GGGOLDEN

Althea sprinted off, the masked woman using her wind magic to pick herself and begin levitating towards her, gales still billowing around her.  A claw of wind picked up a trash can and hurled it at the blonde, the young girl diving out of the way behind the cover of a dumpster instead. “Don’t hide, that’s no fun~!  Come and show me if you can scream louder than the winds of my tornado!”  The masked woman exclaimed, using her winds to allow her voice to reach everywhere in the surrounding area.  Althea obviously didn’t reply, continuing to move while under cover.  She couldn't linger anywhere too long seeing as the wizard’s tornado would destroy her hiding place by upturning whatever it may be.  And she couldn’t really use her magic to stop her either, the wind was much too violent to simply power through and any projectile she throws would just get whipped around in the wind from where she stood.  But the girl’s thoughts were suspended as her last cover, a bright red pickup truck, began lifting off the ground.

As Althea moved behind a brick townhouse, she watched the red blur become part of the other debris the masked woman had picked up as she went, by then the mage couldn’t even really see her at all, but seeing as she was the center or her tornado it wasn’t all that complicated to figure it out.  She gritted her teeth together as she kept on moving, her other masked buddies would be converging here soon, so she couldn’t delay in taking this woman out right at that moment.  She could probably best the people one on one, but they would quickly overwhelm her if they struck all at once.  But Althea grinned despite her situation, it had been a while since she really had to think through things on such a level, mostly she could just punch things harder and move faster than her opponent to win, but this was different.  The blonde filed through everything she knew about the masked woman, the tornado, the red pickup truck, Althea’s own magic, and suddenly something clipped together.

The masked woman was giggling to herself, kneading her hands together as she floated along on her warpath.  The little girl was good at hiding, but there probably wouldn’t be much more to hide in at the rate things were going at.  “I’ll flush you out and leave you to the others!”  She squealed, caressing her masked face with an underlying sense of obsession.  “Yes yes, I’ll decorate the rubble of this place with your entrails!  What a pretty red color they’ll be, perhaps I’ll keep your heart for myself, honey!”  She shrieked before letting out a high-pitched laugh as well.  The woman created more claws of wind to thrash around at anything they could find, destroying things even more.  “I hope you have the money to fix all this property damage, lady…”  A voice suddenly said.  Before the masked woman could even properly react, Althea had appeared right in front of her, a lance made entirely from water already having been shot right at the woman’s face.  It was much to close and much too fast for even the woman’s strongest winds to stop, not like she had the time to cast a spell in the first place.  “N-No!”  She shrieked one last time before the weapon struk her mask.

The wind immediately dissipated, laving Althea standing over the masked woman who was writhing in pain.  “H-How?”  She stammered, moving her hands away from her face enough that the young girl could spot her mask had broken, leaving the bloodied left side of her face and golden eye for all to see. “Well, you didn’t make a tornado, did you?”  The woman’s single visible eye erupted with rage, reaching towards Althea’s neck.  “How-?!”  The slayer didn’t reply, simply bringing her foot down onto the woman’s head, allowing her to fall unconscious.  The water mage sighed, the masked woman had simply been calling her spell a tornado when in reality it was more of a hurricane.  She acted as the eye, where it was peaceful and unaffected by winds, her magic stretched out from there in arms.  It made sense seeing as being in the middle of a tornado would've been much more harmful than just standing to the side of it.

Then again all that debris picked up and whirling around blocked Althea’s vision, and the heavy fog also didn’t help much either, so she hadn’t really noticed until she realized the woman’s cloak wasn’t billowing around like cloth was supposed to in rough wind.  But seeing as the impaired vision worked both ways, it was simple to place her Clarity on a cart and roll it down  hill while suppressing her own magic signature.  Then all that was left was the get to a high enough place before entering the eye horizontally.  A quick and well aimed lance to the face did the rest of the work.  The woman probably didn’t count on Althea possessing something that emanated the same signature as her, but that was half her fault for not paying enough attention and relying only on her magic sense as well as the chance her opponent wouldn’t be thinking that much about her spell.

“You don’t actually like fighting, huh?”  She remarked to the very much unconscious woman before reaching down to retrieve her lance.  No way would someone who loved to brawl would make that many mistakes that would lead her to just hope her opponent wasn’t paying attention to things, the wind mage probably just wanted to see blood and hear screams.  “How boring…” The ribbon wearing mage finally said before turning and running after Clarity.  She could already feel herself shifting a bit, so it would be in her best interest to quickly get the key back as soon as possible.  After all, it was her heart, and now her body was stupidly trying to adapt in a way that it wouldn’t need it around to live.  Who knew what it could change, and the blonde wasn’t taking her chances by finding out.  She picked up the pace, although she had to keep to the fog blanketed streets to prevent being blasted from the sky on her way there.  Not like it was much better, she could barely see anything and enemies could be awaiting to ambush her from above, but that wasn’t what Althea was concerned about.  Clarity, she rolled it down a hill because it was really the only way she could get out of that situation in one piece, but darn it was she beginning to regret that.

Althea sprinted through Hargeon’s streets scanning the area not for enemies but for the cart she rolled her key down a hill on.  Her head probably would’ve been racing under normal circumstances, but oddly no real thoughts came to mind.  While the girl’s thoughts were usually like an ocean of constant movement and change, it was more like a still pool, undisturbed unless the blonde actively created ripples.  And then there was her body, somehow feeling cold and despondent despite the hectic scenario.  If she hadn’t known better, Althea would’ve started walking, but for as long as possible she’d keep up her sprinting.  Such sensations were not foreign to her, but certainly weren’t something she could ever get used to after having the key for so long.  She was in an incredibly dangerous situation, but Clarity took priority over anything else.  Ambushes were something that could readily happen at any moment, and for all Althea knew she was running straight into the ranks of her opponents.  One looking at the situation without any context would probably label her as pretty insane, but Althea didn’t really care.  Her mind was focused on her key only, so that didn’t matter.

It was then the young girl finally found exactly where her key was.  Held between the gloved hands of a masked man was Clarity, the two momean with him trying to get a good look as well.  She whisked undercover in an alleyway before the masked group of three noticed her presence.  Even through the thick fog sprawled across the town, she could clearly see her golden key sparkle.  She gritted her teeth out of agitation, how her emotions flared at the fact she was this close to getting back her Clarity.  And the fact the masked people of all those around had to find it only served to anger her more.  Usually something of only slight inconvenience wouldn’t be able to rile Althea up that much, but with the cool stiffness of her body she was willing to latch onto any form of emotion pesent.  Such was the way to verify the fact she was still technically “living” and “feeling” as a human being should.

“What is this supposed to be?”  The masked man holding her key muttered, turning it over and inspecting every bit of it.  He brushed his black locks out of the way of his mask, bringing Clarity even closer to his eyes.  Of course he would  be curious, the thing was emitting a magical signature, one nearly identical to Althea’s own.  That was how she was able to win her battle with the woman before, and they had probably thought someone was coming at them only to find a cart and a key.  Instead of avoiding conflict, they probably eck owned that from the fast and direct movement they were already spotted and instead opted to stand their ground and fight head on.  All this was soundly logical and easy to rationalize, but Althea refused to let up her anger until she had Clarity back.

One of his female companions looked over his shoulder at the key, pressing her breasts against the man’s back while draping her arms over her companion’s chest.  “Hmm, I dunno, maybe it unlocks something?”  She seemed to be completely oblivious to the man’s intense discomfort, although his other female companion wasn’t.

“Navino, let up!”  She said in a gentle motherly voice, despite her words.  “He's is getting smothered by you!”  She said to the dark blue haired woman apparently referred to as Navino.  Knowing her opponent’s names actually helped Althea recognize something, the fact that her last two encounters had just been going on their own solo.  There were two possible reasons for this, either that they had been dubbed strong enough to do it by themselves or were just scouts.  If the latter were true, that would make the threesome with Althea’s key one of the elite squads.  She gritted her teeth, she didn’t even care all that much if she could win or not.  Clarity was her target and she’d recover it no matter what.

