by wrath, he is beyond the point where anything resembling the angelic is left inside of him. Your friend is the same way isn't he? A monster wearing human skin? I've no idea how you did it but I can tell that your family have worked hard on it. I imagine you're happy too. All the work you've put into him is paying off!
Transcript of Hertrude Sera Rault's interrogation aboard the Umbra
Mylene's hands were changing colour she was gripping them so hard.
"This flute..."
"Shattered during my rampage and scattered to the ocean." Angelica stated simply. "What we should be more concerned about is the one that the Principality still has."
"There's two of them?" Mylene had went pale at the news.
"The Flute Hertrude has produces angels, but the enemy force predominantly consisted of demons." Angelica pointed out and made her own conjecture. "If there's a flute that can create and control Angels then theoretically there should be a flute that produces and commands demons instead." Near as Angelica could tell, the demon flute wasn't among the debris of Fanoss's fleet, and Hertrude looked like she was controlling them, both flutes could have the ability to control the monsters the flutes produced but a more likely explanation was that the one who is really controlling the demons gave a order of 'follow Hertrude's commands exactly.' "Given the number of demons that they had it's only logical that they're using such a flute."
"Huu. Right there are some matters that are left to attend to." Mylene looked ahead at Leon a clear feeling of dread on her features.
"Congratulations, Count Blackmore for your successful Promotion."
"Oh really...?" A chill went down Olivia's spine, Leon's hair went wild, a black paw gripped the back of the couch as several heads started to appear. The room was too small for Chimera's whole body, but there won't be any problems to just summon their most notable features. Thus the heads of three demonic monsters appeared behind Leon, while the fourth in the form of a snake circled around back and hissed at Mylene and the sword saint. "I don't remember conquering any territory lately. Could it be that you've decided to repay my efforts to clean up the mess you've made by giving me a Tax Hike? Is that what you're saying?"
"I can see why you had me standing guard." Cyrus Fia Arclight, Sword Saint, strongest Knight in the Holfort Kingdom, took a step backwards and put his hand on his sword as he was stared down by a heavily wounded, one armed boy the same age as his son and his pet monster.
"This is a contract signed by the Roseblade family." Mylene held out a thick bundle of papers across the table. The Black snake snapped down on the Contract and passed it over to Leon who took it with his remaining hand. "They've launched an expedition to discover a sufficient quantity of floating islands to fill in the missing land you are currently short on, and have agreed to hand that territory over to you one year from today, or they will subtract the necessary territory from their own."
"Deidre and Dorothea's family?" Olivia remembered both of the sisters from the ship and Leon's cafe respectively. "You left quite the impression on young Deidre. Her family is... eccentric but deeply values honour." Mylene explained, but she turned away mid way through.
"Why are you avoiding eye contact?" Leon asked making his suspicions blatantly clear.
"Before that Leon can you call them off? They're pretty hard on Olivia." Angelica stated as Leon looked up and realised that his demon was still there.
"Right right." Leon waved his arm and Chimera unraveled and went away. "Despite how I'm acting, I'm still a wounded person, if there's nothing else we have to talk about I have to go lie down and get my wounds tended to."
"We'd like to take Hertrude into our custody." Mylene stated bluntly.
"Sure sure." With that The annoying people left, and that just left the three of them to go over the boons of the battle.
The Angel summoning flute, which right now was being kept in a custom case with a second slot prepared inside of it.
"I didn't think that you would want something that is supposed to be so heavily connected to the angels." Angelica stated as she looked on at the case, the one that seemed to confirm her suspicions about the second flute.
"The flutes were originally created by the Umbran and Lumen clans, one of them were ours to begin with." Leon locked the case as he prepared to put it away. "When the clans started to kill each other large numbers of our artefacts were lost and scattered, the survivors were hunted down and killed and the rest of our artefacts were stolen from us." This wasn't about hoarding weapons, they had lots of those already, and they could use them with much greater ease than this. This was cultural reclamation and if Leon had any say in the matter he'd have every one of them returned to their people.
"Are you going to be okay Leon?" Olivia asked looking at Leon who was making heavy movements.
"I'm alright. I'm just concerned." Leon stated as he sat in the back of a chair.
"What about?" Angelica asked looking concerned.
"Where did Hertrude's demons come from?" Leon asked a question that Angelica theorised before and Leon seemingly answered. "From whom have the Principality been extracting the negative emotions and mana that would become the demons? And now that they've lost a fleet what are they going to do to replace it?" Leon's question left the two girls confused for a period of time, Angelica seemed to clue in on the matter first with Olivia going pale with the same revelation.
