Creation began on 04-30-18
Creation ended on 05-07-18
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Grimoire of Evangelion: The Return
Gendo was a man of many rumors, but one such belief being that he didn't have any relationship with his late wife's family was a common factor in why he didn't let Shinji live with them after her passing. The fact that they preferred Shinji over him was upsetting, though he never admitted it, and couldn't see whatever it was that they saw in such an incompetent child. Even as the visit to the cemetery ended, he grew disgusted with their presence and how the Third Child's spirits seemed to lift while in the presence of these three elders that looked as though they should've expired years ago.
"It's always grand to see you, Shinji," he recalled his sister-in-law saying to the boy. "You're among my favorite people to see."
What makes him so damn special in their eyes? He wondered; none of them ever looked at him the way they looked at Shinji. He has no scientific achievements, no interests in politics, not even an academically-acceptable GPA. What makes him so worth their time when his only real use is piloting the Eva?
If only he knew the truth, but even if he knew, it wouldn't have changed his standing in the family. He'd still be viewed as a disgrace due to his own treatment towards his son.
"Unlike my father, the rest of my family is rather…complicated," Yui had informed him during one of their dates. "For as long as I can remember, my mother and elder siblings have been waiting for some day to come where they'll be able to look back at everything as though it were a dream they were unable to wake up from. Tenshi caught me reading in one of our mother's old books one time and stressed that one day, they'll tell me what they're waiting for. Whatever their reasons, they're heavy into its belief."
But to Gendo, it seemed as though whatever it was they were waiting on, it couldn't have been that important to wait for as long as they had been. Not when he was waiting to achieve the Human Instrumentality Project to achieve his reunion with Yui.
-x-
"…You seem to be in poor spirits, Shinji," said Suki to her nephew as they, Rika and Tenshi were at the park. "Has your father finally hurt you in a way that is beyond the physical?"
"No, it's nothing like that," he responded, though his eyes said differently. "Did he really throw away every picture of my mother?"
"Only the ones that he had," Tenshi expressed, "not the ones we got, and we'd never let him have access to those."
Rika reached into her bag and pulled out an old picture of Yui back when she was in college.
Shinji looked at her and thought that they almost looked the same in a way.
"It's like looking in a mirror," he uttered.
"Not entirely," Tenshi stated his opinion. "You're softer, less into things, like a wad of clay that has yet to be molded. Your mother, on the other hand, she was like a surgical scalpel, always sharp."
"That's your opinion, Tenshi," Suki responded, needing to share hers. "She had her blunt side, which she got from her father. Shinji, you don't know this about your mother, but she made her fair share of mistakes in the past. I don't get it with people that choose the way of the scientist, but when you forego your emotions, you take risks that are better off without being taken."
"And what were her mistakes?" Shinji asked, still looking at the picture.
"Well, your father is just one of her mistakes," explained Rika to him. "Another was leaving you behind; it's awful when people with children die young."
"Yeah, it is," he agreed with her.
"Whenever I think about it, maybe we should've just told her what we refrained from talking about," stated Tenshi.
"What did you need to tell her about?"
"You remember those old tales we used to spin for you when you were little?" Rika asked her grandson. "The ones about the kingdom and the people of power and potential?"
"The Clover Kingdom? I love those stories."
Shinji couldn't forget the last time he was told about those tales that were, in his mind, for some reason, better than most other childhood stories that had princesses and dragons or pirates and giant squids. The way his grandmother and uncle would speak of a large kingdom where there was magic everywhere and the majority of the people were capable of performing magical feats would make him feel all giddy. He would often wonder how it was possible for the people of that kingdom to possess such an aptitude for magic.
"What if we were to tell you that those stories were more than stories?" Rika suggested.
"What do you mean by that?" He asked.
"What if everything they ever told you about the kingdom was as true as there being a place called Heaven and its opposite being called Hell?" Suki suggested, having heard the stories herself, many, many times in the past. "What if they told you that the kingdom actually exists?"
