Chapter 34
Raphtalia's light had done more than show us what was really below decks on the skeleton ship. The stark white light made the shadows around us dance with a literal living presence. All of those skeletons we had been smashing were being restored by smaller versions of the Soul Eater, the weird runny flesh face monsters immune to harm while their skeleton servants were attempting to fight.
The Captain I was pleased to note, no longer had a shadow. And while I looked down into the crater in the deck with the others, my tail picked up the nice black tricorn hat for me, and I made it vanish into the Shield's inventory for later.
But that was all the time I had for casual observation, because as soon as the echoing screech of pain(?) faded, it lunged its huge amorphous body out from below deck, and at Raphtalia! And just as it did, my Air Strike Shield expired and vanished into cool down.
"Rabbits!" I said, Raphtalia and I jumping left, Usa and Tetsu jumping right.
Raphtalia outpaced me of course, but I stepped behind her, switched my Shield to the Acid Worm Shield (the widest one in my Almanac) and put myself bodily in the way of the screeching blob of maddened shadows. It didn't really weigh anything, and while I stopped its charge at Raphtalia's back, it was only for an instant. While its mouthful of black teeth latched into the edge of the Shield, the rest of it started to shift around it, and where its 'flesh' touched mine, I felt an instant bone deep chill.
"Sir!" Usa called out, "Get away from it!"
"I'll get it!" Tetsu shouted.
"Shooting Star Sword!" Ren said, his attacks slamming into the Soul Eater's side.
It had almost no effect at all, but it did slow its attempt to envelope me and I jumped backwards, my Shield spitting out a spray of acid from the worm mouth in the middle. But just like the sword attack, it hardly seemed to do more than move it, and even that was almost not worth noticing.
"It's resisting physical attacks!" I shouted.
"YAAAA!" Except Tetsu was already in the air. She slammed into it, but her weight seemed to have more effect than the attack. It did, however, peel the creature off the Shield entirely, leaving it alone in the middle of our formation.
"Lightning SPEAR!" A near solid beam of lightning stabbed through the Soul Eater and it seemed to have more effect than either mine or Ren's attacks but it still hardly moved its HP bar in the status screen. Thinking on it, that was a handy feature.
"First lightning!" Usa called out as the glare from Motoyasu's attack faded. If he was using the weaker version of the spell though...
"Usa recover! Raphtalia! More light!"
"Starlight Arrow!" Itsuki joined the fray with a hundred slivers of light pelting the Soul Eater.
"Five seconds!" Raphtalia called.
"Tetsu cover her!" And I rushed forward, "Hold it down! It hates light! Strong against Physical damage!"
Of everything we'd done, blowing the side off the ship to expose it to the sunset and Raphtalia's light spell had actually made it scream in pain. All we had to do was give her a few seconds.
The Soul Eater lunged at me, but without some way to hold its attention, I couldn't do more than stop it for a moment. Motoyasu came to the 'rescue' however, his spear sweeping out to further slow it down. Still, it wasn't enough, and while I stood my ground, he jumped back to avoid the weird tendrils of the Soul Eater.
Ren jumped ahead as Motoyasu left my side, "Crimson Sword!"
His sword seemed to bleed fire as he swung, making the Soul Eater shiver and recoil, but still, less than a second later, it was trying to wrap itself around me.
"Get Ready!" I called out.
"Illumination!" Raphtalia called out, a small star forming above us and bathing the entire ship in a harsh white light.
And the Soul Eater howled! It hurt my ears, made my bones vibrate, and threw more than a few loose bones and bits of broken wood off the deck in a shock wave of sound. "GO!" I shouted.
We, that is all four Heroes and all of our party members, dropped all kinds of attacks on it. Fireballs, lightning bolts, swords, spears, arrows, a couple of rocks, a dragon sized drop kick...
But then Raphtalia's spell faded, and all we had to show for it was a very angry monster, and a lot of wasted power. But, it had hurt it! If it wasn't for the little HP bar above its head, I'd have thought we hadn't, but unless the Status screen way lying...
Wait, no, the light wasn't fading!
I suddenly felt like I was being pushed from behind, and the monster started to form a ball of... darkness... in front of itself between two of its many tentacles. It was absorbing the light! As well as all the little shadows who had been reforming the skeletons.
"We have to stop it!" Ren said, "That's its big attack!"
