Rescue Mission II

~20 July 2006~

"Oya, we have a guest."

I couldn't help but shudder once again after hearing Rizevim say that word to me. If his aura only creeped me out not too long ago, this time, his aura is like a snake coiling around my body.

"What can I do for you, stranger?"

I look at the blonde man who looks at me while also showing off his sharp fang.

"I'm here to take that little girl over there."

"Ahhhh, I fear I can't let you do that. I'm her brother, you see… So it's my job to 'protect' her."

"I see."

After saying those words, I immediately shoot the blonde man with my gun. Unfortunately, my attack gets blocked by a magic barrier the man creates in short notice.

"Hmmm. It Looks like he doesn't want to live anymore. Marius, will you take care of him, or should I?"

"No, I will take care of this pest."

"Hmmm. Do take care."

"Yes"

Marius… Marius Tepes. The son of the current king of Tepes clan. He is also the traitor to the current Tepes king by planning a coup d'état against his father.

I snap from my thoughts when my intuition screams at me to duck low on the ground, which I did without hesitation. I look at a stream of darkness passing me and hit the nearby window, destroying it.

"Tch. I miss"

Seeing the situation, I take out a little box from my pocket and use my Vongola Ring to open up the box. This is a weapon box—a box filled containing various weaponry. As I place my Vongola Ring into the Box Weapon hole, I push a little bit of my Sky Flame into the weapon.

A second later, the box opened up and released a small white cat from the box. This cat is Lily, my Animal box weapon. Lily has a Sky Flame on her forehead. Not only her forehead, but she also has a Sky flame on her foot and tails.

"Interesting… A familiar perhaps?"

Seeing the enemy, Lily begins to hiss at both Marius and Rizevim, who are busy doing some sort of ritual toward Valerie. Without wasting any more time, I push a considerable amount of Sun Flame toward Lily, who begins to grow into a white tiger.

"Lily, Let's go."

"Gao~."

Lily and I begin to charge toward Marius with our Flame blazing in power. As we appear in front of Marius, I let Lily charge head-on while I fire a continuous barrage of Flame bullets at Marius.

With Marius busy dealing with Lily, some of my bullets hit Marius. The effect of my Flame can be seen immediately as I can see that the wound created by my bullet begins to sizzle as if it boils Marius blood.

"WHAT IS THAT?!?"

I ignore his shout and begin to combine my Sky Flame with Cloud and Rain before pointing my gun toward Marius, who is getting ready to block my incoming attack. Sensing my Flame, Lily begins to retreat to my side as I fire my pistol.

As my attack flies toward Marius, I can see him create a barrier using his magic, but before my attack hits his barrier, it branches out like a tree root and begins to attack him from all sides.

*Boom* *Boom* *Boom*

While I am satisfied that my attack hit Marius, my real target is Rizevim, who is busy doing the unknown ritual. Seeing that Rizevim ritual gets interrupted by me, I immediately change the Flame inside my gun to Sky, Storm, and Cloud combination. When I fire my gun, it immediately creates a root-like pattern like before, but this time, I charge it to the maximum capacity my weapon can take.

As I see another explosion happening, I try to steal Valerie from Rizevim guard, but before I can even get close to her, my intuition says that I need to leap away from my location. Without hesitation, I comply with my intuition and true to intuition; I see Rizevim create an arc of black energy toward my previous location.

"I hate impolite children. I let you play with Marius here so I can work in peace, but you keep interrupting me. Not only that, but you also hit me with this nasty Flame. It hurt, you know? Is this a holy flame? No matter. I will find out after I dissected your body."

Each second Rizevim talks, I can feel his demonic power slowly increasing to the point that the floor begins to crack because of the pressure.

Seeing there are no other choices. I let myself 'die.'

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

*Marius Tepes POV*

I looked at my wound that slowly healed itself; however, it was much slower than usual. It must be that weird-looking Flame that brat used in the fight. I don't know what kind of Flame that is, but I'm plenty sure that it was not a holy Flame as I don't feel any holy energy coming from it. The only Flame that I can compare it with is Phoenix Flame, THE REAL Phoenix, not the one Phenex clan have. However, I know that the Phoenix race is already extinct.

I snap from my thoughts when I feel a terrifying power coming from Rizevim. I couldn't have but shudder thinking how close I'm to death the first time Rizevim came to me. It was the first day where my half-blood sister awakened her sacred gear. It was also the first time where I experimented with it and successfully enhanced one of the 'volunteers' for my experiment. I don't know how Rizevim knows about the Grail, but after he comes to me, he immediately receives an offer. Either cooperate with him in using the Grail or Die on the spot. That day I rejected his offer, and that day was also the first time I saw Rizevim's real power. That bottomless pit of demonic energy that makes me feel like I stare into the abyss. Needless to say that I immediately changed my heart and accepted his offer.

