4 Chapter 0: Another Day in Neverland (3)

Unlike the first two free birds, Juno was the sound one out of the trio, and probably the only sound one in the entire team. Out of everyone in the team, she utilized her studies the best.

Her ability relied on being a Scholar, after all.

[STUDENT FILE #21104]

Full Name: Juno Ullrich

Age: 17 years old

Birthdate: February 11

Gender: Female

Height: 176cm

Literary Element: Scholiast

Rank: 2nd Year Student (Luxsworth Academy)

Note: High deductive skills

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The fine young lady stood atop the rooftop of an apartment building, in a neighborhood about two miles away from the marketplace, gazing, and carefully studying her target. The rooftop perfectly overlooked the alleyway in which the little bizarre creature took shelter.

The little creature muddled around the dumpster, probably searching for food. It amused Juno in the way it behaved as if it were a normal stray dog or cat. Being the animal fanatic she was, she would have been fine with adopting the little creature and keeping it safe with her, that was to say if the little creature remained "the little creature," but she knew better.

That was the gift and curse of a Scholar: she always knew better.

Never once in her life did she take a reckless step like any average human would accidentally take at least once in their life. That, in itself, wasn't a bad thing. But to her, it was. Among some of the names she had all over school (mostly from perverted "admirers" about her body), she earned the nickname "The Icy Purist," which came from both facts about her stone-cold personality toward others and the perfectionist image she maintained.

She didn't mind the name though. It was better and more popular than the others anyway.

— Heart rate is approximately 125.2 beats per minute.

Through the monocle she wrote into the world, Juno observed the creature carefully. The monocle had the ability to magnify whatever scene the user tried to see. It wasn't her specialty, creating tools such as this, but she came to learn those simple tricks as anyone could, even if it wasn't their speciality.

As she keenly scrutinized the little creature, she used a normal pencil with her left hand (she was ambidextrous) to write down and record all information she could gather from the creature in a notebook. Call it a bestiary. Call it a book of spells. Her notebook had all her studies since the day she first became a writer. Earlier, she tried rummaging through the pages of her notebook, looking to suppress the creature without any need for hostility. But most of her spells were summoning circles, which were not too kind to their intended target. Unless she identified the creature's breathing nature, there was no current method to safely secure the creature.

— If only you weren't from Wonderland…

Neverland was essentially a bridge between the reality that existed on planet Earth and the world of Wonderland, where the age of fairy tales dwelled on its own. It was a bizarre, yet beautiful, world, packed with whatever a child's imagination could muster, and housed all the mysterious outworld creatures such as the little Dragooun.

However, that world was not made up of said imagination. It naturally existed long before the first hundred authors realized the dream of writers and brought upon Coletaria, the country of Neverland (in which Pontemus lied a capital in).

It had a government of its own, rules of its own, separate, yet similar, to reality's. And then there was the Association, from Wonderland. Together with the Committee of the One Hundred (the founding fathers of Neverland, sort to speak), they established the Laws of Bastion, intercontinental laws that held the rights of both worlds' inhabitants, especially for Wonderland's creatures, who had no words to speak their rights with.

With all that in place, the Laws of Bastion ensured that no Wonderland creature (non-humans), either friend or foe, was to cross the borders without an official license from either themselves or their caretakers. Even then, there was a limit to how long they could stay in Coletaria. So, of course, adopting such creatures was out of the question.

— Maybe in another lifetime, little guy.

Juno believed that lie.

All of a sudden, she felt a clump of feathers stroking her head, before leisurely moving on to her side. Next to her stood a gigantic creature sheltered in a brown feather. It was an owl the size of a lion. Instead of cowering away as any person would in a situation like that, Juno caressed her hand against the owl's feather, comforting it. There was no need to be afraid. That owl was her pet familiar — it wasn't a demon in a literal sense, but it was still close.

A chuckle escaped Juno's breath, "I'm sorry, Starry!"

Starry was the name that she gave it. Even if it was a familiar, it had to have a name. What it did a few moments before was a plea for attention. It must have gotten jealous of Juno watching over another creature for a while, she thought.

"But you shouldn't do that…"

It twisted its head to the side, lowering it just enough to reach Juno's hand, it was plainly asking her to pet it. For a familiar, it behaved quite like a normal pet, more so like a loyal dog. After all, it had been with Juno since it was but a mere small owl with no distinctive powers or anything.

Juno rested her hand on its head, "I'm working right now. We can go for a flight once this is all over. And just so you know…," unlike how she talked with her teammates earlier, her voice was soothing, "If I do a good enough job on this mission, we can get some coins and buy you your favorite snack, how's that?"

A merry smile, not often seen, was drawn on her face.

"Now that's something you don't see every day." A young man spoke out in a mundane tone.

Juno retracted her expression and turned to where the voice came from.

On the other side of the building stood a young man, dressed completely in the academy's basic uniform.

It was Nathan Cross, the boy with no dreams.