And they all renewed their attacks. More magic, more physical attacks, but there just wasn't enough magic power behind the swings! It was hardly making it react!
I jumped between Raphtalia and the monster and summoned the Air Strike Shield in front of me. She stayed behind me, as the black orb of magic jetted towards us.
Again, that cold bone deep chill, a wave of weakness and pain, and little spots in my vision. I went to one knee, but I already had potion in my free hand. We needed... Well, I knew what could kill it, but she couldn't cast a light spell and use the sword I gave her at the same time. So I called out to my party.
"ROLE SWITCH! I'm caster! Raphtalia support! Wait for the opening and use it!
We all re-engaged, with Tetsu jumping in front of me and clawing at the Soul Eater, Usa giving up on his caster role for melee, Kunshu gliding in front of Raphtalia as support defence, and me fading into the back with the Book Shield opening up in my hand.
"I am the source of all power!" I started, "I call for aid from the first spark of dawn and ask for the light of creation to echo before me!"
To the side, Raphtalia crouched behind Kunshu, her hand going to the hilt of the Atma Weapon. She didn't need to 'draw' it, but the motion was part of her Moon Slash attack.
"Illumination!" I called out, focusing my eyes on the crossbeam of the middle mast as the 'origin point' for the spell.
It wasn't as bright as the Raphtalia had made it. But it still got the same scream of pain, the same cessation of motion from the Soul Eater as it flinched from the light and tried to absorb it to make it go away. Again, it started to pull in the light to build up for another shadow attack.
But with a YA! A blur of motion, and a sweeping slash of mirror light, Raphtalia appeared on the other side of the Soul Eater, the magic blade only visible by the hissing foaming air around it. It was only then that the monster seemed to gain true substance, and fall into two pieces with a bubbling gurgle of expelled gas and fizzy ethereal blood.
Opinion was of course divided on our victory. The ragged party members of the three Heroes were out of breath from the long fight and recovering. My party was looking exhausted with Raphtalia looking the worst off as she straightened up and put the Atma weapon back on her belt. But for the 'normal' people on deck, they were emitting a quiet satisfaction of a job well done.
The other three heroes on the other hand...
"What's the big idea?" Ren accused, poking me in the chest with a finger, "Attacking me, kill stealing, acting like you know everything, getting in my way when I'm fighting?" The last one was directed to Kunshu, who in true royal fashion seemed to not care about a peasant's opinion and gave my sleeve a tug to ask permission to nap.
"You were in the way, and calling that fighting is an insult to everyone who actually figured out how to swing a sword properly." I replied, feeling that itch starting in my horns again. I did however give a nod to Kunshu, who very promptly compressed into her Bee Backpack form on my back. But as usual, she just dropped her spear.
"Chill dude." Motoyasu said, "Both of you." Having been on the other end of my anger enough by now, he knew I was about to lose my cool. He picked up the dropped spear, "Huh... Not bad." And hiw own Spear changed to match it.
"I agree with Ren." Itsuki said, glaring at me. "We had it under control, and you stepped in."
"Taking three hours to kill something that took my party and I about three minutes to figure out is not 'under control'. Especially when all over the world, the Wave is spawning monsters. And those monsters are killing people." The itch was getting stronger, and I could feel my fists curling up even as I tried to come down from my battle high.
"In the game-" Ren started to say...
"This, is, not, a, game." I said, each word coming out in my very best Japanese. "If it were a game, you wouldn't feel hunger, you wouldn't feel pain, and you wouldn't be so casual with the lives of the people. Because of that jerk on the throne, we were summoned together, instead of each of us in a different country. It was supposed to be one of us defending an area, not just Melromarc!"
"Stop listening to him!" Myne demanded.
"Now now..." Motoyasu tried to divert her from joining in on the conversation.
"And, if your games are so similar, have you thought to ask yourself why? It's because they were written by other heroes from past generations that survived their own series of Waves!" I felt something nagging at me for attention. But I quite firmly told what ever it was to wait. "The book I had, spoke of King Melromarc the Twenty Eighth, not Thirty Second!"
"Be silent you-" Myne tried again, and I started to move my leg in her direction to ask her to try and make me.
"SIR!" Usa shouted, my foot planting itself back down.
And a shadow passed over us, wide, silken, blue black and white. I felt my adrenaline spike again, and saw that Ren Itsuki and Motoyasu felt it too. Myne went from anger to ghost white shock, and I could see others of their parties start showing fear responses.
