It was the first and only time I would ever take a bus. It was a warm summer day, near early January. I took my seat on the public bus which I had never once experienced before. The seats seemed oddly placed, with some facing each other, whilst some faced the front. They were all a bright orange-y colour with various playful patterns. It had a welcoming feel, unlike the transport I was used to. There were sections marked out for those with disabilities and those who are physically disadvantaged. As I took my seat near the back, I noticed there were a few other students, all attending the same school I was. They were scrolling through their phones, something I took no interest in. I leaned my head against the window and looked out to see the blur of buildings and cars which moved past in my line of sight. The bright summer sun shined brightly against the road, causing a little refraction which obstructed the view of distances far away. The vivid green trees and lush greenery would si
I opened my eyes only to be met by a relatively dark room. My entire body was bandaged yet again. It seemed that it was either dusk or dawn, I wasn't sure which. I had been asleep for a period of time. No one seemed to be in the room with me, it was honestly kind of lonely. My entire body was still sore and I could hardly move, so I decided to just stay on the bed and ponder about all the things that had happened to me throughout this new life of mine. It wasn't until almost an hour later, when someone finally came into the room. "Are you feeling better now?" It was the same doctor who had first treated me. "Yeah, a little bit." "Would you be able to get up and walk?" "Maybe." My entire body ached as I manoeuvred myself off the bed. It was pretty painful to sit up but I still pushed myself to do so. "Just wait here, I'll get a carriage so we can transport you to the other facility." "Thank you." I wondered how much this would all cost. "You're carriage is ready!" I wadd
I could walk with relative stability at this point. Mal was in the room just next to ours so it wasn't a great distance I need to travel. After entering the room, I was met by a man on the brink of death. His condition looked even worse than mine when I was first admitted. His entire body was covered with bandages, all of which were stained with a deep red. It seemed he was either asleep or unconscious. I had recovered to the point where I could move around. It probably wasn't long until I was on my way again. Considering our current situation, I was practically out of money again. There wasn't much for me to do here, since he was unconscious, as I left the room Lily followed me out. "You should probably get some more rest as well." I had pretty much had enough of lying in a hospital bed. It was true that my condition wasn't optimal however so I needed to come up with something to do. I turned to Chloe. "Can you ask the doctor if he has any more pain killers?" "What are you plan
We stayed at the mansion for two more days. Lucia played with the children a lot during these two passing days. I had a suspicion that she already knew what was going to happen. I thought about maybe bringing one or two of them, but in the end, it would likely be even more cruel than not and they would make the escape much harder. No one told her about the plan, in case she decided to resort to some rather extreme measures in order to protect the children. I spent most of my days walking around the mansion with Muichiro and Lily, we kept a look out to see if there were any advances by Reid's army. The plan actually hoped for Reid and Daario's armies to come into contact with each other near the centre of Gavaria. This way, due to their already poor relations, it might work in weakening them. Not much was told about what I was meant to do after finding Alfonso. Muichiro had told me that he was a powerful Warrior, on par with Mal. Although at best it would just delay Reid should he a
With one clean stream of water, I managed to cut down a few of the soldiers. It wasn't enough to break the group so they were given time to retaliate. Lucia was hiding in the grass behind whilst I tried to break a hole. If it didn't work, I would just use my fourth form and run through with her on my back. Several soldiers charged at me, inconsistently swinging their swords. It was not hard to evade the attacks in fact, they were extremely weak in comparison to many of the enemies I had faced until now. If this was the strength of Reid's army then the only thing I needed to worry about was Reid himself. I raised my sword for another attack. I looked around to make sure there weren't any soldiers hanging around who might accidently discover Lucia. "Universal Sword, Second Form, Arctic Blizzard." The attack launched wind and ice, cleaving the remaining soldiers and sending them crashing into the ground several metres away. It wasn't going to be long before reinforcements came so I
I woke up to the sound of talking outside the carriage. Could someone have found out about us? "I just needed to see a friend, his name is Ritsu." I looked outside the carriage. The guard was shocked by his words. It would've been very bad news if someone found out that Lucia was in here, but for some reason this person seemed to know me instead. I decided that going out and speaking to him was the best idea, if they knew me, there was a chance that they could've been an ally. I stepped outside and joined the guard. "It's really you!" The boy shouted. I had plenty of times were people would recognise me for no reason, likely due to something I had forgotten about my past and so forth, so this wasn't exactly extraordinary. "I suppose so." I responded "Can we talk in private?" He asked. He was someone who I didn't recognise, although his demeanour seemed relatively friendly. With my sword on my hip, I decided to take him up on the offer and I asked the guard to leave us for now.