The slayer scaled the building she had been hiding behind, taking advantage of the group’s lighthearted banterings to get right behind them and promptly jumping down as her own sort of ambush.  She landed on the motherly one’s shoulders, held onto one of the extended signs for a shop.  “Wha!?”  The woman said at the sudden weight bearing upon her.  But it was already too late, Althea had pulled herself up in a way reminiscent of doing a pushup, tightening her legs around the woman’s neck and pulling up.  She struggled using her nails to desperately scratch at the youth's legs while making gurgling sounds that you would’ve barely been able to identify a human.  Before the other to even really knew what was happening, a sharp snap echoed through the foggy streets of Hargeon and Althea released her legs from the woman’s neck.  She fell limply to the ground before her group, a pool of blood slowly forming under her head.

Staring down at the woman’s grotesquely disjointed neck, the other two had shock painted all over their expressions.  The woman lifted her hands to prevent herself from throwing up, tears escaping from under her mask to land on the street below.  Meanwhile, the man began shaking uncontrollably, taking a few steps away from the corpse before landing backwards on his butt.  Letting go of the sign, Althea landed next to the woman’s lifeless body to face what she could only assume were her friends.  “I request for my key.”  She said, her voice so chilled that Althea was surprised to find it was her own.  She offered an outstretched hand, although the two just looked on at her with horror.

“A little g-girl?”  The man said, rushing to get back onto his feet.  “What kind of little girl…?”  He abruptly shook his head decisively.  “No!  Whoever you are, if you can do something like that… I don’t think you should have whatever this is!”  He said, shoving Clarity into his pocket, a blade of wind forming in his grasp.  “Navino!”  The blue haired crying girl pried her gaze from her fallen friend to face the man.  “She would’ve wanted us to fight… we NEED to fight!”  He pointed his wind sword at Althea.  “That thing is pure evil, we can’t let it have this key!”

“Pure… evil?”  The dark blue haired woman murmured, “E-Evil!?”  Her magic signature flared, a visible aura of fire forming around herself.  “I must… purge that evil!”  She exclaimed.  Soon it was like she forgot all about the corpse on the ground, her magic never failing to ramp up further and further.  “This is it for you, evil incarnate!”  She screamed, throwing herself at Althea in a blaze of fire.

Althea could already feel the intense heat from where she stood, the girl called Navino speeding towards her in a ball of raging fire.  She wasn’t exactly sure what warranted her transformation from a heartbroken person mourning the loss of a friend to a vengeful being looking only to “eradicate evil”.  Something about it struck a nerve with Althea, and she quickly held onto that anger as she had before.  She was furious, so much so that it started to pain her physically.  Her heart was tired of pumping fervently, her skull felt like it was bing split open, pure emotion spilling right out.  And yet to any spectator she would’ve appeared to be a vacant, despondent husk.

“Evil!”  Navino screeched once more, bringing the blonde out of her introspection.  Stepping out of the way just in time, the other girl wizzed right past Althea.  But Navino skidded to a stop right behind her to deal a roundhouse kick.  Swiftly, Althea bent backwards, narrowly avoiding her flaming blow.  She debated creating some space between her and the blue haired girl, but she came to the conclusion that close quarters combat was more of her forte anyways.  Still, Althea followed through on her previous movement to dodge, performing a back handspring.  Navino didn’t let up, letting loose a flurry of punches Althea matched blow for blow.  “Die, evil!  Die here at my hands!”  Navino screamed, rearing her hand for another punch.  The flames on the hand she was using to strike intensified, going from a red hot to a searing blue.  Althea’s eyes narrowed, even if she were to dodge the attack, maintaining her distance would end up being a hassle, so she leapt backwards, keeping her eyes on Navino..

“This is it, wind prison!”  The voice of the man she had nearly forgotten the presence of penetrated the battle.  Instinctively, without even stopping to truly process the masked man’s words, Althea used her magic to instantaneously move as far away from the raging Navino possible.  The man’s spell would probably serve to help Navino land her big attack, but something like that limiting Althea’s movements would just be troublesome.  And she was almost out of range of the thing when she found falling to the ground after feeling a firm tug from her right arm.  The blonde turned to see said arm suspended in the air, caught right in between the man’s “wind prison”.  “I got her, Navino!”

“REPENT, MONSTER!”  Navino leaped to great heights, preparing to bear her fist down upon Althea’s head.  The blonde’s royal blue eyes narrowed from the annoyance of the whole situation, why in the world did she have to be caught in such a situation?  Even if she blasted Navino with all her might and defeated her, the man still had her trapped.  And if he could continue his spell while hitting her from afar, it wouldn’t look to good for the young girl.  So, she pulled.  The bandages on her arms unraveled slightly, releasing Althea just enough for her to truly move away from the spell and avoid Navino’s attack.  And so when the other girl landed on the ground in a cloud of black soot Althea needed only to rewrap the bandage.  Of course, she made sure to do it in a way they’d have no opportunity to really look at her right arm, although the fact she had unwrapped the bandages without touching them was more than suspicious.  All the more reason to kill the two.

“...come… Come…!  COME!”  Navino’s mutterings slowly increased in volume, her gaze locked on Althea.  Her magical output erupted even further, reaching such heights that the mage’s natural resistance towards her magic had been peeled away.  Her dark blue locks were lost to the blue inferno, skin beginning to char.  And yet the girl had started running towards the slayer as she had in the beginning of the fight.  Althea let out a deep sigh of concentration, extending her hand towards her attacker.  Suddenly, the ground underneath Navino loosened, parting to make way for the pillar of water that would pierce the sky, the previously flaming girl taking along for the ride.  Althea lowered her hand, watching her opponent disappear into the sky.  The girl had died, Althea had made sure that one blow would be enough.  Usually hen casting the spell Corinthian Order she didn’t need to worry about the actual existence of water underneath her, but during the fight she had detected a large reservoir below the streets.  And with no need for her to produce enough water for the spell, all energy was poured into the brute force of the impact.  And so the young girl turned her gaze towards the man, left cowering on the street as the main offense had been disposed of.  The slayer walked up to him, lifting him up by his head alone.  His hands clutched Althea’s wristes, trying to exert enough force to make her loosen her grip, but it was all for naught.  Althea squeezed enough that the man ceased movement, but not enough a mess was made.

But with the battle over, Althea immediately moved to retrieve the key that had fallen out of the man’s pocket during his struggle, not even waiting a moment to bask in the joy of battle.  Actually, at the moment there was none, just the cold yet unrelenting drive to have Clarity in her hands.  Reaching for the discarded key, she could practically feel the life once again stirring through her very essence.  That is until a boot suddenly stomped on top it interfering with the youth’s retrieval. “So you want this?”  The one wearing the boot said, somehow smirking through voice only.  “No wonder you ravaged through those guys like that.”

Althea rose her head to make eye contact with the obstacle, her gaze empty of any apparent emotion.  “Move your foot.”  She practically murmured, her voice colder than it had been before. However, the boot obstacle didn’t budge, leaning towards the young girl despite her request.  She bore a mask just like the other ones, but her wild yet short pale blonde mane distinguished her.  Behind her, man with long chestnut brown hair stood there silently.

It was then Navino’s charred corpse returned from the sky, leaving the masked girl almost unrecognizable.  The woman scowled at the sight of her, “So she got overwhelmed?  Fool.”  She spat before turning her sharp green eyes back to Althea.  “You’re voice and mannerisms are cold, but you’ve been emitting murderous intent this entire time.”  The woman crossed her arms, kicking Clarity behind her and her associate.  “Also, you killed my sister, so I’m obliged to return the favor.”  It was then the pure fiercity behind her voice truly emerged.  Even though Althea couldn’t see her eyes, she could feel them searing into her.

Althea got to her feet, looking at her opponents with a gaze intense with unreadable emotions.  Her opponents drew their weapons, the boot obstacle’s being a spear while her silent associate wielded a bow.  The blonde haired woman smirked, “You see these?  No one else has weapons to channel magic through.  It packs a nice punch, as you’ll see.”  She gave it a fun twirl around her head before driving into the ground beside her.  She absolutely exuded confidence, and for a good reason.  The way she handled the spear displayed her years of experience.  Of course, Althea was able to deduce this due to her own time using such a weapon.  Finding it to be fitting, the slayer formed her water lance, made entirely from her magic as opposed to imbuing something with it as her opponents were.  “So you think you can match me?  Okay, let’s do this girl.”