If it weren't for the flutter of fabric, the newcomer's appearance would have been silent as she landed on the broken main mast's lower crossbeam.. With grace that made her seem like she was floating in zero gravity, she turned around and stood at the same time. "Are you all threatened by these little monsters? It seems my task will be a pittance to complete."
A kimono. She was wearing an 'improper' kimono similar to my battle kimono, except hers had the long wide sleeves and about twice the amount of fabric around the legs. In each hand was a metal fan each shaped like a spread of thin blades, and her long black hair flowed freely behind her much like her clothes.
Then she attacked! But before I could say anything, I realized she wasn't attacking us, but something at the far end of the ship near where Motoyasu had been fighting the tentacles. Turning, we all saw a second soul eater appear, then die, the narrow fan of light from her weapons cutting it to bits before we had even noticed it, and that was at range too!
She hid her mouth behind her other fan to laugh, and I noticed two things... First, her skin wasn't just porcelain white, but partially see-through, making me think she might have been a spirit or the like. Second, was at the base of the fan, just over one the fingers holding it, was a blue gem that looked VERY similar to the green one on the Shield. Well crap...
She posed with her fans like a dancer, perfectly balanced, and pointed one fan at us. "Now the real battle of the Wave starts."
I had been stupid. I'd let my anger get in the way, and hadn't noticed that the death of the first Soul Eater hadn't stopped lights in the sky from returning to normal. I had ignored my usual second sense for danger, and instead focused on wanting to punch someones ignorant teeth down their throat...
"Shooting Star Sword!"
"Shooting Star Spear!"
"Shooting Star Bow!"
The three other heroes acted, jumping in front of me and winding up with their special attacks. But I could see the look of pure confidence in the newcomer's eyes. That was not the look of arrogance, but the same look Mikoto would give someone, even me, on the sparring field.
"Form up!" I shouted, jumping away and raising the Shield up, the icon for the Air Strike Shield just waiting to be activated in front of me, but not just yet.
"Circle Dance Zero! Reverse Snow Moon Flower!" She said, spinning in place, the air above her glowing like a moon over a lake, brighter than the ugly purple in the sky. She held one fan straight up at the translucent moon, while the other interposed itself between her and the incoming attacks.
And the attacks from the other three heroes fizzled out, shattered against her delicate seeming defence. Then I saw what was coming, and slammed the Air Strike Shield in place, "Duck and cover!" I shouted.
The ghostly woman's other arm came down, a crimson wave arcing out. The Sword, Spear and Bow were slapped aside like paper, while Tetsu had to put her big clawed hands on my shoulders to stop my backward slide as my Air Strike Shield dulled the counter attack, shattered as it couldn't absorb it all and leaving me to brace against what was left of the attack.
Dazed, hanging limp over bits of broken ship debris, the other three heroes weren't even moving as she came out of her spin and looked down at my party and I. "O-ho... Seems I may have misjudged. Perhaps not all the the heroes of this world may be snuffed like frail candles." She smiled slightly, reminding me of Akeno, and pointed a fan at me. "Your name? Fox Demon?"
I filed away all the sudden questions I had, and replied with as much politeness as I could, "Kodori Haruhime. Yours?"
"One must forgive me, it was rude not to give my name first. My name is Glass. Alas, your weapons must be crying if the heroes are this weak... No matter."
And with a flutter of cloth and lustrous black hair, she jumped at me like an arrow, her metal fan leading the way.
Except... that was exactly what I'd hoped she'd do. "Back off-ouf!" At least until she hit me. I'd judged everything right, her speed, the curve on the end of her closed fan, the general range of her weight, the angle to put the Shield so I could redirect her and counter... But when she slammed into my shield the only thing I'd gotten right was the angle to deflect her!
I recoiled backwards, her attack going wide but destroying my balance. Tetsu once again saved me from falling, but I hardly had enough time to recover my balance before Glass spun on one foot and slashed at me.
"She's really strong!" I said, "One at a time! GO!"
I deflected another attack, then quickly backed off. In the space I left, Tetsu stomped forward and tried to slash with her nice metal claws. "Oh? Can it be you can think and breathe in the same instant?" Glass taunted, reversing her spin to let Tetsu stumble past her.
