7,6,2024 -grammar fixes
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Clad under the luminous light of the midnight sun, a cloaked young man, white locks billowing in the nighttime summer breeze, trudged towards a once-temple of religious worship: one constructed in a time long before the gods had descended to the Gekai.
He wore a black cloak that covered most of his body, leaving only a patch of short white hair and refractive, dreaey rubellite eyes that practically glowed with a single-minded glimmer in the darkness.
Standing in front of the stone arc, he pushed open the dilapidated, dusty door of one of several abandoned churches that resided in Daedalus Street, the 'Slums' of the Labyrinth city Orario, revealing what remained of its former glory.
Rows upon rows of mouldy, moss-ridden wooden benches were scattered randomly across the hallway as if a teenagers' clothes in their room. The walls retained only a fraction of what they once were as mother nature began to consume the millennia-old relic as vines and moss seeped through the seams and cracks of stone and brick.
Stepping in front of the broken cross-altair, he was basked in a circular ring of luminescent moonlight that shone through the shattered, mosaic glass window framed above the main door.
Yes.
This was the former home of the Hestia Familia -His home. The home Bell Cranel was raised in by the Goddess of the Hearth, his adoptive mother.
Descending the wooden spiral that led into the basement of the church, each step resulting in a song of creaks, the cacophony ended as his foot made contact with the stone floor. He unlatched the buckle of his mantle forged from the hide of deep-level monsters and carelessly tossed it towards the green and yellow striped couch on the far left side of the room. The albino watched as it would miss and land half-draped on the small coffee table at the fore of the couch.
A sigh escaped his dry lips as he loosened the rest of the straps of his armour gripping his limbs, each piece clattering to the floor one after the other. Bell got comfortable laying down on the couch. As he stared up at the ceiling solemnly, he soon drifted off to sleep reminiscing about his life; his badges of failure.
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Upon receiving his falna at the age of 7 from Hestia, Bell manifested a skill that increased his Excelia gain by leaps and bounds, never before seen.
In the months following his enrollment with the guild, any previous records of level-ups were completely destroyed in the Astrapi's wake, drawing the gaze and ire of many adventurers and familia alike.
What was once hate and spite turned to respect after Bell took part in the war against the 'Evil Gods' who plunged the Labyrinth city into chaos under the name: Evilus.
15 years ago following the defeat of history's Greatest and first two familia: The Zeus and Hera familia to the One-Eyed Black Dragon, they were reduced to less than a hundredth of their original glory and were banished from Orario not even a week after by the third and fourth strongest familia's of Loki and Freya who sook to usurp their power for their own.
The Zeus and Hera familia were irreplaceable. They upheld the peace and safety of Orario with their plethora of first class adventurers, however in the chaos left by the loss of over half of Orario's power, Evilus used it to their advantage and plunged the city into a 'Dark Age' of crime and violence. None would be spared. Not civilians, not adventurers, and certainly not the gods.
A massive battle occurred in the city 2 years ago which lasted for a week and would go down in the labyrinth city's history as the 'Seven Dark Days'.
This week of seemingly perpetual sorrow and suffering ended with the 'Great Feud' on the seventh day, through the defeat of the 'Silence' Alfia in the middle levels of the dungeon and the 'Predator' Zard, both of who were former level 7 adventurers of the Hera and Zeus familia respectively.
To the masses, these two irreplaceable legends were traitors, unsurmountable walls of terrorism who spitefully destroyed their city. To a certain Goddess of Justice, her children, and a white haired rabbit however, these two were martyrs that sacrificed themselves to reap an age of new heroes who could take their place.
In the days following the Great Feud, it was decided by the guild to announce a complete subjugation of Evilus's forces which served to uplift the morale of the city and townsfolk.
During this time, the Hestia familia had gained new members in the form of a familia which lost their god in the midst of Evilus's attacks and in the following months, rose through the ranks of the city.
Two months ago, the Hestia familia had to take a required expedition from the guild down to the lower levels of the dungeon. Midway through the expedition, the rest of his familia was separated from Bell and massacred in cold steel.
In a blind fury, he lashed out at his attackers, laying waste and nearly destroying an entire floor of the dungeon. However amidst the fray, -A demon was summoned; a pitch-black emissary of death thats cold, red eyes became the last thing you could see before being cleaved by crescent-black scythes.
None would be at the mercy of the dungeon's executioner, its personal assassin. The two sides were all but helpless in the face of 'death'.
