Kamigoroshi

"Hina... the truth is, I'm an archangel." Aerendyl spoke softly, sitting with his legs crossed and a tired look in his amber eyes. It'd been a long day well before Hina and company even woke up, but now, he should try to relax. Yet, he couldn't, for even though he was truly beginning to see this girl as a friend more than anything else... he still felt a fierce and passionate cry within him to protect her poor soul who'd been torn from his home and thrown into an unfamiliar world, hunted, persecuted, infected and worse. "As I was made from a mortal, an elf, it may or may not be obvious to you that my creator was one as well. Do you see where I'm going with this?"

"Nao, Emily, Aurelia and I. All of us..." Hina nodded, her thin red lips twisting slightly at one end in a thoughtful frown.

"Yes. You hold, while not all of my power, an enormous portion of it... and while that alone would make you able to rival an angel, you're also a beast girl, part demon, and Fell Hero, which means that... well, your body naturally becomes more susceptible to change when you're transformed, as you were. I can't say for certain because it's never happened before, but I imagine that your being a Fell Hero means you've completely bonded with whatever demonic traits are still inside you. Hina... if the angels tried to make a weapon to rival the other gods, it would be you."

"The... other gods?" Hina was confused; what about the One True God, these angels, and heaven?

"Yes," Aerendyl agreed, nodding. "No religion anywhere is inherently wrong, and I have no need to lie to you about that now. Our god, the one above all... he is indeed strong enough to begin and end universes, but there are others, as well. Inari, Mars, Ganesh... many gods flit from world to world, leaving their influence for the fun of it and one day vanishing to find themselves a new home. That is what happened in your world, with the... ugh, I'm a bit rusty. Did you call them the kami? Once, Japan was a hub for millions upon millions of gods, but in time they abandoned your race, seeing the flaws that ran deep therein."

"And you know I came from Japan because...?"

"I'm an angel, Hina, don't question it. The point is, depending on the god, I think you could give one a risky fight and stand a chance. There are many of them... many potential enemies you should fear, even if few or no mortals could lay a finger on you now." He seemed to hesitate then, and his next words were full of trepidation. "Hina... people like gods and goddesses don't like when a mortal rises to their level. I can't guarantee, but I'm almost positive your adventures are going to rise to new heights, and for every ally you make, there will be twenty new enemies chomping at the bit to kill you. All of you will be as gods on Earth, but not the only ones... and you may end up going to other worlds as well, an angel can do so in the right conditions. Technically speaking, if you wanted to, you could likely even find a way home, to Japan."

"I don't want that," Hina replied flippantly, and Aerendyl furrowed his brow.

"Isn't that what every reincarnation victim wants? To get back to their old home, in the end?"

"No," Hina replied just as quickly and casually as before. "I'm happy here, and I've only just begun to make a real home for myself, so to speak. No way in any of the hells do I want to go back, you know? Life was the same routine over and over, and on my Earth, nobody was ever going anywhere... but, I would be interested to check out some of those other worlds, eventually, no doubt about it... for now, I guess this one is good enough for me." Hina smiled, feeling her lips curl up into a slow grin.

"I see," Aerendyl replied calmly after a brief pause, offering a small smile of his own. "Well, it's unusual, certainly, but I think I can understand. After all, you're in love, aren't you~?" His voice was teasing and light, putting the badger girl at ease.

"I am in love, yes, with each of them, even Charlotte, who joined most recently... and I'm just so glad that we're safe, now. I think I was pretty angry when I saw that Emily was hurt, I can't really remember, but... the point is, I'm glad that the girls are okay, no matter what happened to them along the way. If you had to kill them to purge that demonic whatever... I don't know, I really can't remember much of anything from... after I was transformed."

"Do you hate Aurum and Argent for what they did?" Aerendyl didn't look as though he cared either way, but in the same breath he certainly seemed curious.

"No, because I understand." Hina said it slowly, shaking her head, calm. "I mean, if you can use one person to stop the slaughter of thousands, maybe hundreds of... I would have done the same thing, in all honesty. Plus, it was Starria who transformed me, Aurum and Argent just cut the wrong wire, on purpose, so to speak." She blinked slowly, the girl's long lashes sticking against each other a bit for some reason. "So... teach me, Aerendyl. Show me what I can do."

"You've got one of Underland's strongest demons to train you, and now an archangel as well... the enemies that you'll inevitably draw in scare me, but quite frankly, so do you." Aerendyl stood, stretching, and looked around, the sunlight glistening both on his shiny curls and the light sheen of sweat coating his chest and shoulders. "You're not the strongest in existence or some such bullshit by any means, no... but, there will still be threats. Now, spar with me Hina," he added, pulling a short sword from only gods-knew-where.

"I'd rather not cut my friend to ribbons, if at all possible," Hina spoke quietly, remembering the spell for guarding a blade that somebody had taught her. Who was that, again...? Or had she just picked it up in one of the spell books...