Usa was next, preventing Glass from swiping at Tetsu's tail by forcing her to turn and block, her two fans coming together to flick away the lashing barb on the end of Usa's whip, "Ah, I see thy mind in this tact!" Glass continued with that eerily similar Akeno smile, "It will avail you not."
Raphtalia came in from behind her, her colour bleeding back into reality as her invisibility faded. She was using her metal blade, not the Atma weapon, but Glass did a neat little sidestep and twist with her fan to deflect that too.
"Will you not fi-" I dashed forward as she spoke again, the Shield on my back once more, and grabbed her wrist. "You dare lay a han-" And punched her in the mouth.
Of course, being the Shield Hero, about all she suffered was the insult for being careless. She twisted her wrist out of my grip and fell silent this time as Tetsu lunged at her again, Usa tried to snare her legs, and Raphtalia slashed at her. But nothing went through! A neat dodge, an economical parry, and this time it seemed she might have hit Raphtalia as Glass slipped between her and Tetsu, her fan coming up to slash at Raphtalia's belly.
But then Kunshu slammed into the deck spear first, the shaft of the spear stopping the fan, while Glass herself almost stumbled trying to evade the Imperial Bee.
Honestly, she seemed more displeased about the missed dance step than the tiny smudge of dirt on her cheek from my punch. "I was expecting-" She sidestepped again, her fan coming up and CLANG'ing as a steel arrow nearly took her in the eye. There was a tiny flutter as a little of her hair wafted to the deck, and when she looked at us again, her fan spread and raised to attack, I could see real anger there.
She was going to do that same attack again, and I wasn't sure if I could stop her just by standing in front of her and defending. "Circl-"
I visualized the Shield Prison around her, then used the Change Shield skill. "Scatter!" I called out as the inside faces of all the Shields changed into the Acid Worm Shield.
But before the dozens of Shields around her could start spewing acid on her, the Prison exploded outwards in a wave of crimson and crumbling Shield Debris. Her attack was much reduced by being inside the Shield Prison, but the wave of energy still made it to me. But only me. The rest of the party was outside of the blast zone, and oddly enough each of them was standing over one of the other unconscious heroes.
"Humph." Glass's snort was almost as beautiful as the rest of her. "I perhaps see what might be holding you back. Shall we step off this rotting arena, and continue away from the detritus that is the other Heroes of your pathetic world?" She jumped up onto the rail, and paused, "I do despise interruptions, and the fallen will only get in the way." She looked over to the cliffs, then jumped.
I frowned, then looked to where she'd focused. I realized then that I wasn't the focus of her attack. Clive was there, trying to sit up. One of his shoulders had a deep slash in it, and he'd dropped his bow in favour of trying to stop the bleeding.
"Take a moment to recover, Kunshu, help Clive." She zipped off to help, two of her hands grabbing a quick-release medical pouch from Usa's lame arm. "Everyone else, potions now."
"How are we gonna win?" Tetsu asked, "She's super strong!"
"Defensive fighting. Try and get her closer to the tree. Let's go before she gets bored."
We jumped off the side of the boat, and found that she had saved us the trouble of trying to lure her to my tree. She stood there, under its swaying branches, looking up and admiring the way the bark seemed to run with little foxes, or how no two flowers seemed to have the same neighbour. It wasn't until all six of us got around the corner, bellies full of recovery potions, that she turned around to look at us.
She was beautiful, elegant, and on any other day I'd have smiled to see someone who appreciated my creation. But at this moment, she was on my lawn, and I wanted her off.
"Ah, such anger in your gaze." She smiled with a polite 'fu-fu', not even hiding her mouth behind a fan. "Does it irk you to see an invader near a place of worship?"
00:59
The word 'worship' sent a chill through my head, like someone had put an ice cube into each ear. The wave wasn't over, there had been a second Soul Eater, and this woman seemed to be after us, or rather, the Heroes. And now there was a second timer? Time for what? To repel her? So many questions...
I considered asking those questions, but she was far too strong, and she wasn't stupid either. So I looked a little left and right, my party spreading out on the ledge beside me, and I switched to the Book Shield. "I am the source of all power." Tetsu jumped down, followed by Raphtalia and Usa. Kunshu jumped into the air, and Clive readied an arrow. "Skin of iron, bones of steel, Defence up!"
Everyone in the party glowed briefly as my copied spell from the Beginner's Book of Spells increased their defence.
