Creation began on 07-20-19
Creation ended on 08-07-19
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Grimoire of Evangelion: Beneath the Sea, Heightened Danger
It was as expected: The moment Captain Yami was informed that the sea monster at Raque was caused by Vetto of the Despair and informed the Wizard King, the Black Bulls were tasked with returning to the town and were informed of something that the Eye of the Midnight Sun were likely after that was accessible only through what was there at Raque. But the upside to going back to the town was that everyone in the squad was to be on this extended mission, since the ones initially chosen had given Vetto a run for his magic and forced him to flee.
"They're after a magic stone?" Suki questioned as she and Shinji were informed of what it was that the Midnight Sun was likely after. "What is that?"
"Nobody's sure," went Asta, "but that's something we think they want from wherever they can find it and take it."
"It must be something of immense magical power if they're willing to go through this degree of trouble to find one," said Shinji to them.
"Now that I think about it, last year, there was an attack on the village of Sosshi just after I joined the Black Bulls. Noelle, Magna and I found something that might've been a magic stone."
"Can you describe it, please?" Suki requested of him.
"It didn't look like a stone," Asta explained. "It looked more like some sort of pink, square-shaped crystal. There was a small symbol on it, too."
"In some cultures, something like that can be referred to as a stone, but only because it comes from the ground. If it was fashioned some time ago, then it's considered a jewel because it was intended to look impressive to the eye of the beholder. Surely, there are several within the Noble Realm that possess these jewels."
"If there were, the Midnight Sun would've attacked them a long time ago," went Finral.
"Uh, Shinji," Vanessa spoke to Shinji, pointing over towards Guardian at the edge of the beach, "what's with Guardian?"
"Oh, he's been measuring the magical energy laced in the water," he explained.
"That better be all he's doing," said Charmy, brandishing a shish kebab in her left hand. "If he sees some fish and is holding out on us, we're going to have a problem."
Suddenly, Guardian turned his head around to face them; whether he heard Charmy's threat or not was unknown to Shinji. Then he pointed over to the rocks where they had fought with Vetto with his right claw.
"There's fish over there!" He yelled, indicating that he heard what the little witch said.
"I'll go see," Shinji sighed and walked over.
"I'll go help," Suki added in.
-x-
"Goodness gracious," Rika sighed as she examined the jewel owned by Fuegoleon Vermillion at the request of the Wizard King, and she looked at two gentlemen in front of her as she sat at the table across from them. "If this jewel were something else altogether dangerous for any one of you to carry, I'd stress that you hide it away and forget it ever existed."
"Then…you know what it is?" Fuegoleon asked her.
"Yes," she answered. "I've seen a few like it before I went into self-imposed exile with my surviving children. It's one of the magic stones associated with the Elf Tribe."
"The Elf Tribe?" Julius questioned. "You mean to say that they actually existed long ago?"
"They lived in the Forsaken Region, not far from where my family lived back then. We were friends with some of them growing up. They never thought badly of or feared us at all. I had great respect for two of them: Licht of the Sword and Patoli of the Light. They admired my family's Infinity Affinity; they've never encountered mages that could use more than one type of magic that wasn't related to what one of their members possessed as Imitation Magic."
"Imitation Magic?" Julius spoke, clearly never hearing of it.
"You get into contact with another person's grimoire, and your grimoire can copy the spells that they know. The only downside is that there's a limit in both the number of spells you can use at any one time…and the spells you're able to copy. If you copy more spells than you can handle, your grimoire won't be able to sustain the accumulated total, resulting in a backlash."
"That sounds dangerous," Fuegoleon stated.
"Only for the grimoire in question," she explained, and then handed him back the stone. "I don't know what happened to the Elf Tribe, but if you've had this stone for a time, then something must've happened to them and their stones were lost over the ages. In the possession of others capable of magic, they can amplify their magic power so long as they can endure the intensity of said increase. Be careful, though. If these rogue mages are after the stones, then they must know what they can do and will stop at nothing to obtain them, making them both a blessing and a curse to whoever possesses them."
Fuegoleon then tucked the stone back under his shirt, keeping it out of sight. Now that they knew what the stone was, they could be better prepared the next time the Midnight Sun attacked.
"Again, I thank you for your services as a reservoir of ancient information, Rika Ikari," Julius praised the matriarch of House Ikari.
"You're welcome. In all honesty, I needed to get out of the house in Hage; otherwise, I'd probably go a little mad not doing anything to pass the time."