"Let's change the subject!" Olivia squeaked in fear. Even if they were to make this revelation public, it wouldn't change much, aside from inducing unnecessary pity for the people of Fanoss. "I wanted to ask you about some of the magic the cross has been teaching me!"
Among the so-called witch hunters, one of the organisations that had been the most prominent had been the Brotherhood of Light. Acquiring the scraps of notes of magic from Umbran and Lumen texts they carefully pieced this information together and invented their own form of magic. Light and Shadow do not refer to elements to them but rather the act of splitting the angelic and demonic power innate to what we know as magical power to grant its unique properties.
Light, or angelic, magic takes life away from enemies, using it to heal the wielder, Shadow, or demonic, induces enhanced damage and infests the wounds making them harder to heal.
The Process of filtering this energy expels the unused energy as a waste product, which is unfortunate but ultimately necessary as if not expelled this energy could induce horrific mutations into the body, these issues might be mitigated by either skilfully wielding both magics at once or rapidly switching between the two. This power can also be used defensively as well, Shadow repels Shadow, Light repels Light, conversely Shadow Neutralises Light and Light Neutralises Shadow returning the energy back into ordinary magic. Crude and Bastardised as it is, the brotherhood's particular style of magic isn't without benefits and is worth learning more about.
Jeanne Blackmore on Other Magic utilising organisations
Various High Ranking Noblemen within Holfort had been gathered together in order to discuss the recent attack by the Principality.
"Obviously the Principality is making moves against us again!" Vincent spoke with authority on the matter. "They've made an obvious attempt to frame my household and drive us further into civil war! Such things can only be responded to in one way!"
"Do not forget that the army of Holfort is not yours to command Vincent." Sat on the far end of the table from the Duke was the Minister of Defence Marquis Malcolm Rapha Frampton. He was a older man, long grey hair and a face marred by age and scars. A fellow 'victim' of the Principalities frame job, though unlike Vincent it wasn't Frampton's son who was put into danger. "Before you talk about invasion you should consider looking into your own house."
"Yes. The two traitors. I assure you I have dealt with them appropriately." Vincent replied dismissively.
"Not who I was talking about." Vincent narrowed a glare at his rival, Frampton was a known schemer after all, even if he was a moderately competent general. "Recent events have shed light on your daughter's boyfriend, Blackmore." Frampton stated as he brought up the file that was at his side. "Not all of it is good."
"Do tell." Not that Frampton needed Vincent's permission, but it was better to know what the fool was scheming now and deal with it as soon as possible.
"I am referring to Blackmore's relationship with the Black Knight of Fanoss." Frampton started laying out sheets of paper onto the table as he revealed the extent of his scheme. "The two both have an affinity for the rare Shadow Element, as revealed during the recent battle, and possess the ability to manipulate dungeon drops in a way that no human should be able to. Something that he has in common with his opponent, Blackmore." The people present cringed at that. Legends tell of ancient blood magic that could identify lineage by blood alone, but it's been a long time since the old days, these days when there's doubt as to whose child belongs to whom it's usually wise to check people's affinities for magic, and here were two individuals who had the same ridiculously rare affinity for magic.
"You forget that it was Blackmore who chased off the Black Knight!" Vincent stated, throwing himself headlong into Frampton's trap.
"Blackmore and your daughter yes." Frampton stated as if what he was saying was obvious, and followed up with an equally obvious statement. "Tell me which is more likely 'A pair of first year children defeated the most potent swordsman in two kingdoms, one matching him in a test of melee, the other dealing a finishing blow with magic against a opponent who is explicitly immune to magic attacks' Or 'The Fanoss family, conspired with their plant inside of the Country in order to stage a fight to make them look good and increase their prestige?'" Looks of horror went through the entire room, even Vincent's eyes flashed briefly with recognition.
"What proof do you have for your groundless accusation!?"
"Blackmore had a absurd number of weapons with him on what he should've thought to be a school field trip, where aside from reportedly getting into a fight with his cousin he apparently had no use for them. Blackmore, the son of 'Wandering Merchants' suddenly appears out of nowhere, no apparent connections of allegiances aside from a irrational hatred of the Crown prince, and proceeds to humiliate the royal family while continuously working to build influence with different noble families and in one swift move destroyed over a dozen prestigious families." Frampton cocked a brow while spreading his arms apart, and murmuring had already spread throughout the room. "It's out of my hands Vince." The Duke Redgrave sincerely doubted that. "I have no other choice but to put Blackmore under investigation." Frampton had a unique talent for spitting objectively true facts but making them sound like complete and utter lies.