Drenched in sweat, his tears and the blood of his family, Bell had managed to escape the banquet of calamity and returned to the surface, but as a shell of his former self. No matter how much Hestia tried to console him, he wouldn't budge.
He was depressed, downcast and dejected.
Depressed at his failure at saving them.
Downcast because of the loss of his loved ones.
Dejected from his weakness.
Guilt-ridden and overcome with grief and rage at his own incapability,
-Something deep inside him snapped.
Morals, dreams, future -None of it mattered anymore.
They would pay, and the Astrapi would make sure of it.
News of the tragedy that killed the Hestia familia and the disappearance of their captain would be heard across the Labyrinth city.
Where some frowned in pity and some grinned in joy, Hestia never gave up and kept searching for her son, still feeling the single, thin, dwindling string that made him a part of her familia -her family.
Over the course of a single month, several businesses and familia would be put down by the white-haired adventurer's onyx-black blade. None would be spared from the Astrapi's blind vengeance, like how none could escape that monster's claws.
Had you even a single conversation with any member of Evilus, the Astrapi's blade would find its way to your neck.
Any group with even the slightest connection to Evilus was massacred.
Numerous people sighted the Astrapi standing in a ring of mutilated, bloodied bodies. A first-class adventurer was loose in the city on a murder-spree. In response to the concern of the citizens, the guild had no choice but to place an ever-increasing bounty on the Astrapi despite the higher-ups and a few familia knowing the true nature of his crusade.
Many greedy adventurers saw the opportunity to strike it rich and attacked the former-captain, seeking to take the 180 million valis bounty for themselves. How easy it could have been for them to be killed too, however they were not affiliated with Evilus. Despite how persistent and unrelenting they were in making his life even more difficult, the embers of his justice that remained compelled Bell to spare them.
All of this would come to an end the following day. Through his purge of Evilus, the remnants should there have been any, had all congregated at a stronghold north of Orario.
Perhaps it was reckless to dive headfirst into the belly of the dragon, but Bell didn't care anymore. He was lonely, solitary and tired, oh so, so tired. Tired from how long this farce had gone on for and simply wished it to be over.
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"Captain!" An arm flew.
"AAAAGHH..! Damn you!" A body bisected.
"N-no…I don't wanna di-" The cracking of bones under heel.
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It was a dream. Yes, only a dream. One that he relived night after night after night after night. One so vivid he felt as if he had been transported back to that very moment.
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"Lucia watch out!" A girl cried as her body was skewered by fang.
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-And each time, he tried and tried and tried and tried again and again and again.
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"Please make this count…!" The mage murmured, pouring her very last breath into her spell.
.
But, it wasn't enough. It was never enough.
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"I'm sorry, Bell." The vice captain smiled.
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He was never enough.
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"Aaaaaaahhhh!"
His flooding eyes shot open as he was greeted by the nostalgic, crumbling stone ceiling in the basement of the church. No matter how long he lived, Bell was sure he would never forget this sight.
As he sat up, he wiped his eyes with the sleeve of his black shirt, finding it similarly clinging to his body in cold sweat. After wiping his eyes off with the inside of his wrists, Bell dragged himself to his feet, picking up the pieces of his armour off the floor before tightening the leather straps around his limbs.
Bell reached into his rugged sack, retrieving a highly detailed map of Orario. The map had several crosses all across the cities, marking hideouts, factories and strongholds that he had taken out on his crusade. Among the many crosses on the sheet of paper, there was a single circle left unmarked north of the map. On normal maps this location would have lead to a normal magic stone factory, however under the surface it was a massive hub that manufactured, sold and produced illegal goods.
After confirming his route, he rolled the paper and placed it back into his bag. The Astrapi leaned over, picking up a straight, onyx-black sword and unsheathing it from its scabbard.
The longsword, Vesta, was a gift from his goddess to him when he became an adventurer. It was a one-of-a-kind weapon that was bound to him, grew as he did, and as such would never break should he stay alive.
Vesta was as black as the night and roughly 110 celches long including the handle. The blade was completely straight and had an edge on only one side, measuring 90 celches and had runes engraved into its surface that would illuminate a light blue with a light hum whenever it was in his palms. Vesta had no cross quillons, only a rectangular block that separated the blade from the grip and was more akin to ones on knives. Similarly to the "quillon", the grip was also rectangular however there were small indentations that improved grip.
