Reinforcement.
The Istari Living Stone.
Gurdoa's Lightning Barrier.
Even though I stacked those spells gathered from exceptional magi atop one another multiple times, the damn thing still managed to push me back. Its claws rasped along stone, lightning singed its sinewy flesh, and reinforcement allowed me to hold on as it dragged me into a wall. Fortunately, I managed to push Luviagelita out of the way quickly enough.
This wasn't about to be one of those stupid totally avoidable rage moments.
Any reasonable person would expect me to be annoyed with what had just occurred, I wasn't. No, far from it. Like before, that rush of adrenaline made me grin once Luvia's safety was assured, and when Ashborn's beast bit into my shoulder, her pincers only found layered stone as hard as diamonds.
Where Heine only had one layer of stone covering him, I had around half a dozen, a lot thinner, but a lot tougher, morphed from my own blood and tissue. His was violet, mine was white. I imagined even someone as calm as he was would be shaken seeing his family's magecraft be improved in such a way by a complete outsider. But, he wasn't here, so it was fine.
"Henry!"
"I told you I was him."
I gave Luvia a thumbs up, even as the stupid creature impotently tried to grind away at my shoulder with her razor-like fangs. Reinforcing my arms, I grabbed her pincers with either hand and wrenched them, intent on tearing them right out. She caught onto what I was doing quickly enough and jumped back.
That was a mistake.
With my eyes, it was easy to calculate her possible trajectories, and it was easy to plant those same traps I was about to hit Jiroubou with when we first met. As soon as she made contact with the dirty floor, it erupted in lightning that ran along her legs and scorched her fur and flesh.
I didn't stop. No, a coiled stone spear formed in my hands as I jumped at her, feeling like I was in some comic book. With a heave, I threw it at her eye... or well, at least, I tried to. The beast was faster than I was, not mentally, or visually, just physically. She jumped to the wall, then to the roof and knocked her shoulder against me to push me aside before once again standing in the corridor, blocking our escape.
Clearly, this thing had not encountered a minecraft player before. Before I could pull a juggernaut and ram through the wall beside me though, it howled again. This time, I wasn't flashbanged so I could easily process just what that howl was.
It wasn't some dumb animal's intimidation tactic. It was resonating with the whole workshop around us, amplifying and then...
"So that's why you're being so noisy!"
"What is it?"
"That scream, it's interfering with the wor-... It's disabling your Magic Crest."
It was like a cheap, more brutish version of the first thing I learned to do. That was, after reading the flow of mana, I could insert a chaos factor that made the whole spell go haywire. She was just using a specific frequency to accomplish the same thing, just not at my level of expertise.
In fact, I was rather confident I could directly hinder her interference.
"That's absurd. But I suppose it's well within the purview of one so intimately familiar with the workings of Crests."
"It's really not that special..." I murmured.
"Perhaps for you, but as before, you'd be hard pressed to find someone other than a handful of Brands capable of this kind of interference."
Honestly, I couldn't tell if it was confidence or trust that she wasn't the least bit perturbed by the fact that she'd be grievously wounded if not for me.
I opened my mouth to answer but the foe we were completely ignoring like she wasn't even there got butthurt and lunged at me. I wondered where the confidence came from, then I realised that she probably thought I wouldn't be able to use spells either after that howl.
"Yeah... I don't even have a magic crest, lil bro." My taunt fell on deaf ears.
She bit at me. I let her. She swallowed my hand. But then, abruptly, her golden eyes widened and she backed away. I was just left standing there with my hand on fire and a grin on my face.
"Man, why is everyone so reasonable?"
A second later, and I could have exploded her from the inside out, painting the walls with gore. The beast gave a confused bark as I flicked my wrist and stone swords erupted from the floor beneath her, impaling one of her legs.
It howled madly, shaking free before... just disappearing.
"OH MY FUCKING GO-"
"Oh come off it. You'll get plenty chance to run wild elsewhere." Luviagelita huffed.
Again, she was WAY too relaxed for someone that was an inch from getting a free body reconstruction surgery with the business end of claws that could tear through fucking diamonds.
