The Collectors of the Carpathians

Toru managed to run into the school building. Where the sky quaked all in all. The earth swallowed in human and sky masses. Red light flooding the ambient around them like an infection. Outside a fight between Ohto and the one graced by the so called Saintess. It was loud and prominent that it drown out everything else.

Ohto had distracted her. That fact alone saved Toru. Whatever it is, he cannot waste such opportunity that had been given to him.

Whoever had come for him had been looking for Ichiha. The cult marking on her neck all but confirmed it. What he could not understand was her mother’s involvement. He couldn't confirm if there is any marking on her mother from the brief encounter, but he could tell, only tell, they were close in relation.

A bargaining chip, perhaps. But that made little to no sense. Toru is sure that the Saintess' Grace has all the power she needed to bend the will of people without resorting to such cruel tactic. One that would expose her. At least in the perspective of someone who's trying to lie low.

She's definitely not that kind of person right now. Not will all this human involvement right now.

Naturally, the only plausible lead Toru had is Ichiha's mother herself. That means he had to locate her — where ever she ended up — which proves to be something else. Saintess' Grace had been teleporting erratically. One time with Nanoka in her grasp then not another time.

---§---

"Who are you?" Ohto screamed, forcing back the overexerted attack of the woman before him.

"Absolutely no name you need to remember, but that I am THE Saintess' Grace!" She shouted with flair, practically vanished mid-declaration.

Ohto tried to track down her whereabout when she sped into nothing.

Swish. Strike on the back. Swosh. Arm blocked the next attack. And then the next. And the next. All and each blow driving Ohto from his pivot, stripping any advantage.

"Boring."

A statement simply intoned. She pushed with her ambly hand. But still nothing to scoff at. When clearly it had let Ohto flung uncontrollably and soon the wave of destruction that followed him.

The dust imploded thereafter, swallowing his whole. The 'Saintess' Grace' cocked her head toward Ichiha. A predatory gaze drawn from the bleeding eyes. She doesn't put energy on anticipation, clearly zipping without moving from where she was standing. Displacement is the word. To say it was an instant one.

"Got—"

She crashed into the bed of the school ground. Her ankle twisted violently. Toru managed to block the path she took with what is her flash ability using flash-step of his own.

The ground beneath her were churned with viscous red liquid. But undeniably clear liquid had seeped from her wound, mixing with one would assume as human matter.

"Aheheh, haha!" She expressed, a paradoxical laughter. Then disappeared but a trace of displaced liquid.

It was so fast for anything, not even the viscous liquid to clings to her as she managed to appeared mid-swing behin Ohto. Successfully did she land more slash into Toru. It seems that she was happy having such fights, a bit troubling for Toru.

Ohto recovered in time to intercept.

"What is with this girl?" Toru quipped, evading from her fury of glorious entertainment.

"The Lady, might be linked to what we know so far," Ohto responded—

The scythe landed and sliced his forehead. It was wide open, gnash, made of gurgling liquid was let out.

"Go get the girl and her mother, I'll take care of her," Toru instructed, briefly checking Ohto's wound.

The woman responded in a chorus of overlapping voices, "oh, taking it alone, huh? I'll make sure you are thoroughly cleansed."

"Bring it on!" Toru shouted. Ohto ran behind him.

"Frankly," she continued, sounds collapsing into one that isn't human. "I am shocked you have such nerve. But if you want to walk the narrow gate, then I won’t complain."

With that, she teleported yet again. The same attack she used from the start of the encounter. She seems not keen on pushing more, especially when that electric scythe attack had failed.

Good then, he mused.

He dashed behind, forcing a distance between them. Even if she could teleport, she needed to at least have her attack targeted properly.

Words escaped from his mouth, forming into a thought, thought into a sound, sound made law, and soon an incantation. Then sigil hovered within his walking distance. Despite the slashes, it wasn't interrupted. No, it was perfect, she backed up perfectly. It glows bright yellow, right in her spot. Enveloping her in it. She was knocked, far, unable to use those teleport skill to recover. Evidently, she stuck herself to the fence of the school.

"Heh," she laughed, a single heaves of it.

She twirled her scythe. A dark crystal, glossy like obsidian, sprouted from the ground, carrying her to the stratosphere. Casting a looming shadow loomed his figure. It was big conchospiral formation, like the shell of a pond snail.

And when the low-lying sun outlined her silhoutte. Her iris became visibly red. Her knee bent. The crystal curled. She shouted a battle cries.

Swing, her attack connected. Toru got strewn over the air.

Zipped. Toru got launched upward to the open air.

---§---

"My goodness me," Ohto chipped when he sees the frozen Ichiha still in the same spot, despite her friends already turning into liquid.

He grabbed her by the wrist. "Now where's that mother of yours" he asked to Ichiha who was frozen stiff. He grunted. His feet unable to move. Seems that he can't carry Ichiha in this state.

She clinched herself deep. Let's wake her up and briefed her, he thought.

He brought his hands closer, where a gold-coloured sigil appeared. As he muttered something that can't be heard.