"How strange, Is your holy weapon a Shield, or a Book?" She smiled, easily dancing aside as Tetsu arrived. "Such brutish attacks. One must have grace." Disapproval clear in her voice.
She didn't even bother to dodge Clive's arrow as it slammed into the stone at her feet. Raphtalia and her locked weapons a moment later, her two fans, while much lighter, hit so much harder that the Raccoon Girl's bigger blade was thrown back an instant after Glass parried.
Raphtalia was further thrown back as a Glass's second parry lashed out with a small wave of energy. But before Glass could chase, another arrow zipped past her, interrupting her and letting Usa have a try. Once, twice, three times Glass wove around the cracking whip, but on the forth SNAP of displaced air, the end of Usa's whip was simply sheared off the end!
"Close, little bunny, yet-"
Again, Clive's arrow spoke and prevented Glass from pursuing. With a hint of anger, she glared at Clive, but then jumped backwards as once again Kunshu slammed into the ground, spear point first. The barest bit of fabric on the end of her Kimono was cut, just by her foot, before she swung her fan at Kunshu. As before, Kunshu moved just a tiny bit faster, but this time, the Empress Bee took only a piece of her spear with her as Glass's fan cleaved through the weapon shaft.
And once again, Clive stopped her from following up with a shot from his bow, her back now almost touching the tree. I could practically see the veins of her porcelain skinned forehead start to throb in frustration and she glared at Clive and I, "ENOUGH!" Her fans swept out, throwing everyone but Clive and I off their feet. "Are you..." She realized her mistake the instant our eyes met.
"Spirit." I said, my hands linking together, "You tread on my ground, you defile my space, leave, or be forever bound to the symbol of my power."
Unlike the other Heroes, if you could even call them that, I had a reasonable idea on what she was the instant I saw through her. But now, it was a contest of wills. Her feet on the ground, my ground, linked me to her, and now that she was touching the tree, something that was already made to bind souls inside of it...
Pain. Much like her name, the clash of willpower felt like I was pushing my hands into jagged slivers of glass. Slowly, that stinging, cold, too sharp feeling sunk into my skin, sunk through to my bones.
We both started screaming. The clash of our wills lighting up around us, my own purple/gold/silver aura pressing against the silver grey of hers. My blood started to feel like it was boiling, my vision started to spark with white and black, it felt like all my bones wanted to step out of my skin and find another person who wouldn't abuse them so much. And my skull... again, deep within my skull I could feel the tiny cracks of new bone forming.
But I was losing. Even as I started to dip into the forbidden well for just that little bit more, just enough to win, just enough to conquer, to dominate...
Clive's bow THWANG'ed beside me, and both Glass and I staggered backwards. She had an arrow in her heart, while I almost fell backwards, my vision going grey as blood dripped down my face. I just barely managed to stay on my feet, and keep my eyes squinted open so I could see if that had worked.
But Glass was still standing. Or rather, the arrow had passed through her and pinned her to my tree. But looking at me with a pained smile, she stepped forward. She pulled herself off the arrow, with only the tiny sound of ripping fabric.
"Who's to say who might have won." She smiled, a fingertip touching the tiny hole in her Kimono as if that tiny rip might ruin her modesty. "But I believe I have your measure. We will consider this Wave ended, and we have emerged victorious."
She looked around, smiled slightly, her finger still covering her skin, and jumped into the air. It was an incredible jump for sure, but part way, as gravity started to tug on her again, something invisible caught her and she started to float upwards towards the purple shimmering portals in the sky, "Ah, a final service for the entertainment."
For a moment, I thought she was going to attack my tree. But the wave of power that came out of her fan went over my head, back towards the still floating ship, and cut through the prow. Once more, there was the terrible nails on chalkboard scream of a Soul Eater as it died.
"I will remember your name, Kodori the Fox Demon of the Shield." And she vanished, the sky clearing up to its proper sundown colours, and the floating ship 'sinking' down to the ground slowly a hundred or more metres below.
The little timer for the Wave vanished, and I gave up trying to stay on my feet. Clive helped me roll over onto my back, and I said to no one in particular, "We got our asses whooped."
My party and I were, in a word, wrecked. Raphtalia's single use of the Atma weapon had drained almost her entire MP pool, and fighting Glass had done a number on her clothing. Usa's whip had lost about a half metre, but we were going to replace that anyhow. Tetsu, for all her size and toughness, was once again 'going to feel that later, a lot'. Clive's shoulder was okay, but it had been a near thing. Had he not already been looking in Glass's direction when she attacked him from the ship, he might have lost his head. Kunshu's spear had been cut in half, and her movements were stiff and uncomfortable looking as she bore her pain in silence.
