Interlude: Awakening (Part Two)

The sound of the battle was heard throughout the entire village. The entity relentlessly attacked from all sides with its tendrils, while Corina continued to push back each attack albeit struggling.

“You’re a tough little thing aren’t you? Let’s see how you deal with this."

Her hands stilled before she flung her whipswords forward, wrapping once around the entity as she used the stillness of it as an anchor to launch herself forward, kicking the entity and forcing it back.

The entity crashes into a building, collapsing it. It gets back up in no time and leaps forward again toward them.

“Tsk, this is not the kind of fun I wanted to have.”

“Indu al-dieb yunthul—“

“Zoe darling, any time would be nice. I’m not sure that little thing likes to play nice anymore.”

The area surrounding Zoe throbs as small blasts of shockwaves erupt from where she stood.

“Sorry to keep you waiting! It’s time for you to die!”

“Elder Magic: Gaze of Azum-Nazrek!”

The ground begins to shake as dark clouds start to gather in the sky, blocking out the light from the moon. A sudden bright light looms above the clouds, a low hum radiating from the light. The wind shifts slightly and picks up its pace as the cloud dissipates from view. The light shows itself, a bright orb of light, hovering in the sky, turning the night into day.

Kira squinted up toward the light, her mouth opening in shock as she took in the sight.

“Is that… the sun!?”

The entity stands still, lifting its head up toward the orb of light, it winces from the sheer brightness emitting from it, turning away to cover its eyes. The orb halts its hums before emitting a high pitched screech. Kira immediately tried to cover her ears, but it pierced through her hands, echoing inside her brain and blurring her vision. The entity didn’t care so much for it, mostly just the light blinding it from seeing anything.

The orb then begins to form a focus point, targeting the entity as it then fires down a beam of light, the power of it emanating a wide shockwave as it shoots out. The entity, noticing it was being targeted, immediately switched, it didn’t care that it was being blinded, all it cared about was the safety of the one being who mattered, Zero. Without hesitation, it leaps from the ground, using its tendrils to push itself up directly into the beam.

BOOM!

As they both collided with one another, a loud explosion happened, gusts of wind began to increase its velocity, hitting out with a shockwave as clouds from the collision erupted. The entity falls down from the sky, plummeting toward the ground and crashes, creating a small crater at the impact.

Kira runs to the crater to see the outcome of the fight. As she arrives, the sight causes her to flinch back in shock.

No… it can’t be…

From the crater lay an unconscious girl, the dark ooze no longer covering it. Kira falls to her knees as she begins to breathe erratically, unbelieving of the person she sees.

That can’t be her… it looks like her so much… I… I need to check.”

Her knees start to buckle as she forces herself up and sprints toward the crater before sliding down the edges of it on her knees, ignoring the pain in a rush to get to the entity. As she got closer and closer, the entity came into view more clearly.

It’s her… it really is her…that lavender hair… the soft spoken face…the face I never thought I would see again…

“Vivian…it’s you…it’s really you.”

Kira reaches the girl, before lifting the girl's head up onto her lap, leaning down to listen to her chest.

She’s still breathing… her heart's beating but slowly. I need to get her —

Footsteps approach the crater as both Corina and Zoe appear into view, both looking down at Kira

“Oh my? A cute little toy appeared. Who would’ve thought that little monster was such a cutie.”

Zoe looked down as she squinted.

“It’s her… it’s the one who stole my ZERO FROM ME! That face! That hair! Everything! Please can we kill her now? Please?!”

Corina chuckles, tilting her body to one side, one hand on her hips, the other resting on her chin.

“Zoe, you know we can’t do that, that little cutie is going to become my new little toy. Gray might also know what it—she really is.”

Zoe kicks up some dirt off the ground and mutters to herself.

“Okay then, if you say so then I guess we have no choice, but we can kill her though, right?”

She points to Kira, her lips and eyes tighten into a look of disdain.

“She isn’t of any importance, we can kill her and then you can go collect your little toy man over there and I’ll collect my toy here.”

A grin lit up Zoe’s face from side to side, eagerly jumping in circles.

“Oh I can’t wait! Let’s kill her now!”

Corina sighs and chuckles at the sight of Zoe happily jumping in circles as she readies her whipswords and swings them in, aiming at her neck for a killing blow.

The blades close in on Kira, her eyes closing as she readies herself to die.

BOOM!

A cloud of dust erupts, covering Kira and the entity. Zoe gets on her knees and scans the area.

“Did you get her?! Did you get her?! Tell me —“

“Zoe. Get back. Now.”

Seeing Corina’s change in tone causes Zoe to flinch as she quickly scrambles back.

As the dust dissipates, a man is standing there in front of Kira. The man chuckles as he looks around.

“Well now, you sure had some fun around here didn’t you Kira? Where are the rest of your party members?”

