You want me to be the WHAT of the Sundered Lands?

Tyrlars' escapedes had been escalated higher, the foreign minister now sitting across from the Arcanist while his party members all sought to while away their time in their own ways. Being put on the spot like that meant that Akane had to sit in too...Aratani and Yuriko too, even poor Shiki who seemed petrified at having to be on the other side of the table from officials as important as the foreign minister, a JSMDF Admiral, the Lieutenant General in charge of all American troops in Japan, and a who's who of ambassadors.  

To think so many people would pour into this sterile looking conference room in the space of a few hours as soon as word of the Arcanist Prince's desires and confirmation of his nature was spread around to everyone who could hear about it. Akane certainly seemed to be trying her best to not sweat under all this scrutiny.  

She prayed silently that none of the people gathered here would ever dig into her internet search history. If the gods were merciful, in such an eventuality they would simply strike her down and put her out of her misery. And if they were more merciful, her parents wouldn't have been notified of any of this yet. 

"...You want to install a Japanese and Irish citizen as the...ruler of a warlord zone?" The Foreign Minister said frankly towards the youthful-looking half-elf opposite to him, a serene smile on the Arcanist's face as he seemed to be utterly at home in situations like this...but then he said that he had to give advance warning before entering countries.  

"Just to be clear it wasn't my idea. He just appeared in my apartment one day and started speaking of crazy dreams and visions. If he didn't have such a..." She almost said something that would be read as way too flirty out loud before she coughed and replaced it with "interesting looking face I would have kicked him out of my home for dropping in unannounced." Akane protested.  

All eyes briefly turned towards her, giving her a feeling of suddenly being very, very small and very, very powerless when a set of gazes that could spell the end of entire nations, nevermind desk jockey code-monkeys like her all locked on her. 

She could feel sweat dripping down her neck while her body locked up, a nervous laugh coming from her as she looked to the side and gave a little cough. She really, really wanted to be anywhere but here.  

But then she saw that Tyrlars seemed kind of...hurt by the admission, frowning and looking as if she had actually punched him. That made her feel like she herself had been punched, frowning as she looked down and twiddled her thumbs, letting out a long sigh.  It didn't feel great to be mean to this boy, when he was the first to think she was more than merely ordinary. Especially when his friends seemed to be set on consoling him, Velodus approaching one elfin ear and blowing on it cooly.  

Oh...oh she'd read doujinshi like this. Maybe not with all these geezers staring but two very nice looking Elvish boys and the way Tyrlars let out a gentle exhalation with some pink to his cheek and an arm around his midsection. She couldn't tell enough about the culture to know if this was platonic or not but...there was a part of her brain that drifted to certain places that prompted her to reach for a napkin to pre-emptively dab her nose for anything that might have leaked out.  

"Akane is this really the best place for you to have a perverted fantasy?" Yuriko whispered into her ear as she made a dismissive wave in her direction.  

"With the day I've had I'm entitled to some daydreaming." She dismissed while the Tiefling stuck her tongue out at the Russian representative clutching at his crucifix necklace and muttering to himself upon making eye contact with her. 

Thank the gods her action got all attention off of her, her posture relaxing as she no longer felt like a fish in an aquarium. 

She certainly wanted to be in a situation like this with a better-looking outfit, having simply thrown on the last high school uniform she had that still fit, making her feel absurd and horridly out of place while she adjusted her blazer. The intense awkwardness only continued for a bit longer before Strykar, at last, spoke up to cut through it. 

"Your world wasn't stolen in the best of circumstances. It would be to your benefit to allow Akane and her friends to come with us to the Sundered Lands. At worst, you lose a few citizens, at best, you gain an ally out of a large region." He said, the Mekman's voice echoing upon itself very slightly with a bassy reverb to make it unmissable that he was an automaton. 

"What sort of circumstances?" The Foreign Minister asked cooly. 

"The Zonth Ocean is in the midst of a long...very complicated...many sided war. I'm not the best person to ask about the intricacies of that conflict honestly."  He didn't sigh as expected, merely remaining quiet as he always seemed to be. 

