Chapter 56: Another princess
Lucinda sighed to herself.
"Just how did it come to this?" She questioned, her voice exasperated. She stared at the grinning girl that comfortably hovered in the air.
Lyraeth, her beauty betrayed her ferocity. The girl was no older than herself, with a head of short red hair and gleaming yellow eyes. Her skin was sun-kissed, and she had a rather elaborate outfit, consisting of a white jacket that was cropped up, showing off her smooth stomach. Along with that, she wore baggy blue trousers and heavy black boots.
"Must we fight, Lyraeth?" Lucinda asked from the crumbling building she was hoisted on. The spawn of the Sun Goddess cackled.
"Of course!" She answered, her voice excited. "It's been a year, I wanna see what you're made of! If you survive a few attacks, then I'll hear you out!"
"There is no changing your mind?" The girl shook her head as Lucinda sighed. "How very like you, very well."
Lyraeth grinned. The air crackled with her mana that blazed through the entire area and beyond.
With a mere thought, large orbs of fire materialized around her. Each orb glowed with a fierce intensity, casting ominous shadows on the already devastated town below. With a mental command, she launched the orbs at unseen speeds, their fiery trails streaking through the air like celestial comets.
Lucinda channeled her magic and vanished in a flash of light just as the orbs of fire struck the building she stood on. The impact was cataclysmic, sending shockwaves rippling through the remnants of the town. Buildings crumbled, their stone walls shattering into rubble, and flames erupted, devouring what little remained of the once-vibrant streets.
As the smoke and debris quickly settled, Lucinda reappeared on another building, her stance poised and ready for the next onslaught. Lyraeth, undeterred by the destruction she had wrought, focused her magic once more as she turned to Lucinda.
With a sweeping motion of her hand, Lyraeth summoned an immensely condensed fire stream that erupted from her palm. The stream of flames spread wildly, engulfing everything in its path with blistering heat and devastation. The ancient structures of the town groaned and collapsed under the relentless assault of magical fire, sending plumes of smoke billowing into the sky.
But Lucinda was not idle. With a thought, she erected a shimmering barrier of mana that absorbed the fiery onslaught. The barrier crackled and shimmered under the intense heat, but it held firm, protecting Lucinda from the brunt of the inferno.
"Haha! Nicely done, Lucinda!" Lyraeth clapped her hands, not minding the destruction she was causing.
"Just one more attack and then we'll talk, right?" Lucinda asked, the grinning girl nodded her head.
With a primal roar, she tapped into the depths of her magic, summoning something akin to a miniature sun that came into existence above in the sky.
"Primordial sun," she chanted.
"Familial Arts, hm." Lucinda frowned as she prepared a defensive spell.
The miniature sun blazed into existence, melting the surrounding snowflakes and the snow collected on the various buildings, its searing light illuminating the entire town with blinding intensity. The ground trembled as the miniature sun expanded, growing larger and larger until it reached a critical mass. Then, with a deafening roar, it exploded in a wave of destructive energy that swept across the town like a tidal wave of fire and force.
The explosion was cataclysmic. Buildings were reduced to mere ash and debris, and the earth quaked under the onslaught. The sky darkened with smoke and embers, and the town lay in ruins, utterly consumed by the devastating power of the magical explosion.
Yet still unscathed, Lucinda stood on the blackened ground, even the surrounding snow was melted away.
"Woohoo! You passed!" She watched Lyraeth's feet touch down onto the ground, and Lucinda just looked at her exasperated.
("Thank the Gods I sent Agatha and Mirabella back to Briarwick,") she looked at the spawn of Sylvestra. ("Lyraeth is even more unhinged than I originally thought. Did she really have to destroy the entire town!?") The aforementioned girl merely approached her and threw an arm around her.
"So what brought you here?" Lyraeth asked, her tone much too casual, as if she had not obliterated an entire town.
"We are investigating the Drah'lurahr Cult," Lucinda informed, shrugging off her arm.
