101 — LETTERS FROM THE NORTH
Asgard's cells recounted, perhaps, to their heyday, but like everything else, frozen in time; the weedy stones, the leaks, the rusty locks, the high ceiling, for the round cell was in a tower with openings high above the heads of its prisoners, through which freezing rain soaked the place on inclement days.
In another cell and in another time, the door opened with a great clang and Hilda's counselor walked into that dismal place where the prisoner was imprisoned by the hands in precious shackles, but attached to the opposite walls and very high, so that he seemed to be hanging by open arms.
That prisoner was an Athena Saint.
The visitor locked the door behind him, and the boy raised his swollen eyes to see a young man standing before him who had a red fringe over one eye; an outfit that seemed to hark back to any kind of nobility, an earring in his ear and a diadem in his hand.
"What is your name and what did you come here for?" asked the boy in common-tongue.
"Where's Jamian?" returned the Athena Saint to his side.
"Jamian?" asked Alberich.
"The Raven Saint!"
"Your friend is very well taken care of. He is locked up just like you in some of our many cells in Valhalla."
He struggled in the amethyst handcuffs, but then there was nothing he could do against the spell that bound his hands.
"He is alive, which is more than we should have done for invaders like you." continued Alberich. "And if you do not cooperate, I am afraid the God Warriors of Asgard will leave you here until both of your bodies rot and descend to Helheim. Do you understand what I say? Until you finally perish."
"Damn it…"
The Athena Saint couldn't believe that he and Jamian were trapped in a place like that, where their Cosmos were worthless; he hated himself, as at first they were welcomed with open arms only to be surrendered and removed from their Cloths in a bloody battle that had ended with both bodies being taken to the dungeons of Valhalla.
"Why are you doing all this?!" asked the Saint again.
"You invaded our lands. That's what happens to Asgard trespassers."
"We come in peace!" shouted the boy.
The guard didn't answer him.
"What is your name?" asked Alberich, but the boy did not answer him.
The boy in the darkness approached him with a lamp that illuminated the Hyoga's wounded face: his clear eyes, his hair stained with blood, but still carrying the color of the northern sun, the thick accent. Alberich showed him the diadem he held in his hand, a shiny, though badly cracked, circlet of white and blue bronze in the shape of a beautiful, spread-winged bird. His voice was almost whispered so close to the Saint.
"лебедь."
The boy's eyes widened in surprise and he stared into Alberich's one eye, which was a pale green.
"You are the Cygnus Saint, are you not?" Alberich asked in Russian, surprising Hyoga.
Although curious, Hyoga remained silent, when he was finally surprised one last time by Alberich's cunning.
"You are Cygnus Hyoga, the Sanctuary Saint."
Hyoga's eyes accused and finally gave the certainty that Alberich needed and the boy got up, turning his back to Hyoga and leaving the lamp on a nearby table. He took a deep breath and returned to Hyoga's side.
"So you are Camus' disciple." The boy's eyes widened once more.
"What? Do you know my Master Camus?"
"Yes." replied Alberich; while Hyoga searched for words, the boy took out from under his tunic that he wore an arrowhead pendant that Hyoga immediately recognized as Aioros' amulet, which was used to mark the traitors of the Sanctuary, but which came to be worn with pride by those who believed in the Hero of Sagittarius. "Camus gave this to me a long time ago. I am Alberich."
Hyoga's eyes were pleading.
"Alberich." he began, in a begging voice. "I was sent to find you. If you had any appreciation for my Master Camus, I beg you to listen to me. All we want is to seal the Relic of the Sea so that Poseidon can sleep in the Oceans. Nothing more than that."
"Poseidon." repeated Alberich, as if echoing a name deep and distant.
"You need to help us, Alberich. I was sent by the Sanctuary just because Camus knew someone in Valhalla and we need Asgard's help."
The God Warrior, however, closed his eyes and took a deep breath in front of Hyoga. His eyes held a curious expression of confusion.
"You speak of my friend Camus in the past." he observed.
Hyoga didn't dare say anything else and his eyes closed in deep sadness.
"That can not be." Alberich guessed immediately. "Is Camus dead?"
Maybe it was the pain of having been a victim of the God Warriors along with the weakness that those handcuffs slowly imposed on him by draining his energy, but Hyoga let out a tearful sob. Alberich knelt before him, as if trying to give strength to the prisoner, who opened his eyes and couldn't help recounting that sad memory in his heart.