"I can give you contacts that might be of use..." Strykar said before Akane felt the urge to speak up. 

"What about his family? If he's a High Prince wouldn't they be the best people to speak to?" 

"Not...recommended. In fact, let's discard that idea, immediately." Lelienna said brusquely. Dismissively, before Tyrlars could even open his mouth.  A huff and a pout coming from him while the suited men discussed matters that all sounded rather important. 

"For a Prince, you are rather...informal I must say, Opyrheimir-Oiju." The Minister said, getting a shrug and a smile out of the arcanist while he laid his hand out to his familiar, the curling nebula like strands of the being shimmering its way up his arm. 

"I try not to be a bore honestly. Why even be royalty if you can't have fun with it?" He said, smirking to himself, though Akane couldn't help but wonder why a royal had no guards. 

"In any case, I don't think his family would be eager to receive a call from him, based on the last few encounters we've had." Velodus sighed, Tyrlars about to say something before Akane's eyes noticed something shimmering in the room. A few other pairs of eyes flicking over to notice it too.  

Tyrlars grabbed closer at his staff, wrapping fingers around its haft before she raised a hand. Something skittering could be heard in her innermost ear, something below what should have been possible for a human to perceive.  

"Is something the matter?" The minister said as she caught sight of something with legs that were far too long and had far too many joints to be anything remotely humanoid.  

"Get down!" Akane said as she heard the briefest clicking of strange jaws. 

With a movement, she had thrown the table up as something came crashing through with an odd warbling cry, seeming to push into existence and go from half-real to fully there, though still invisible. Panicked cries were made while Akane grabbed a mug and tossed it at the sihlouette she perceived to quickly do something, anything to not be merely passive.  

The creature let out a crackling cry, arcs of electricity starting to dance around a shape that seemed increasingly spider like before Tyrlars threw his own magic at it; coils of energy banishing the veil of invisibility around it. 

She saw something that didn't seem like something that belonged in a fantasy world. More of a scifi monster, with six...eight...no twelve limbs. Six for walking, shorter hind-legs, medium length limbs emerging from the middle of a sloping body, and long forelimbs like a gorilla. Except...far too unmammalian. even accounting for the six smaller limbs closer to its chest. 

It wasn't naked, this was a creature of civiliisation. A person, not a beast. But the glimmering yellow glow in parts of the bear sized creature's body that peeked through carapace like armour seemed unhealthy...cancerous. Crystal growing out of flesh and chitin. A mutant? 

It was horrid, to be sure. Repulsive, its movements seemed almost pained, and she felt this sickness in her stomach looking at it. An electric tingle down her spine in response to the presence of this thing and the faint sound of a Gieger counter somewhere in her head. 

Something in her rebelled at being in the presence of the glow, and she quickly moved to push the nearby Shiki out of the way as the thing swept heavy scythe like forelimbs to try and get at his head, runes glowing on its arm while Tyrlars made a gesture and let out a cascade of runes.  

Those that were not ready to fight were pushed into an otherworld, fading like ghosts so that Velodus could start cracking his rifle as it crackled into being, Lelienna leaping onto its back and trying to find weak points in a series of shimmering barriers.  

Helmets manifested over heads. Tyrlars' gas mask type helm, Velodus' knightly helmet, Lelienna's triclopean facemask and armoured mouthshield, and Strykar's heavier duty almost tanklike helmet with a thin Y-shaped visor. 

"Noncombatants out!" Tyrlars shouted as he weaved coils of magic into a series of crushing tendrils that seemed to be made out of the starry night sky, threading out bolts of light from every glittering point to stab into the thing. 

"Why is she still here?!" Velodus shoute,d jumping to the left as the creature let out a burst of rippling yellow energy from its mouth, jaws splitting open like a flower petal to try and strike at Akane who by some curious feat of speed, managed to get ahead of the pillar of killing light.  

"I...I don't know the spell just read her as a noncombatant!" Tyrlars replied.  