The two females rushed towards each other, meeting spear first.  The woman withdrew, attempting to slash Althea only to find the girl’s lance of water in the way.  The exchanged continued, the two quickly manipulating their blades as to get the upper hand.  The woman brought her spear over her head for a hefty blow, but as if was about to impact the young girl she swept it away with a push from her hand.  After that she had planned to use the opening to go for the woman’s heart, but as she was pushing the spear away her hand loss a suffered a violent blow.  She withdrew, taking several steps away form the woman to heal her hand, seeing it necessary for proper manipulation of her lance.

Whilst doing so, Althea raised her head to inspect the area for the cause of her injury, but nothing seemed out of place.  It was then the youth detected the traces of magic covering every inch of the woman’s spear, her eyes narrowing in concentration.  It was sort of like a chainsaw, the woman spinning the air around her weapon so violently that it would tear through any of Althea’s defenses.  That meant that even the shaft of the thing was deadly, so dodging it in its entirety was the only real option.  But she wouldn’t be able to last that long like that, she’d have to end it soon.

The masked woman reengaged the teen in combat, each one side stepping and twisting to avoid the other’s nimple jabs.  Spotting an opportunity, Althea leapt behind her opponent, rearing back her spear for an especially strong throw.  It sliced through the air at an intense speed, and Althea could hear a gasp escape her opponent’s mouth.  She had made the move at a very close range, there was no chance of the woman avoiding the blow entirely, and one graze was all she needed.  But suddenly, the lance stopped mid air right in front of the woman before falling to the earth harmlessly.  The slayer scanning the area for the cause of such a disturbance, she didn’t see her opponent cast any spell other then her “wind razor” one, so what exactly was the cause?  In the ground in front of the woman was an arrow, a red talisman wrapped around the shaft.  Upon seeing this herself, the wild haired woman let out a triumphant laugh.  “Thanks for the save, homunculus!  I guess you aren’t here for nothing!”

Althea turned her narrow eyes to the place where the masked man had been standing, finding that he had his bow drawn in preparedness the entire time.  The ability to infuse magic into objects for later activation, a common yet effective tactic.  The water mage extended her hand to reform her lance into her hand, but she felt a strong yet invisible gip fasten around her neck, breaking any and all focus.  “I’ve got you~”  The woman cooed, her arm moving in accordance to the invisible hand.  Air escaped the young girl’s throat, her mind fighting the urge to lose consciousness from the lack of oxygen.  Her hands instinctively found themselves attempting to wrap around her the hands choking her out, but as expected she found only air.  From her throat came violent gasps, large block dots staining Althea’s perspective.  “If you don’t like being choked to death so much, maybe you shouldn’t have done it to my sister.”  Soon, the young girl’s movement ceased, her arms falling uselessly to her sides.  The masked woman turned to her silent associate, “Alright, shower her with fire just to be sure.”  The man nodded, drawing his bow and aiming right at Althea when the unlikely occured.

A bolt of lightning struck the homunculus, and although no sound came from him he slumped to the ground.  “What the-!”  The woman looked up to see that the sky had spontaneously been draped in angry black clouds, the speed of which they whirled seeming almost unrealistic.  And once again, a bolt escaped the mass, striking dangerously close to the wild haired woman.  She turned her fiery gaze back to the motionless Althea, “Is this you’re doing, filthy-”  The lightning struck indiscriminately, so Hargeon, Althea, and the woman were all caught in it.  She fought against it of course, letting out screams of effort as she attempted to leave it’s range.  But the moment she lifted herself from the stone street another bolt found its way to her.  One after another, unrelenting even after it’s victim's brain was fried beyond repair, until it stopped just as suddenly as it began.

And that was when Althea opened her eyes, dragging herself off the floor.  She surveying the area only to spot the two charred bodies of her opponents, the air smelling strongly of burnt flesh.  It was a good thing she was a slayer and therefore more hardy than the average person, otherwise she probably wouldn’t have been able to hang onto consciousness after being nearly choked to death and rained upon by random strikes of lightning.  Her own resistance towards a spell she herself casted was also part of this, but she still felt a sting.  Althea gazed at her hands, it was odd, she remembered being able to control that magic much more adeptly.  Either way the blonde hastily healed herself with her magic for the umpteenth time that day.  Hanging around the area after a the light show of a battle was a very bad idea, so Althea once again went for her key, letting out a sigh of relief once she picked it up.  The young girl’s eyes closed as she held it close to her chest, warmth spreading through her body.  But before she could really savor the sensation of her humanity, her body suddenly stiffened again.  The blonde cast her royal blue gaze at her hand, only to find it not there at all.  Her left arm stopped at the wrist, and at the end a rough opening where her hand once was.  Lowering it, instead of being grasped by the cold hand of panic as she usually would’ve been, the youth cast her gaze around her surroundings for the cause.

“Oh?  Has the presence of the obelisk attracted something odd?”  A slow rhythmic voice said.  Althea turned to see it belonged to a man adorned in not only a mask, but a cloak as well.  And in his hand was the slayer’s own, still grasping onto Clarity.  The girl simply glared at the man, not offering any of her words.  But the man let out a slick laugh, “I hope you’re not angry with me!  My, what a beautiful gaze… may I have it?”  Althea’s lance sped right at the man, but it stopped mid air before simply losing its shape.  “Aw, don’t be like that!  Here, let me see-”  Althea had already attained another weapon, an assault rifle.  Although she had spent the most time training with the lance, her skills with guns still surpassed it.  Also, ith the absence of her left hand her efficiency with the thing was largely impacted.  And the blonde had a feeling that if that man got close enough to her, she’d be in a large amount of trouble.

Suddenly, the earth quaked, the ground beneath Althea losing it’s uniform shape.  Leaping onto a house instead, the blonde got a real look at what she was up against.  Four other copies of the man began encircling her, only one busy creating the earthquake.  The young girl dove into combat, weaving through the masses of earth thrown at her to take aim in mid air at the copies.  Of course, as copies they were easy to deal with, and Althea ended up dispatching of three.  But, during all this chaos she spotted a golden glint in the corner of her eye, Clarity.  Ignoring her opponents, Althea dove for it, grabbing hold of it with her right hand.  A familiar warmth spread through her, Althea curling herself up to bask in all of it.  Right there.  In the middle of a fight.
“What… what are you doing?”  The man gazed down at the young girl, “I thought you’d become stronger with it, but you apparently fell asleep because of that thing... oh well.”  He sighed, walking over to child before flinging her unresistant body over his shoulder.

The pair sat inside a narrow cave, the only real room comfortably fitting the two of them unless they dove deeper into the cave.  They might as well have been sitting side by side, the only light through a small hole on top.  On one side sat the even younger than usual Althea looking no different than usual other than her apparent age, hugging her knees while shivering.  On the other side was a girl with warm chestnut hair, appearing to be around 18.  She looked like any other person, and if one to were take away her fluffy fox ears and tail and katana she could easily pass for a young village beauty.  But even without those, her personality would really get in the way of being universally admired, one that could only be described as “pretty horrible”.

The chestnut haired kitsune seemed bored, but as an idea passed through her eyes her expression slowly favored a smirk.  She cast her olive green gaze towards Althea, twirling around her finger, forming a breeze through magic, before sending it in younger girl’s way.  The blonde’s shivers intensified at the chill, proceeding to pull her knees towards her chest.  Only the kitsune would have the idea to make a little girl even colder than she already was just for the fun of it, and she didn’t display any apparent grief over her actions.  In fact, the kitsune laughed at the blonde’s reaction, twirling a breeze around her pointer finger once again.  But Althea really didn’t mind, the way the fox treated her was a sign of her being independent from the one who had come before her.

“Really, you are such a kid, Ku.”


Althea's eyes shot open, rapidly adjusting to the darkness.  Her senses allowed her to be pretty darn good at seeing in the dark, but the only thing that she could discern was that she was in a metal box of some sorts.  Not a single sound from the outside penetrated through the barrier, and the place was really cramped.  She could feel the cold wall at her back and her legs could stretch out to reach the other side of the box.  Everything smelled faintly of metal, although what exactly the material was was unclear.  The blonde attempted to shift her position to better get into a punching position only to find chains wrapped around her legs, arms, and neck.  Any attempts to simply pull hard enough were thwarted, leaving Althea thoroughly trapped.  But how the heck did she get captured?