"That'd be…" Shinji couldn't bring himself to say it; part of him, due to being an Evangelion pilot for NERV, wanted to disbelieve this due to being forced into an inescapable feud between people and giant creatures named after several of God's messengers…but another part of him, probably his innocent child self that he still clung to, felt like he should've believed in the stories he grew up knowing because they eased his soul. "That'd be unlike half the things I know now."
-x-
"This prophecy has been aglow all week now," uttered Solid Silva to his elder brother and sister as they looked at the torn page. "It hasn't done this in many generations since those Ikaris fled. Why does it choose to do so now?"
"Maybe it's a sign that the House of Ikari is due to return at any given moment," suggested none other than Fuegoreon Vermillion from the House of Vermillion, who had shown up to observe the glowing page that he, like the rest of his family, grew up knowing about over the years. "If so, it would be quite the honor to meet a member of such a house, even if they are just a descendant."
"They're an insult to the kingdom," Nozel expressed. "They should never return."
"That's not for any of us to decide. If this page is truly meant as a prophecy, then it is designed by powers beyond our own magic. You cannot fight back against fate, what is preordained to happen."
"You're not one to talk, Fuegoreon," said Nebra to him. "Last time I checked, House Vermillion didn't do anything to drive House Ikari away."
"No, House Silva was one of the royal families that decided to dispose of House Ikari simply for their beliefs," Fuegoreon responded; his house's ancestors had taken no involvement in the feud he had felt that was just other families looking to get rid of one that tolerated everyone. "Still, should they return, I would gladly shake hands with one of their members. Should they return."
As he turned to leave, his cousins of House Silva frowned in disgust over his willingness to be accepting of people from the House of Ikari. Personally, they felt their ancestors should've killed them all when the opportunity presented itself to them.
Letting even one of them live, even if they were just newborn, was a sign of shame and weakness.
-x-
Shinji had to be honest with himself when he returned to Misato's apartment after his day out with his maternal relatives, and that was how he just didn't feel much for the cello. Not that he didn't mention it to anyone except for them. He just…didn't have any passion for it.
"You shouldn't do something you have no taste for, Shinji," his aunt told him before he left their hotel. "I hope that you one day find your thing that gives you passion. When you find that, you find another step that takes you to wherever it is you want to go."
But he didn't know what his passion truly was. He didn't get any satisfaction…from anything he did. Not even piloting the Eva to protect the people or obtaining his father's acceptance brought him any real joy. But if he didn't like any of those, just what was out there for him? Where was his passion?
"Seems like you had a good day with your relatives," said Asuka, being sarcastic towards him, not really caring as he looked at the picture of his mother in the living room.
"Yeah, I did," he responded, not really paying attention to her. "I did."
"Who's that?" Asuka wanted to know when she took notice of the picture he was looking at.
"My mother."
"You two look alike."
"Thank you."
Asuka walked away; the boy seemed to be ignoring the world around him in favor of the picture of the woman he thought he lost because of his father.
-x-
"…So, they gave him a picture of his mother," Sub-Commander Kozo Fuyutsuki stated to Gendo in his office that evening, responding to the discovery of an old photo of Yui now in the Third Child's possession. "It's not like they gave him a video game or something."
"Their unforeseen arrival in the city is an inconvenience to NERV," Gendo expressed, "and their treatment of him is interfering with his status as a pilot to the Eva."
"That doesn't change the fact that they are his family, Ikari."
"These three should've kept to themselves."
"They were within their rights to apply for custody of him after his mother died. You simply put an end to their claim by pressing the difficulties of their advanced ages."
"He needed to be deprived of any emotional attachments."
"Well, you didn't succeed. They still had visitation rights to see him."
"What is it that they see in him?"
"Maybe it's not what they see, but, rather, what you don't understand, Ikari. Shinji is their only relative on his mother's side. He is blood. You, on the other hand…aren't."
Ring-ring-ring! The phone rang and Gendo answered it.
"Yes?" He questioned. "How long ago was this? Very well, alert the pilots."