We began trekking on foot through the night. The best case scenario would involve us not running into anyone during this time. Alister was taking care of the soldiers who were chasing us. We didn't have a torch or anything that could produce light, so I was mostly going off the direction our carriage was moving. We had already left the village where we got on the carriage and were now running through a dessert like, scarce landscape. "Is your friend going to be okay?" Asked the guard. "I'm not sure, he seemed pretty confident so I'll put my confidence in him." It was cold and windy, the rough sandy breeze brushed against us. Sand was getting all over my body and in my eyes, it was quite the annoyance. "How far do you think the mansion is from here?" I asked him. "I'm not completely sure, but I think it should be too far, maybe forty minutes or so on foot." "Ok." I looked around, we were in complete isolation, it seemed no one was near us, although it might've been due to the
"I'm Lily's father." "Lily's... father..." I was struggling to comprehend what was going on. From her story, I had always though that her father was dead. Yet this person standing before me was claiming to be her father. "Well, I don't have much else to say to you." I picked up my sword off the ground. "I'll tell Lily you said hi, okay?" He turned his back on me. "Universal Sword, Sixth Form, Break." "Huh?" The shockwave produced from my attack tore into his back, ripping his clothing and drawing blood. He winced in pain, seemingly surprised by my attack. "What is wrong with you?" He drew his sword again. "I don't care who you are, you better expect pain if you think attacking me out of the blue is acceptable." "Stop it, I let you live!" "Should I be grateful for you mercy now?" He poised himself to fight, holding his sword in front with his two feet planted firmly into the ground. "You're going to regret this." "Universal Sword, Third Form, Arctic Blizzard!" My en
"Huh? Where am I?" "Alister." In the bright blue open space, Alister sat, facing a goddess of the after world. "What is this place?" "This is the afterlife." "Wait, I'm dead?" "Yes." The memories of his death sudden flushed back into his head. After a moment of despair, his mind was swiftly cleared and replaced with the unyielding apathy that plagued all of the outcomes. "I assumed you've just remembered." She said. "Yes." "Now, you know Rin Takamiya correct?" "Yes, I know him relatively well." "You will be reincarnated in this new world where he is also staying, however, he doesn't have his memories, unlike you." The outcome are known for embracing change. "I see." "Just follow along with his mission and support him as well as you can." "Is that all?" "For the most part." After a little more explanation about the situation and circumstances with Freya, the portal was opened, leading to the new world. "Please do well and support him as much as you can, I'm counting
He gestured for me to make the first move. I decided to take some of my learnings from earlier. I rushed straight towards him, getting up close and personal. Then I dropped my shoulder, baiting out his swing. I managed to see the tiny movement of his arm and deciphered the movement of the blade. In the tiny amount of time I had in between, I began unleashing my form. "Universal Sword, First Form, Unstable Curre-" Suddenly, I felt a sharp pain in my stomach. What happened? I was carefully observing all of his movements, he couldn't have possibly hit me. I fell back a few steps and regained my composure. "Don't forget that the opponent will also have abilities just like you, don't rush in unless you know what they are." Ah, that made sense. I had completely forgotten that Alfonso had powers. Based on what I saw, it seemed that first of all, his power was able to deal blunt force damaged to my stomach. It didn't look like it needed and arm or body movements and it was able to be ac
We trained until late into the night. "Honestly, you're improving much faster than I expected." "Thanks, I guess." "Still, I can't rid the image of Rin from my head when I look at you." "I wish I knew what I was like back then, from the way you talk about him, he sounds like some really cool dude." "Really cool dude doesn't even cut it, you were the greatest human to ever roam the earth." "Come to think of it, how did I even die if I was so great, did I die of old age or something?" "I honestly don't know, but I did hear news of your death when I was only seventeen, so something very drastic must have happened." "Oh." It was getting rather dark. The blistering sounds of crickets in the ground was intensifying, the number of mosquitoes and other annoying insects were also increasing. This was a pretty evocative signal that the training session was about to near its end. "We'll train again tomorrow morning. I'm going to have to make you into a decent fighting force before Reid
"What do you mean you have a plan?" I asked. "Our mission is to protect the princess, correct?" "Yes...?" "Reid's mission is to kill the princess, right?" "Yes...?" "The missions aren't very specific." "I suppose." "First of all, I'm pretty sure the mission is to kill the person named 'Lucia Ourania', this means her status as princess is irrelevant. Second of all, I've deduced that Reid does not know what she looks like, from observing him, there is a good chance that Reid's mission is worded differently from ours." "Wait, so you're saying that their might be a way for us both to complete our missions?" "Not exactly, I'm basing it off the idea that neither of our sides know what the reward is, meaning, all we need to do is make it seem like Reid has completed his side of the mission." "How do we do that? Are we going to have someone pretend to be the princess?" "Based off his actions, I'm assuming his mission is not as straight forward as 'kill Princess Lucia'. He's been her