"There was a bloody battle at the Sanctuary. Camus chose to use this war to teach me his final lessons."
"Camus was defeated."
"By me."
Alberich then stood up, startled.
"You killed your master Camus."
"I did." Hyoga agreed, painfully.
He walked to the table stomping and let out, within his elegance, a punch on the wood table dropping a bottle of paint that spilled onto the floor; he was disgusted to learn that such an old friend had been killed. And by his own disciple. Now his prisoner. Still with his back to Hyoga, he spoke with the deepest and most irascible voice.
"The Camus killer before me. I should let you rot in this cell, Cygnus Hyoga."
"I, I didn't want to!" Hyoga stammered. "It was a tragedy. My own master seems to have chosen that fate. If I could go back, I would never have attacked him like that. I could swear on all things in the World that he would strike back, but… But he chose not to. And then…"
"A disciple who kills his own master. Perhaps it is best for you to walk the path of Hell and then ask your Master's forgiveness wherever he is."
"Alberich, please don't. You have to believe me."
"You were lucky once, Hyoga." he said. "You were supposed to be killed by the God Warriors. And then you were lucky a second time, for I am the voice of the foreign legions in Asgard. And I was ordered to come here to talk to the prisoners. A friend of your own master. But here before me, you present yourself not only as Camus' disciple, but as his own assassin."
Hyoga wanted to rip his chest and give him the heart as proof of how much that hurt him. But Alberich couldn't read his thoughts, so he simply left him there to fend for himself and Hyoga figured his sins were finally being paid for; and if before he had hope, now he had only time to wait for death.
Days passed, Hyoga couldn't say how many of them. His handcuffs raised in the air were fastened to the wall, so he spent those next few days lying there, unable to use his Cosmo thanks to the power of the Amethyst that bound his feet and hands. It was a body thrown at the bottom of a solitary room feeling really alone. Still feeling guilty for the death of his Master Camus, who he loved so much. But now, too, he felt guilty about the unknown fate of Jamian, with whom he crossed the Northern Path and from whom he had some unexpected laughs on the crossing until they were victims of those valiant and powerful God Warriors of the North.
Most of all, he thought of Seiya sailing the Seven Seas, that he wouldn't have his help when he reached that trap that was Asgard. And then he thought of the World and Saori, Athena, who in addition to Hades and Poseidon, would probably have to deal with those God Warriors. The weight of the world on his back. Filled with guilt and anger at himself, Hyoga denied the food he was given.
But then hunger and thirst really began to take hold of his body, just as they assailed all the wretches of Asgard; and then he no longer denied the meager food they left on the floor for him to eat like a dog. His body ached with every inch. Lost in his consciousness, as usual, Hyoga only opened his eyes one night when the cell door opened again.
And instead of the stale bread and the metallic glass of dirty water that he drank every miserable day, this time he was thrown on the wooden bench, on which he sometimes sat, a sealed envelope. He found it curious, though inexplicable, and then he looked at the guard to see what that could mean. And then he saw that it wasn't just a guard but Alberich, back again.
"Read it." he ordered, frowning.
Hyoga straightened up as best he could and then took the envelope with trembling hands and opened an already broken seal, which made his heart freeze: it was Athena's insignia, the circular shape of the Golden Staff that Saori held. He opened it and read:
"Dear Polaris Hilda, Representative of Odin and Ruler of Asgard,
I hereby confirm that the letter sent by the Ravens of the Saint Jamian were received and I am glad to hear that he is already on his way to the Sanctuary. I am sorry for the confusion and I understand and accept your apologies. Times are indeed clouded, but I trust that once the Relic of Asgard is sealed, all the bad weather will be resolved.
I appreciate the reconsideration on the Cygnus Saint's arrest and hope he is well taken care of. He is a disciple of Camus, who we now know to be very well liked among you.
I wish Asgard and the Sanctuary can soon be together on less stormy days.
Sincerely,
Mayura,
Sanctuary Camerlenga"
When he finished reading, Hyoga read the contents again to make sure he wasn't going crazy.
"I've been rotting in this prison for days..." he pondered.
"You must understand that the words traded between those above us sometimes hide shades behind pretty words."
"Where really is Jamian?" asked Hyoga, gathering strength.
