A/N: I hope the little break from writing didn't lessen the quality.
Anyway, same deal. 700.
-
When I came to in the morning, instead of my dingy and uncomfortable pillow, my head was resting on something much softer. My first thought was that perhaps my long awaited kidnapping and waking up in a lab adventure was finally about to start, but then I took a look around.
Unfortunately, I was still in the shitty room we managed to find after asking the locals for a hotel. Accommodations for travellers were terribly lacking in a town in the middle of nowhere, with a population that barely even reached two hundred. What a surprise. In the end, we had to resort to being extorted by a lone widow living alone at the base of the hills the town was built against.
The stingy old crone gave us the upper floor at a downright exorbitant rate. She even forbid us from 'making any noise'. For some reason, Luvia's immediate response to this was calling her a filthy commoner, tossing a ruby at her, and then proceeding to literally break the bed.
Honestly? Worth it. T'was a good time if I did say so myself...
Snorting, I shook my head, and looked up.
There, I caught a glimpse of heaven. Luvia's taste in night wear often involved a comfy transparent lace nighty. That soft 'thing' I was lying on were her thighs, and consequently, I could see right up it. Her breasts were big enough that they held up the nighty enough that it had to dangle awkwardly a good distance from her belly.
"You know... I've been a hater of Physics all my life. They never let you do cool stuff, and studying Physics always gave me a massive headache."
"Hm?" Luvia hummed idly, braiding my hair with a gentle smile. "Well, I suppose you would struggle with a somewhat complicated subject."
"Yeah, but from now on, the laws of Physics have my eternal respect."
She tilted her head ever so slightly, confused, before abruptly pushing a hand under her breasts with tinted cheeks.
"I don't understand that reaction at all."
"W-We can't spend the whole day here. That's going to happen if-"
"Understandable."
We were both teenagers.
She smiled softly and returned to fiddling with my hair. After a moment, she began tracing a finger along my shoulder before moving along my arm to... pinch it?
"I see that your effort is beginning to show. And, you've become a bit respectable in regards to your skill with wrestling as well."
True to my promise back at Adra, I'd taken to working out and practising a variety of martial arts. Namely, Wrestling and, for some reason, Baji Quan. Both were her own suggestions. With the way my brain was hardwired to work with my Mystic Eyes, it was far easier to analyze, then replicate most of the movements. Putting them into practice was also no trouble, because the world moved a lot slower the moment I removed my aviators.
"Alright, time to get up. Let's see what this town's about."
Luvia sighed when I abruptly stood up but followed suit all the same. "I would've liked to sit a bit longer."
Before long, we were sitting in the old widow's dining room. An ostensibly simple place, but still well-kept, with a long table in the middle right next to a lit fireplace right across an open kitchen. Sitting with my back to the fireplace, I had a clear view of the front door, although the sunlight from the window directly hit my eyes so it was a bit inconvenient too.
Luviagelita was studying an old grandfather clock sitting against a flowerpot. I couldn't blame her. The damn thing was giving off a decent level of mystery. A quick look without my glasses revealed it was nothing to worry about however, as it was the by-product of the clock's age and nothing else.
Still, some magus would probably murder or brainwash the stingy old lady for it if they found out just for its use as a catalyst for some time-related spell.
We didn't have to wait long for breakfast. Our host stepped out of the kitchen with a nasty gleam in her blue eyes, her hair done in a ponytail and a bib apron tied around her waist. She practically slammed my plate in front of me, but was a bit more courteous towards Luvia... She even gave her a wrinkly smile before once again, turning to glare at me as if I'd done her some personal wrong.
English hospitality at its finest.
"I told you to not make too much noise."
"And I paid you adequately for your convenience. I will not humour any further remarks." Luvia said calmly, eyes closed, "You may sit if it pleases you, but I would prefer you leave us be."
"O-Of course, miss. Anything else?"
She was met with silence.
Once she was gone, I turned to my girl. "That old lady's a bitc-... What did I even do to her?"
"I believe she's simply taking out her grievances with her late husband on you, as a man. You know, one of those petulant sorts that believe their opinion of the world is right to be dictated by one experience." She shrugged, eying her breakfast.
I shrugged too and decided to drop the matter in favour of eating... that was until I actually saw the food. It was a typical English breakfast. That was the problem. My people had no taste. Beans. Toast. Sausages. Bacon.
With not a word exchanged, both of us dumped the beans into one plate and moved the rest of the food to the other. The beans were then exiled to a dark corner of the table, never to be spoken of again. With them gone, breakfast was saved. It finally became worth eating.
As usual, Luviagelita held no complaints about the 'low-class' breakfast.
"I quite like this bacon." She said suddenly.
"You know it's store bought, yeah?"
"I said what I said."
I chuckled, "I love it too."
She loved unhealthy foods. It was, honestly, one of the main reasons I was so infatuated with her. The girl would rather down a Big Mac than eat some rich people thing with some french-sounding name... even though the latter was what she was accustomed to.
The second I shoved the last bit of sausage down my throat, the old crone was upon us like some ghost, hovering over my shoulder with a smile that didn't quite seem real.