Returning Vesta to its scabbard, Bell equipped it to his hip before checking that the vials of health, mana and stamina potions were properly secured to his thigh under his armour. The Astrapi swung his mantle around his shoulders, latching the buckle around his neck and swinging the large hood over his head.
As he left the church, he turned to look back at the crumbling building. The albino let his mind wander in pointless hypotheticals such as how different his mind could have been, or if Vesta had been a knife. -Those kinds of fruitless thoughts.
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Two young women walked side by side down the bustling-noon street.
The taller woman had her hair tied in a ponytail with a pink flower-like ribbon that had 5 petals. Curved silver armour covered her chest and shoulders above a rose-pink sleeveless shirt that was white towards the sides. Her forearms were donned in black gloves that receded at her forearms and had a pair of silver bracers bordered with gold towards the ends.
On her waist was a crimson-red cape that was loosely draped over her left leg, slightly above her brown, with a sword sheathed neatly above the 'cape'. She wore black shorts and black stockings, exposing a modest bit of her thighs. The redhead called this the 'Zettai Ryouiki', one of the many odd phrases used by the gods such as 'Tsunderes' or 'Milf's', though no human including the girl truly knew what they meant. A bright smile was plastered over her face as her jolly stride abruptly came to a halt, her bright-emerald eyes finding itself glued to one of the many rooftops that walled the street.
The shorter girl, noticing her friend's inactivity, turned. She had short pink hair and eyes of a similar colour. Her expression screamed of boredom and lack of enthusiasm. She wore a white scarf and a black tank-top with a loose sleeveless white shirt over it that left her stomach and shoulders exposed. The shirt had slight red accents bordering the collar and came in a Y shape. She wore a brown belt over her black shorts, and had a small 'cape' visibly loosely wedged in between the belt and her shorts similarly to the red-haired girl. Her fingers clad in fingerless gloves were interlocked behind her head as she spun on the heel of her brown boot to face her friend.
"What's wrong? See somethin' up there?" Said the shorter girl.
"Was that a rabbit?" Said the redhead, as she found her eyes still glued to the rooftop, seemingly deep in thought.
Sighing, the Pallum pinched the bridge of her nose. "Haaah? Stop daydreaming, Alise and get your head together, or I'm going to tell Kaguya that you were slacking off." She said, before continuing down the street.
"Aaaah! Lyra I'm begging you just not that!" Snapping out of her thoughts, Alise jogged back up to the pallum and continued on their routine patrol.
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Dashing from rooftop to rooftop, he landed on the top of a clock tower opposite of the factory, looking down like a hawk to their prey. The factory was not as large as the familia homes of the larger familia such as the Freya, Loki or Ganesha familia, but was still quite considerably large in of itself.
Bell surveyed the building for any guards, before diving in and dispatching them with haste before continuing further.
"Jupiter."
Blue lightning danced around his body, covering him in a mantle of electricity. His magic contained a passive stunning effect which proved to be very useful when fighting weaker enemies. Vesta being a sword crafted using Mithril allowed for him to enchant his weapon with 'Jupiter' and amplified its effects.
"Enemy attack!"
"It's the Astrapi!"
"Regulus!"
An explosive flash of thunder streamed out of his left palm, sending the cloaked members to the ground, paralyzed and unable to move. Stunned by his magic, the Evilus members were mercilessly killed with precise swipes of his sword.
Blood poured out of the decapitated bodies like a leaky fire hydrant, coating the corridor in a pool of red. As he proceeded further into the stronghold, the Astrapi killed every single assassin in his way. Despite being in the heart of enemy territory, The Astrapi was by no means outnumbered. Each and every Evilus member within the factory might as well have been lambs waiting to be slaughtered.
No longer hearing footsteps tapping away: his level 5 senses instead picked up a faint sound of shuffling, prompting him to investigate the noise. After a few minutes of wandering the maze-like corridors, he found himself in front of a pair of tall spruce-wood doors. Gently pushing them open, he was taken aback by the unexpected weight.
...As expected of Evilus...
He scanned the room for any signs of hostility to no avail. The room was dimly lit, its only source of light coming from the melting candle that rested on the desk opposite of the doorway. The walls were lined with old books, documents and files. He dragged his finger across the shelves; his fingertips collecting a coin's worth of dust. It seemed as though it hadn't been maintained for a long time.
Stepping towards the desk, his gaze fell upon a scrap-pile of paper:
Bell Cranel, we have your Goddess. If you wish for her safety, come to this location in Daedalus Street.