"On the way to the Sanctuary." confirmed Alberich sharply, kneeling in front of Hyoga to remove the handcuffs from his feet. "He corroborated your story about the Sea Relic and Poseidon. He was released a few days ago, sent a letter to the Sanctuary and left for your land. What you have just read is the response of your most excellent Camerlenga to our Representative of Odin."
Hyoga took the letter and read it a third time.
"What does this means?" he asked as Alberich removed the cuffs from his arms.
"That means you're free for now, Hyoga. Hilda may seem like a reasonable woman in the letters that cross the heavenly skies, but she doesn't fully trust the story you tell."
"Well, it's the truth."
"So spoke Raven and so I could check with some sources I have abroad. Still, the people of Asgard are a very suspicious people. And with good reason to be so. But I will present your case more calmly to Valhalla. I will explain that the Sanctuary's mission in Asgard is not for war, but for peace."
"I can't trust you." Hyoga said, already free of his shackles, but still completely drained of his strength.
Alberich for the first time hesitated and faced the badly wounded boy in that cell, apparently still containing a deep hurt at being faced with the murderer of his old friend; the boy then took off the arrowhead pendant he had kept in his chest again and gave it to Hyoga's hand.
"Your Master gave me this gift a few years ago. Said it's the mark of a traitor in the Sanctuary." he paused, seeking Hyoga's eyes. "For it is also the mark of a traitor in Asgard, for here they consider me a deserter of Odin for choosing to be friends with someone so far away. To act much more outside these walls than inside them. And again here I am risking myself against my own people to voice a quest that is not mine or even Odin's."
"Alberich…"
"Stand up." he ordered to Hyoga.
The boy scrambled to his feet as best he could, but his weakness made him stagger and have to lean against the wall; Alberich came forward to pick him up and support him on his shoulders.
"I will speak to Valhalla Palace on your behalf and on behalf of your mission." he tried to calm Hyoga. "Now you will come with me. You will stay at my house recovering until all is clear with Hilda and her Counselors."
"Are you going to welcome a friend's murderer in your own house?" Hyoga asked, feeling out of place.
"It is my duty to take care of foreigners." he replied tersely.
Hyoga left there supported by Alberich, as his forces were really exhausted; he had lost a lot of weight and perhaps passed out on the way from the dungeon to the Alberich mansion in High-Asgard. The God Warrior laid him down on a comfortable bed and asked a single servant who still had in the mansion that a bath be prepared for the guest and then dinner set for him.
"Take a shower, eat and rest. I need to return to Valhalla Palace to confirm to the divine Hilda that you are now free from your dungeon. And then we can define the next steps."
"Listen, Alberich..." Hyoga began, before he could walk away. "Tell your people that all we want is peace. It's sealing Poseidon. We have a crew on the high seas as we speak across the Oceans to seal away all the other Poseidon Relics. And soon they should get here so we can do the same."
"Jamian mentioned a Galleon." said Alberich.
"They shouldn't be long."
"I understand, Hyoga. Now rest." said Alberich.
The Cygnus Saint was so tired that he didn't even have the strength to insist, and the pains that had kept him awake for all those days trapped, at that moment, lying on such a soft mattress, disappeared, and Hyoga simply went out. Alberich looked at his assistant and asked him to let him sleep.
When he woke up in two days, practically, Hyoga realized he was wearing a different outfit and his wounds had been taken care of. He got up startled, remembering absolutely nothing since he had arrived in that mansion. There was no one in the room, but from the window he could see the snow falling in a great ruckus, the white glow of the sky flooding the room and hurting his newly awakened eyes. He perched on the edge of the bed looking down at his still sore feet on a plush rug that gave him a certain comfort.
The room he was in still held something elegant and noble, although it lacked thorough cleaning and dust gathered in some of the corners. In addition to the wide bed, there was a dark mahogany armoire and a desk with an armchair leaning against the windowpane. From where he was sitting, Hyoga could see that a number of very similar envelopes were scattered across the table. All with the Sanctuary insignia, which greatly attracted his attention.
He got up, eager to touch and open all the letters, but then hesitated, for it was not his mail after all.
"Read them."
Hyoga quickly turned around and found Alberich, very serious, at the bedroom door.
"Pick any of them." he said again.
Hyoga looked at the dozens of cards that were there and chose one that seemed to stand out from the others, closest to him. He looked back at Alberich and he nodded for him to go on. The boy opened the envelope sealed by Athena's coat of arms, but which had already been torn open, and read the words in a beloved handwriting.