The last thing she remembered was getting Clarity back, so she presumed her body went into forced hibernation due to all the switching between emotional variation to none at all.  Seeing as she could identify such things, Althea still had the key on her person, but what to do next was debatable.  For some reason, her captors, probably the earth guy from before, didn’t kill her right away.  Even though she blew through a large portion of his group, the masked man was confident enough in the metal that he didn’t use anything else.  But, all she had really done before was use tons of brute force and physical capabilities, so there was probably something in her arsenal that could get her out.

Althea placed her foot on one of the box’s walls, casting floe on her limb before immediately replacing it with arroyo.  It was a process described as the ductile to brittle transition, basically just consisting of something going from really hot to really cold in a short amount of time.  It was supposed to to shatter the metal box, but whatever it was apparently didn’t even soften under heat.  But to be fair, neither of Althea’s spells really encompassed the extreme temperatures needed to break metal of such caliber.  And so, it was back to the drawing board.


Althea attempted to suppress her shivering, raising her eyes to meet the kitsune's.  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”  She murmured stubbornly, crossing her arms.  “But how do you expect me to be okay in so little clothes with a snowstorm going on outside… and we’re in a cave..!”  She complained, although her words only prompted for the kitsune’s laughter to intensify.  A dark cave with no fire in it was certainly not a good place for a little girl only wearing regular old snow gear, but the kitsune should've been even worse off.  The being was only in a crop top that exposed her entire midriff and jean shorts that barely made it past the halfway point on her thighs.

The kitsune managed to finally get past her laughter, resting her head against the stones at her back with a smirk evident on her visage.  “Magic.  Duh.”  She voiced, “Also I'm a celestial fox.  I don’t get cold.”

“Lucky…”  Althea murmured, burying herself deeper into her jacket.

“You should be able to do some stuff about it too, Ku.  You have a magical signature now, right?”  The blonde nodded slowly.  “Just imagine something and make it happen.”

“But that isn’t how the world works!”  Althea blurted, leaning in towards the brunette.

“It can be, I’ve already tested your aptitude for this magic, you’ll be fine.”  The fox said, stretching out her limbs across the stone cold floor.  “You’ve seen me use it enough times that you can just copy it.  Try clearing up the storm outside.”

Althea closed her eyes, taking a slow, deep breath.  She hadn’t really consciously had to use magic before, having only done so through instinct alone, but apparently she thought Althea was ready so it was sure to turn out fine!  If someone tried using magic they weren't attuned to, it could have all sorts of consequences, but apparently it was okay for her to try and manipulate the weather.  All she had to do was change how things were outside, so the young girl focused on projecting her magic, her will, out to the area.  But, what would she change it to?  Hopefully something warm, but it’s so cold outside and inside.  The chill moved to the young girl's very bone despite her layers of clothes. How come being warm on the mountain was so darn difficult?  Althea shivered as she remembered the frosty nights she had spent in caves such as the one she and the fox were currently in.

But suddenly, Althea felt a fist connect with the top of her head.  “Hey, kid, you messed it up.”  The fox said, her expression displaying her mild annoyance.

“What?  How?  I could feel my magic and stuff doing something!”

The fox shot an agitated glare at the girl, pointing to the single point at which light flowed into the cave.  Except, there was no light, just snow and the howling of wind.

“Yeah, you made it COLDER dummy.”

Althea sighed, racking her brain for yet another way to tackle the issue.  Then it came to mind: that one lady she had fought with that chainsaw lance of hers.  That had been her magic, right?  And if she could do it, what stopped Althea from trying it out.  Fiercely, she stared at her leg, willing for her ethernano to somehow manifest itself as something physical.  It shouldn’t be that much different from coating her limbs in water while attacking, just gotta do that, but way more focused.  Just gotta take that magic, and bam!  It was then the blonde went on a limb to try and perform the magic, managing to form her own ethernano ito spiky little points on her leg.  The next hurdle was to make them move fast enough to break through Mr. Unbreakable Metal!  Grunting in effort, sweat began dripping onto the cool surface of the mage’s container as she struggled to get the thing to move at all.

The reason it was so difficult was probably due to the nature of water and Althea’s own ineptitude in handling her own magic.  Water really was the last element that would just go along with what you want it to do, instead forcing you to dance to its tune.  Basically, this meant that Althea’s magic could start being a lot less effective whenever it felt like, somehow making the very fluid element into a rigid, niche one.  A way to solve this problem would be to just learn more about the dragon arts to make her magic abide by her will more, but when Althea learned the magic her goal was only to make it usable to the a certain degree.  If she could go about her business as a mage without having to worry about being able to defend herself properly, that would be good enough.  And that was essentially what lend to her surprisingly short training time with Tethys, and the young girl should really pay a visit to her dragon mentor soon.  But, at the moment she had more pressing matters to attend to.


Because of the weather intensifying, Althea and the fox actually needed to move even further into the cramped little cave, the kemonomimi begrudgingly leading the way.

“Look what you did Ku, going around and doing literally the exact opposite of what I asked.”

“I-I didn't mean to!”

“Who the hell thinks of the cold when they're trying to make it warm?  Honestly, I don't know why I bother myself with you anymore.”

Althea sunk into despair as the fox continued to berate her, her blue eyes glued to the cave floor.  That is until the fox suddenly stopped, the blonde nearly barreling into her from behind.

“Okay, there's a chance for redemption.”  The fox said, her voice laced with a subtle ill will that the young Althea couldn't quite detect.  “See that?”  The brunette gesture in front of the pair, a wall of solid ice.  “Lick it.”

“But won’t that-?”

“I didn’t ask you, Ku.”

“B-But I-I-I!”  Althea mumbled slowly devolving into a sputtering, teary mess.  “I don’t wanna!”  The first thing the girl learned after coming to the desolate wastelands of Phoenix Mountains was that licking ice, no matter how thirsty you were, would only make things worse.  She had been stuck almost all day at once particular icicle, bawling her eyes out until the brunette came to get her out.

“Or…”  The fox spoke again, a grin of pleasure from the young girl’s distress obviously curing her bad mood.  “You could tell why it's snowing outside and not nice and pleasant.”

“S-So I don’t have to lick the ice?”  Althea whimpered, quickly wiping all traces of tears from her face.

“No, just use your head and tell me… and don’t you dare say ‘because I used magic’.”

“Okay… So it’s all about temperature, air pressure, water vapor, mass flow, the interactions between them, and how they change overtime…”


Althea had been stewing in her metal cage for what seemed like ages by now, having tried every spell in her arsenal to see what would work.  But, seeing as she was still stuck, nothing quite did the trick.  But just as the blonde was about to take a nice nap in the frankly cozy enclosure, she sensed a familiar magical signature.  It wasn’t anyone form Fairy Tail or someone she had once done a job with, but the earth mage from earlier.  The sensation of leaving the ground came to Althea as she was apparently moved before being placed loftily back onto the ground.  After staying for a while, the magical signature withdrew, leaving Althea with a few moments to wonder where the heck she had been moved.  Until at least, she started to recognize the increase in temperature.

Apparently, not willing to let the blonde have a normal death, the earth mage locked her in a box and chucked her into a blazing inferno.  Now all sides of the box burned Althea’s skin, her breath slowly becoming shorter.  Before it hadn’t been much of a concern to her, but there was only a limited amount of air in the box.  And with the water mage’s shortened breath due to the temperature, it was being used faster and faster.  Althea sighed, she really was about to die, wasn’t she?  Really it was quite embarrassing, having to go out in some box, suffocating on the very air.

Actually, the slayer’s sense of self preservation prevented her from consciously allowing herself to kick the bucket when there was yet another set of spells she hadn’t used yet.  Taking a deep breath and distracting herself from her second-degree burns.  Hargeon was a city, and she was absolutely positive she was still within it.  Due to that fact, there must be plenty of pollution in the air already.  If so, all she needed to do was bring over a highly concentrated bit of that polluted cool air above her.  And thus, it rained acid, corroding at the metal Althea was encased in.  The temperature difference of her magic wasn’t enough to weaken it, but the cumulative pollution of all the citizens of Hargeon was.  Also, it did double duty of putting out the fire, and not even her chains were an issue.  Although Althea needed her skin to be exposed to get rid of them, seeing as the acid rain was entirely her doing it was very easy to protect herself from it without even thinking.