Adjacent to the piece of paper was a map impaled by a knife, seemingly marking a location.
Without wasting a second, he bolted out of the room, down the winding halls. Just as he turned a corner, his foot was caught by a bloodied individual.
As the Astrapi's eyes met the injured mans, a twisted smirk formed on the Evilus member's face. He unfurled his cloak, revealing a vest lined with red stones.
...-Blazerock!...
"Go to hell!" The man shouted.
In seconds, his vision was clouded by a fog of flames as he covered his vitals with his arms. The cloaked man was no longer in front of him. -Bones, blood and flesh all incinerated by the unprotectable attack.
Bell grimaced, poor memories of the children who were coerced by Evilus to kill themselves resurfacing. During the Dark age of Orario, Evilus was notorious for outfitting children with vests of Blazerock and using them as weapons, knowing the adventurers were unable to take lives.
He didn't have much time to dwell on those thoughts however. More individuals pounced at him from the shadows with similar bundles of blazerock strapped to their chests.
"-Damn!" He grit his teeth, bracing himself.
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The pair leisurely strolled the city as they had any other day, making small talk with the various vendors in the street.
"I'll go grab us some snacks, be back in a bit." Waved Lyra as she strutted off to a stand selling fried potato snacks.
Finding herself alone, Alise let her eyes wander around, her jades finding themselves drawn to a poster on the wall. She slid her fingers over the gritty, rough surface of the poster, dragging it across the bracket towards the bottom, right over a text which said.
The centre of the poster was a sketch of an adventurer she knew. He was a kind upstanding young man purer than what the job of an adventurer entailed. Below the frame was a caption that read: [Bell Cranel] [Bounty: 180,000,000 Valis].
Alise frowned, wondering how he was doing.
"Yo, I go' our gagawalukun." Lyra mumbled, her mouth stuffed with one of the snacks. She held one out to her red-haired companion. Alise wore a frown on her face, still unresponding with her back turned. Lyra furrowed her brows, mouth still stuffed. "Awise?"
An explosion erupted a few blocks over, snapping her out of her thoughts as if cold water. Her head darted to the direction, feet propelling one before the other before she could even think.
"Hey-" Lyra swallowed, wiping her lips of the salt and pepper with her thumb. "Alise wait- Argh damn it!" The pink-haired girl tossed the snack without a care to who it would grace its presence before dashing after Alise who had become minuscule in seconds.
"Woah…. Tonight's dinner is secured…!" A dog-woman walking side by side with a long blue-haired apothecarian held up the discarded snack in her palms as if it were the holy grail.
"Naaza, when did you buy that?" The man smiled at his companion who shrugged dismissively in response.
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The Astrapi was flung out of the building at impossible speeds; thrown onto the streets rolling, his body tumbling into a stone wall. His body was scarred and burnt horribly, armour and cloak reduced to half-melted alloy and ash respectively gone from taking the brunt of the explosion. Despite that, his armour had only prevented his body from directly being damaged by the heat of the explosion, stone shrapnel and the force of the blast having done plenty of damage on his body.
He reached for the vials on his left thigh, his palms grasping air as his potions too had been eviscerated in the blow.
Every second he spent staggered, his mother could be getting in more and more danger. Toughing out the pain, he dashed through the busy streets. His muscles burned. Bell felt as if his entire body was going to collapse at any moment. But it didn't matter. All that mattered was that his mother was safe.
"Get out of my way!" He yelled, pushing through the crowd.
"What the heck asshole! Watch where you're going you brat!" A rough looking adventurer grabbed the Astrapi's shoulder. The man's entire body froze. Every single hair on his body rose, feeling as if someone had been breathing coldly down his neck as his eyes met the Astrapi's.
The white-haired boy's eyes practically bled anger. What was a bright, bold rubellite red had been reduced to a glaring ball of flames and rage.
"M-my bad man." He gulped, releasing his shaking hand. The adventurer fell to the ground, supported by quivering arms, eyes still fixated and unable to remove themselves from the retreating figure of the white-haired boy.
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His body was in pain, unimaginable searing pain, but his mind couldn't process it, running faster and faster leaving a burnt trail on the stone pavement, having unknowingly cast his magic. Nothing else mattered to him besides finding Hestia. -Finding his mother.