That day he took one of three Valerie Grails inside her body while leaving two of them for me to use. Not only that, but Rizevim also helped me enchanting the vampire in the Tepes Clan, making our skirmish toward the Carmilla clan much easier than before.

I promise to myself not to anger Rizevim and feel that bottomless darkness once again. However, seeing Rizevim's pissed expression makes me nervous. Lucky for me, it was not me who pissed him off but rather the human.

I look at the human standing up from the ground after he dodges the Rizevim attack. The human and his familiar stood there in silence before suddenly, I felt a shudder on my back. The little boy in front of me released a warm aura that made me sick. It was like the sun, but at the same time, it did not feel like the sun. I even feel my power begins to weaken second by second.

"Fascinating. Who are you, boy? Let me hear your name."

"..."

"Tch so disrespectful. No matter. Let's finish this."

Rizevim waves his hand, and suddenly, a beam made of demonic energy fly toward the human and his familiar.

I see the human dodge to the right, but sadly, for him, Rizevim creates another beam of darkness to attack him. However, to my surprise, the human created a green shield with a hint of blue and purple around it that successfully blocked the Rizevim attack.

While blocking the Rizevim attack, The human points his gun at Rizevim before firing it. A red like energy flies toward Rizevim at high speed and hits a barrier he creates in a second. However, before Rizevim could use another attack, there is an explosion around the devil. I don't know what is happening or how the human could hit Rizevim without him knowing. Many questions were popping inside my head, but it stopped as I see a mote of red light floating near Rizevim like a bee flying near a flower.

So that is the reason for the explosion. However, I should be able to see it, so how?

As the explosion finished, I can see Rizevim become angrier… no, he already passed angry. Now he is mad at humans.

Suddenly Rizevim disappears from my sight and appears behind the human who manages to dodge Rizevim's attack by the skin of his teeth. However, Rizevim did not stop there as he used his feet to attack the human, but to my surprise, the human can dodge it once again.

I continue to watch the fight in awe. The human is not only able to dodge, but he also can block and even make a counter-attack of his own toward Rizevim. Every time Rizevim makes an attack, the human is ready to dodge or block if he needs to, and he is also able to counter-attack at the right time where Rizevim never expects an incoming attack.

It was like the little boy… know the future. Yes, there is no other explanation. Every time Rizevim attacks him, the human dodge flawlessly, and he also blocks an incoming attack that cannot be seen by an average human or even other beings.

While on the deadlock, The human suddenly leaps away from Rizevim. He once again pointed his gun at Rizevim and fired it. A beam of reddish-orange flies toward Rizevim, who blocks it with ease. However, to my surprise, the human began to run away from the fight. I expected Rizevim to chase after him, but to my surprise, he did not.

"Rizevim, do we chase after him?"

"No. Let him go."

"I see, but may ask why?"

"Do you now feel it?"

"Pardon?"

"Do you not feel your power begin to weaken second by second?"

Now he says it, yes, my power still weakens even until now. How could I forget about this?!?

"By the look on your face, you are just aware of this, or at least you forget about it."

"Yes"

"That man is dangerous. I don't know how, but he somehow can weaken our power. Not only that, but he also can make us forget about it. Someone like him is most likely an assassin hired by the other. Marius, after this, I need you to look at the Carmilla clan and check if they know about the presence of Valerie. His main objective is to kidnap Valerie from us, and when he knows that he can't defeat us, he decides to bail out the mission."

"Yes. I will do it right away."

"Good, now let's build another magic circle. That nasty technique also affects the magic circle."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

*Lexian Vongola POV*

I ran away from the room alongside Lily. When I arrive on the first floor, I see both Medea and Carol already finished fighting both Katerea and Creuserey and ready to kill them, but after seeing me, they stop and say.

"Master, are you successful in your mission?"

"We don't have much time, Medea quickly activated the emergency teleportation. We need to get out of here."

Without saying anything, Medea obeyed my command and crushed a crystal she took from her robe, and suddenly, we were outside the castle.

"Medea teleports us to our base immediately."

"Yes"

While Medea is preparing, Carol walks toward me and says.

"My Lord, why are we in a hurry? I thought we needed to kill every vampire we found?"

"Yes, but the situation has changed. There is a strong opponent that I don't want to fight right now. As for why we hurry up…"

I deactivated my mist flame around Lily and let both Medea and Carol see Valerie's unconscious body on top of Lily.

"My Lord is that…."

"Yes, this one is Valerie Tepes. The owner of Sephiroth Graal, also known as the Holy Grail. I successfully fooled my enemy into thinking he only fought me alone and made a copy of myself behind him, and with the help of Lily, my clone easily stole Valerie from her tormentor. The reason why we should hurry up is that the fake body of Valerie will be gone in a few seconds. Actually, it will be gone in 3… 2… 1…"

A few seconds after I finish my countdown, I hear an angry roar coming from the castle.

"RAAAAAAGHHHRRRHGGGHH"

As Rizevim shouts in anger, Medea finishes her preparation, and we are gone.

Mission accomplished.