Everything At Its End

Queen Yori was ready to wring Misa's neck. "You've polluted the minds of both my sons, you wench! Just like the last one. Humans will be the final death of this family."

Ryusei turned hard eyes on his mother. "Can this wait, Mother? We have more pressing matters to deal with."

Immediately after saying that, Pera shot a powerful beam of energy from up above. It shattered the stone beneath their feet, tilting the ground haphazardly. And it hit Queen Yori.

"Your Majesty!" Misa shouted.

"Mother!!" Ryusei screamed.

They rush to her side, finding that the Queen had a gaping wound through her collarbone and shoulder. The whole area was pretty much missing. Her blue blood pooled all over the ground and she moved weakly, trying to lift herself with one arm, but failing and falling back to the ground.

"Luckily it just missed her heart. And... her head's still attached... She'll regenerate soon enough." Misa observed, feeling sick looking at the sight and feeling weird just hearing those words leave her mouth. 

At the lack of response, she looked up at Ryusei. The former prince looked stricken, staring at his mother's near-fatal wound. From up above, Pera cried out over the plaza, "The queen of your vampire kingdom is weak! A queen this weak shows the strength of its followers. Weak! Not to mention foolish!

"She who thinks so highly of herself is destined to fall. The Fae intellect is superior to all!"

Pera built another beam in her hands and blasted it over Queen Yori, going for the kill. Moving fast, Misa intercepted it, taking the full brunt of the blast head on, managing to block it. 

Behind her, Queen Yori was pulled away by Ryusei while he simultaneously swatted away the attack of a human who tried beheading him with a cleaver.

The humans! They've reached this far in!? Misa shouted in her mind, breaking through the beam Pera shot down and blasting it to the side. Smoke billowed up from the ground where it hit, and Misa let out a sigh. 

Quickly, she whirled on Ryusei, knowing what he'd be doing. Sure enough, Ryusei had the human's neck and head stretched hard in opposite directions, about to snap it, or worse.

"Don't kill him!" She shouted at Ryusei who gave her the most bewildered look on the planet.

"Excuse me? He just tried beheading me!"

"B-B-Because you're a v-v-vampire!!" The human screamed. "Listen to her, please!"

"And you are a human! Why not kill you if you would kill me?" Ryusei countered.

"P-Please! I was only trying to survive!"

"Don't, Ryusei!" Misa exclaimed again. "You're the one who wants peace with the humans. Do the right thing!"

"The peaceful humans! The right thing is to kill attackers. He is an enemy."

"No! I-I swear--" The human started, but Misa cut him off. More humans stumbled into the scene, shouting curses and threats, screaming their resolve.

Misa was feeling completely overwhelmed. Everything was happening all at once, was too loud, too frightening, too serious. Tana, who was still smashed into the ground, hadn't moved a muscle and yet Misa still couldn't get to her. The humans were relentless, thrashing garlic around and slicing the air with their cleavers and stakes.

They were weak in strength but stronger in heart, mind, and numbers.

Misa looked to Prince Ran, more than a hundred feet behind. She could hardly see him through the horde of opponents he fought alongside his father, King Kousei. The Fae soldiers were trying almost doggedly to break through the father and son's strong defenses, and the scene worried Misa to a degree worse than death.

Oh my God, please! Misa cried, "Stay back! We won't hurt you!" She cried to the humans whom she continuously sent flying backwards with gentle bursts of energy. "Please listen! We won't kill you! 

"Please listen! Please, listen!!"

She fought desperately trying to save the situation, but it all seemed to no avail.

It was all becoming too much. 

Out of the corner of her eye, she finally-- Finally! --saw Tana move one of her previously shattered arms. It was healed now, as if Tana had been quietly working magic on herself this entire time. 

She's alive!!! Misa celebrated, at the same time as Pera said, "Oh? Still alive?" And formed a long blue and shimmering gold spear in her left hand. Then, the bottom of the spear started to glow a deep, burning blue.

And it was just too damned much.

Fed up, Misa instantly squatted down and screamed, "SCREW THIS!!" The blast from her energy was powerful, sending the people, Fae, and vampires around her careening backward several meters in all directions. 

With eye-defying speed, she burst up into the sky and hovered next to Pera before Pera knew what to do with herself. Misa struck the middle of the spear with her bare fist and cracked the long weapon in half, diminishing its light. Pera screamed at her, flying forward with both halves of the weakened spear, slashing the air with frightening speed. Blue and white streaks of light coloring the air as she tried desperately to slice Misa in two.

The vampire princess and the exiled Fae were engaged in an incredible battle. The power from both their strikes sent shock waves across the land below. Their speed reduced them to unintelligible smears of light clashing again and again across the moonlit sky.

Finally, Pera called forth the power of the sky itself, bringing blinding lightning to the skies. A shower of pouring rain burst from suddenly formed storm clouds. Pointing the spiked half of her broken spear at Misa, she cried, "Die, heathen princess!" 

As if the entire sky followed the command, Misa was instantly assailed by several lightning bolts all at once. In her mind, Misa told herself, I can do this! And she thrust both her arms up to the sky, palms open.