"You didn't manually pick targets?!" Lelienna shouted, slipping a dagger through part of the complex multi-barrier to deal more damage to the defensive shields before jumping off when it released arcs of yellow lightning, Akane recoiling from the near impacts that sizzled the edges of her dress and shoes.  

"...Damn it..." She hissed as she patted at the curls of smoke, sighing at the thought of polishing out the scorch marks on the tips of her shoes.  

"You're remarkably fast...perhaps that's why." Strykar said, bringing out a heavy riot shield to block another one of the beast's beams before his arm folded up into a cannon and opened up on the thing's head, a few shots being all it took to break the barrier and let Tyrlars' spells stab into the armour, a shot from Velodus offering Lelienna a place for a fatal stab that vibrated the thing's body and liquefied it from the inside out.  

"Why are these things even going after you?" Akane said. 

"Actually I think they're here for you." Tyrlars said as another thing pulled its way through into standard reality, this one more humanoid, followed by more of the earlier sorts of beasts, all rippling with that odd yellow glow in the corner of her eyes.  

The thought of these things being here for her was...mind boggling. She was some IT worker, why her? 

They were on her, the flicker-ghosts of those banished safely to the other dimension seeming to be filled with panic, confusion as they tried to react to things happening too fast for the human brain to fully process.  

The more humanoid figure, with elongated arms and digitigrade legs and a too wide head within its helmet, stalked through the openings left by the group. Spells and weapons swung around at incredible speeds and great precision not managing to stop the lanky thing from lunging towards her. 

So much to process. So many questions in need of answering. Tyrlars locking eyes with her for a moment and shouting something she was in too much shock to process. 

The thing's claws elongated and rushed towards her, and memories flashed before her eyes. Mother teaching her to swear in English, papa showing her some games on the newest consoles a little early, grandpa stating some legally...questionable things, that weird otaku's confession to her in high school, teasing at the playground...what she had for dinner last morning. 

She really hoped that her last dinner wasn't going to be a submarine sandwich...it wasn't even very good. She didn't even get a chance to force Opyrheimir to cook something for her for making a mess of her apartment. 

But she heard a crash, and the strain of an alien voice. And she opened her eyes to see that she had her own sort of multi-barrier, flickering between colours and transperciesi and capturing the thing's claws in them. 

She reacted mostly on instinct, her brain still too bewildered to form fully complete thoughts, and she jabbed her hand through the thing's arm as its barrier started to flicker from the drain, breaking through it and cracking the armour there. As the armour began to heal and regenerate, she hit again. 

She put all her focus into this, her desire to live, her desire for a better last dinner, her desire to finally get some answers, and to see if Tyrlars understood the magic of the kitchen as much as the magic of the...magic. 

Coiling colours, a rainbow of differing energies, bent to her will, rippling with her intent and then shimmering back into invisibility to the naked eye as she let out a yell. The thing's arm ruptured and the energy poured into the breaks to fry its body, random, only scarcely directed coils leaping out to torch the other interlopers. 

She panted a bit, blinking as she called off the flow of energy, looking at the sparks dancing in her fingers while Tyrlars clapped and grabbed at her, pulling her up into a bear hug while she let out a squeak from the sensation of his grip.  

"Tyrlars...my spine..." She muttered out of reflex since that was what you were supposed to say in these situations right? 

"AHAH! I KNEW I WAS RIGHT! HA!" He grinned, setting her down and then patting her on the shoulders, letting his facemask part while he beamed like the sun itself.  

"Right about what?" 

"That you were a candidate for the uniter! Potential sure, you have to choose to be a hero and all...but a candidate! Hah! I spent a year searching for someone like you you know?!" He said, just about skipping while Akane felt herself blushing despite herself. 

Searching for...someone like her? How could he even say such things while the people unbanished back into the material plane let out gasps and fumbled around as they flopped unceremoniously, seeming to have been in...quite the strange otherworld while they were fighting.  

What had she gotten herself into?