"You know how to guard your blade so that it won't cut anybody open, right?" Aerendyl was, evidently, doing the same to his own.

"I do," Badger Girl agreed, magically coating her weapon. "What's the story behind this sword, anyway? Tanuki's Claw... I mean, the village chief of Lop told me that an angel delivered it to him with instructions to give it to me, but I don't actually know much about it."

"It's an angelic weapon, Hina." Aerendyl smiled, giving his weapon a few practice swings and fancy moves to match. "You were never going to stay as you were before... truthfully, even I don't know what the ultimate plan is for you, outside of ending Starria's cruelty as you did. However, most angels have a weapon like this short sword I've borrowed, enchanted to cut down demons and wound mortals more severely than steel." He smiled, admiring his blade- or perhaps his reflection in it, Hina found herself thinking with a bemused smile.

"You, though, Hina, have what the higher ups, the special angels have. Mine isn't here, though I have one... yours... it's called a Revered Weapon, and it's a bit like an angel's calling card, and incredibly powerful in ways that only you will be able to discover. People will grow to recognize that weapon in any world you travel to, and respect you for your capabilities. Unless you travel to a land that supports Satanism, they might hate you then." The addition to this sentence was unexpected, and Hina found herself laughing sharply as she looked down to Tanuki's Claw. It was a gorgeous blade, a lustrous amber-brown color... but right now, something felt different. This thing felt less like a blade, more like... well, Hina didn't know how to explain it, but something wasn't as usual. Her body felt light, strong, like she'd been made of iron before and was now of titanium.

"Hina, let it out." Aerendyl spoke seriously, suddenly, dropping his sword arm to his side. "Scream if you have to... but know that you are not wrong, and never have been. Let yourself have some pride, let it overflow, spill out of you... even if you're in the wrong, you have to convince yourself that there's a good reason to push through anything. If not in the name of what's right and just, then in the name of what you care for, value, and want to protect."

"My girls," Hina answered, not needing more of a reason to push through anything than that. As the words slipped past her cherry-colored lips, she felt a surge of something like magic and, though she didn't feel much of anything in the way of pain or discomfort, she heard the snap to either side of her as immense wings shot outward like bullets. Should that be scary, to her...? Somehow, Hina could only look on in mild confusion. They were massive, those wings, almost comically so, but that wasn't the thing that confused her. Rather, they weren't white, instead an ashen gray like the remnants of a burned city. Similarly, the halo over her head was casting a light, gray-blue ambience down to the floor of this courtyard.

"Your demon's blood must be tainting the angelic side of you." Aerendyl commented calmly, nodding. "That doesn't matter though, because you're still going to be amazing, Hina, I have every confidence in you. Now, fight me."

"Fight you?" Hina slowly raised her blade into a defensive position.

"Yes," Aerendyl affirmed, and suddenly he was in front of her, hacking viciously in a downward arc toward her head. Hina dodged to the side, then staggered and fell... she hadn't expected to fly fifteen meters with a push of her legs, but here she was, ass up and head in the lush grass.

"Now, I won't lie, that's a very nice view, but get up. This is why I'm making you practice, Hina." Aerendyl chuckled softly. "You're not human, so don't think like one. Imagine that anything is possible, and think of this as a dance... then strike me."

Slowly, Hina stood. Anything possible, think of this as a dance... dances were graceful, fluid, unending for a time... drawing a breath, the Fell Hero shot forward, feinting past Aerendyl when he made to parry her hit, then lowered herself, spun and whipped the heel of her foot into the backs of his knees, intending to buckle him. It didn't work, but Aerendyl staggered away, gritting his teeth, and Hina smiled like a proud child bringing home good marks in school.

"Exactly, Hina. Graceful, lithe, this is a dance for the devil that only you and I will partake in." This angel, for all his divine renaissance beauty, smiled more temptingly than any demon in any hell as he lashed out with his sword. Hina managed to parry, but she stumbled as she shifted to the side, and this was when Hina realized her mistake; her wings. She wasn't using them for balance, and as such they were dragging her down instead. When the next jab came from her sparring partner, Hina flared her feathers and shifted to the side, going in and forcing Aerendyl back.

"Excellent, girl! Show me what it means to be trained by one of hell's arches!"

~~~

This continued on for hours, at the end of it all, and upon reaching the tail of the training, Hina and Aerendyl collapsed into the grass without their wings and halos, laughing merrily, grins on their faces. Hina glared at him with the barely concealed anger that a sister would hold, unerring but entirely false.

"You really kicked my ass out there, Aerendyl."

"Well you've got a ways to go, yes, but you're not bad, Hina. Once you learn to fully use your wings and new powers, I think you'll be unstoppable... which reminds me, Hina." Suddenly his voice was so serious that she felt her heart drop into the bottom of her belly.

"Reminds you?"

"There's somebody who wants to meet with you while you're here. She was just a young fox girl, really, but she claims that her master wants to meet with you, for friendly reasons."

"A young fox girl, in heaven? Then that would mean..."

"Yes, it absolutely would."