"Maybe you should consider becoming a Magic Knight," Fuegoleon suggested.
"No, my children and grandson being Magic Knights is enough for the kingdom to handle right now. And I got nothing to prove to anyone. Should you face the Midnight Sun again, those four are likely to be your ace in the hole."
"Aren't your elder daughter and grandson on an extended mission over in Raque?"
"Yes, they are," Julius explained. "It's possible that a magic stone exists at the Seabed Temple just under the ocean there."
"The Seabed Temple? Don't you mean the Coral Village?" Rika asked.
"It hasn't been called by that name in over four-hundred years."
"I guess it really did expand like the High Priestess told my mother it would one day."
"You visited it before?" Fuegoleon asked her.
"Yes, twice in my childhood. It was about the size of Sosshi back then."
-x-
"…So, there's a temple beneath the ocean out here?" Shinji asked Yami, making sure he understood right, and then looked out at the ocean. "It shouldn't be too difficult for us to get down there if we know where it is and how far down."
"Yeah, it would sound like a piece of cake to go down there," Yami agreed with him, "except the temple's a Grand Magic Zone, so there's a magical barrier and whirlpool currents that keep out invaders. Fortunately, the currents lose their potency during periods of full moons. We will have three days to prepare for going down there."
"Three days," went Guardian, who was still looking at the ocean, "or four hours from now."
"What?!" Finral questioned. "There's no full moon out tonight, Guardian, so how do you expect us to get down there when there's a magic barrier and a series of whirlpools strong enough to keep us out?!"
Guardian looked at him and said nothing…but gave him a small smirk.
"He clearly sees something that's possible for us to do," Shinji suspected.
"But can we really do it?" Vanessa asked him.
"I believe in what Guardian says we can do," went Gordon. "If he says we can get down there in four hours, then we can get down there in four hours."
"Does Guardian confide in you about what it is that he sees, Shinji?" Yami asked the boy.
"Not everything," he answered back. "Whatever it is that he sees in our ability to get to the temple ahead of time is likely related to the fact that each of us is stronger than we were originally. He wouldn't say we'd be able to get down there ahead of schedule if he didn't really mean it."
"But in four hours?" Asta spoke up, getting Shinji's attention. "What do we do until then?"
"Sleep," went Guardian, turning to face the squad, "eat up, train, whatever you feel it takes to get ready for what might be down there along with the objective."
-x-
"That creature that's affiliated with Shinji seems to be aware of things they don't know about," went Ritsuko as the photo album depicted Shinji and Guardian looking out at the ocean.
"It still looks like they're on vacation," Asuka claimed, seeing the picture under Shinji and Guardian depicting Suki sitting under a tree near the beach with Noelle, staying out of the sunlight, looking as though they were engaged in conversation.
"If they were on vacation," stated Misato to the redhead, "I don't think they'd be working. I mean, look, the next picture here shows Shinji engaged in a training exercise with that Luck fellow…and is clearly winning."
Gendo looked at the fourth picture going down on the pages and frowned at how Shinji had, apparently, pinned the boy that seemed to spark with electricity to the ground.
"Your mana reserves have deepened yet again, Luck," he thought he heard his voice say.
Fuyutsuki turned to the next page and saw the beach at night…and the Black Bull squad standing before Noelle and Suki, who seemed to be radiating with power.
"Did these two find something or are they turning into something else?" Kaji uttered.
-x-
"Union Magic," Noelle and Suki uttered as their grimoires unleashed their chosen spells to create their combo spell for the squad, "Seafarer's Vessel!"
A large sphere of water had formed around them and the squad, and lifted them off the ground and over the ocean.
Splash! They slammed into the sea and were moving like there was barely any resistance between them and the currents. It was as though they were moving through the air instead of through the water.
"How'd you two come up with a spell like this?" Asta asked them.
"It's mostly Noelle's Sea Dragon's Cradle," explained Suki to him, "just reinforced and augmented by my Ice Magic spell Sub-Zero Barrier."
"Impressive spell, you two," Guardian praised them, raising his left claw up and extending a talon to touch the sphere. "This magic is heightened by your determination to see us through to our destination…and affords us a grand view of the world beneath the waves."
Noelle looked around them and saw fish swimming by, octopi propelling themselves by using all their tentacles, and even a large whale that seemed to attract Shinji's attention.