And so, the youth was free, leaving behind a melted pool of black metal, buildings scarred by fire, a street corroded by acid, and a fragment of her clarity.

Althea had escaped from the metal box, but what now?  She kind of wanted to see what that masked troupe was all about, but with Clarity in her grasp she didn't really need to.  Of course, there was the Magic Council to keep in mind, but Althea was sure they had someone else on the way to deal with things.  However, one more thing really concerned the youth, a thick, malicious energy hanging over Hargeon.  She was sure that despite her reintegration of Today's Forecast, it hadn't caused the change.  After all, it was more of a heavenly magic than anything, although Althea's slayer magic was managing to keep her general affinity neutral.

“Hault!”  A voice echoed from above.  “Raise you hands and turn towards my voice slowly.”  Althea sighed, not having the energy to do anything but comply.  From the girl’s senses, it was apparently two people who possessed some sort of magic, and it was likely they just happened to get sucked into the situation just as Althea had.  But once the mage turned towards them, she was faced with two familiar faces.

“Wha-?  Althea!?”  A teenage girl around the age of eighteen with amber eyes and sandy blonde hair lowered her staff.  Through it, she had been channeling a large amount of energy, but upon recognizing Althea she seized doing so.  “What in the world are you doing here?”

“Don’t be fooled, Nat!”  The other girl exclaimed, her own staff still trained on the young girl.  She looked exactly the same as Nat other than her substantially longer hair.  “Those masked weirdos -- who knows if they have magic other than ones centered around elemental magic!  This could be an illusion!”  Her sharp amber gaze turned from her twin to Althea.  “After all something about her… is off.”

Nadia’s deduction was in fact correct, between the time of them meeting her to now a lot about Althea had changed.  First off, she had gained substantially stronger, which was a given.  Both the twins had seemed to grow just as she had.  But, with the newly reintroduced Today’s Forecast, her magic signature must be feeling off.  Second of all, after her confrontation with Elodea Althea “shifted” a bit.  Such was a natural result of the passing of time for her, but for people who didn’t see her often and were unused to the accumulation of small changes to her personality, disposition, etc, it could seem like she wasn’t even the same person.

And after having such changes pointed out to her, Nat began eyeing Althea with suspicion, raising her staff once more.  “Okay, so, are you Althea?”

“Yeah.”  The blonde answered frankly.

“Nat, you can’t just ask her!  Prove it!”  Nadia exclaimed, glaring at her sister.

“I’m trying my best, Nadia!  No one can be perfect like you are!”

“I never said I was perfect!”

The exchange continued, quickly draining Althea of any curiosity she might’ve had.  She was going to ask what exactly they were doing there, but the twins were to busy trying to interrogate her and bickering.  She really wasn’t in the mood for it, even though she was a bit less human than usual her patience was not infinite.  After that emotional roller coaster of losing Clarity and regaining it, she just hoped one of her eyes hadn’t turned red.

“Eh, I’m bored… See you guys.”  Althea announced, turning back around and continuing on her way.

“W-Wait!  You can’t go!”  Nadia yelled, beginning to walk towards the girl.

“But… why not?”  The youth asked, turning to face the long haired teen.

“Because… erm…”

“Because we say so.”  Nat said, placing her hands on her hips with great authority.  How could Althea ever bring herself to refuse such a firm, unshakable reason?  I mean, how could she react?  With something like, ‘You didn’t say so’?

“Okay!” She affirmed, grinning at the two.  Nat seemed rather pleased with herself, but Nadia seemed more amazed  that Althea.

“Really?  That was your expert reasoning?  Honestly you two…”  Nadia sighed, her eyes on Althea.  “Okay, I guess it was a bit rash of me to assume the enemy had illusion magic or something.  I’m just… on edge.”

“That’s okay!”  Althea chirped, “I’m on lookout for the mask people too!”

“Really, you?”  Nat exclaimed, “Treasure hunting is one thing, but this place is really dangerous for a little girl!”  She remarked, casting a concerned gaze over the streets of Hargeon, still caked in fog.   “In fact, we came here because of a really funky magic signature, but now that you’re here we’d better leave.”

“Well, what are you guys doing here?  I came on a train!”  She offered helpfully.

“Oh,”  Nat began, “We were on a train too!  We were working as staff for a job, and we were getting off here before…”  She looked around, “This all happened.”

“Really, our modern-day society is so intriguing at times.”  Nadia remarked, crossing her arms, “Hiring a mage to serve as train staff is not only cheaper in the long run since they don’t expect any benefits or loyalty programs, but also serve double duty as security.  The only thing stopping a large problem within the country is the fact that only about 30% of people possess magic, and a fraction of those people actually take job requests.”

Althea had been keeping her deep blue eyes on the sandy blonde teen as she spoke, but honestly the words that were coming out of her mouth weren’t all that interesting.  So, once she began the slayer just kind of tuned her voice out.  Not her fault she had no idea what Nadia found so interesting about social politics and the economy. “I see.”  She said simply, “But about me being me…”

“You completely ignored everything I said, didn’t you?”  Nadia sighed, her expression mre disappointed than annoyed.  Althea’s surprise over the twin adeptly recognizing her reply to Nadia’s remarks was very half assed was plainly displayed on her face.  “Urgh, I don’t think anyone but you could be so helplessly obvious.”  She muttered.

The rolling mist clung desperately to the lonely city streets, suffocating the air around the three mages.  Shops and homes built tightly together had been scattered around the city.  Their corpses served as roadblocks, rubble piled high for the young group to traverse over.  Despite the fact that the town had previously been a bustling port, not a single soul revealed itself.  The mist stagnated the air, choking any sign of life from the scenery.  Althea, along with her twin companions, scaled over a mass that may have once been a house.  A placed someone had expected to be safe before it was decloved to a simple bunch of rocks.  Now it blended so seamlessly into the landscape that depicted the passing of a disaster.  No danger, simply remains.  In every direction there was one such house, ruined to some degree.  Lost in the blanket of the mindless chaos, from the vantage point Althea gazed at the blanket of destruction.  The stones shifted slightly under her weight before standing still.  The whole world stood was still…

“EARTH TO ALTHEA,  HULLOOO!”

A voice prompted for Althea to turn, finding that it belonged to a Nadia barely managing to climb hoist herself on the same platform.  “Help-”. A gasp, “Help me UP!”

“Oh yeah, right, my bad.”  Althea chirped, grasping onto the sandy blonde’s hand and assisting her up.

Sweeping her short hair out of her face, Nadia leaned against a fragmented pipe, “You sure do… Climb well…!”

The ribbon wearing mags nodded, flashing a smile at Nadia.  “I spent ages in the mountains, so I hope so!”

Nadia wiped the sweat from her brow, seemingly not all that engaged with the conversation.  “Hah, that's… good for you.”

It was then Nat finally arrived, her usually neat hair resembling a bird’s nest more than an actual hair style.  “I cannot believe…”  With Althea's assistance she climbed onto the platform, setting herself down in exhaustion.  “I cannot BELIEVE that my hair got stuck on EVERYTHING!  The broken glass, the broken pipes, and that's not to mention the BIRDS!”

Nadia sighed, nodding along with her sister.  “They were bothering me for a while, but obviously you faced the brunt of their torment.”

“At some point I tried casting magic, the darn things dodged!”

“I managed to hit one but it didn't leave a scratch.”

Althea looked from the twins, her eyes plainly displaying her confusion.  “What birds?”

Nat dragged herself to hr feet.  “Wow, they left YOU alone?  But why?”

Althea shrugged, surveying the ruined landscape.  “In the state I’m in right now, living things without much sentience tend to avoid me.”  That would explain why Nadia, the one climbing closer to Althea, had less bird related issues than Nat.

Nat sighed, shrugging, “You keep saying stuff like that, but you’re lucky I’m too exhausted to get an answer out of you.”

Althea grinned, turning away to resume looking over the ruins of Hargeon.

Nadia stepped forwards, standing next to Althea.  “Crazy, right?  This is only a small section of Hargeon, but it really got messed up.  It’s like a natural disaster wiped through this place.”