"Dear Alberich,
Times are quiet at last in Greece. I still occupy my days with research and observations about the Underworld so that the Sanctuary is prepared for the War to come. I received and am immensely grateful for the dark stone you sent me. I'm sure there is no better one than this one and that only you could have achieved it. It will be of great value to us and the Sanctuary will know of Valhalla's contribution. Again I am in your debt, don't ever think that I forget your pain.
I leave today for Siberia. Isaac and Hyoga are training with Crystal and I miss the two younglings. Hyoga mainly, as the boy lost his mother not far from there; Isaac is older and understands things better. But fate put me a boy who has the biggest heart in the world to train. But I believe he will be a great warrior.
I know you must be laughing as you read these words; maybe I really am getting old. It is said that one lose track of the years it loses spend too much time pouring over books. Maybe it's true.
I hope the winter isn't so harsh in Asgard. Keep me posted.
Sincerely,
Camus"
Hyoga cried with sobs.
Alberich came forward and took the letter gently from his hands, putting it back in the envelope and placing it with the others. Those words were as if they had opened a hole in Hyoga's chest, used to trying to lock his feelings inside himself, trying to honor his master's memory with the forgetfulness and abandonment of feelings. After so many days of traveling in the snow, many others in prison, those words opened his chest to the feeling he had held back. He could almost hear his Master's voice in those lines, though some of them sounded completely unbelievable; but precisely because he understood, at that moment, that perhaps there was a subtle and unknown side of his Master that he reflected day and night on the possibility of existing. A man who was also capable of feeling something. And there was proof that, in fact, Camus really saw him as the son he felt he was.
"Forgive me for how I behaved before." said Alberich in Russian. "Camus and I were great friends since childhood. We trained together to become Warriors and we study together to be professors in the biggest Sanctuaries in the World. That of Asgard and Athena's. Camus was amazing both as a warrior and as a scholar. But I never had any aptitude for war. Knowing of his death made me mad. I apologize, Hyoga. I should have remembered how much Camus loved you and how having to face your Master must have hurt you."
Hyoga was silent listening to those reports from his beloved master.
"Feel free to read all the letters." said Alberich. "I made a point of separating the ones I received from your Master."
"When was the last time you saw him?" Hyoga asked, and Alberich took a deep breath.
"Over ten years ago, the last time Camus was in Asgard and brought me the arrowhead." replied Alberich. "Since then, his role within the Sanctuary and your own training have made Camus too busy a man for such travels."
"I almost can't believe those words." Hyoga commented with a brief smile on his face, and Alberich guessed what was going through his mind.
"It's always funny when we realize that our untouchable figures are sometimes as vulnerable as we are. Your Master Camus was indeed a very reserved man and at times extremely cold, but there were details that touched him. You were one of those."
Hyoga cried again and Alberich put his hand on his shoulders.
Little happened in the days that followed, and although Alberich let Hyoga read as much of Camus' mail he wanted, Hyoga didn't read them all at once, as there were perhaps a dozen or so short letters. A task he knew he could accomplish in one voracious afternoon, but he chose to read one or two a day, as if leaving a new message from his Master for each day to come.
Hyoga was well taken care of in the mansion by the only servant, an old man who took care of the few chores in the house; his fate for Asgard had not changed and Alberich asked him not to leave the house so as not to attract unnecessary attention, since the people of the city were still very aloof to foreigners in a time of war, as Alberich always pointed out. So Hyoga really only had those letters and the snow to watch outside; the letters he read, Hyoga read and reread even the punctuation. His Master's voice always echoing along those lines.
"I feel that Camus' words carried an enormous sadness." Hyoga said to Alberich one night. "I get the impression he knew he was going to die."
"He had been researching very deeply in recent years into Death and the Underworld at the behest of the Camerlengo, as a way of preparing for the Holy War to come."
"More than that, the impression is that the more he seemed to prepare for his death, the more he was anxious about leaving behind a debt. A debt to you, Alberich."
The boy was silent for the first time and Hyoga noticed how his eyes sought to deviate from his gaze. Few things made Alberich hesitant like that moment, but Hyoga remembered that he was a mere guest of that benevolent host who had accepted him into his manor a prisoner of Valhalla taking his mission as his before the Representative of Odin.
And so Hyoga chose to leave that doubt in the back of his mind, avoiding the subject.
"The Holy War is the certain battle. But we can still avoid confrontation with Poseidon."