"So beautiful," he sighed, mesmerized by the view as a manta ray swam by. "Beautiful…"
"You've…never seen sea creatures like this before, haven't you, Shinji?" She asked him.
"Never," he answered.
"That world you're from must've been really sad."
Shinji thought about it for a moment and nodded in the positive, expressing, "Sad…and broken. It wasn't always like that, but I only know about what it was like from the view of three of my relatives. My view is that of a broken keyhole."
"People that are responsible for breaking the world don't even have the morality to admit their mistakes or own up to them," Guardian stated. "People who know they are responsible for the parts of a world that is broken lack everything, not from means and knowledge, but the will and spine to fix those parts."
"Speaking of anyone in particular, Guardian?" Suki asked.
"Would you care to hear it straight from my heart?"
"How else will I know if you don't say?"
"No offense to you in any way, Shinji, but your father is a member of those that broke the world you come from and doesn't have the decency to admit his faults."
"No argument from me about that," Shinji responded; this was just a form of truth that was admitted with some subtlety, and he accepted that there were some things about his parents that were clear as crystal was. "My father isn't very…open about himself or anyone."
-x-
"Don't agree with them, you brat!" Gendo yelled at the album, getting everyone's attention again because he acted out over what they were hearing every now and then.
"He's only sharing his opinion," Ritsuko stated as she turned the page. "It's not like he has his parents to talk to about what the world was like before Second Impact. And…wait, is that… Is that an Eva?"
The first two pictures on the left side of the page depicted a look at where Yui was at the moment, with said woman waving her arms in the air and looking as though she was sculpting a human-sized Evangelion in front of her.
"His mother's using her magic to create an Eva?" Asuka questioned, and looked at the third photo that depicted a spell inside the woman's grimoire with an image of only half an Eva from the waist up. "Somehow, I don't think he's going to like it if she shows it off one day."
Rei looked at the picture and pressed her left index finger onto it.
FLASH! She saw the Eva, its armor similar to Unit-01's, but now massive instead of human-sized, and crouched behind Yui as she stood in front of a mountain city with a white lab coat on, her Golden Dawn robes cast aside to the winds.
"I'm doing this to save everyone from the end," she heard her say.
Pulling her finger away, the albino's thoughts shaped into a train that made her suspect that Shinji's mother was clearly up to something that she intended to do that was not what most people would approve of. She then looked at the right page and saw the grandmother walking down a street, passing a young woman with red hair, surrounded by five younger children. And then, the picture under the top one showed her conjuring flowers for them.
-x-
As the sphere continued to travel down the undersea world, Guardian sensed the presence of strong magic on the Black Bulls' path.
"We're approaching the magic barrier," he informed them.
"You mean those whirlpools?" Finral pointed out to at least ten whirlpools that were gathering in front of them. "And how are we supposed to get through those, Guardian?"
"Asta," the creature spoke, getting the knight's attention, "will you help Shinji with an Anti-Magic combo spell?"
"No problem," Asta responded.
"Wait," Noelle told them. "Won't that just cancel out this combo spell currently in use?"
"Nope," Shinji explained. "Anti Magic doesn't affect every spell if you know exactly what to do. And now that Asta has a few spells in his possession, we should be able to get through those whirlpools without much difficulty."
"You don't sound very sure of yourself."
"I've never used this Anti Magic spell before, but it's beneficial to getting through the whirlpools. It's a supplementary spell."
Asta and Shinji opened their grimoires and the whirlpools were seconds away from their sphere.
"Any time now," Guardian uttered.
"Union Magic," Shinji and Asta went, "Defense Negation!"
Asta's Demon-Dweller Sword emerged from his grimoire and phased through the front of the sphere, where it then replicated into a ring of swords linked together by a chain around the sphere, glowing black.
"I can't watch," Finral stated, covering his eyes.
The first whirlpool made contact, shaking the sphere, but then the current dissipated when the swords started spinning around the sphere like a saw blade; somehow, the swords were able to dispel the magic within the whirlpool and enable the sphere to pass through.
"One down, nine to go," Shinji told them as the second one was up next.
Finral opened his eyes and saw their sphere pass through another whirlpool without much difficulty, followed by two more whirlpools.
"Ha-ha!" He laughed. "You two are awesome! Anti Magic is amazing!"
"Don't praise too soon," said Suki to him as they passed through another whirlpool. "Heh, we're all doing better now."