Her eyes jolted up in an instant and she almost tripped on her own feet. But was caught by Ohto hand.

"Ohto!" she said, seemingly, or rather, just realized what happened around her.

"Where's everyone?" she whispered, fidgety in her voice.

"I'll tell about it later, but now…" he let the silence speak for itself, where behind him is Toru is struggling with the so called 'Saintess' Grace'. "We need to get out." He turned his head.

"Where's your mother?"

"My mother?" She asked, profusely worried. "She— she supposed to be… on the work!" She shouted.

"I'm sorry, should've not asked you." He practically bowed, but held back.

"What happen with my mother?" More worry dawned at her, clearly at great distress.

"Let's get you out now," he repeated, trying to ignore her question.

He grabbed her by the wrist again and run. She tried to protest but can't even keep at his pace as she falls on her knees. He turned back, put her behind his back as he ran again.

Suddenly, they were stopped dead in the track by the looming figure of two robed man watching from the school building gate.

"That's…" she mumbled.

"Well, well, look like she has graced us the very best moment. We will be overjoyed!" The robed man on the left piped up.

"Fiend, attack!" He boomed with excitement. From behind the shroud darkness of the barely lit school hallway.

A monster, like a wolf, but the fur replaced with crystal. Black bile risen from his head. Its strides are uneven, trying to compensate for its build that wasn't perfect.

Indubitably a liminal-made creation. They made to be ferocious, to attack whoever comes their path.

It charged, galloping at great speed. The speed compensated its uneven features as they closed the distances.

"Urk!" He tried to dodge but got bitten in the hand, there was just no time to dodge its attack. His hand punctured deep, from the wound was let out a gurgling liquid. A sickish green miasma quickly reacted with the air. He tried to grasp free of its bite. But it was a frail attempt, as he can feel it biting deep into his bone, almost cracking in two.

Suddenly, the back of his head was hit in quick succession. Ichiha was crying behind him. He dropped her when that happened. Letting her submerged within the pooling bile of human and sky masses — her sound became muffled.

"I wish I could've seen you struggle for much longer, but I have a job that I need to do," one of the robed man said.

"Oh my, what gratuitous this would come!" another intoned.

They then start approaching him, or rather the lady behind him. Ichiha, with the marking on her nape. It keeps glowing and glowing, so much that it pierces the red, viscous liquid. But that wasn't a concern of his, when all he worried about is trying to wrench himself free.

They all sures took their time as they watched his struggle for longer. Grinning ear to ear as they satiate their eyes. Until they held the unconscious Ichiha on their arm. Suddenly, they disappeared into thin air, carrying Ichiha with them. That much has becoming common occurrences with them.

The fiend dissolved in conchoidal fractures, bile absorbed then vaporize into thin air. Ohto cocked his head to see nothing.

"I failed my mission."

---§---

It was a dark room where Ichiha had become. She tried to sit up but unable to do sp. She had come to realized she was tied to the table. The place she was in is like a dungeon, with cobblestone wall and dimly lit torches.

The wooden door across it, it creaks as one entered the room. Similar looking robed man with him a torch that emit red light.

"Hey Young Lady, sorry that we tied you, but it was a must," he muttered as he fixed the torch on the wall. He revealed his head, a dark-skinned man, like a lightly-roast coffee, with black hair tied in a small bunch. He closed the distance to her and goes behind her to untie her hand. Letting her free.

A humph sound echoed as she planted her feet to the mossy floor.

"Come on," he asked,

They both walked on a decrepit hallway. The sound of boot echoed within the small confines of this place. With smoke rising and lowering like it has its own life. If it was inhaled it can cause her to cough, but the man was unbothered by it. Multiple torches and the same door were set across each wall in repeating pattern.

They continued for solid minutes, the hallway feels like it stretched for eternity with no discernible end. Until he stopped at one of the doors. The same door that has ingrained into her impression of this place.

"Your contribution, was greatly appreciated by the Saintess."

It was similar to or rather the same hallway as always. With difference was that at least there is one end where they come from, but they keep walking down the hallway. Finally, what seems to be a light, a salvation, slowly appeared.

The library had greeted her forefront, with multiple if not a hundred of robed man gathering on row and row of big wide tables that stretched from one side to another. Bookshelves towering each side, multiple walkway accessed by a spiral staircase that repeat every 50 paces or so. The table of maplewood with oil burner and some piles of book for every single robed attendee. With collection the like that could contend one found in London Library tens over.

"Ignore everyone else, someone is here to summon you, Young Lady," he said, scanning within the horizon. "Let me see if I can find it, ah, there we go!"

"Hey Shimizu," he said to the one particular woman who was drowned in books, she was visibly tired.

It was odds occurences for Ichiha. All she can remember is that she talked to Toru, suddenly jolt up with no one in the vicinity but Ohto and Toru fighting with some woman. She got carried by Ohto. 

Stopped by robed man. Now she's here escorted by a man to meet some tired high-fantasy magic school type student?