And I had been pushed into drawing power from the corruption in my body. Everything hurt, and the roots of my horns were still bleeding a little, even after Raphtalia helped me bandage them. But most of all, we had failed. Glass, unless we had hurt her more than she let on, could have killed us all, and there would have been nothing we could have done about it except try and run.
Before this Wave started, I asked myself if we were ready... We weren't. Not only that, there were other heroes, and they had their sights set on this world.
"We need to do better." I said, "Not just with equipment, but with our levelling."
Aside from Kunshu (who was clinging to Raphtalia's back and snoring) we all nodded to one another. We didn't point fingers, or try and shift the blame. We all knew what was stopping us, and we all knew the plan going forward. But Glass had put a few things into context.
"Sir? Should we..." Usa looked back towards the gap in the rock wall that led towards the ghost ship, or rather, where the ghost ship had been before sinking to the ground far below.
I nodded. Dead boss monsters meant special loot. "Let me..." I took a deep breath. It brought no power like I was used to, back in Orario. But it did bring focus. I looked at the sheer rock wall, that was about three metres high, and made three hand signs, "Chikyu no ugoki."
There was a subtle rumble, and the rock wall and the ground near its base became a nice easy to traverse ramp to the top. This close to my Tree, it was simple, but even that made my horns itch again. I smiled though, since the others (except Usa and Kunshu) clapped at the neat trick.
"Could you do that down the rest of the mountain?" Tetsu asked.
"Not today, no. Maybe I will though, and set up a nice little Torii down at the bottom, so people don't have to go around, then up, and then pass through Mirso." We walked up the nice ramp, and I switched to the Rope Shield. "Doesn't look too hard. Tetsu?"
Her big dragon head turned to me, "Oh right!" And with her own little cloud of smoke and sparkles, she was in her Dragon-newt form. "Ow... that just made all my bruises fit into a smaller space." She hugged herself, and Clive, who was nearest, applied headpats to comfort her.
"Once we get someplace to rest, we can... I dunno... take a day off." I sighed, "We have a lot of work to do when we get back to the castle town."
My auxiliary knight squads were guarding and tending the other heroes and their parties by the time we'd gotten down. I found it funny that even with all their fancy equipment, special treatment, much higher levels and all the other stuff... my party and I were still on their feet, while they were arranged in neat rows with broken equipment and for the most part still unconscious.
After a bit of a greeting and heartfelt thank you to Ake and his second in command, as well as finding out that Melty and the Elder had started their return to the Castle Town already (a smart move since it kept me away from her and any suspicion she was in my party), we got to work trying to salvage something from this mess.
"Huh." The 'flesh' of the Soul Eater was just as hard to handle physically as it was to hurt it with physical attacks. That just made me want to skin it even more...
"Raphtalia?" I called her over, "Oh, you got something?"
She brought over... well it looked like one of those 'shadow assault goblins', except it was literally just its shadow. It felt like nothing, and seemed to have no thickness, just like a real shadow, but the Shield ate it all the same.
Shadow Shield: ability locked: equip bonus: shadow resistance (small)
"Did you need a hand?" She asked, "Tetsu, you're supposed to wait before you eat the monster!"
"Sorry... but I am really hungry!"
"How are you holding on to it?" I asked, "Ah, it's the gloves."
"Yup! I... kinda already ripped some of it... But if I think like I'm giving someone a scratch on the back, instead of clawing their face off, I can hold it without ripping it!"
She held out her hands, and the magic claw projectors were just barely glowing. "Perfect. Raphtalia? Use the Atma weapon to skin this thing. Just like Tetsu, put only a tiny amount of power into the blade."
"I'm not sure..." She took the hilt off her belt and made sure it wasn't pointed at anyone.
"Ha! I can do something you can't!" Tetsu teased.
This was all the encouragement Raphtalia needed to try, and with an initial hum of the weapon activating at full size, the blade shrank down to something much shorter, like maybe the length of a finger. "There." And she stuck her tongue out at Tetsu.
"You've seen me skin things before. I'm sure you can both work together." I gave them both headpats.