"Be honest, Guardian of the Void," uttered Yami to the creature, "you knew that we'd be able to get through these whirlpools because these slackers were whipped into shape by the newbie, didn't you?"
Guardian looked down at him and responded, "Shinji has a strength within him that enables him to bring out the hidden strength in those that impress him, but to say that this is possible because of him would be false of me to do so. The Black Bull squad impresses and motivates him to become better, but each of its members, they must put in the effort to bring out their own best…and all I need to do is look at each of them…all of them flawed, all of them unbearably predictable in their own way…and see that they have progressed by a substantial degree. One of this squad's greatest qualities is its imperfection. Not a single individual in this squad is perfect…and that's what makes this squad perfect for Shinji to be a part of."
As they passed through the last two whirlpools, Charmy looked beneath her feet and saw something that caught her attention.
"What is that down there?" She asked the others, and they looked down to see.
"That must be it," went Vanessa, "the Seabed Temple."
The whole place looked like it was made of stone or coral, decorated with starfish and seashells, protected by a large bubble. How it was all illuminated despite being deep beneath the ocean was a mystery to each member of the Black Bull as their sphere came closer and closer.
"And one such powerful mage declared that all with good intentions would pass through locked doors without fail," said Guardian as their sphere passed through the bubble and floated to the ground in front of the temple.
There were people gathering around out front as the sphere dissolved before them, displaying the Magic Knight squad to the masses. Each individual looked as though their attire was based off a sea creature, with fish scale designs and seashell accessories.
"I didn't know people could live this far below the sea," Shinji expressed.
"Same here," added Asta.
The people in the background stood aside as a man came forward to the Black Bulls. He seemed quite old, with long, white hair that was tied into a sort of ponytail that was floating around behind his head, dressed in robes.
"Welcome to the Seabed Temple," he greeted them. "I'm the High Priest, Gifso. Such an honor it is to be in the presence of Magic Knights."
Shinji and Suki bowed their heads to the man in respect, something that was lost to Asta and Noelle; the former rarely saw this action in Hage and the latter never saw others of the royal and noble affiliated perform such an action.
Guardian of the Void also bowed his head to the High Priest.
"You three," Gifso expressed, perceiving the abundance of magic power within these individuals to such a heightened degree with his mana sensory. "The mana within you, it's different from the mana in your squad mates. It's more…more…"
"Widespread?" Guardian suggested. "Vast? Is what you feel similar to the ocean around us: It stretches as far as the eye can see, beyond the horizon?"
"Yes," he answered. "You're unusually intelligent for a creature of magic."
"A creature of magic, I am, but I am as independent of others as you yourself are."
Gifso gasps upon hearing this.
"Who are you?" He asked.
"I am the Guardian of the Void," the creature introduced himself. "The possibilities beyond this encounter with me may be as vast as this very ocean from which we draw sustenance from."
"You're the Guardian of…of the Void? What kind of creature are you?"
"Not the kind that you can conquer…without overcoming the very Void itself."
Gifso then looked at Shinji and Suki, their mana different from Guardian's…and the rest of the squad, as well.
"Are they of House Ikari?" He pointed to them.
"We are," Suki responded.
"Wow, it really is an honor to be in the presence of the Magic Knights."
-x-
"Now, what seems to be the problem going on here, people?" Tenshi asked, noticing that there were two Magic Knights affiliated with the Purple Orca squad, and behind them was a young woman in a blue and green dress that sported a tear in the right sleeve and a frightened look on her face. Why do I get the feeling that I'm about to pick a fight with these two?
"Go home, old guy," one of the Purple Orcas told him. "This doesn't concern you."
"Please," he heard the woman beg. "Please, help."
The way she asked Tenshi made him suspect that whatever was going on here…was against the rules and regulations of the Magic Knights. And his brief history discovery of the Purple Orcas from Shinji's talk with Rades Spirito left him…actually frowning at this particular squad among the nine squads. If there was more truth to what Rades expressed over his brief history with the knights, then the Purple Orcas weren't much in the honor and respect department, as both a squad that helps to defend the country from invaders and keeping the peace among the people…and as a select group of people that were handpicked to serve the interests of the people.
"I get no clarity over the situation, except for what I can see happening," he said to the two Purple Orcas, "and what I see is a woman in distress because of two men who seem to be doing the very opposite of what they should be doing. Now, what's going on here?"
"Do you not know whose presence you're in?" The other Purple Orca knight asked him. "This is Xerx Lugner, the vice-captain of the Purple Orcas! He is the Saint of Pure Ice! He commands respect from everyone around him!"
