XIII - Dark of the Moon

Within the UICAs secret base, Saitori and her spies compiled evidence from salvaged surveillance recordings that Maika tried to destroy. The spies also found out that the reformation centers for unconscious players that Maika offered were assimilation academies. This led to their discovery of SANDRA (Specially Advanced NPC Designed to Reform and Assimilate).

SANDRA was a program not only to crush Mivangeline and hinder Saitori's antiprogram, but to free players within Maika's will. The catch Maika hid from Altair's citizens is that players will wake up in the reformation centers with amnesia and be assimilated into Reaper Squad commandos. Saitori and her spies made the internet explode, virally exposing the secrets of Code Fuchsia and the reformation centers.

While Saitori and Oreic prepared the UICA rebels and Vulpi magicians for the upcoming war, Isrina watched over Shien's body in a bedroom. She was secretly being trained by the dark Vulpi named Iagen. The mother practiced the moves of the Ouroboros Fang as Iagen taught her.

Ignite your anger, dear friend! Iagen's apparition watched Isrina with his pale pentagram eyes. Channel your wrath into your limbs!

"Ouroboros Fang: Lunar Misfortune!" Isrina hurled rolling punches into the air with arms dislocating like serpents. "Ouroboros Fang: Draco Animus!"

The mother's right arm morphed into a skinned dragon head that breathed fire.

"Ouroboros Fang: Baneful Dreadscythe!" Isrina's arms elongated with bleeding muscles and long scythes.

Iagen clapped his hands. Well done, dear friend! You're a quick learner! Now, I believe you're ready for the upcoming war.

"Am I becoming a good mother?" Isrina's arms returned to normal. "This power will help me protect my Little Chickadee and secure his future? To end Hernamidos, my family's generational curse?"

Yes, dear friend! Now, join your friends and test out my teachings! Iagen's ghost vanished when Saitori and Oreic entered the room.

"Hey!" Isrina greeted them, keeping her Ouroboros Fang training in secret. "Are we ready?"

"We are! Are you?" Oreic patted Isrina on the shoulder. "We've waited very patiently for this God given moment, yes?"

Saitori nodded, adjusting her blue hair bun.

"While our forces fight the Reaper Squad, I want you two to help me get to Maika in Altair's palace. I have some unfinished business with my former sister-in-arms. Then, we can focus on finding Hernamidos and Fanghui. Understood?"

"I have my apprentices ready to help as well!" Master Magician Oreic then smiled at Isrina. "Ready to get back on the field? I know the legendary Niang doesn't like being left out of the fun!"

Isrina laughed with her longtime Vulpi friend. "Ready whenever we are."

***

After defeating the boss, Shien, Mivangeline, Elysia, and Enshiron sat in the arena room with Phoenicia's unconscious body. The android NPC's eyes opened with circular loading symbols.

"Phoenicia! Are you there?" Shien asked.

The android blinked awake with a breath. "Greetings, companions! I'm grateful that you've rescued me from the oddest dream."

"We missed you!" The four friends jumped on Phoenicia with joyful tears.

The android NPC smiled. "I detect many injuries likely from your battle with Cyber Shoguness Kirina. Allow me to heal you all to demonstrate my gratitude!"

Phoenicia healed her friends, releasing green light from her palms. Mivangeline, Elysia, and Enshiron's HP were healed to the maximum.

"Hey! What about me?" Shien pouted.

"My apologies, I have difficulty detecting small people like yourself," Phoenicia grinned.

"You tin can!"

"What a derogatory statement, shortie!"

Elysia laughed. "Too bad, tiny! No healing for you! Haha!"

"You know, Elysia, you never think before you speak!" Shien pointed.

"Wait, what? I'm not dumb!"

"You sure, little fox? Big height doesn't mean big brain, you know."

Elysia tackled Shien as Mivangeline and Enshiron sighed, used to the bickering.

"Come and get some, half pint!"

"Bite me!"

"Cease your bickering!" Phoenicia bonked Elysia's head and threw a plush warbler at Shien.

She healed Shien as he hugged the plush bird.

"Phoenicia, good to have you back!" Mivangeline fist-bumped her. "Ow! Your hand is hard!"

"My lady, you get used to it," Enshiron also fist-bumped Phoenicia. "Oh, ouch. Never mind."

The five friends then heard loud banging from the jade palace doors.

"Now, who would that be?" Phoenicia blinked.

"Assassins from real-life!" Mivangeline warned. "Battle positions!"

The commander, Shien, and the Vulpi friends prepared their weapons. They knew who was coming. The doors broke open, and two figures walked in. One was the hooded Thalamoid with magenta lightning bolt eyes and a mechanical respirator. The other was the trench-coated SANDRA with shadowy glasses and an earpiece coil.

"And before mine own holiness is the blasphemous who claims the Lord chooses the lame over the righteous!" SANDRA pointed an accusing finger at Mivangeline. "Thy tongue truly is wicked indeed."

"So, thou heathen hast quickened thy pace to activate Saitori's antiprogram. Bleh! For I have no patience for thy impoverished party who hast annoyed Empress Maika's wishes! Let us all skip the formalities, shall we? En garde, thou heathen!"