As he hung up, Fuyutsuki could only guess what the situation was about, and how serious it was going to escalate until resolved.
-x-
"…So far, that's all we know," Misato informed the pilots on the Twelfth Angel that just appeared in the sky in the city. "Approach it carefully, see what it does, and, if possible, try to lure it out of the city."
Shinji understood his orders, but was really concerned about his maternal relatives, whom were most likely evacuated to the civilian shelters away from the city. There were still things about the stories they shared with him that were missing details that he needed clarity on. He promised himself that once this Angel was defeated, he would go back to see them to know more about these…grimoires that people had in the Clover Kingdom. As far as he could understand, they were just books that fill themselves up with creative means that enable those blessed with magic to achieve greater feats.
As he looked up at the black and white sphere that floated the air, the Third Child sighed at how passive this Angel, if it was even one, was. The previous Angels would show up and cause a ruckus one way or another, but this one was just out there where the world could see it.
The houses that seek your end must be shown your potential, he heard a voice in his head, just as he willed the Eva to raise its gun into the air and shoot at the target.
Unfortunately, he never got to pull the trigger, as the sphere disappeared from sight…and the ground around the purple Eva turned dark, dragging it in.
"Aah! I can't get free!" He shouted.
-x-
Gasp! Suki shuddered at the shelter, in a corner with her mother and brother.
"Suki, what is it?" Tenshi asked her.
She raised her left arm…and revealed the hand was see-through.
"And something's wrong with Shinji," she told them.
"Tenshi, your legs," Rika gasps, pointing to her son's knees, seeing them disappear.
"What's going on?" He questions, raising his hands up as they started fading away. "Mother?"
Rika was unsure herself. But as of late, she had been feeling an increase in the decline of her mana reserves needed to extend her natural lifespan. The very mana in this universe was limited, stagnant in that it seemed like the Earth had very little due to the limited life that remained after Second Impact. Not even an experienced mage, such as herself or Tenshi, who was barely into his rank as a Senior Magic Knight before Suki was born the day they became the only known survivors of the family annihilation that drove them away from home, were able to draw more than a day's worth of mana from the world around them every few months, and they needed that mana just to lengthen their lives by a few precious minutes.
"There were demons in the kingdom?" Shinji had asked her when he was just six years old, learning of the creatures that inhabited the Clover Kingdom. "Were they…strong?"
Yet there was something about the way he asked her that question that had her puzzled; if she had access to her stronger spells, she would've been able to determine what happened to him when his mother died. There was just no detailed explanation for what happened to Yui when her son was four. Not even her husband would say what really happened…or why Shinji was there when it happened.
"Suki!" Tenshi yelled, and Rika saw her daughter fade from sight completely.
Then, without warning, she saw her son disappear from his chair.
What is going on? Where did my children go? She wondered, looking down at her hands, barely seeing them. What is wrong with Shinji?
-x-
The prophecy was flaring now! Electrical sparks and fiery arcs were surrounding the torn page, spreading concern for the managers of the building due to the intensity of the magic infused within it. The air was thickening with an energy unlike what the Magic Knights of the Golden Dawn and Silver Eagle squads were capable of. Even the ground began to tremble under the weight of the power.
"This could be the strongest degree of magic ever!" The twenty-eighth Wizard King, Julius Novachrono, expressed in his excitement; when he was alerted by Rill Boismortier of the Azure Deer squad, his fascination with the age-old prophecy peaked.
"It just keeps intensifying!" Rill informed him, afraid. "Could this prophecy be coming true now?"
Seconds later, the page started unleashing bursts of electrical energy so intense that the display case holding it shattered.
"My God," Julius shuddered as the bursts were occurring every three seconds now. "Their return is near. Their return is near."
-x-
"…What do you mean, that sphere is the Angel's shadow?" Asuka questioned Misato as NERV was watching the Angel as it floated over a dark patch of land that most of the buildings in Tokyo-3 sank into along with Unit-01.