"Oh, really, he commands respect? Maybe where you're from, but I'm afraid to say that I can't give him mine…because he who harms a defenseless civilian that does nothing to wrong you…is clearly devoid of respect. Now, I'm gonna ask again. What is the problem here?"
"They took my daughter and won't give her back!" The woman yelled to him.
"Is that so? Well, that's not going to do. That's not going to do at all. So I'll tell you two this: Return to this woman her daughter and leave with your dignity intact. If not…then I can't promise you'll walk away unscathed."
"Are you threatening us, you Golden Dawn lackey?" The older man, Xerx, asked him.
"When it becomes a threat, you will know it," Tenshi told him, removing his Golden Dawn robes, "and what Golden Dawn lackey? I'm not wearing any robes representing that squad. Right now…I'm just a patriarch for my family and an otaku whose knowledge is versed in comic books and cartoons."
Xerx frowned upon this man…and opened his grimoire.
"You're a disgrace!" He yelled at Tenshi.
-x-
"…A magic stone, you say?" Gifso questioned the Black Bulls as he led them to the interior of the temple. "I don't think we've ever seen anything of the sort around here."
"Are you sure?" Finral asked him. "It wouldn't be too hard to miss, we're sure about that."
"Yes, it'd be a small stone, maybe resembling a colored crystal of some sort," Shinji described the stone, "maybe looking like a piece of jewelry. There might be a strange symbol on it, even?"
"If something like that were around here, we'd seen it a long time ago."
"Then it's possible that the stone's hidden around here," suggested Suki and Noelle.
"If it's hidden, then we'll have to look all over for it," went Magna, sounding like they would be here for a while.
"Better us than the Eye of the Midnight Sun," Vanessa told him, as that group would've likely caused unnecessary devastation to find the stone.
"Grr!" Guardian growled, turning his head left and right as what looked like dark fur with silver edges sprouted around his neck, making him look like hybrid between a reptilian creature and some sort of furry animal.
"Guardian," Shinji spoke to him, "you feeling alright?"
Now sporting a lion-like mane around his neck, Guardian responded, "Yeah, just irritated. There's definitely a magic stone here. I can feel it in my veins. I can smell it in the air down here. No matter how you try to hide it, magic will always leave a lingering trace to be sensed."
"Is that so?" Yami questioned, and then Guardian's right arm shot up and closed around something in the air.
"Whoa!" Asta gasped. "What was up with that, Guardian?! Did you catch a bug or something?"
Guardian turned to face the other squad members and brought his claw down. Opening it, he revealed what he had caught.
It was an anti-bird, one with upturned horns and two tail feathers shaped like arrows.
"Nero?" Luck questioned. "What are you doing here?"
Guardian brought his claw close to his face and looked down at the anti-bird.
Nero, for the first time in a long time, felt fear being in the presence of this creature.
"It looks like I'm not the only one that looks out for this particular squad," Guardian spoke to the bird. "Can you help us find the magic stone, lass?"
Nero nodded and flew off his claw and into the air, flying away from the squad.
"Guardian," went Suki, "you went and called Nero 'lass', didn't you?"
"Isn't that what you use to address someone who is female?"
"You knew the bird was female before any of us did?"
"Not until I plucked her out of the air."
"You're a little spooky right now."
"Because of what I can do…or because of how I can do what I do?"
"Absolutely, positively the second part, Guardian."
"To each their own opinion of someone, no matter how it is."
"But you're helpful, and that makes up for all of it."
"Thank you."
They saw Nero land on a coral formation and pointed her left wing towards the temple.
"It's in there, Nero?" Shinji asked her, and she fly over to land on his left shoulder and pointed again towards the temple. "Thank you very much."
"So, what you're looking for is inside the temple?" Gifso questioned. "Very well, then, this should become a game of hide and seek."
"Huh?" Gordon went as Gifso opened his grimoire.
A flash of light enveloped the Black Bulls…and then they were gone. And so was Gifso.
-x-
"You Purple Orcas cannot just command respect," Tenshi told the two Magic Knights that fell before him through a combination of Sword Magic, Thread Magic and assaulting their pressure points, removing their robes from their bodies. "You must have respect to obtain respect, and you two have none to give. Now, one of you is going to tell me where the lady's daughter is, or I'm going to extract the information from you, and you don't want that to happen if it comes to that."