"Hilda has been listening to me." Alberich said, finally returning his attention to Hyoga and noticing that the observation caused the boy some anxiety. "Poseidon's threat afflicts us too. Winter becomes increasingly harsh and there are reports that the Arctic Sea has never been more violent. I believe the Sanctuary's mission across the Seven Seas must be causing the Sea God some headaches."
"Seiya and the others must have sealed many Relics. Which means it won't be long before they get here."
"And I don't believe they'll be the only ones to get here." said Alberich. "If it is true that here will be the last Relic of the Seas, we must not assume that the faithful to Poseidon will quietly accept that theri God is silenced."
"We will fight if we have to."
Alberich let out a discredited laugh.
"Your Cloth is destroyed, Hyoga, leave the battle to the God Warriors of Asgard."
"Don't underestimate me, Alberich."
"Never, Hyoga. You are a disciple of Camus, but if Athena's Galleon arrives in Asgard with Poseidon's minions, I am fully convinced that the God Warriors will be able to end the threats with the help of the Athena Saints. There is no need to sacrifice yourself in vain."
"You talk like you're not part of the God Warriors." Hyoga observed.
"I have the right to be a God Warrior, but I'm not a warrior like they are. I said before that Camus was the scholar who kept talent in both worlds. I would only get in the way of Hilda's noble advisers."
Hyoga listened, but shrugged as he turned to the window where the snow never stopped falling.
"There's not the slightest chance of a battle happening where my friends will risk their own lives and I'll be here behind this table reading letters. This will not happen."
Alberich's eyes were clear as the coldness of Asgard, but one of them was covered by the red lock that covered his face; that single eye staring at Hyoga gave him a strange feeling that the Asgardian was capable of looking at his inner fears and all his anxieties. He walked through that anteroom and approached.
"In that case, I have an idea, Hyoga." said the host approaching Hyoga, but staying on the other side of the table. "Times are miserable even among the front lines of Valhalla's warriors. The God Warriors of Odin represent the Seven Stars of Heaven. But only five of them were occupied by warriors truly capable of doing justice to the ancient warriors."
"Only five God Warriors?"
"With me, there are six of us. But like I said, battle will never be my forte."
"I can't believe a proud kingdom like Asgard doesn't have more than a handful of warriors."
"This pride of ours does not allow us to weaken in front of the Gods and the visitors, but the truth is that there is not. Unfortunately, a storm at the beginning of this period of harsh winter took Thor, one of our greatest warriors, whom fell victim by hunger and misery. There is another huge warrior whose greed has locked him away forever in the dungeons of Valhalla, from which he will never be freed. So this Odin Sapphire has no owner." Alberich placed a shiny Odin Sapphire on the table.
Hyoga looked at it and then at Alberich.
"An Odin Sapphire?"
"It's Odin's gift to the Seven God Warriors."
The Cygnus Saint looked back at the gem on the table.
"You must be kidding." he commented.
"You are a much more capable warrior than I am, Hyoga. It would be much better to have you in the fighting to come than an aristocrat like myself. And so you could help your mission, help your friends and still prove to Hilda and all of Valhalla how much you speak the truth."
"I will not wear any other Cloth than the one intended for me and gifted to me by my own Master Camus. The one I took the Saint's Oath with."
Alberich fell silent, for it was as if he were looking for the best words to follow.
"This is also your chance to pay off your Master Camus' debt."
"What!?"
The words were sharp and to the point, exactly to revive the doubt that had previously populated Hyoga's mind, but which he had politely pushed to the back of his mind. For now Alberich wanted it to take his entire body.
"The debt that your Master Camus died without being able to settle was to fight for Asgard."
"What are you talking about, Alberich? Come on, say at once!"
"Camus was responsible for a tragedy when he was an aspiring Saint. And a child died because of this tragedy. In Asgard, we all understood that it was a fatality, that it wasn't really his fault, but Camus…" Alberich paused and every word, every comma, every fluctuation in his tone was calculated. "Camus was mortified by what he considered a terrible mistake on his part. And then he left behind an oath and a debt: that he would lend his strength to Asgard when the time came."
"Master Camus..." Hyoga stammered.
"But his fate took him before he could pay off this debt that bothered him so much. No one from Asgard ever asked him to pay it, as he was very welcome here even after this fatality. But Camus never forgave himself."
Hyoga was gaping and practically out of breath, and Alberich left him there with his doubts.