"That's what Ritsuko was able to determine," Misato explains, "meaning the shadow that sucked in Shinji…is the actual target, sustained by an inverted AT-Field. Instead of repelling everything that hits it, it takes them into itself."
"Well, what about Shinji? How long can his Eva last without external power and the internal battery operating on low-power mode?"
"If Shinji doesn't do anything rash, he has at least sixteen hours of life support."
"Do you not think it odd that an Angel shows up just after his relatives do?"
"Probably a coincidence, Asuka."
"It's hard to believe that when the only other family he has is a man that wants nothing to do with him or them."
Of course, Misato barely knew about the Ikaris due to Shinji's file lacking information on his maternal relatives; she had to suspect that this was deliberate because of Commander Ikari's estrangement from them and their own adoration of Shinji. All she knew from the file were their names, current ages and last known residences. Everything else was completely redacted, just like with the letter that was sent to Shinji when the Third Angel attacked. She believed there was more to these three individuals that Shinji seemed to take more to than anyone else he could've in the world.
"It's part of the job to risk our lives against the Angels, but who do you think they'll blame the most if he doesn't come out of this alive?" Asuka asked her.
"If they love Shinji, they'll blame anyone that had anything to do with him in this mess," she sighed.
-x-
"All they found was a wheelchair abandoned in one of the shelters," a man from Section Two informed Gendo, returning from a survey of the shelters to ascertain the whereabouts of the Ikaris. "Nobody knows where they went and they were out of camera range."
Initially, Gendo had planned to remove the three from the city to keep the Third Child from seeing them so that he had no distractions, but it seemed somebody beat him to the punch.
-x-
Where… Where am I? Shinji's dissociated consciousness wondered, not feeling as though he were inside the Entry Plug.
Shinji? He heard a female voice call out to him as he tried to open his eyes. Shinji, are you there?
It sounded like his Aunt Suki, but he couldn't say for sure. He could barely open his eyes to see anything around him.
It's so bright and silent here, he heard a male voice. I can't…see anyone…see myself…no mana left to keep alive… Am I…dying?
Tenshi? Shinji heard a second female voice around him. Suki? Shinji? Yui? Where are you? Where are we? Are we finally going home? I…don't know, anymore.
Shinji felt like he was floating somewhere, but vision was blurred, preventing him from seeing anything. He barely felt his body, unsure of if he was alive or dead. There was no sense of smell, no sense of touch, not even a sense of taste within his mouth. There was just no…sense of anything around him besides that of sound from the voices of who he perceived to be his maternal relatives.
How long has it been…and how long until it ends? He wondered, losing consciousness.
-x-
"…Is this…Commander Ikari's order?" Rei asked Ritsuko, who informed her, Major Katsuragi and the Second Child of the plan to deal with the Twelfth Angel.
"It is," she explained.
The plan to defeat the Angel involved dropping the remaining N² bombs into the shadow body while the remaining Evas used their AT-Fields to negate the Angel's. It was hoped that this plan would force the Angel to release its hold on Unit-01 while at the same time destroying it. However, the plan, according to Major Katsuragi, was not without substantial risk to Shinji, who would not survive, whether the Eva was damaged extensively or not.
"We shouldn't," went Asuka, which surprised Rei; as someone prone to violence against an enemy, the albino had expected the redhead to jump at the opportunity to defeat the Angel.
"There's no other way to deal with it," Ritsuko explained.
"Explain that to the ones that have to deal with this if he doesn't survive, and I don't mean his father."
Misato knew Asuka was referring to the Ikaris that Shinji was fond of and that tried to get custody of him after his mother died. If Shinji died, they would definitely blame each of them for his death.
"Find an alternate solution to the one you think will work," Asuka suggested. "One that doesn't include the risk of killing him."
-x-
"…The magic's unstable!" Nozel Silva yelled as the leaders of each magic squad gathered around the prophecy as it unleashed more magical energy.
"How long until it blows?" Yami Sukehiro of the Black Bulls questioned.
"At this rate, it could go off at any second now!" William Vangeance of the Golden Dawn suspected, just in time as the torn page's prophetic energy spiked again and caused the stone floor to split in half.