Xerx, frowning at Tenshi as he looked up at him, unable to move due to his pressure points being assaulted, uttered, "I refuse to divulge anything of the sort to the likes of you, you filthy cretin that thinks commoners are deserving to be treated with respect that only the nobility and royalty deserve. That is pathetic."
Tenshi sighed and opened his grimoire.
"Dark Memory Magic," he responded, "Suffering Recall."
Xerx felt his mind being violated by the spell, all of his dark secrets, all of his acts, exposed to this old man that had defeated him.
"You're a depraved mind, Mr. Lugner," he heard Tenshi say to him. "And worse is that you knew the Purple Orca was compromised, but you stayed silent about it in order to rise through the ranks to become the vice-captain. Your squad has done many depraved things to hide this corruption. You blamed other people for your vile acts, cast aside previous members or killed them because they disgusted you. I wouldn't be surprised if most of the Magic Knights were compromised, but it seems that your squad is the most crooked if nobody has done anything to remove the infection that is greed, pride and murder. And yet during the selection portion of the entrance exam, your captain raised his hand for me, hoping I would join your crew. But while purple is one of my six most liked colors, your squad is one of three of my least favorite groups here, alongside the Green Praying Mantis and Silver Eagle squads. I never truly wanted to believe that a former member for this squad was right about the lack of understanding and acceptance of its older members or the lack of team spirit, but I guess Rades Spirito was spot-on about you after you kicked him out."
"Rades Spirito? That fool has magic so unstable and ugly that he didn't deserve to be a Magic Knight!" The other Purple Orca member declared. "In fact, it was because of his little chat with your nephew that our captain felt he had lost any interest in joining our squad. But to think that he'd choose the most pathetic of the squads, the Black Bull, over the other squads that don't make more trouble… Your family has clearly fallen on hard times!"
Tenshi's face was a blend between vacant and angry; you couldn't tell he was upset because of the lack of emotion seen on his face, but when he looked at you, there was a hint of rage directed towards you for your offense.
"I won't deny that as a truth," he uttered, walking away from them and picking up their robes; he had obtained the information he required from Xerx. "Everyone eventually falls on such times. You, him, her, anyone and everyone. But not as much as you're going to now. Spatial Blood Magic: Reunion of the Kin!"
A tear in space opened beside Tenshi like a knife cutting through flesh…and a young woman emerged from it, with short blond hair and wearing a brown dress with three tears on it.
"My daughter!" The elder woman cried out, running over to the woman and embracing her. "Thank you, sir! Thank you!"
Tenshi smiled and nodded, then turned his attention back to Xerx and his ally.
"You two don't deserve to be called Magic Knights if you have forgotten the duties each member must uphold in the Clover Kingdom," he told them. "We protect the Clover King and his family from any that seek to lay claim to the throne or to destroy it, we keep watch over the Clover Kingdom against any and all threats to it, both inside and out, and we assist the people that live in and make up the kingdom, no matter who they are, be they of the nobility you respect so much or just a bunch of low-class people you look down upon because they don't live up to any of your standards. When you choose to become a Magic Knight, you take an oath to uphold all three of the duties tasked to you. Upholding these duties honors you and your comrades…and ignoring these duties shame you and your comrades."
Tenshi then offered to escort the two women back to their home, which they accepted, leaving the two Purple Orcas on the ground where they were defeated; Tenshi wouldn't report them just yet, but he would make sure that the Wizard King would be informed of the squad's corruption and admit his role in dealing with two of its members.
"I couldn't have said it better myself," Xerx and his ally heard a new voice say as they saw someone step out of the shadows of an alleyway. "He was right about all of it, everything he said to you two. You don't deserve to be Magic Knights if you can't offer to help the people that seek your aid. You're unworthy of such recognition and bring nothing but shame to the rest of the Magic Knights. How pathetic."
"Who…are you?" Xerx asked, seeing nothing recognizable on this mysterious man, except for his red hair and sharp teeth.
"I'm just a guy passing by," he responded. "I thought I'd find some more Magic Knights out to do good for the people and the kingdom. It turns out I was only half-right. There was only one Magic Knight…and two posers."
To be continued…
A/N: We rarely get the facts of what a Magic Knight is supposed to do in the Clover Kingdom much of the time beyond what we see them do, but with Tenshi, we get a clear understanding of what a knight's duties are and why. I bet one of you knows who the mystery guy was at the end.