“I mean, I know there was a tornado earlier, and a bit of lightning, but anything other than that is beyond me.”

Nadia shot Althea a concerned look, “Wait, you were here when this stuff was getting destroyed?”

“Yeah, I was here the moment it got attacked.”

Nat’s amber eyes widened, “Wait, people did this?  How?”

“Yeah, some weirdos in masks.  I didn’t help with the whole “don’t destroy the city” part either.”  After all, when she was being put into her temporary prison, Today’s Forecast was probably going absolutely insane.  Thank goodness it apparently hadn’t rained though, they had no proof that it wasn’t just the tornado.

Nadia looked around desperately while Nat seemed to lose all power in her legs, collapsing onto the platform.  “Natalia.”  Nadia murmured hoarsely, her eyes still glued on the horizon.  “We don't even know if those are the same people.  Either way-”

Nat began to tremble.  “It's HIM!  I-I can feel it.  And those birds, they were probably…!”

“Dammit,”. Nadia swiftly strode up to her sister, dealing a clean slap across her face.  “Keep it TOGETHER.”

Nat was left dazed, her hand tenderly grazing her red cheeks.  However, Nadia’s glare kept her silent, so she opted just to quietly murmur to herself.

Nadia exhaled, pushing back a lock of blonde hair.  “I’m… sorry you had to see that.”

“See what?”  Althea chirped turning to face the other teen.

“You know… Nat?”

Althea shrugged, “I realized you guys were having a moment, so I just didn't pay attention!”  She grinned, seeming quite impressed with herself.  After all, she had just taken a social que and was able to scrape by the tense situation with absolutely no problems!

Nadia’s brows furrowed, “You can't just choose not to pay attention.  We- We were yelling and…”

“Yeah, I was listening to other people instead!  Pretty sure they noticed my eavesdropping though, seems like one of rock dude’s clones are coming.”

Nadia's eyes widened, hastily stooping down to help her sister to her knees when a silky smooth voice echoed through the mist.

“Well well well, look what we have here.”  The masked man said, a pillar of earth raising to put him on the same level as the girls.  “You broke out, and as a bonus I’ve even found two failures.  Very nice indeed.”

Nat’s eyes slowly came to meet the masked man’s, her eyes widening in horror.  “No, he, you’re-”

“Glad to see you’re doing well, Natalia.  You even have the troublesome one with you, what was her name?  Naomi?  Natasha?”

Nadia’s eyes narrowed, taking several steps with Nat in arm away from the man.  “Surprised to see you’re alive and kicking, old man.”

Suddenly, Nat reached up, grabbing Nadia’s hair.  Her vissage had been twisted by hysteria, tears freely flowing from her eyes.  “D-Don’t say anything bad about him!”  Nadia attempted to twist herself away.  Nat grasped harder.  “You don’t know!  You have no idea!  He’ll hurt us, I-I…”  Her grip weakened enough that Nadia was able to escape, a few locks of sandy blonde hair still remaining in her sister’s hand.  “I don’t want it… Please… No!”

The masked man chuckled, stepping onto the mound of rumble along with the girls.  “Haha, I got to witness something very amusing today!”  He turned to Althea, “Wait a moment, beast, I need to deal with a few bugs first.”  Before the blonde could even respond.

One moment he was standing there, another he had propelled himself into the air, a throat of a sandy blonde in both of his hands.  As they remained airborne, he let his gloved hand tighten and dig into their flesh.  And before they had time to do anything but gasp for air, he had driven them through the wall of ad already damaged warehouse.  The man allowed the girls to cushion the fall for him, pushing them deep into the cement floor as they skidded to a stop.  Nadia, despite the ringing in her ears, summoned her staff to herself, taking a swing at the earth mage.  However, he withdrew, Nat still in his grasp.

“Oh, so you’ve managed to do that?”  The man’s smooth voice echoed through the empty ruins.  “But is that all?”

A thin sliver of lightning darted towards the man, prompting him to back up once more.  The moment the crackling light met with the ground, a blinding flash consumed the room.  Nadia seized this opportunity, raising her staff to channel her magic into one big blast.  If things were drawn out to long, it would endanger Nat and the man’s experience and power would be used to quickly overwhelm her.  The only advantage Nadia had was the fact that the man didn’t know what she was capable of.  By firing off a small yet high level blinding spell, the man would be wary of its effects but still make sure to keep an eye on it.  And that was what gaze the sandy blonde her opportunity, know was her chance!

She gritted her teeth as she felt the excessive amount of magic leaving her body.  Normally Naia wouldn’t be able to use the spell in the first place, but due to her connection with Nat their magic pools had been relatively mixed.  “But now it’s over.”  Nadia murmured, the ball of pure lightning making contact with the ground.  The warehouse, no, the entire district was showered by an absolutely blinding light, something that served to damage and scorch already ruined properties.  Admittedly, the spell had the power to harm both her sister, Althea, and herself, but if that meant she would defeat that man she would allow any cost.

Soon, the violent light faded away, leaving a sandy haired girl falling to her knees, her breathing heavy.  That was it, the end.  Finally she and Nat could be free from his invisible grip.  But where was-?

“Did you really think that could work?”  A silky voice echoed from behind Nadia.  The girl whirled around to find the masked man emerging from the ground, the unconscious Nat held by the wrist.  “I didn’t think you’d waste all your energy on one attack, but at least you got me on the defensive.”  He mused, throwing aside Nat.  His boot met Nadia’s face, holding the girl down on the concrete floor.  “I guess it was too muc to ever expect you to become anything special.  What awaste of sentiance.”  He raised his foot before etting it fall back onto Nadia.  Once more.  Again.  Until his was finished, kicking away Nadia’s bruised body.  “Too bad you lack the magic power to even stand anymore.  Guess this is the end.”  The masked man pointed at the speechless Nadia, a condensed bullet of earth forming in the air.

“Mister, you aren’t helping yourself by doing that.”

Suddenly, a pillar of water gushed out of the ground from underneath the masked figure, bursting through the roof of the broken down warehouse.  The masked man fell to the ground along with a short yet heavy drizzle.

The man struggled to his feet, his black boots splashing in the newly formed puddles.  “What- Why?”

Of course, the one who had pulled off this attack was Althea, having propped herself on the warehouse’s highest window.  “What do you mean by'' why?”  She retorted, leaping down onto the floor.  And despite the inch high water, she didn’t make a sound.  “We went on a cool adventure one time, that’s enough.”  However, from the glare she felt from the man, it seemed that was an unsubstantial answer.  “I mean, if I let you murder whoever, I’ll drag a bunch of other people down with me.”

Silence.

In a voice trembling with rage, the man spoke.  “That’s all?  You haven’t had any qualms about killing, beast.”

“I’m not “a beast”, I’m Althea!”

The man clenched his fist, “Stop with this idiotic charade, I’ve seen the real you.  You could be described as nothing else than a beast.”

Althea crossed her arms, her lighthearted expression becoming rather annoyed, “There is no real me, I am whatever I assign myself as.”  She walked towards the man, her footsteps still silent, “Okay, enough talking.  Bring out your other clone please.  This body is a bit tattered now, right?”  She chirped, internally praising herself for making astute observations.  And apparently that man had thought the same thing, his body sinking into the earth as if it were quicksand.

“I’ll be back.”

“Sure, uh huh.  See ya mister!”  Althea chirped, waving.  Sighing, she placed her hands on her hips, rather proud about how things turned out.  Nat, Nadia, and mister earth guy seemed to have some sort of history, so she found it fit to just let them sort it out.  Of course, it was rather difficult having to just sit back and watch the fight without doing anything, but they offered her some nice entertainment.  She had never actually seen either of the twins’ magic, so it was a nice little exhibition.  Of course, Nadia’s course of actions had been rather logical.  Too logical.  The earth guy immediately saw her intent the moment she cast the blinding spell, burying both himself and Nat underground.  “And you would’ve gotten him too, you broke through one of my shields in one go with an area of effect!  Super firepower!”  She chirped, lowering herself to heal the beaten in face of Nadia.