"You should've brought that Magic Knight with you, Yami!" Jack the Ripper of the Green Mantis squad declared. "The one without magic! He might've been able to deal with this!"
"No way!" Julius expressed. "This prophecy hasn't caused any actual harm yet. What's more, we can't stop it from happening. It's preordained. Whatever's going to happen is supposed to happen."
As more flaring and arcs of energy emanated from the page, the ceiling above their heads began to crack under pressure from the magic.
"We may have to clear the building," suggested Mereoleona Vermillion of the Crimson Lion squad.
"Clear the building, everyone!" Kaiser Granvorka of the Purple Orca squad yelled.
Everyone had no choice but to turn and run away from the prophecy as it continued its bout of magical energy venting.
-x-
The fact that neither pilot wanted to go through with this plan that Ritsuko stressed was the only solution to their current predicament didn't change Gendo's order for them to carry it out. Their priority was to eliminate the Angel, no matter what, regardless of the danger to the Third Child's life.
I don't want to do this, thought Asuka as she got into position in Unit-02; it wasn't like she cared about Shinji, she just didn't want to hear that his relatives would be devastated by his possible death.
Rei, in Unit-00, didn't know if Unit-01 would survive such an attempt on the Angel, but hoped that Shinji would survive the devastation.
Not even Misato wanted them to carry out this order, as it was just too risky. But it was out of her hands now; Commander Ikari transferred command of this operation to Ritsuko.
CRASH! The two-dimensional shadow body of the Angel began cracking and shattering on the ground, spilling out what looked like white light.
"What's going on?!" Ritsuko demanded; the plan to extract the Eva from the Angel hadn't been implemented yet.
"We're reading instability from within the Angel!" One of the technicians explained.
The Angel's three-dimensional shadow turned black and began to look as though something were trying to escape from it.
Pierce! A beam of white light shot out from inside, followed by another beam…and another…until dozens of beams of light had shot out from every angle, making it look like a sort of mace without a handle or a morning star.
"It's…disappearing," went Asuka, concerned that something was not right about this.
As the last bits of darkness disappeared from sight on the Angel's body and shadow, the whole of Tokyo-3 was enveloped in light.
FLASH! It felt like an explosion, but no secondary sounds were heard apart from the clashing sound, obscuring everything and blinding people's vision for a few moments.
-x-
A massive light shot out of the building in front of the Magic Knights and into the sky, assuming a monstrous form for three seconds before shooting out across the Clover Kingdom! Ten lights shooting across the entire terrain, as if forming some sort of cage. The light shone brighter, obscuring everything. And then…it ceased, and the light dissipated.
The torn page, the prophecy, flew out of the building and into the hands of the Wizard King himself, who looked at it.
"Sir?" Yami asked.
"The prophecy…has been fulfilled," Julius declared to him and the other Magic Knights.
"You mean," went Dorothy Unsworth of the Coral Peacock squad, having been awakened by the intense magic given off by the prophecy, "the House of Ikari has finally returned?"
Solid, Nozel and Nebra looked to one another and felt threatened by this now, though they said nothing. The fact that the prophecy had finally come to pass explained enough to them. Now, they had to deal with the new situation.
"But…if they've returned," said William, "where are they? I mean, shouldn't they have come here?"
"One possibility is that they need to be found," Charlotte Roselei of the Blue Rose squad suspected; if this were any other group of people, she would think the same thing.
"Each squad goes to where those lights shot out," Julius ordered. "Find the members of the House of Ikari and return them to the capital."
-x-
The city was restored, but no trace of the Eva was found. No signs of the Angel, an AT-Field, not even the Entry Plug were reported.
"Where…where is he?" Misato demanded to know from Ritsuko; this was her operation, so she needed to take responsibility for the outcome.
"We don't know," she answered; it was the honest truth, that they didn't know where the Eva, not the pilot, went.