"I'll leave the Sapphire here in case you change your mind."
Other days went by and Hyoga would be lying if he said that it didn't eat his curiosity around that fatality inside him, but he understood that this was a secret from his Master to Asgard and maybe it wasn't up to him to seek it out of pure curiosity, since that seemed to be something so serious. On the other hand, Hyoga felt anxious for the arrival of Seiya and Athena's Galleon and the end of that mission. And between his curiosity and his anxiety was that sparkling gemstone on the table, which the boy refused even to get too close or even touch, because there was something there that seemed to be too sacred to Asgard.
It shone in the center of the table and Alberich never took it away, just as they never spoke of it again. And yet, Hyoga sipped every character of his Master Camus in those letters and the boy felt enraptured and largely flattered when, more than once, he was mentioned in those brief passages. As was also more and more evident Camus' anguish with his imminent passage, leaving behind that damn debt.
The boy let tears slip from his face in a certain passage in which his Master confided his regret for the loss of Crystal and even Isaac many years ago; if for Hyoga those letters were like windows to the heart of his master Camus, they were also proof of how his master trusted Alberich, a distant confidant. This appeared to be one of his last letters in the pile, for in fact Alberich seemed to have left them all in a certain order, so that he could even observe the way his Master thought over the years. Since accepting him as a tutor, still a little boy, going through the ordeal of having lost his brother Isaac, the frequent abandonment of the Sanctuary until he was commissioned for the mission that changed his life in the city.
And after rereading all the lines and phrases in his Master's handwriting, Hyoga realized that in the pile there was one last letter, one of those very curious ones, as it didn't have any insignia, nor did it seem sealed in any way. The envelope looked nothing like the thick, good quality paper the other letters were on. Hyoga imagined that this was a correspondence that Camus had sent, perhaps, from Siberia itself, as there was one or another among the dozens he had already read.
The boy opened the envelope again and read what was undoubtedly the handwriting of his master Camus, the same as the other letters he had just read. He devoured the small letter, but the contents made him jump out of his chair and stare in horror at the contents. It wasn't possible and he could never believe it. But the words he had read left no doubt.
Hyoga got up from his chair, but then he was surprised by the servant who entered the room panting, eyes bulging, clothes all crooked and a single word repeated several times:
"Alberich! Alberich!"
Hyoga didn't understand the language of the people of the North, nor could that old man speak to him in a language he understood. But the servant took Hyoga by the arm and dragged him to the window where he pointed to a path that was lost in the Forbidden Forest in despair and repeating the name of his frightened host.
"Is Alberich in danger?"
"Poseidon! Poseidon!"
Words that carried weight anywhere in the world; Hyoga turned to go to Alberich, when he stopped mid-step, looking at that Odin Sapphire on the table. He thought twice and left it where it was, not before picking up that last and mysterious letter from Camus.
Hyoga went out through the snow that was now falling with less intensity, went around the house and took off along the trail that sank into the Forbidden Forest; he still had time to look at the servant's face, white as snow, watching him lose himself in the window of the room he was in. He ran over roots, over leaves, and it didn't take long to hear the din of battle.
"Alberich!" he exclaimed when he saw the boy on the ground trying to escape from two huge warriors who seemed to attack him with thick chains with ship anchors at the ends.
The Cygnus Saint, even without his Cloth, already recovered from his time in prison, jumped into the air and hit the two brutes in the face, taking them to the ground; Hyoga easily took out what appeared to be simple guards who carried scales for protection. But they were no match for Hyoga's strength.
"Watch out, Hyoga!" Alberich warned him. "Those are just sentries."
A laugh crossed the walls of that forest, formed by ancient trunks, and Hyoga saw emerge among them, with a fabulous and bluish cosmo-energy, someone who also protected himself with a blue and oceanic Armor. He had no doubts: he was a Poseidon Mariner.
"Who are you?" asked Hyoga.
"I'm Lieutenant Mariner Alexei!" the proud man announced.
A close-cropped haircut, no helmet covering his head, and that wonderful Ocean Armor on his body. Hyoga put himself on guard to face the Mariner and immediately felt the pressure of his cosmos, which seemed to have the depth of an ocean. It was a sensation diametrically opposite to that sad cold of the God Warriors or even to the solar heat of the Athena Saints.
"I'll kill you both!" announced Alexei's voice.