Like a lightning rod, the bolts absorbed into her palms and filled her body up from the inside. Misa felt ridiculously powerful but was too weak to hold such energy for longer than a couple of seconds. She could instantly feel the magic slipping from her fingers like loose string.

With everything she had, Misa pushed the lightning forward and out of her body as one monstrous beam, aiming it at Pera, and ultimately, blasting the malevolent Fae to the ground. The impact was massive, breaking a crater into the cobblestone and sending a thick plume of dust into the air. 

Before the dust even cleared, Misa, her polychromatic eyes glowing brighter than the moon, announced, "I'm not done," and crafted an iron spear out of thin air. She noticed that it irritated her palm a teensy bit, the bit of Fae blood left circuiting her veins causing the iron to affect her minimally.

It didn't deter Misa. She positioned the spear over Pera's body and rocketed down to the earth before the injured Fae could even find the strength to move.

The crack of sound the spear made against the stone was deafening and its force impactful. The attack lifted every stone in the square, making it appear as though the tiles were, on their own, a wave of water. Everyone standing atop the stones cried out in shock, halting battles everywhere that hadn't yet come to an end.

Except, now everything was at its end.

The bodies in the square were still while the dust slowly dissipated. Misa still knelt at the center of the massive, charred crater, the large spear tightly gripped in her hands.

The crowd of vampires broke into wild cheers, celebrating the overwhelming defeat of the tyrant Fae, Pera, by their newly crowned Princess Misa. Misa heard her name on every tongue, knew her image was reflected in every eye, as all occupants in the square, friend or foe, watched her in awe.

She stood over Pera, leaving the spear stuck in the stone. It had struck a few inches away from Pera's both shocked and distressed face. Pera blinked at her, her eyelids fluttering weakly.

"The Fae lives!" Someone cried among the cheering crowd. Plenty of the cheers died down instantly. The rest eventually scattered to a stop. 

"Why didn't the princess kill her?" A voice asked. Another one echoed the question, followed by another, then another. Soon, the square was again consumed by noise, but this time, it was discontent.

"Kill the Fae! Destroy them! Princess, the Fae are our enemi--"

"You are wrong!!" Misa shouted firmly, cutting the speaker off. "I have found a friend among our foes."

"It's trickery!" Someone cried.

"It's not!" Misa asserted. "I've helped her, and she helped me back! We've formed a respect and understanding for one another--"

"Nonsense!" Voices cried. "The Fae merely returned a favor, that is no mark of friendship! The princess has been fooled! Nonsense!"

"It's not nonsense!"

Misa's head shot over to Tana's direction. The heavily injured Fae was kneeling, holding a chest wound so deep Misa could see through it. Tana was slowly stitching herself back together piece by piece, her golden blood shimmering in her hands. 

It looked so painful. 

Then suddenly, "Misa!" 

A clear voice rang through the air, piercing Misa's ears like a gong. She smiled, whipping her head back to the front of the large crowd in search of her husband.

"Look out!" Prince Ran cried. He shoved someone powerfully out of his path. He began sprinting to her. Misa frowned, her eyes growing wide in alarm. "MOVE!"

Misa turned halfway around before her eyes met with the sight of a large wooden stake. Her balance was off center, and she began a downward fall. It all happened so quickly it seemed impossible.

It seemed impossible to lose someone so fast.

All this time, Misa hadn't seen Ida among the chaos even once. But she saw her now, her face stern as always and loyal as she looked down at Misa, the human's stake driving its point right through Ida's chest. Her eyes, though, were incredibly kind in her last moments. And then, she faded away.

Misa screamed in horror as Ida's body disintegrated right before her eyes, tears welling up and blurring her vision instantly. And although Ida threw her body in the way, it only slowed the momentum of the human's thrust but didn't stop the stake from continuing through its path.

This time, Prince Ran was there, arriving at the same time as two others. He yanked the human assailant up off the ground by his neck. The man kicked his feet, struggling in the prince's grasp while everyone looked on. The whole square seemed frozen still, even the humans who watched one of their own be strangled, not daring to move.

Except two.

It was Doli and her mother, Bola, standing over Misa who sobbed on the ground. They held their arms out as if to shield her and shouted, "Not the princess! She's good!" 

Bola shouted, "Misa was just human yesterday and she helped out so many of us. Many of you met her! She gave us that medicine that cured half the town. She helped not only my family, but yours as well! That makes her one of us as much as she is one of them! Keep away!"

Misa wiped her tears, her eyes glistening in the dark as she looked up at the two humans who used their bodies to shield her. "Thank you." She said.

To Prince Ran who, interestingly, had yet to end the man's life, she said, "Everything's okay. Let him live."

Immediately, the angry vampire dropped the man to the ground and helped Misa to stand. Looking around at the crowd, Misa saw faces that had shifted from fear to questioning. 

A crowd full of vampires, humans, and Fae--at one point, all fatal enemies, and now, all potential allies.

Through her teary eyes, she smiled. Questioning is good. She thought.

It was progress.