Erica and Luxion were sitting together in Erica's room/private office as they discussed the contents of the reports in the aftermath of the Principalities attack. While everyone was focusing on Leon as the MVP Erica had zeroed in on another individual entirely. Olivia had demonstrated magic on a level that should only be possible with the three Key Items.
"We'll have to re-examine everything that we know about the Key items from the beginning without any of my previous life biases." Erica stated bluntly as she let out a exhausted sigh.
"I have been doing that from the beginning." Luxion stated bluntly. "Based on everything that I know about magic, those items have nothing to do with enhancing Olivia's capacity for magic."
"Yes." Erica picked up a report from Marie.
"But referencing our 'Saintess' has provided us with some relevant insight." Simply put: Marie has no free time. Her life was a constant battle of managing her group's expenses and income, dungeon diving, and keeping the five fools pacified, she barely has any time to study and has no free time for herself. Erica couldn't remember all the details but it smelled vaguely of Olivia's situation from the game. "Olivia would've never had the time to learn the spells that she used in the game."
"Meaning that what the 'Key Items' actually were doing was grant Olivia the knowledge to utilise her immense magical potential." Luxion suggested, his synthesised voice failed to convey his horror. Knowledge was within the realm of the mind, and objects that alter the mind represents one of the most crippling security threats in the kingdom. "With the premise of the Key Items tampering with her mind we need to re-examine all of 'Olivia's' actions from the moment she got the first item."
Angelica once Theorised that if Julius had met Olivia as he was intended to then her innate brainwashing power would've dialled up any affection he felt for her up to eleven, as it would've for the other four fools as well. They would force their affections onto her, rack up expenses in her name such as a demi-human servant, and force her to dungeon dive to pay for them, then would come the natural conclusion of those relationships that Olivia would be forced to go through with, as many as five times over if she was particularly unlucky.
"Starting from the trip where she found the Bracelet, 'Olivia's' personality takes a sharp 180 degree turn, it was generally presumed that nearly getting killed caused her to develop some bite as a coping mechanism. One of the things she was particularly notable for doing was arranging for the people who pushed her into a trap in the dungeon to have an 'unfortunate accident.'" Erica explained as she held her chin. It was a reasonable, logical course of action for someone to take after nearly being killed.
But...
"I have signed testimony from Olivia advocating for the three Followers who had set up the cruise ship to be attack by the principality and everyone on board to be killed, including her, be given leniency." Luxion even provided a hologram of the documents as proof. Given the fact that Olivia was one of the three individuals who contributed the most to the entire situation she'd likely be successful too. In other words having people killed out of spite or for the sake of personal safety is not something that Olivia would do of her own accord.
"We need to re-examine the three Key Items with the presumption that they belong to some kind of malevolent intelligence."
The Kingdom's army got wiped in the game, which is what forced the final battle against the God of the Earth from Fanoss. Erica has seen the Kingdom's army first hand, they're not so incompetent to lose so easily, not unless say a influential figure was maliciously rearranging the formations with the intention of having as many people as possible killed in the ensuing cross fire. The relationships with the five heirs also inflicted huge amounts of damage to the Kingdom as well. Yes it's entirely possible that 'Olivia' tripped the initial relationship flags, but she actively maintained those relationships no matter how damaging they turned out for the Internal politics of the Kingdom. The Ultimate conclusion that could be reached was:
"The Key Items, or someone controlling them, are enemies!" Erica let out a growl at the revelation.
"Worse yet, that little prepubescent slut is following their script!" Luxion followed up the conclusion with his own.
Review Section:
RonaldM40196867: I'm not really that interested in Medieval history, I read up on weapons as needed for my fight scenes.
Guest: It's not a solid argument to make. Vincent only has the words of three traitors to go off of, and the three traitor's only have the word of the people who approached them to go off of. If the goal is to cause Holfort to break out in to Civil war then sowing discord between obvious rivals is a sound thing to do.
RedRat8: Column A Column B, part of what made this chapter so long is that I went back and added some bonding moments at the beginning.
Dakota Bruder: Julius and Marie's both. Overall I'd rate the feeling as 'pretty unpleasant.'
Guest2: True.
Mogthegnome: Sorry you feel that way.