What really happened three years ago? Was the perpetrator really Reid? Or was it someone else? Who else was there at the time? * "Lily!" A loud voice came from the distance. "No way..." She muttered. She could not believe what she saw. A middle-aged man, running towards them. "I don't understand..." Eventually, he made his way over and stood in front of her. His dirtied formal clothes and caring demeanour. Lily couldn't understand any of it. "Dad, why are you still alive?" "Lily, believe me when I say this, I truly wished for the best for all of you." He was so narrow-minded at the time that he hadn't even noticed that Reid was standing right next to them. As soon as he saw Reid, his expression darkened. After the awkward, confusing reunion between them, Reid finally decided to drop some exposition. "Here's the person who killed your entire village." He said. "What...?" Lily was in utter confusion. Suddenly, Ferren drew his sword and rushed towards Reid, trying to kill
Lily raised her sword and prepared to face the opponent in front of her. She braced herself for a quick decisive victory. He was merely one of Reid's peons after all. However, he had other plans "You better not think of me as second fry, you'll regret it." * Finn stood firmly in the ground, showing no sign of attacking. Somewhat hurried, Lily quickly drew her sword and dashed towards him. "Royal Arts, Blitzing Orchid!" Her sword gleamed with a tint of white as it swung towards Finn. It was her fastest attack, as the sword travelled towards Finn, it suddenly sped up, supposed to catch him off-guard. "Calm down won't you? We're in no rush here." He was already in a defensive position so deflecting the attack was easily, it was all fully within his expectations. "Light Sword, Third Form, Full-Colour Spectrum." Rays of vibrant multi-coloured light was scattered all throughout the area as he swiped Lily's sword to the ground. Her sword smashed into the ground with a clang and
Reid drew one of his swords, the devil sword. He was up against Muichiro and Mal. Lily had confronted Finn, who was the owner of the light sword. The desperate battle would commence. * "Devil Sword, First Sword, Bereshit." Reid thrusted his sword towards Muichiro who was forced to react with extremely minimal time. Reid's attack was extremely fast, the likes of which Muichiro had practically never seen before. He unleashed his Royal Art as fast as he could. "Royal Arts, Itto Raikiri!" He swung his scythe as fast as he could, forming a gigantic cloud of dust, circling the area. However, it was still not swift enough to completely block Reid's attack, receiving cuts on his wrist and arm. Reid advanced upon Muichiro but then was forced to block an attack from Mal. "Royal Arts, Explode." The attack managed to connect with Reid, however, despite how strong it was, it still did minimal damage, doing nothing more than simply soiling Reid's clothing and giving him a slight irritation
"Here they come." Muichiro, Mal and Lily were the last line of defence, the various other guards and soldiers they had at their disposal would serve nothing more than a simple distraction when Reid finally made his way here. They had maybe sixty personnel in total, all armed with a myriad of different weapons and of all different levels of skill. The three strongest drew their swords, every second they bought was another second in which Ritsu and Lucia would be able to make their escape. Everyone in the surrounding area braced for what was about to come next. It all began when a few of Reid's soldier's streamed in, reaching the outer fence of the mansion. They were instantly confronted by the garrison, holding onto the outer fence. Brutal fighting took place, swords were swung, explosions and blood seethed all across the battlefield. The first group of around twenty soldiers who seemed to have mostly consisted of scouts, were quickly wiped out. However, the second wave would prove a
"Musical Sword, First Form, Triplet Rhythm." Powerful shockwaves were sprayed towards Ferren, they came in three waves, crashing into him as he blocked with his sword. His technique was still as clean as ever, rediverting the force of the attacks, cracking the ground beneath him. On his way to find his 'daughter' Lily, he suddenly found himself in a skirmish with one of Reid's soldiers. They were a quite powerful one at that, having access to a unique magical sword. He had just gotten away from Ritsu, who had embarrassed him, defeating him with relative ease after using his advanced forms. Stabilising on the rough ground, Ferren got into an attacking posture. "Musical Sword, Forth Form, Dissonance Score." Suddenly a painful, disorienting sounds protruded from the soldier's blade. This caused Ferren to somewhat lose his balance, almost falling to the ground. Still continuing the attack, the soldier rushed towards him, raising his sword above his head. Just as it looked like Ferre