"If you're done eating...?"
"Come Hal. We have matters to attend to."
I shrugged and listened to my lady... only the woman held me back the second Luvia was out of the door. Then, she whispered the sort of wild shit no one, including me, ever expected to hear from a stranger.
"Shame on you. You're making a girl from a fine family toss away her whole life just to elope with a ruffian like you."
Wow.
I found myself genuinely baffled by the statement. Now, I was probably justified in socking her or at least throwing a fit just for how rude that had been... but, hey, I was actually just impressed by the courage it took to be so utterly wrong and even confidently say that to a complete stranger instead.
So, I grinned. My aviators shimmered in the sunlight.
"You gonna cry?"
She backed away, startled. I leaned in.
"You know, maybe don't be a bit-"
"Hal."
"Right, right," I backed away, hands raised in surrender, "Swearing isn't cool. I remember. I remember."
-
We spent the rest of the day exploring the town. Admittedly, there wasn't much to explore in the first place. Left with no resort, we had to resort to asking around for any news about the disappearances.
That was where things took a bit of an unexpected turn.
There were none.
No one we asked knew anything at all about any disappearances. They were even genuinely confused by the questions. At first, I thought it was just a case of ignorance, difficult as it was for me to believe that anyone from such a small community wouldn't know of a matter that huge.
But no, none of the storeowners knew anything. Most others had gone to the city for their jobs or were tending to the land and their animals.
I was a bit baffled... and honestly, had no idea how to proceed anymore.
By then, the Sun had begun to set, and a great shadow had begun falling upon the town as the Sun shied further and further behind the hills next to us.
"It would seem nothing is wrong here." Luvia noted, walking beside me, arms crossed under her breasts. "But, that is how any magus worth their mettle would operate. Memory tampering, perhaps?"
I nodded, "The Holy Church's here too. Something's definitely up... but-"
"But you can't notice anything, right?" Luvia finished my words, "I fail to accept that any spell would go unnoticed under your gaze."
Her trust in my abilities was more resolute than my own at times like these, to the point where I was often left unable to even come up with a reasoning for it. Regardless, she was right. Pulling the wool over my eyes with a spell was completely impossible. That was why, when all of a sudden, a bounded field was erected over the whole town, I noticed it and dismantled its functions before it even finished materialising.
My knowledge of the programming languages I saw the different Thaumaturgies had expanded to a point where I was able to fill in most sequences or 'programs' after only a partial analysis. For that, I owed thanks to my constant suicidal adventures, and the Professor, who often took me with him to other departments when he was free and showed me as many spells as he could without drawing suspicion.
"You sense it?" Luviagelita raised a brow, but remained otherwise unbothered.
Immediately, the people around us became numb, like someone intoxicated on the kind of drugs that trapped them in their little world. They began wandering thoughtlessly, and every individual movement seemed to morph into a poorly telegraphed imitation of what they were doing before the Bounded Field went up.
I closed my eyes, putting a hand to my chin, "Mental Compulsion. And a cage. I can break through it pretty easily but clearly, it's supposed to trap everyone in here. No, it's supposed to stop them from even thinking about leaving, and stop those like us by force."
"And the caster is..."
"Holy Church. The Thaumaturgy is the so-called Holy Word."
With a nod, Luviagelita turned on her heel, tossing her furcoat aside as she spun to glare at a nearby rooftop. I followed her gaze to find a... Well, I knew what they were now and they definitely weren't Exorcists.
A young woman sat easily only on the slanted roof, an arm wrapped around her knees. As usual, her body was hidden by the nun's habit all women from the Church wore but she had no headdress, letting her puffy ginger hair freely float down to her bosom. Her eyes narrowed into thin slits when our gazes met, and she waved a hand at us with an excited smile.
"Hello, apostates~! Truly, truly I thank the Lord for the pleasure of coming upon you this fine evening. I thank the Lord for the opportunity to rip your throats out, then make you beg for His Grace, the grace you willfully abandoned with no voice to plead with~"
Maniacs. Genuine maniacs. The lot of them. Why were they always so vividly violent? Had they convinced themselves that their Lord agreed with this?
"You know, I'm not particularly learned but... I'm positive the Big man isn't fine with this sort of talk."
"How dare an apostate presume he knows of the Lord? The Lord's Old Testament confirms our acts as deserving of the highest reward within his Great Kingdom!"
...Alright, yeah, that checked out.
Just as I prepared myself for a disappointing altercation, however, the Executor shook her head.
"Ah, ah wait. Forgive me. I got all bothered by what you were that I forgot what Father Vespaio asked of me. Yes, please, forget what I said. You are requested at the Church. Please follow me."
I looked at Luviagelita.
She looked at me.
We both nodded.
That shit was a trap.
"Before that," I jabbed a finger at the sky, "Is this you lot?"
"Mhm~ For a certainty! Our Lord's blessings are truly vast."
-
Hope you enjoyed.
I think this is the longest break I've been forced to take from this work. But, I'm good now, we're back in business. I apologise for my absence.