53 Calamity Butterflies

Rain Dance?

"Of course you all wouldn't know about it. It's being done every month to summon rain clouds over this place."

"You mean, people actually dance and gather to summon the rain?"

I couldn't help but ask Mom, so I shot the question. Mom's expression was a bit confused though.

"Dance doesn't exactly mean dancing during the Rain Dance, but more like the mages here do that kind of thing with magic to summon the rain clouds to be exact."

"Is it also a different type of magic?" This time Aunt asked. Looks like she's also interested in the other types of magic that Yona had mentioned.

"I'm not really sure as I don't have a source spirit, and my parents also don't have one which makes us strangers to these kinds of things. Everyone that wants to participate could also watch, and most of the children go at the southern west part of the city to see the rain clouds."

Mom led the way as she discussed like a tour guide at Kandria.

People were starting to appear more as we went further in, and the lined houses eventually came to an end. There was a large structure at the end of the street, which looked like a church.

"Stay here, I'll just get something."

Mom went inside for a few minutes, and a few other people could be seen going in and out of the building. It seems that this place is frequented by people.

Suddenly, the surroundings started to become dark. A large shadow was casted over all the place, and I couldn't help but look upwards.

The skies which were once blue became tinted with a partial combination of purple and black. Thick clouds were starting to move towards this place, and a massive lightning bolt came down from the skies and hit the ground only a few meters away from me.

The blinding light and the loud crisp sound that almost seemed like an explosion temporarily blinded my eyes and deafened my ears. I could also feel something travel throughout my whole body which felt like a prickle.

There was also a shockwave that followed, which blew me away, but I stabilized myself by floating, and I just floated in the air.

It was too late to stop the momentum, but the force wasn't enough to destroy a wall or anything, but more like a strong wind that slightly pushed me away.

For a time, I couldn't see or hear anything, and I could only crouch and protect my head and chest with my hands, before I formed a barrier around myself.

A few seconds passed before I regained my sight and hearing, and I could see the surrounding buildings have blackened rooftops.

"What the..... Aunt! Three!"

The two were both lying on the ground, and they both had their respective protective measures on as they try to stand up.

A sharp whistle suddenly sounded from above, and a black blur instantly went towards us.

*clang*

I increased the barrier that I made and saw the object---or beast on the other side of the barrier.

It was a small and black butterfly with pink patterns on its wings. Each of its wings spanned for over a meter, and on its head was a single white horn instead of feelers.

A heavy thrum crashed on my ears, and the direction it came from was the skies which looked like it was falling down.

"What the heck is happening? Mom!"

I quickly went inside the church-looking like structure where she went in, and I found everyone collapsed on the ground. I found Mom within a group of people near the furthest counter, which she was third in line based from the line they formed on the ground.

"MOM!"

Her already pale face went pale further, and I could feel that tingling sensation from her body similar to the one I had earlier.

"Electricity!?"

I lifted her from the ground, and quickly enveloped her whole body with Origin.

"Please, you've gotta be alright!"

Hearing another whistling sound, I quickly made my way back towards Aunt and Three which were already partially standing on their own by supporting each other.

"Pi...sa-sis... How is she?"

I took a quick glance at Mom which was enveloped with white Origin. Now that I observed her more closely, my heart almost stopped its beating from the sight of her body.

Her chest isn't rising up and down, and her hands were cold.

"NO! She's..... not breathing."

CPR! How do I do it!? There's no internet to search how to do it, and I've never done it before!

Without hesitation, I laid her on the ground instead and partially opened her mouth... and pumped on her chest, which hopefully could restart her heart.

"You've gotta live!"

...

***

While Kaff performed CPR on her mother, Arc already regained her senses and saw a massive black cloud above the skies which seem to move towards them.

"Calamity Butterfles!?"

She once heard of them when she was a child, and saw it on the book her father had secretly kept. Fearing that her father would scold her, she vaguely asked questions about the said butterfly's appearance and he finally guessed the said beast and told her the name.

They were butterflies that fed on anything that contained source power, and humans innately had a little bit that was contained in their life force.

These insects which turned into beasts that propagated using dead carcasses eventually became a nuisance, and finally, a threat to living things. Their uncountable numbers were the threat, along with their speeds that almost reached the speed of sound.

They also fear intense cold and hot places, and preferred to live at warm and humid climates.

Them being here, Arc couldn't think of any reason why, but she still prepared herself for their assault as they come from the skies.

"One important thing to know when dealing with unknown insects, is that most of them usually have a weakness. Do you understand, Griff?"

"Yes, master."

Arc glanced towards where the voices came from, and he saw a man and a boy almost the same age as Kaff, floating at the distance.

"Be careful!" She didn't even realize that they were floating, and only let out a warning towards them as a few of the Calamity Butterflies were already swarming over the whole city.

Without time to waste, she instantly gathered Natural Energy within her whole body, before passing it towards her orange sword which gave it a brilliant silver light.

"Forlorn Might."

She silently muttered, before the light from her sword extended towards the skies, whose piercing radiance almost pierced into the heavens that turned dark from the large number of butterflies, and split into a thousand swords that attempted to slice everything that were within her radius.