Althea sighed, looking over the status of both the sandy blonde girls, both of their breathing having stabilized.  Of course she had healed both of their wounds, but what would happen when they woke up?  Well, hopefully by then mister rock man had would have already been dealt with, so they won’t have anything to worry about!  Althea was still rather peeved he refused to stop referring to her as “beast”, but it was partly her fault for getting off on the wrong foot.  Wait, should she have even bothered with her introduction?  He was going to die after all.  Hargeon had faced several calamities before, but this time people couldn’t just take shelter in one of those handy shelters.  After all, there are people actively looking around for people, not the best conditions for trying to simply bunker down.  Better just evacuate, abandon your house and let it get demolished.

“Ah!  Challenger approaching!”  Althea called, leaping out through the hole in the roof to the roof of the warehouse.  She didn’t have to squint to see the earth guy approaching quickly.  He was standing firmly with his hands behind his back, a pillar of earth moving swiftly across the district.  Of course, despite his composed pose he actually gave off the impression of being livid.  “Hi mister!  Sorry for the shoddy place, but I’m ready to go now!”  She called, grinning as she clenched her hands into a fist.

“Beast, one attracted to the obelisk, why do you stand in my way?”

“Huh?  Obelisk?  What obelisk?”

The earth mage glared at Althea through his mask, “There’s no way an existence like you-”

“Dude, I’m just a mage, so c’mon.  You wrecked this place so I basically have to kill you now.”

“Beast, I command that you answer my questions.”

“No no no, we’re fighting, not talking!”

THe earth mage’s hands clenched into a fist, “And why are you so insistent on fighting me?”

“Because I need to kill you, I literally just said that.”

“Yes, but why-?”

“Ugh, I don’t have patience for people who can’t pick up on social cues!”

Althea launched herself directly at the mage, a streak of water being left in her wake.  The earth mage however, had already began erecting walls between he and Althea, the structures causing small quakes as the meter inch wall of earth formed.  Still flying right at the wall and unable to stop her momentum in time, Althea’s face was in a due course to collide with the wall.  Whirling her body around midair, she positioned herself in a way that allowed her to meet the wall foot first, her kick allowing her to cleanly burst through the wall.  But by the time a whole had been made in one wall, yet another had appeared before her.  The momentum from her initial jump had already started dying, forcing her feet to meet the ground for yet another one.  She had a feeling that the earth underneath her was sort of acting as an extension of the earth mage’s magic from the trace amount of ethernano present in there, so it was better to keep off it as much as possible.

But yet another wall meant yet another way to get past it.  The moment Althea’s feet met the ground, she burst into the air, clearing the wall in one leap.  Whilst in that high up position, the girl got her first sight of the earth mage since the beginning of the fight.  Beaming, she waved to him, his displeasure caught in the corner of her eyes.  However, a few more things needed to be dealt with before teasing him any further.  And thus her sapphire blue eyes were once again on the battlefield, more walls being erected every minute.  Althea was actually able to get to the top of one however, leaping off the thick wall of rubble to travel to the next one.  In an instant she was directly above the earth mage, although nothing about his disposition suggested this was a very tight spot for him.

And indeed it wasn’t, because while Althea’s fist had landed on an empty ground, he had already moved himself with that column of earth of his.  The water mage rose from the crater of her own creation before leaping out, her eyes trained on the moving shadow of the earth mage.  She was much faster than him, so it took no time to catch up, the girl maintaining her airborne state by pushing off the skeletons of ruined buildings.  However, the moment she reared up her fist to deal a near fatal blow, a blunt force was felt by the entirety of the girl’s left side.

With that, she was sent barrelling into the streets, crashing into a mound of cement and other not so soft things.  But the moment she sat up, she felt the ground shift, the very earth throwing her into the air.  From there, it was a repeat from last time, the metal leftovers of a building shifting in order to hit Althea’s entire body.  But not that she was at least paying attention to her surroundings, the ribbon wearing mage was able to roll her body up the metal surface, clutching onto the top.

“Hahah,”  A silky laugh came before the owner of it came within Althea's field of view.  “You look like a mess.”  Truthfully, after taking a direct blow like that, she was probably starting to show some bruises on her pale skin, and dusty cement probably also clung to her hair.  “I knew you to be quick, hardy, and simple minded, so it was quite easy to manipulate you to do what I wanted.  As you can see, in a city you have no hopes to outmaneuvering me no matter what you do.”

Althea stood up on the jutting out metal, shrugging nonchalantly, “Okay.  I’ll try something else.”

The thunder came before the lightning, the lightning before the sudden downpour.  One moment there wasn’t the slightest breeze, the next it was storming violently.

“Ah, so you hope to impair my eyesight?  Sorry to say that I don’t need to see to know where you are.  There are still dirt particles in the air connected to my magic, so even when you aren’t directly on the ground you’re still able to be subject to my magic.  See?”

A pillar from the opposite side of the street came rushing towards Althea, but instead of jumping to avoid being crushed, she simply turned and punched it.  And then she launched herself right back at the earth mage.  Although he dodged, it was comparatively slower, something that was her goal in the first place.  If his “run away while hitting Althea with those dumb huildings” plan didn’t work, he’d be forced to assume another position that could allow for her victory.  And so Althea pursued the moving pillar from land, sprinting normally as opposed to her leaping from earlier.  When close enough, she clung onto it, diggin her fingers into the wet soil as she climbed her way up.  Displeased, the earth mage rose himself above the height of any building, presumably to try squashing Althea with every building in the block.  But he never got the chance because a stray shot of lightning streak through the sky, striking the highest point in the area that also comprised of a few metals.  Althea was uninjure, but the earth mage clearly wasn’t, falling off his pillar and only catching himself narrowly.

Althea wasted no time approaching the scent of burnt flesh, made even more apparent despite the rain due to her senses.  “Do you think that was enough?”  The earth mage called, his white mask cracked through the middle, ironically, a bit like a lightning bolt.  “I haven’t even used my strongest attack.”  He said, his arm raising along with several balls of earth.

They all came whizzing towards her at once, the girl bending herself to allow them to barrel past her.  But she didn’t have a moment to rest, another wave, and another, coming right at her.  After several, one found its way to Althea’s right thigh, leaving behind, a dirty, bloody bruise.  She winced, although she didn’t allow herself to become absorbed in the throbbing pain.  After all, yet another wave was coming, and that had given her some valuable information.  Although he had been physically slowed down, the earth mage’s spells still hit just as hard as they should be.  But admittedly there wasn’t much time for thinking, because another ball of earth collided with Althea’s left shoulder.  She felt it dislocate, but there wasn’t much she could do about it in the current situation, only continue moving.  However, almost right after, a pillar from a nearby building collided with Althea’s face, her back submerging into the mud.

The earth mage apprached, a finely crafted sword made from his magic in his grasp.  “I bet you thought you could drive me into a corner, huh?”  Althea remained motionless in the muddy puddle, but her jewel like eyes still highly contrasted her dark, brown surroundings.  “Well, I guess you know this it the end already.  Now, you are-”  He was only a step away, but the earth mage couldn’t move his feet at all.  Was this some new magic the beast came up?  Althea shot up, somersaulting backwards easily, despite her injuries.  “How-?”  Suddenly the earth mage noticed something, since when did it stop raining?

Althea exhaled, a warm cloud of breath emitted from her mouth.  In a second, the temperatures had entered sub zero, and the earth mage stuck in frozen mud up to his ankles.  The entire floor of the city was effectively a skating rink, Althea able to glide across it barefoot without any problems.

The earth mage’s gloved hands balled into a fist, his balls of earth reappearing.  Except this time the casting was much slower, but it was only to be expected.  Any earth readily able to be used for magic had been iced over, so he had to construct the stuff from scratch.  That small delay wouldn’t let Althea just rush at him, but it did help her out considerably.  And along with slow down the man’s casting time, the temperature also hardened his earth shots.  Usually it would be counterproductive to try something like that, but the reasoning behind her tactical decision was evident with the arrival of the first rock bullet.  Altha simply punched it, allowing it to break into pieces.  Hitting a hard surface was much easier than hitting a soft, slippery one, so now she was effectively on the offensive.  The earth mage continued to throw shots at her, but Althea volleyed them right back, one hitting the mage’s hand and taking it clean off.

And then that was it.  Althea had noticed throughout their fight how often the mage moved around his hands, as if it were controlling hi magic, and the balls of rock losing their shape and magical properties made that fact clear.