"Ooooh! So you're the support the kingdom of Galadriel sent?" Lucinda nodded in confirmation. "Hah! Talk about overkill."
"I take it you have orders to investigate these cultists as well?" Lucinda questioned.
"That's right, the geezers up top wanted an Inheritor involved," she confirmed, the 'geezers' she referred to were no doubt the governing body of Verdantis.
"But what of that mana explosion that tore through the city?" Lucinda asked, and momentary confusion found its way on Lyraeth's expression before realization found its way onto her face.
"Oh, that! Eh, I was dealing with some Vel'ryr tech," she stated, her tone ever casual. Lucinda looked at her confused.
"Vel'ryr?" She questioned. "What is their tech doing here in Verdantis?" Lyraeth shrugged.
"Dunno, they attacked first though so I just responded in kind," the girl stated with a grin.
"I... I see," Lucinda frowned, this was news to her. (Vel'ryr troops in Verdantis?) This all left her with a bad feeling.
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[Pain Nullifications]
("It was a simple charm that did as the name suggested, it rendered you unfeeling of any kind of pain. Usually there was an upper limit to how much pain just a single person could take. But that all depended on the person who used the spell. It also depended on mana quantity, the more pain that was absorbed the more mana was drained. If you are too severely injured and you lack the mana reserves then the charm will merely burn through your mana and be useless. But luckily I have an absurd amount of it.") Mikoto mused as he watched his severed left arm fly through the sky. He swung his head to the side as a dark blade scraped against his mask, shifting his heel he got a good look at the perpetrator as he leaped backward to create distance, a simple black circular glyph was in place of where his arm had been severed, to prevent blood loss.
But for now, Mikoto paid that no mind, instead he zeroed in on the one responsible. It was a tall girl, maybe slightly older than himself. She had a head of pitch-black short wild hair and striking red eyes that fit perfectly with her beautiful face. Her outfit consisted of a silver chest piece adorned with pieces of red, along with silver sabotans and black gloves finished with a white coat wrapped around her form with the sleeves rolled up.
Then there was the blade she wielded that dripped with his blood that stained the pristine snow. It seemed like a simple enough steel blade, only it was black in color and seemed to absorb the light around it. The handle was intricately forged with a pristine gem in its hilt.
He watched her impale the blade into the ground as she rested both her gloved hands atop it.
"I am Amaury Von Auerswald, fourth in line to the throne of Vel'ryr," she boldly proclaimed. "You trespassed and injured my men, give up now and I shall show you mercy."
("Vel'ryr? One of the three main nations?") Mikoto mentally mused as he looked at the girl. ("And she's a princess? And she's all the way out here in Verdantis. Not to mention I can't sense a lick of mana from her. She's like the rest of the animals.") He frowned beneath his mask as he saw more guards trudge through the snow and towards him, yet they did not stand by their princess; instead, they recovered the unconscious forms of their comrades. Mikoto ignored them as he focused on Amaury. "Wouldn't have beaten their asses if they didn't kidnap villagers or conspire with cultists."
"Your words are air, boy," she stated, her tone low and her expression unreadable.
"Please, the Drah'lurahr Cult had the same weapons your precious guards had," Mikoto shook his head. "Ah, but what the hell am I doing? There's no use in arguing with a filthy animal. I'll just go ahead and take care of you."
"Bold words," she spoke, glancing at his severed arm that lay cushioned in the snow a few meters away from them. "Considering I easily took an arm, I shall be going for your head next."
"You got lucky, emo," Mikoto extended his right arm as Amaury swiftly took a stance with her blade. "I'll go for the kill."
("But still, my instincts are going haywire for this chick, she may have no magic but something tells me she'll be hard to kill. Considering I'm a spawn of a war Goddess, I shouldn't ignore it. Fine then I'll make a plan.")
With that, the snow was kicked under her feet as she shot forward towards him at blurring speeds no normal human should have been capable of. Mikoto's eyes slightly widened.