"Did you see what she did? It was an attack that can even be used defensively. Such is the might of a Sword User. Now, try to deal with the rest as long as you can, and I'll support you after."

"Understood, master."

Arc glanced over the two at the distance, and saw that the boy was slowly floating forward.

He held his hand forward and the Calamity Butterflies surrounded them, yet they only passed around the boy as if he wasn't even there.

His eyes opened, and an image of a blue star appeared behind the boy briefly before disappearing, then a sphere of light started to enlarge with him on the middle. The Calamity Butterflies started flying towards the ball of light that was still grew as time passed, until it expanded into a diameter of a hundred meters.

The boy closed his open hand, and the massive ball of light that contained a large amount of butterflies instantly shrunk into a dot, before disappearing from existence. The small dot then emitted a waft of white and blue light before moving towards the boy's hand, then went into his grasp.

The surroundings suddenly blurred and their surroundings seemed to become an afterimage for a second before everything returned to normal.

"Good. Now try to do it on a larger scale."

"Master, I want to try something else."

"Sure, as long as you're applying what I've taught you, then it's good."

They casually had a conversation while everyone that were still alive and are able to move are panicking all around, and from the master-student combination, the surrounding people somehow got distracted from what he did and started cheering for the boy instead.

"Hey, what about me?" Arc grumbled as she complained to the side as she executed a skill that she once had difficulty in, and thought that she still looked like a side character.

"Mom!"

Pisa finally irregularly coughed after a while, and maybe it was some sort of miracle, but Kaff believed that what helped her was both Origin and the chest compressions that he gave.

"Wha...what happened?"

She took a quick look at her surroundings before looking towards the southern horizon.

"Ellie!"

Before she could even start to run, Kaff and Dorother held her back inside their barrier.

"Calm down, there's someone else taking care of our 'guests' right now." Three said as she firmly gripped Pisa's shoulder before pointing towards the direction of the boy that was currently flying.

"Who's that?"

"Don't know, but he stole my spotlight."

The boy once more closed his eyes as the butterflies started to gather towards him, and this time held both of his arms forward.

That blurring sensation once more appeared, before the winds started to gather in front of him, forming a visible gust that almost looked like a sphere.

It expanded as it gathered more of the butterflies, and the skies were starting to clear up.

Almost a minute pass later, and everyone that watched him had their jaws dropped.

A massive black ball now formed in front of him, and there was not a butterfly in sight. There were a few birds that got implicated within his sphere of wind and instantly died but it wasn't comparable to the number of Calamity Butterflies that struggled inside what seemed to be a cage of wind.

The boy then made a few hand gestures, and clapped his hands on his front.

The blue star once more appeared on his back but it was a bit different in color and was hued in a bit of purple. That very star somehow moved and it decreased in size, before moving towards the ball of wind that contained all of the butterflies that invaded Kandria.

Some sort of suction force suddenly winded from the orb, and it shrunk as the winds as it sliced every butterfly inside, until it revealed the blue star that was slowly rotating in place.

"What in the world..." Arc's eyes slightly trembled from the sight and how the supposed calamity had been ended just like that.

"Aunt, looks like we still have a lot to learn...and experience."

"That power, I've probably heard of it before. But I can't recall what was it called." Three pondered as she put her hand on her chin.

The boy then lowered his arms and turned towards the man which he called master.

Now that the skies had cleared up and vision was clear, it was only then that they saw what the duo looked like.

The man had a long hair that was tied to his back, and his bangs were partially excluded from his tied long hair. He had clothes that had wave patterns all over them which probably served as a robe too from the way it covered each of him limbs.

There were not much more defining features on him which made him almost look like an ordinary man, but from the way he instructed the boy and how he was respected, one could not help but be respectful towards him.

The boy was about three feet tall, and looked like the same age as Kaff, and his clothes were slightly similar to his master, only without patterns, and his limbs could be seen. His hair was short though, and it was parted towards the back which almost seem like he's always going forward.

"Now that that's done, we should rest for a while. I hope that the people here could accommodate us well."

The man glanced downwards, and the people who were once in panic and in fear became more respectful towards the two. The two flew away towards the distance before landing somewhere with a lot of people.

"Tch, we could've done that ourselves too. But I can't argue that the boy was really efficient."

"You mean that his skills perfectly suited how to deal with enemy." Three added.

"Ellie!" Pisa once more exclaimed, and Arc carried her and asked where they should go instead. Above the skies were a few Civil Corps soldiers that were assisting people that were injured during the butterflies' raid, and they didn't paid much attention to Kaff and the others.

Pointing the direction where they should go, they landed on a courtyard by the southern most area of Kandria.

There were not much houses as they went there, and there were a lot of signages in the area which almost made looked like a market district.

The good news is that, there were few casualties in the area which made Pisa heave a sigh of relief, before finally walking around the courtyard and found a small looking hut without a door.

An old man was limping as he greeted Pisa.

"Young Miss, you're back?"

"Where's Ellie? I'll be taking her."

"Please follow me."