Asuka and Rei, both confused by this phenomenon, were left to wonder the very same thing that Misato was wondering: Was Shinji dead or alive?
-x-
Opening her eyes, Rika found herself laying on some grass beside a large tree, shaded by its massive branches. A feeling of energy surrounded her as she struggled to get up.
"Aah…ahh…" She groaned as she turned her head left and right. "Where…am I?"
"Mother?" She heard Tenshi's voice call out to her. "Can you feel it, Mother?"
Rising to her weakened feet as she leaned against the tree trunk, Rika saw her elderly children laying a few feet away from her on the grass beside other trees.
"This place feels very soothing," said Suki as she got up to her feet. "It's not like Japan at all. I actually feel comfortable out here for the first time in a long time."
Rika held her hands up in front of her…and watched as they glowed bright blue…as mana surged through her veins, replenishing her depleted reserves!
"Tenshi… Suki… We're home," she told them, smiling.
"The Clover Kingdom? We're actually back in the Clover Kingdom?" Suki asked; the last time she was ever here was when she was a newborn, and although this was home, she felt alien to her new surroundings. "But…where's Shinji? Shouldn't he be here with us?"
Rika looked around, but there was no trace of Shinji anywhere. But that didn't mean he wasn't around. Most likely somewhere else in the kingdom.
"We have to find him," she told her children, but then realized that none of them were in any condition to do so as long as their bodies were in such decrepit states. "As soon as we rejuvenate."
She took out her grimoire, opened it to the necessary page, and channeled the mana around her through the spell that would undo their current state.
"Rejuvenation Magic!" She called out, feeling the mana flow through her body like a tsunami. "Full Body Vitality Restoration!"
The spell flowed through herself and her children, restoring their mana reserves and forcing their bodies to revert in age back to where they were at their strongest (or in the case of Suki, back to the age where she would've been at her strongest).
Tenshi felt the sensation in his legs and spine as his wrinkled skin straightened out and lost its spots and frailty whilst his graying hair became ebony and glossy once more.
Suki shrunk down in age as her graying hair became ebony and her muscles full of life.
Rika sighed as her body reverted in age and her flesh feeling like she had just been immersed in a hot tub made to smell like vanilla and cherry blossoms.
In less than a minute, the three were restored of their mana reserves and made young again.
"We must be in a Grand Magic Zone," Rika suggested. "That's the only way this spell would've worked the way it did to restore us."
"Ah," Tenshi sighed, able to stand on his own for the first time in a long time after so many years. "I must be twenty-three again. That was when I felt I was at my strongest."
"Hey, I'm younger than you two!" Suki complained about her rejuvenated age as she stood in front of them, her clothes baggy and loose. "My clothes don't fit no more!"
"That's because you're fourteen years old again, sister," Tenshi informed her, conjuring up a small mirror for her to see her restored face.
Suki looked like a young teen with long, ebony hair and blue eyes; she didn't cut her hair shorter until after she had turned seventeen.
"I'm the same age as my nephew," she accepted this as when she was at her strongest had she been trained to be a mage like her mother and brother had. "Now we find Shinji?"
"Yes," Rika told them.
-x-
"The magic given off by that forsaken prophecy has thrown off the magic in this place," said Solid to his brother and sister as they investigated the wilderness of the Clover Kingdom's western region, unable to tell where the prophetic magic ended and where the natural magic of the environment began. "I can't separate the two."
"None of our location spells are working, either," added Nebra. "It's like they don't want to be found."
But Nozel didn't have time to complain about his siblings' complaints. The fact that the magic unleashed by the prophecy had been from the Ikari family left him bitter over one crucial fact that he couldn't ignore, and that was how the magic it gave off was far stronger than the combined magic of these three members of House Silva put together. If anything, it was just as the old stories they grew up knowing stated about these Ikaris, and it was that they were among the strongest of houses.
And if they're back, they could be stronger than all the current houses put together, he suspected, meaning they were a threat to House Silva just by being here or elsewhere in the kingdom, possibly even in a Grand Magic Zone.