"Sorry for the rough—" she coughed coffee, her green eyes is dim, "visit. Welcome, our dear prized donator," she sings, already standing from where she at.

"What is this place?" She asked, grokking the many robed people around her. "Where's my mother?"

"One at the time," she muttered, her long hair danced to the statement. "Let's see…" she put her finger to his chin, scanning the place. "This what we call as the First Library, a bit cryptic yes, however this is where knowledge is collected and shared."

She mumbled, "That's pretty much what library is…"

"Anyway, this library and pretty much the whole place is safe haven, for you, for me, for him, for all of us."

Sitting idly on the edge of a table, the man waited — tapping into whatever came, as they whiled away the time in idyllic conversation, too deep in talk to notice its passing.

"Safe haven?"

"Yes! You're new to this, so you might not know. But you're one of us!" She proclaimed with wide arms. "There's a lot of you poor bearer of the child. Those marking on your neck are our tag, they are only visible to the child and its bearer."

"Child, bearer of them?"

"Child is what we call to those who lived in one mind, you bear them in your mind."

"What does that mean?"

"It means a lot depending on what kind of child you're having."

"But still… child?"

"Yes, that's what we call them, those pringus called them weaver; but they are just trying to alienate them, they are pretty much a part of us. So it's natural to call them child."

Shimizu flicked her finger. "Also, what is your second question?"

The man, who sat cross-armed added to theirs: "her mother?"

"Oh, yeah, your mother. Well, ask Lady Nozomi when she got here."

She gathered all the book that was lying flat. "Once again, thank you for everything." And with that she started walking.

"Wait, who's Nozomi?"

"A vampire lady with deep violet eyes. Marius — one beside you — will let you greet her once she returned."

Then she disappeared into the crowd of studious robed man. While Marius stood from where he at.

He signalled, "let's go."

"Where?" She said concerned, but she followed him regardless.

"Your place."

They both walked together, navigating among the knot of robed man just out of byway.

---§---

Toru woke in a decrepit room. Ohto lay unconscious beside him. When he lifted his head, he realized he was in a pit. The ceiling carved so far into shadow that its outline blurred. He suspected the eaves were there; only the breathing light from behind them confirmed that it was.

Toru stood, his feet carrying him toward his friend. Breathing softly, he was pronounced — thankfully — alive. But nothing could wake him up.

"Ohto, come on." He slapped his faces, desperation in his voices.

"Ohto got bitten by an angry dog."

Toru jerked his head upward, searching for the source of the voice. Above him loomed the same overhang, built to keep its prisoners from climbing out.

"Who are you?" He shouted, the voices amplified by the pit wall, then swallowed by the vast ceiling.

Not a sound came out. But an appearance of pale lady announced a response. She smiled. Her violet irises gleaming against the light. The same one they had fought before. Indeed, to her, their capture was complete.

He clenched his teeth, practically bruxing. His arm tensed into a fist. An understandable response given how thoroughly destroyed they were. Trapped in a pit with no escape. His only hope was Ohto, whose magic surpassed his own. But he lay unconscious beside him.

The woman set her enormous scythe at her side. A weapon that also acted as her staff. It, too, glowed red in response to her movement.

Toru know well that those scythe has been enhanced with the same stone that he has been producing. It seems that those lead to his capture.

"What is your deal with me?" He demanded.

"As I said, work for us, make those crystal for us."

He tutted, there's nothing else to get out of here than that proposition. Outrageous, he thought. Between her faction and the client, there is bound to be one unhappy party.

"We can provide you with the material. You did not make 100% pure crystal? We will help you, providing the correct environment for those."

No, not this choice.

What should I do, relent myself and give in to her? What it is in for me? That I slaved away in this godforsaken cult? An undescribable harangue?

Ohto stirred faintly behind him. Looking frail with shallow breath that could be mistaken with silence. Toru's heart knotted. Gazing back, his minds resolved now.

He spat at the ground, his fist trembling. "I'd rather rot in this pit than serve you."

Pale lady tilted her head, curiosity painted in her head. Like she watched a turtle being boiled alive. "Why?"

"I have life."

"Oh, a human life," she nodded. Then her eyes gleamed maliciously, "What is human? But a miserable pile of secrets! If that's what you want… then have at you!"

She twirled her scythe that gleamed as bright as her irises that exudes mist in its own. This place clearly had enhanced her abilities. A tall order indeed.

The scythe twirled faster and faster, its glow swelling until the pit itself seemed to breathe with her power. Toru’s pulse hammered in his ears, every nerve screaming. He thought of Ohto’s shallow breath, the fragile thread of life he had to protect.

I won’t bow, he whispered, more to himself than to her.

The pale lady’s smile widened, cruel and knowing. "Then break."

Brace yourself Ohto, this time, I'll hold her off.

Toru braced himself too, teeth grinding, every muscle screaming for action. Knowing he had no chance, but refusing to bow, he told himself.

The scythe swung, red mist trailing in its wake. Toru lunged, reckless, desperate and the world seemed to shatter into silence.