"Shien, you living curse! Prepare to die!" Thalamoid roared. "Isrina will be mine!"

The jade palace collapsed as hundreds of SANDRA clones attacked Enshiron, Elysia, and Phoenicia with their Tessenjutsu. Many tried to pierce palms into Phoenicia, attempting to assimilate her into another copy of SANDRA. Thankfully, Enshiron and Elysia killed any agent who dared touch Phoenicia.

"Enshiron! Elysia! Protect Phoenicia!" Mivangeline ordered. "Phoenicia, help them with all you can. Shien and I have scores to settle with these two."

"Yes, Commander!"

While Phoenicia's healing assisted in Elysia and Enshiron's fight with SANDRA's copies, Shien and Mivangeline faced Thalamoid and SANDRA in a 2v2 duel. Mivangeline drew her katana as SANDRA opened her tessen warfans.

"Avian Form: Roadrunner Blitz!" Thalamoid and Shien wasted no time bashing their heads together with super speed. "Avian Form: Woodpecker Beak Strikes!"

With the two Avian Form users battling with swarms of beak-shaped palms, Mivangeline and SANDRA circled each other in a standoff. The dark of the moon shone over the Dynastiotron village that was overrun by SANDRA clones.

"Renounce thy blasphemous words against the Lord! Thy daring words that I knoweth not much as I thought! And I shalt give thee a painless journey to the everlasting inferno! Thus saith the Lord!"

"SANDRA, I will not. Jesus, the Messiah, arrived to show us new wine. For he healed the sick and didn't only offer forgiveness just for the righteous, but the broken as well."

"Jesus, the Messiah? Bleh! The one who hath conducted witchcraft and healed those on Shabbat! That false prophet speaketh forgiveness of transgressions and ate with the heathen scum and undeserving! The son of God would have been born of royalty, a mighty King on a horse with a sword to conquer thou heathen!"

"This is why you Pharisees can never see the light of God! You're so blinded by expectations and tradition that you fail to see that the Lord can work through the weak and foolish. The Messiah said the blind shall see and the lame will walk! Are you not joyful of what Jesus offers to the brokenhearted?"

"Bleh! Blasphemy! God shalt only exalt the clean and worthy, thou insolent fool! For I am the sudden windstorm who hath arrived to reform and assimilate. To punish the unholy and burn the nonbelievers! And thou shalt die a horrible death! Thus saith the Lord!"

As Mivangeline struck her sword in a deadlock with SANDRA's warfans, she looked at the sinister NPC's red eyes behind the glasses.

"SANDRA, you truly are a snake like the Pharisees who rejected the Messiah despite all the miracles he had shown. You all reject the new wine Jesus offered to the sick, those you've all condemned as unclean. For Jesus said those like you who blaspheme against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven!"

"I shalt cut thy muttering sorcery and let the wild dogs devour thy flesh!"

Mivangeline and SANDRA sliced and blocked each other with their weapons at insane speed. They kept slashing at each other until the Machine Queen's warfan caught the commander's katana and cracked it in half.

"Thou art finished!" SANDRA aimed her tessen at Mivangeline's neck.

The commander ducked and aimed a hard fist into SANDRA's chest. "I don't think so. Avian Form: Shoebill Thunderforce!"

The Machine Queen shuddered from the punch, almost dropping her warfans. "Thou knowest the Avian Form? Sorcery! The Niang named Shien hath infected-"

"Avian Form: Wryneck Scythe!" Mivangeline cut SANDRA's arms off, keeping her element of surprise.

The Machine Queen screamed in agony as she was disarmed. "By the power of God, I condemn thee! Thou heathen shalt weep in the devil's snare-"

"Avian Form: Hummingbird's Tongue!" Mivangeline broke SANDRA's glasses with a curled index finger.

SANDRA's HP slowly lowered into the red zone as her red devilish eyes were exposed.

With her HP almost zero, SANDRA's human-skinned face melted to reveal a monstrous mechanical skull. "Thus saith the Lord! Thou and Shien shalt be a cursed union. I curse thy children with a pestilence and plague-"

"Avian Form: Parotia's Guillotine!" Mivangeline finally knocked SANDRA's head off her neck with the beheading kick. "Farewell, SANDRA. The Lord has had enough of you."

Thalamoid and Shien stopped their duel to see SANDRA's defeat. Her body disintegrated as all her copies suffered the same fate. Phoenicia, Enshiron, and Elysia sighed with relief, battered from their fight with the agents. Thalamoid shuddered as the five friends stood together.

"T-this isn't over, Shien!" Thalamoid swiped her menu tab to log off. "I-I'll kill you another time!"

"Get back here!" Shien yelled as Thalamoid escaped. "Finish your duels, you coward!"

***

Within Altair's palace, Empress Maika slammed her foot into the computer screens after witnessing SANDRA's defeat.

"Impossible! That little Christian singer of Saitori's beat my superior NPC? I'm not seeing this!"

Maika threw a tantrum in Altair's palace, watching the country's citizens riot after the viral truth of Code Fuchsia. "Saitori! If you want war, war it is! I'm waiting for you, dear sister-in-arms!"