-x-
"…This sign says 'Welcome to Hage'," said Suki to Rika and Tenshi as they found themselves out of the forest now.
"Hage?" Rika questioned. "We're in the Forsaken Region of the Clover Kingdom."
As they entered the small village, they saw very few people and large patches of cultivated land used for farming.
"What is it?" They heard a little boy ask an adult woman.
"I'm not sure what it is," she responded.
"Uh, excuse me, miss," Tenshi uttered, getting the woman's attention. "What's going on here?"
"There's a large…thing over by the remains of the demon's skull," she explained, pointing away from the village to something beyond the trees nearby. "We're not sure what it is. It could be a golem, but it could also be a stature. Everyone's too afraid to go near it if it's sleeping."
"Could you describe it for us, please?" Rika requested, wanting to know its appearance before they did anything else.
"It looks mostly purple with some green spots, has two arms and legs, and atop its head is a long horn. It might be armored or something."
The three looked at each other and got the feeling that it wasn't whatever the people here thought it was. They were reminded of what Shinji had told them, against the policy that NERV had to keep the public from knowing and getting suspicious. But if it was true, then it meant that Shinji was here, just inside a colossal behemoth that wasn't made from magic.
"How far away is this demon's skull?" Suki asked the woman.
-x-
The Black Bulls and the Golden Dawn, despite their orders to search for the remnants of the House of Ikari, had to investigate this other phenomenon that was in the village of Hage that frightened the people. Something about a giant with a horn.
Whatever it was, both Asta and Yuno wanted to make sure it wasn't a threat to the village or the people.
-x-
"Oh, God," Rika gasped, covering her face at the sight before her eyes.
True to their belief, Evangelion Unit-01 was present in the Clover Kingdom, kneeling in front of the remains of a large skull with a statue of a man atop of it.
"That behemoth looks uglier than Shinji described it," Suki expressed her opinion. "We have to get him out of it if he's in there."
The three approached the downed Eva and then Tenshi formed a stone pillar that shot them upwards until they were at the height of the Eva's nape. Even when the one-hundred-meter giant was kneeling, it was still an impressive eighty meters in height.
"He said they always put him in the neck, right?" Tenshi asked.
"Yeah, that's what he told us," Rika answered, looking at the armor on the back of the Eva. "Okay, let me try something (she opened her grimoire again and searched for a spell to aid in opening the Eva). Here goes. Steel Aid Magic: Release the Seal!"
The Eva rattled as its back opened up and released its Entry Plug, which flushed out its LCL into the air as its top hatch opened.
Suki hopped onto the plug and looked inside, seeing Shinji, but he wasn't the only person she saw inside the plug.
"Mother, you should take a look in here," she told Rika, who did just that. "Is that who I think it is?"
Rika looked at the second person in the tube atop Shinji's waist and was in awe over who it was.
A woman, well into her late-twenties, with pageboy hair that was the same shade of ebony as theirs were, and as bare as she was the day she took her first breath of life.
"Yui," she spoke, recognizing her fourth daughter more than she recognized her other children. The question now is how is she alive when she was reported dead?
-x-
The two squads arrived in Hage and saw the giant that was being spoken about.
"Why are those three on it?" Gordon Agrippa of the Black Bulls mumbled, pointing to a man and two women on the back of the creature.
Whoosh! Noelle Silva of the Black Bulls felt an unsettling degree of mana emanating from three and the behemoth.
"Those three," she uttered. "They must be who we're looking for."
"The House of Ikari?" Asta asked her. "Are you sure it's those three?"
"Or five, maybe," said Luck Voltia, pointing to what those three were doing.
-x-
The light on his face stirred Shinji momentarily as he opened his eyes to the world around him, seeing a countryside-like setting and a large cave with three holes in it and a man atop it.
"Where…where am I?" He wondered, and lost consciousness again.
To be continued…
A/N: Here we have it. Now that the three Ikaris native to the Clover Kingdom have returned, what will transpire for the two that aren't native to the kingdom? I look forward to the next chapter. Peace.