One full, weird amorphous Soul Eater 'pelt' later (in two large pieces due to Raphtalia's initial killing of it), the Shield got another donation.
Soul Eater Shield: ability locked: equip bonus: skill 'Second Shield' spirit resistance (medium): Spiritual Attack Resistance (medium): SP up: Special effect: Soul Eat, SP recovery (small)
"It's good to see you smile again Sir." Usa said, "What did you gain?"
"Ironically enough, the exact thing needed to do better next time." I said, switching the Shield to the Soul Eater shield. "Shame it's so ugly..."
Like the monster itself, the face of the Shield now looked like the weird melted flesh/face of the monster itself. My party, except Tetsu, shivered to look at it however. But then I looked up and summoned the Air Strike Shield, then beside it, a Second Shield (that looked exactly the same, but had a different icon in my status window).
"Oh! That will be super useful!" Tetsu said, "I can jump like... All over the place now!"
"You already do that." Raphtalia sighed.
"Are you going to leave some for the other heroes Sir?" Usa asked.
"There's two others." I said with a shrug, "Hey Ake!"
"Sir!" He was mid conversation with someone, but still turned a neat 180 and snapped his heels together.
"When they wake up, tell them you need a magic weapon to skin it." I said, standing up and feeling the 'I'm too old' stiffness after all of the day's fighting. "We're returning now, catch up when you can."
"Ah, the villagers have readied a couple of wagons, if you wanted to save yourself the walk." He smiled, "And no, miss Tetsu, you don't have to pull it. We will stay and help with recovery, though, aside from superficial damage, it will really just be corpse patrol."
"Thank you." I said, "Let's go."
"Oh good!" She said, "Can we eat on the way? Please?"
The Filolial they had pulling the wagon seemed determined to get us there, and off the wagon as fast as possible. It was probably Tetsu's fault, and yes, she tried to make friends with this one too (and failed). We arrived at Erhard's shop well after he should have been in bed, but all the same he was there to greet us. And like a relived father, he walked around his counter, stopped in front of us all, and used his long arms to wrap us all up in a hug.
He didn't admit to being worried, or get misty eyed, or even hug us very long (though most of us said 'ouch' when he pulled us in). "Good job." He said instead, "It's not much, but I have a pot of soup in the back just in case you were hungry."
Most of the party needed to be rescued from falling asleep in their bowls, myself included. But I still managed to stay up just a little longer, helping everyone else get into bed. But before I myself went to have my bath and get to sleep, I followed Erhard back to his little kitchen.
"This world has a problem." I said, "A big one. Excluding the way the King is treating the Heroes, the Wave isn't just sending monsters."
He nearly dropped the soup pot before getting it into his wash basin, "What do you mean?"
"While we were fighting, someone named Glass showed up. Not only did she kill a monster it took all four of our parties to kill, with one attack, she then took out my party. I suspect, maybe, that the only reason she didn't kill us was we managed to hurt her at least a little bit."
"A person? An actual person?" He seemed shocked.
"Not just any person. She had a weapon, a pair of fans, but with a very distinct feature." I took the Shield off my back and tapped the big green gem in the middle. "It was smaller, but obviously not a normal ornament. Not only that, after she decided she didn't want to play anymore, she went into the purple crap up in the sky, and vanished into it."
He frowned, "That's... Maybe it's a vassal weapon? But-" He held up a hand just as I opened my mouth, "They're like lesser versions of the four holy weapons. The King for example has the Vassal Staff." He lowered his hand.
"Huh." I reached around to grab my tail so I could pet it, "Well, unless there is a Vassal Fan in this world," I paused, and Erhard shook his head 'no', "Then another world is attacking this one. And she wasn't alone either, though, we didn't see any others."
"That powerful, and not alone?"
"She said 'we', and while her form of speech was very formal, I reasonably sure it was 'we are together' and not 'we are not amused'."
"Gets worse and worse..." He sighed, "Look, kid, you're about to pass out on your feet. Get a quick bath, then get to bed. You'll-"
"-have the same problems tomorrow, but I'll be better rested." I finished the sentence. "Yeah. Just figured you should know. You and a handful of others are about the only thing that allowed my party and I to survive. Oh, and tomorrow-"
"Bath. Bed. Now." He squinted down at me. "Good job today."
NOTES!
Yes, a second big loss, and some revelations about the nature of the Waves. Of course, this just means Kodori will TRY HARDER.
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