Eados, Glaive of Elyon

The world was pitch dark once more. Asta strained his eyes trying to see, but he could not make anything out. Just then, he felt a small object in his pocket. An amulet! He vaguely remembered it from somewhere. Asta held it up to his face, and as he did, the darkness slightly dissipated around him.

"Asta!" A voice yelled out. "Asta, are you there?"

A handsome young man with the iconic silver hair and golden eyes of a Serian appeared before Asta. A red cape fluttered in the wind, his armor gleaming despite the lack of light. The man gave a slight smile as he entered Asta's vision.

"Who are you?" Asta asked. "Where...where am I?"

"In Eldingenau, silly. Don't worry, I assume you time isn't moving outside of your mind." A swirl of gold dust ran across the air like a stream. He stuck his hand into the stream, and whipped it around. "This isn't going to take too long, so just be calm with me. You want to beat that thing? You're going to need my help."

"I feel like I've seen this somewhere before." Asta said. 

"Hey look, I'm sorry. Lord Forseti isn't exactly in the right mind to give you his speech right now. So, this is just the gist of it, yeah?" He held out the spear, and turned it sideways. "Eados, forged by Lord Forseti. Have you heard of him before?"

"I can't say I have." Asta said, confused. "Is he a blacksmith?"

"Dyeus above, people these days. Okay, we're going to have to try this differently." He stepped closer to Asta. "When you imagine justice, honor, and battle, what do you think of? Be honest, please."

"Uh...knights, I suppose?" Asta said, slightly confused. Asta had never really acclimated to the idea of honorable warfare. The man sighed.

"Oh boy. Well, I can't really blame you. You live in different times, after all." He smirked. "And people dying is never a fun thing to see." The man looked to the side, as if in deep thought. "Yeah no, that's...that's always a terrible thing to see." He closed his eyes, as if in deep pain.

"What now? Can I have the spear now?"

"Not yet. If you want to beat that thing, you're going to have to listen to me carefully, alright? I have an idea." The man breathed in, and exhaled. "When you think of something you want to fight for, what do you imagine?"

"Fight for?" Asta thought. "My friends and family, I guess." The man slightly frowned.

"Is that it? I need specifics. I need to see that fire inside of you. What matters most to you? What do you, Iwen au Atrean, Prince of Seria find to be something worth even more than yourself?" He looked at Asta again. "What do you, Asta of Nyseros, find to be the most important?"

Asta turned his head down, deep in thought.

"What...what I find important, huh?" Asta looked down. "Um..."

"It's alright, you can tell me. I won't judge. I can't judge, really. I'm a disembodied voice in a glaive that only you can hear, you can admit to a lot of stuff and get away with it."

"Well, I care about my friends. I care about Jason. And I care about Hanna." He scratched the back of his head as he thought of her.

"Hannah, huh? Seems like she's a lot more on your mind." The man raised an eyebrow, but nodded. "Go on."

"I care about Aeneas. And...and my mom, Kaleia." He looked down. "And...I really do care about Eliza. I haven't really been a proper brother to her. Or a good son to my mom. But...I do care."

"That's ok. You know. That's what matters right now." The man looked at Asta up and down. "Feels like there's something else though."

"Huh?"

"Something you're missing here. She's not from this world, but I can read your mind. I know who you're thinking of. Tell me." Asta straight at the man, and then looked down.

"I - fine. I still miss Sylbia." Asta bit his lip. "I want to find her and make sure she's safe. I really do. But I've been looking for years. Years and years. And at this point, I keep telling myself I'll get up there once I get the throne. Once I get stronger. But..."

"But?"

"A part of me wonders if I've given up. I tell myself that I'm still looking, but I don't know how. I think subconsciously..." The man looked at Asta, and sighed.

"Is that someone you want to protect most then?" Asta looked up at him.

"Yes."

"I don't know where Sylbia is. I can't tell you." The man placed the spear into Asta's hands. "But I know one thing, is that the glaive is telling me that you're going to be able to find what you're looking for soon."

"The spear speaks?"

"No, it's not a sentient being or anything. Oh, amulet please." The  man said, gesturing towards the amulet. Asta looked at the amulet, and at the spear. "You're going to need to give that to me if you want to activate the glaive."

"Alright." Asta handed the amulet over to the man, who smiled, and put it into his pocket. "I'll trust you to let me use this thing properly, then." He nodded.

"If you want to kill that thing, I suggest you aim for the face." He winked. "Trust me, I have experience with these things. They're not that scary when they're new."

"I'll make sure to take you up on that." Asta nodded. "Thanks."

"Hey, one last thing." Asta's eyes perked up as the spear began to glow bright gold. "This might be a slightly selfish request. I'm sure you don't understand why, or how. But, when you see your sister again, be sure to be kind to her, okay? She's been through too much."

"Wait, what?"

"See you around, Asta. Try not to disgrace our family, okay? And when you see her, hold on tight. Don't ever let go."