"Be more princess-like!" I complained, turning to look at her. "Shouldn't you fall in my arms and thank me for saving your life?
She just tossed her hair. "I am a princess. Others should strive to be like myself even. Besides, I... have no need for fear or alarm when you're there."
That was an insane thing to say.
I deflected the serious words with shitty humour. Seriously, people like me weren't good with this stuff.
"...Princess from the depths of Hell."
"So that would make you a prince then, yes? Lucifer perhaps, considering how your head is bigger than the rest of your body."
"Listen here, just cause you have nice ti..." I took a deep breath. "You sleep with a teddy bear."
She went silent for a moment, then turned red, "...I-I told you that in confidence!"
My dear Luvia was a glass cannon.
I chuckled, pocketing the late Geryon's research journal.
-
When we left the boss aren-... er, the gloomy corridor, Luviagelita wandered off to find some wine or something while I asked a butler standing nearby to lead me to the Professor. Oddly, he didn't take me to Waver's room or even the lobby or dining hall, instead he led me to a room I was confident belonged to Orlocke Caesermund.
Gray stood near the tall double doors, head ducked and hood pulled low like always, her fingers interlocked just below her waist. When she noticed me, she slightly jumped, and then hid her face again.
"Heya, Gray."
"H...Hello." She nervously averted her gaze, raising her hands to her chest.
"You know, I don't bite."
No answer.
Awkwardly, I scratched the back of my head, wondering what words to use. She was my classmate and fellow apprentice, I wanted to get along with her but the girl clammed up every time anyone even neared her... then there was the restraining order filed against Svin to think about.
Maybe she was just really introverted?
Well, unfortunately for her, I decisively lacked the shame to respect such a thing as personal boundaries. What even were they? Some kind of dish?
"We gotta hang after this is over. I know everybody in our class except you for some reason. Makes me feel like a shit friend."
If she was the type of person to be excessively shy or considerate to the point of needless self-blame, I was the type of person to annoy such a person by befriending them till they gave into the Stockholm Syndrome and started enjoying it instead.
Life was too short to spend clammed up and not let yourself have fun.
I patted her shoulder with a big smile.
She became even more startled, but then, much to my surprise, she gave a meek nod. I caught a brief flash of her ashen hair falling into the fur of her black cape, and confused green eyes... annnd her flushed cheeks.
I wanted to say I was handsome enough to provoke such a reaction but it was probably just her being embarrassed by the sudden familiarity.
"I-I wouldn't want... to inconvenience you." She said softly.
"Inconvenience? Nah. Having some fun is never inconvenient. I live for thrill... unless it's Flat, that guy's way too loud."
"A...Alright." She nodded. "And he is. But I don't... think he means... harm."
"Yeah, he doesn't. Still, my ears suffer in his presence. I like to think he's actually from a monkey circus and he just escaped one day."
Her lips opened and closed like a fish. Before she could answer, the door opened and Waver stepped out, his perpetual frown still etched on his face. No wait, it was different this time. It was less being done with shit and more genuine annoyance.
"Ah, Professor. I was looking for you..." I shoved the journal in his hands. "Did I interrupt your date with Orlocke?"
Waver simply sighed and stepped aside, letting me look into the room.
"Damn."
"Jiroubou and Flueger have already left."
Inside, the torn apart remains of who I presumed to be Orlocke awaited us, messily scattered across his own living quarter. Blood stained the white marble floor, and the numerous angels stationed throughout the place. The young boy who'd been pushing his wheelchair lay by the still-burning fireplace, except half his face was just gone, the other stuck in a dead stare.
As for old Orlocke himself... he was just lying on the bed, a somber look on his face... It was just his torso though, the rest of his limbs were littered all over the bloody scene.
Shit was brutal as hell.
"Goddamn, what the fuck happened here?"
"...That is what I would like to know as well. So far, our only lead is that familiar."
I pinched the bridge of my nose. "That's not it, chief. That thing was fighting me."
"...?" Waver cocked his head, visibly confused.
I ignored him for the moment, and lowered my shades.
If the culprit had used some form of magecraft, then there was still time to find him simply by the residue.
-
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