In the following minutes, he located the building marked on the map. Kicking the door open, he scanned the interior. There were an innumerable number of crates in the room. Perhaps it was a shipping facility of some kind? -What the place was used for didn't matter.
Across from him and in the center of the room was none other than his mother, tied to a wooden chair with a gag over her mouth and tears in her eyes, shaking her head with such aggression it may as well have gone flying off.
…Why are there no guards..?
His mind was so relieved that he rushed to her, Vesta dropping to the ground with a clank. Dispelling Jupiter, he fell onto Hestia in a hug.
"*Hic*…I'm so *hic* -glad you're safe." He cried, biting his lips with enough force to draw blood. "Hold on for a second, -I'll get us out of here." Grabbing the cloth by both hands, he tore the fabric off, letting it plummet to the ground.
"Bell You idiot!… This is a trap!" Hestia, palms now freed, tugged at his arms.
"Wha-"
He was but a second too late.
Explosions ignited omnidirectionally around the pair sequentially.
"Mom!-" He screamed, hugging Hestia as tightly as possible to shield her.
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Whatever semblance of the structure that once stood there was levelled to dust and rubble as the building ignited in a cloud of flames. Evilus seemed to adore using their bombing methods, having been greatly weakened from the 'Great Feud'.
His entire body felt weak. Not from his exhaustion nor the pain of the explosion, but from the warmth of the Hearth being ripped from his back. The boy's throat felt like it was wailing, but he couldn't tell as his ears rung like an irritable, incessant white noise. It felt as if his very skin were being torn off, from the very tips of his toenails to the follicles of his hairs. Every passing second he laid basking in the gilded tower of light rising up towards the sky, he felt as if sixteen years worth of memories had flashed by in a second, leaving his body as his mother's essence returned to the skies.
It was a goddess returning to the heavens. -His mother joining the rest of his family.
"Ah…Ahh…Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh…!"
The boy laid on his chest and sobbed openly, dragging his fingers over the ashes of where the Hearth once burned. He never felt so feeble, so puny, so powerless in the face of nature.
This feeling of emptiness and numbness may as well have been his best friend.
Once, at the sight of his best friend trade her life for his.
Twice, confronting the physical manifestation of talent.
Thrice, despair-ridden in the face of a fanged executioner.
-And now, again. Motionless as his only family slips from his fingertips.
It was an abyss so dark, a hole so deep, a weakness so great, greater than anything he had ever felt. His mind felt clouded. His eyes were drenched and flooding in his tears. His body was riddled in burns. His clothes were in tatters.
-It felt painful to do anything. Painful at not being able to do anything. Oh how he wished for it all to be a dream. A bad, bad dream. To wake up from this nightmare and cry in the warmth of his mother.
Whatever skin left on his fingers too, had purged themselves as he clawed the cold, hard stone beneath him. His mind was in overdrive, so overwhelmed with grief and pain that he considered ending it all there. Not that he had to energy to do so.
His lifeless rubellite eyes traced the golden embers of light that in seconds, faded into non-existence. Eyes up to the sky, he met a pair of jades: belonging to a red-haired woman that he knew. She spoke inaudible words, scrambling for a red vial and dousing his body in it.
What was left of his consciousness could only formulate a single word. A name. Her name.
The albino gazed into her jade-like eyes, before being shut by the crushing weight on his eyelids, plunging him into a world of darkness.
"…Alise?"
Author's Note:
Hihi its been a year huh? I know I said that I probably wouldn't continue this story but I realised I had nothing to do over the summer holiday so I decided to pick it back up...and also I kept getting harassed by ideas every now and then.
This rewrite won't largely change the events in the original but there will be some scenes changed, i.e: the scene of Alise looking at the wanted poster was new and I removed the bit where she saw the pillar.
Now, for any of you folks who're new, the timeline of this story will be below~
Thanks for reading!
Timeline:
The story starts off a couple months after the Hestia familia is massacred by the juggernaut (in the original story this would be the Astraea familia massacred) and takes place 5 years before the start of the original story (when Bell in the canon timeline became an adventurer)
The Great Feud took place 2 years before this story begins and is chronologically the same as the original story where it took place 7 years before the story.
At the present, Bell is 16 and Alise is 18, with most of the Astraea Familia being around the same age as Alise. During the Dark age, Bell would have been 14 years old.
In the canon timeline, the Zeus and Hera familia were defeated the OEBD 15 years ago prior to the main story and this story follows this, however Bell is born one year after they are defeated.