~~*~~

"God dammit." Asta gripped the spear. He looked up at the titanic mass of writhing...whatever it was. But the light of the spear seemed to dispel most of the attacks, preventing the smaller and weaker attacks from connecting as they dissolved in the light. "Sylbia, this is for you."

Asta leapt from the castle wall to the high tower. He didn't even realize he could leap that high, but he suspected the spear was somehow helping.

"Someone's using the Glaive of Eados!" A woman yelled out. "Look up there!"

As the giant swung a massive pitch black tentacle (or whatever it was), Asta jumped onto it. Running up the side of the monster, he plunged the spear into the monster's body, which writhed in pain. As it did, it swung wildly towards Asta, too quickly for him to dodge.

"Provide him covering fire!" Arquebus shots from the ground impacted upon the tentacle, shocking it long enough to freeze as Asta slipped away, onto another side of the monster's body. He wasn't quite sure if it the fire was Empyrean or Serian, but he had a feeling it would be both. He inserted the spear into the side of the monster, and slid down, cutting a giant gash into the beast. He slid off of the monster and into the air, sending him tumbling down towards the earth. Before he could hit the ground, he threw the glaive at a castle wall. It embedded itself into the wall, and as if on cue, Asta ripped towards the object, as if he was being flung towards it. He emerged beside Hanna and Eliza. The two were taking cover behind one of the city ballistas.

"Whoa." Hanna looked at Jason, wide eyed. She even clapped slightly, impressed.

"Took you long enough." Eliza said, trying to hide her surprise.. She took his bow and let several arrows fly towards the behemoth. "I'm not going to question whatever happened with you and the glaive, but I have a feeling if we're going to beat that thing, we'll need it."

"This?" Asta held the spear - no, glaive out, and looked at Eliza. 

"Yeah." Hanna, Eliza, and Asta dodged another attack as the monster swung out at them. "It won't be easy getting close to it though!" 

"I need to hit the face." Asta grinded his teeth. "But it won't let me near. Even with all the new abilities, I can't hit that far." Asta's other eye, the eye that lacked the eye of darkness could practically see the trajectory of the glaive. He wondered if this was a side effect of the glaive.

Just then, a small bird flew over to the trio.

"Hey. Iwen. Can you hear me?" Niria's voice asked from the bird. "Jason helped me get down to Empyrean lines. Empyrean forces left in the city have agreed with your commander for a ceasefire, so you don't need to worry about Empyrean soldiers at all now. I promise you, you can find a way through that thing. I saw you. You have good resonance with the weapon. Now, I have to leave before Jason finds me. I'm sending this bird over to him so he can stop chasing me, so I won't be able to talk to you anymore."

"Alright, but just give me a second.." Asta stopped the bird. "I have an idea." He looked at the ballista. "How exactly did they say the teleportation ability worked again?" Eliza's eyes opened wide, and she poked Hanna with her shoulder.

"Wait, why me?"

"So what exactly counts as throwing, precisely?" Asta put his hand on his chin as he watched Hanna struggle with the ballista. "If I mounted it onto a ballista, and put my hands onto it-"

"You would break your hand." Niria said. "Look, everyone is running low on munitions to distract the thing, and I can't stick around here. If you want to go ahead and try, then try. Technically, yes. I'm sure it would work though."

"Bingo. Thanks, Niria. You can leave." 

"About time." The bird flew off, presumably towards wherever Jason was.

"We ready to do this, Iwen?" Eliza asked as she watched Hanna finally put the ballista in a firing position. 

"Yeah, just give me a moment." Asta put his hand on the glaive, which was now loaded onto the ballista. He glanced at his heavily gloved hand. "Dyeus above, this is madness." Asta gazed out at the titan. Dyeus above. He really was going native, wasn't he?

"I hope this works." Hanna said. "If it doesn't..."

"It will work. It has to." As the ballista aimed at the monster, it had freshly finished devouring a castle wall, and now was turning onto them.

"Iwen, it's looking at us..." Hanna said nervously.

"Not yet. It has to get closer!" Eliza commanded, looking up.

"What if it shoots us?!" Hanna said with a slight panic.

"Not yet!" Eliza yelled. A bead of sweat ran down her face.

"Now!" Asta yelled, as the monster lashed it's tendrils out at the trio.

"Fire, fire!" 

"You don't have to tell me twice!" Hanna cut the cord, and as the ballista let loose the glaive, Asta drove his arm forward, to make sure it count as a throw.

The glaive struck the beast in the face, and the gargantuan shroud surrounding the titan's face faded away as Asta's shattered hand desperately gripped the glaive. As Asta began to fall away from the titan, he steeled his resolve and gripped the glaive tighter, transferring it to his other hand. His entire arm pulsed with pain, but he ignored it and looked at the beast.

"Oh no you don't!" He aimed it carefully at the now exposed face of the titan, and threw it with all his might. It let out a guttural scream, as if it were a person, and fell over onto the ground, before it started dissolving.

There was a moment of pause. And then, thousands of cheers could be heard down below. The human army - mostly Serian - cheered as they held the banner of Eldingenau aloft.