Kira looks up at the man, her posture relaxing as she sees him, exhaling a breath she didn’t know she was holding in.

“They’re back up there… they tried but… these people are something else…”

The man turns his back to her as he looks up at Corina.

“Oh? They must be quite strong if they’re able to have you down like this.

He turns back to her and kneels down, resting his hand on her shoulder.

“Maylene and the rest are coming, we received a mana call from one of your members, the uhhh, bandaged one before it got cut.”

Kira’s eyes widens as she sags completely.

Thank you Gem… thank you so much…

The man smiles at Kira before standing back up to face Corina as he cracks his knuckles and stretches his body.

Kira lifts her arm up to stop him.

“Hey, wait, Hector, we don’t need to fight! We should —“

He chuckles as he steps forward.

“I’ll be okay, I’ll just have a little warm up session before Maylene gets here. They won’t mind I’m sure after making such a mess already.”

Corina stiffens as Hector approaches, her usual uncaring flair completely disappearing.

Hector? Wait—is he… we need to go!

She turns to Zoe, a look of panic on her face.

“ZOE! CAST FLOW, NOW!”

Zoe was already unconscious on the ground, Hector standing over her limp body.

“Don’t worry, she’s not dead, I just gave her a little rest. Don’t tell me you’re going to leave when the excitement has just started?”

Corina grips her whipblades tightly, her knuckles turning white as she sprints forward, weaving her attacks.

“My, a man such as yourself shouldn’t be here with the ladies, don’t you have more important matters at hand?”

Hector chuckles, reacting to each attack with lightning speed, dodging each swing at the very last second, as if enjoying himself.

“I always have time for beautiful women such as yourself, especially ones that can keep me interested in a fight.”

Corina clicks her tongue as she continues her onslaught.

“Aren’t you a bold one? I think you’re a bit too inexperienced for me unfortunately, but I’ll do my best to keep your interests in check.”

Kira doesn’t see the fight, but can hear them hurl words at each other. From the bushes she hears some rustling, her posture stiffens again but as she turns back, she lets out a relieved sigh.

“Maylene…it’s you. You scared me for a second there.”

Maylene giggles as she walks down the hole toward her before squatting down with a big grin.

“Sorry Kira, I didn’t want to draw too much attention hehe.”

She touches Kira on the shoulder as a dim light begins emitting.

“Wind Magic: Zephyr.”

The ground beneath them begins to pull away as the wind slowly carries them up out of the crater and back above ground.

“Thank you Maylene. Wait, where’s everyone else, and Zero?! I need to —”

Maylene giggles again and taps her shoulder.

“Guy and Oswald have them on the back of the carriage over there. They’ll be safe. Now come, we should make our way there while Hector —”

Multiple guttural roars rippled throughout the night as four wyverns fly past the village. Four figures who were on top of them each jumped off, landing in front of Hector as he leaps toward Kira and Maylene. Hector tilts his head to the side, smiles and claps.

“Amazing, spectacular performance! That was a great feat of agility and display!”

His smile stops, his face tightens as he straightened his posture.

“Now, mind telling me who you all are? I don’t think a bunch of ongoing acrobatic jesters like to arrive on wyverns from the Western Steppes.”

Kira's eyes nearly jump out of her sockets as she looks at the newly arrived people.

It’s them… Zero… they’re here…

A gruff looking man steps forward as he chuckles.

“Greetings, Hector.”

Hector lifts his hand up to his chin, thinking to himself.

“Hmm….Hmmm…. Do I know you from somewhere?”

The gruff man smirks.

“No, you do not. But I know you. Hector the Forsaken. The Wrath of Verdinia. The Exiled, but most importantly. Bastard son of King Franz.”

Hector continues thinking as he opens his eyes to look at the gruff man.

“Oh? Is that so? Well since you know so much about me, how about a little introduction of yourself?”

The gruff man turns to Corina, glancing at her and the unconscious Zoe before turning to Gray.

“Take them and leave. Luci, you go too. Gray won’t be able to focus without you. Altina and I will finish off here.”

Corina hesitates a bit, before looking softly at the unconscious Zoe. She walks over to lift her up into her arms as they mount one of the wyverns, before riding off into the darkness with Gray and Luci closely behind

The gruff man turns back toward Hector, pulling out his greatsword.

“Balgrum.”

Hector tilts his head again, looking at both the man and Altina.

Balgrum of the Oathbreakers. I see. Looks like the information was right.

He sighs as he readies himself, his stance wide open.

“I would rather this end peacefully. You two are quite strong, awfully strong. The girl with the mask gives me a bit of a weird feeling, so I would like to offer you two to come peacefully. If so, we can —”

Altina is behind him in an instant, her lance in hand, already thrusting out to pierce Hector. Balgrum rushes forward, his blade up in the air, to strike down onto him, both arriving at the same time, pincering Hector in.