He opened his arms to the air, his oceanic cosmos revolutionized behind his back and a flow of energy seemed to connect all his limbs, while in the center of his body a blue orb manifested that received the energy flows carried by small beams of lights. His voice reverberated with force.
"Blue Impulse!"
The blue orb shot towards Hyoga, who tried to conjure a wall of ice with his cosmos, but it was shattered by the lieutenant's cosmos and lifted both him and Alberich off the ground. The two crashed against opposite walls and fell to the floor.
"Damn it, without my Cloth we'll be an easy prey."
"Take the Odin Sapphire, Hyoga!" said Alberich with difficulty.
"I will not wear this Armor; forget it, Alberich. I am an Athena Saint and I will win with my own pride!"
Alexei approached them laughing.
"An Athena Saint? Well, then in that case you won't be the first to fall into my hands. Die, Saint!"
Hyoga dodged Alexei's fist three times and faced him again.
"What do you mean by that!?" Hyoga asked, but Alexei smiled again, arming his fierce technique.
"Hyoga, stop being silly and put on the God Robe!" Alberich cried out to him.
"Forget it, Alberich." he said, who had not even brought Sapphire to that battle.
And the Blue Impulse again hit him hard, ripping off pieces of his clothing and causing him to vomit blood onto the white snow. He heard his name being shouted in the snow, looked to the side and saw Alberich tossing him his Odin Sapphire. It fell in front of him.
"Put your pride aside. If you die here, your mission and the mission of all your friends will have been in…"
But before he could complete his sentence, his body was thrown by the force of Alexei, who was before him. Hyoga looked at that precious stone in front of him and hated himself for making the decision he didn't want, but Alberich was right: dying there was even worse.
"Do it for Camus, Hyoga." stammered Alberich, badly wounded on the floor.
The boy got up, took the Sapphire in his hands and ascended his Cosmo, which he could touch to the Seventh Sense; that warm energy resonated with Sapphire and an enormous coldness took over.
The gemstone was icy in his hands and glowed with an incandescent light; the earth around him shook for a few moments and, from within the snow, a fantastic creature seemed to sprout that scared Hyoga at first. In front of him was a wonderful purple serpent looking him in the eyes; it was the armor. The parts that formed the totem of the wonderful serpent separated in the air and dressed Hyoga's body, who realized that he was surrounded by an enormous power.
The Sapphire that he had locked in his hands came free and lodged delicately in the waist of the Divine Robe; and when Hyoga felt like the most powerful Warrior in the world, that's when he realized that his chest was invaded by a deep fury and sadness. He looked at his hands almost without recognizing his own cosmos and saw how the purple coloring of that Divine Robe slowly turned to a deep orange that changed the entire hue of that protection. And along with that change, the dark runes of Odin's magic shone in Hyoga's clear eyes.
"Aurora Thunder Attack!"
His voice reverberated, raising hurricanes of ice around the place that razed Alexei; the Lieutenant Mariner who found himself enveloped by a furious blizzard that lifted him off the ground and dropped him already defeated and dead in the snow. Hyoga also fell to his knees, as he felt that the air was lacking in his lungs and an enormous pressure made him greatly distressed in his heart. Desperate, he took the envelope he had brought from his robes and reread the few words of what was little more than a brief note.
"Dear Alberich,
The stone worked.
Here it is as cold as Siberia.
Camus"
They looked like the last words of his Master Camus and Hyoga remembered others he read a long time ago:
"Remember Hyoga, you are an Athena Saint."
And the boy felt an enormous sadness before he fainted in the snow.
He was now a God Warrior.
ABOUT THE CHAPTER: One of the hardest chapters to write, as it is mostly original. I wanted to show what happened to Hyoga, but always keeping some mystery, because I gave myself the challenge of trying to write this arc as much as possible from the God Warriors' point of view, so Alberich's perspective here was very important. And Alberich's setting is totally inspired by the character Surtr from Soul of Gold. =) I believe that the two characters fulfill the same narrative function within the two arcs (that of being a cerebral and cunning character), so it was almost natural to blend the two. The idea of Camus writing letters may be a little strange, but he is the one who sent the original letter to Hyoga to go to the Galaxian Wars, and within that version of the story I had already established that Camus was a great scholar, so writing other letters would not be at all absurd.
NEXT CHAPTER: ALBERICH
Hyoga finally puts Alberich against the wall about his motivations and ambitions, unable to discern what pure reality is.