Sighing, Althea approached the man who was currently breathing heavily, attempting to use his cloak to stop his bleeding “used to be a hand” stub.  She closed her eyes, regulating the temperature and moisture in her little weather bubble to match that of the outside and dissipating.  No longer were there any traces of the ice, mud, or even fog.  “I guess this is it, huh?”

The masked man raised his gaze, his animosity able to penetrate even his mask, “Hah, that’s what you think, but I already delivered the obelisk to the place designated in the sacred texts.  You’re going to die in this damned city, beast.”

“Wow, you are super annoying.”  Althea muttered, stomping on the man’s head and reducing it to a mess of blood.  “Ah… for an earth mage you really aren’t that sturdy, well, I guess I should be saying were...”

But, there was one last thing to take care of.  She couldn’t just walk away from the situation with something as ominous as some “obelisk” floating around, could she?  And she had a bit of fun battling the earth guy, although him never even calling Althea by her actual name was rather irritating.  However, maybe the next person will be a bit more mindful.  And it was honestly pretty simple to find the thing-y anyways, the ethernano in the air whirling around a central point as if it were a hurricane.  Leaping onto the buildings’ rooftops, Althea was able to easily traverse the district to her desired position.  Without the annoying mist the slayer was back to seeing incredibly far distances, allowing her to locate a big, black magic rock with golden scribbles all over it.  Ut perhaps even more odd than the big ol’ rock was the sandy blonde haired standing in front of it.  Her amber eyes shone with amazement as she stroked the thing.

“I was defeated so easily by some summoner who stuck their nose in only to run away, but now…”  She murmured to herself, “I’ll be… I’ll be…”  Althea was just about to interject herself, but two pair of teenage feet beat her to the punch.

Nat ran toward the unidentified teen, “Don’t integrate with that thing, Astrid, it’ll be the end of you!”  Althea chose not to really question anything she was saying, but instead fixated on how the timing was actually perfect.  Or maybe the two detected her coming and decided to make their move before Althea did, knowing she’d stay out of their personal stuff.

The girl, apparently called Astrid, sighed, turning to face the twins.  “Ah, N-3 and N-27.  It’s been quite a while.”  Wait, that’s weird.  When they all stand next to each other they look like triplets.  Are Nat and Nadia’s faces really common amongst sandy blonde people with amber eyes?

This time Nadia spoke, “Astrid, if you integrate with that thing you’ll lose any trace of a personality, your body will just be a vessel through which the scriptures act.”

Astrid pursed her lips, holding her hands behind her back, “And what’s wrong with that?  You’d better get going before Master gets back or-”

“He’s dead.”  Nat’s eyes bore into Astrid, “He’s gone.  You don’t need to do anything he tells you.”

A booming silence wrapped the area, Astrid’s mouth remaining half open.  “No…”

Nadia took a step towards Astrid, “Think about all he did to Nicole's magical origins overflowing.  How Nora never even made it out of the cloning vat.”

Astrid raised her head, her eyes firm but ominously hollow.  “N-10 simply didn’t do the procedure correctly, rejecting the mana flow instead of letting it into her.  And N-2 was simply a test run, after all she paved to way to the creation of you two.”  A dark smile unfolded on her face, “Ah, Master would be so happy to see two of my clones going about having their own free will.”

Nat was shocked to silence while Nadia retracted her step, looking on at Astrid in horror, “What the hell…?”

“I am N-1 of the Misjuven Project, an inituative to reproduce the figurehead of the sacred texts.  To make a ideal society with our inherint destructive power.  I don’t need to listen to any soiled attempts to recreate me.”  Astrid deflected, turning to face the obelisk.  “I was a child born amongst the millions, born by the will of the texts and to die by it.  So, I’m no longer Astird, am I?”  She turned to face the twins, an innocent smile on her visage, “Refer to me as Nahs, the incarnation of misfortune.  A walking plague, a cursed reptile.  I’ll shed this body for the next~”  Her eyes reflected a dangerous light, “There were a total of 30 of us, right?  Now there’s only 3, you two and me.  How odd…”  Astrid, wait, she wanted to be called Nahs, right?  Well then, Nahs plunged her arm into the obelisk, the rock sucking her in as if it were some sort of dark liquid.

Nadia whipped around, grabbing the dumbstruck Nat by the hand and dragging her away, “Althea!”  She called, her desperate eyes saying everything.  She wanted Althea to save the girl, but that was a no can do.  You can’t enter battle with half-assed emotions, and to be honest the water mage didn’t give a flying heck over what happened to Nahs.

“If you want to protect someone,”  Althea said, her cool blue eyes trained on the twins, “Maybe you should get strong enough to do it yourself.”

A roar resounded in the obelisk, cracks forming as it cracked open to reveal a pure white glowing blob.  It varied its shape, flickering from humanoid to snake before growing to an unprecedented size.  It was about as big as four school buses when it started forming its silhouette, granting itself limbs and… wings?  A familiar scent reached Althea as the light blob flaked off the creature, revealing rows of scales.  It was dragon.  Nahs had become a full fledged dragon.

“LOOK UPON THE DARKEST NIGHT, THE RUINER OF WORLDS.”  Wow, what first words for a newly born dragon.

“Sorry Nahs, but you chose the wrong first opponent!”  Althea chriped cracking her knuckles as she watched the dragon inhale, exhaling a haze of mist.  But, instead of coating the ground in a disease ridden cloud, it was consumed by Althea.  “Yeah, as I thought you became a water dragon.  Too bad my magic’s made specially to combat that.”  The aura of water that accompanied dragon force surged around the blonde as she launched herself at Nahs.


The mist-like body of the dragon began flaking away, letting way to the human body of Nahs to fall uselessly to the ground.  It was a tad bit disappointing things ended so quickly, but it was mostly because of how disadvantageous the fight was for Nahs.  Althea literally had magic made to combat her, and she wasn’t even able to get accustomed to her dragon body before trying to defeat Althea with it.  A bit of a waste if you ask the Fairy Tail mage, but she guessed there was enough property damage for one day.

“Hey.  I’m still alive.”

Althea moved into a position as to stand above the barely functioning body of Nahs.  “Ah, I guess you are.  I’d better get to fixing that, shouldn’t I?”

Nahs sighed, her gaze glued to the blue sky, “I can’t believe that the reincarnation of misfortune got killed so easily.  I guess the world will have to wait another thousand years for the obelisk to come back.”  Her gaze seemed more contemplative then regretful however, probably because of all that information that can rushing into her head after taking in the obelisk.  As she was, she was closer to being a being like Althea rather than human, and such people had no need to revel in the pain of their worthlessness.

“I’m sure by then everyone will be over it by then.”  Althea said dismissively, sitting with crossed legs in front of the sprawling body of Nahs.

“It’s just, I thought I could do something.  Anything.  And in the end I couldn’t even completely give up my human form.”

“I’m sure this isn’t your original body, just a reflection on how you think it is.”  Althea assured the sandy blonde, crossing her arms, “What your consciousness inhabits now would’ve become the dragon’s heart and any trace of your humanity erased.”

Nahs sighed, “I guess so…”  A brief quiet.  “Hey, I noticed something while fighting you.”

“Yeah?”

“You’ve got no heartbeat.  Must be sad.”

“Not really.”

“Why do you have a heart that isn’t even functioning inside you?  Sentimental about your organs?”

“Nah, this husk sitting inside me isn’t my original one anyways.  Actually, I see what you’re alluding to.  It could solve lots of problems.”

“Then go ahead.  Rip it out.”

Althea let her hand enter Nahs’s abdomen, the other girl making a lot of unnatural gurgling sounds as the blonde swish around her internal organs.  And then out came a fresh human heart, although an abnormality could be found with the way it seemed to shine with an unnatural light.  However, that was just due to the traces of aether, nothing new to Althea’s body.  And so, she took her key and Nahs’s heart and ate them both whole.

“Ah, so this is what you imprinted on your heart…”  Althea muttered, eyes closed as she shifted her body to combine Nahs’s heart and her Clarity.  “Surviving wasn’t really a priority before, but I guess that now that you gave me your heart I can’t just erode that desire away?  Fine, it’s mine now.”  She stood up wordlessly and made her way out of the ruined wasteland of the district.