[STUDENT FILE #20514]

Full Name: Nathan Cross

Age: 17 years old

Birthdate: August 7

Gender: Male

Height: 178cm

Literary Element: Environmental Manipulator

Rank: 2nd Year Student (Luxsworth Academy)

Note: Potential Leadership Skills

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At second glance, Nathan appeared to have been standing on a long bent street light. With a swift motion from the pen he carried, the street light's pole extended further toward the rooftop, ultimately dropping him there, before suddenly being pulled away and shifted back to a normal object.

"You could've used the stairs?" Juno turned away and focused back on the little creature, which was still there.

"Yeah, I'd rather not take the one where our little friend's at." Nathan walked towards her, "And it's no fun."

"Since when did you know what fun is?"

He passed Starry, the owl, greeting it with a wave of a hand and stood beside Juno, "Not like you're one to talk."

"Touche."

Upon closer inspection, it was painfully obvious how normal his appearance was.

But it wasn't like Juno was any better. Her attire was almost just like his: the patterned blazer and the shirt, coupled with a skirt (instead of pants), white leg socks, and low wedge shoes.

Standing next to each other, those two were practically twins, with her long dark purple hair and his dark blue hair. Twins who, despite their mutual "quiet and calculated" personalities, rarely got along.

"Found any proper execution methods, yet?" Nathan blatantly asked.

"Huh?!" Juno quickly turned to his direction, almost dropping her monocle, "B-But you clearly said we are supposed to apprehend it, seal it— something like that. You never mentioned killing it!"

"Well, yeah," he sighed, "That's for a worst-case scenario… Remember, this isn't the Gatsdale anymore—"

She grit her teeth, "Still! I—"

"Juno! We're on a mission here. Better to remain "the Icy Purist" than the one who led to the loss of lives."

The "loss of lives" was a bit of an overstatement on Nathan's side. A process of evacuation was already in progress, and the neighborhood they were in at the time was already empty. A few other blocks and the entirety of Clockwork Town would be evacuated.

— But who was to say the chaos would remain within the town?

They were dealing with a creature of a Paragon-Grade threat — a high-level threat. Yes, it seemed harmless at that moment, but if it just felt endangered for a second, then real trouble would arise.

"No!" Juno gave her answer.

She wasn't the type to get swayed by senseless orders, nor was she the type to rebel as well. Doing what she did… was to prevent a worst-case scenario in the first place, so there was no way she was going to quietly listen to Nathan's ploy.

"Juno… Think about it… It might be rare, but it surely isn't the last of its kind."

"I said no!" she stood up and faced him with firm tenacity, "Let me say it again in a proper manner, I will not kill the Dragooun. And if I remember correctly… the Laws of Bastion state to never go for the kill "unless a Paragon-Grade threat is achieved." Your "thinking ahead" mindset might not be in favor of that."

"The academy might offer a hefty sum for—"

"Are you really playing that card now?"

"I'm trying to bring you to your senses. You might care about these creatures' lives, but I care about the people's lives," he rubbed the back of his head in frustration, "Ugh… Why won't any of you just listen?"

"Maybe open that mind of yours a little? It will do you wonders, trust me."

At that moment, it was apparent how different their views were, despite being so similar. One maintained a sense of normalcy, yet still had a free imagination to stop her from being inept; the other was just…

"Hey, you!" Nathan shouted.

Juno sighed deeply, "You're really no different Emiya, huh."

He chuckled, "And you're just casually badmouthing your best friend."

"Am I though? We all know how she is, and I don't really see it as a bad thing. In fact, I quite admire her lively and furious behavior. It just shows how good she is, even if she's a little aggressive."

Before Nathan could respond back in vexation, he came to the realization that Juno was just toying with him. She had swiftly changed the subject to something completely meaningless, just to stall him and avoid talking about his plan. And he fell right into her trap.

He sighed, "I see what you did there…"

※※※

As the two were busy in their little dispute, Starry — Juno's pet owl — was in a world of its own. With no one to watch over it, there was potential for it to wander off or cause trouble. However, Juno did not trouble herself with such things. Starry was a giant owl. If it was about to fly off, she would surely notice it in a second.

Except trouble doesn't always come from afar. Sometimes it would be right beside your leg, waiting to be ignited.

Just a few feet away from them, Starry heard the sound of a squealing rodent. To its ears, it was like hearing the bell for a lunch break. It was naturally light on its feet, as a small bird would, the only giveaway was its size, but Juno wasn't paying attention after all.

Like a predator stalking its prey, the owl carefully prowled its way to the rodent, which was nowhere to be seen. It had to rely on its ears to follow the trail.

And there it was, the squealing rat. The moment it glanced at Starry, Starry halted all its movement. If it didn't move, then it wasn't there — that was what the giant owl believed, but that was as believable as not moving to avoid a dinosaur's gaze.

Naturally, the rat fled and Starry was after it. Just as it was within its range, the rat jumped and hid in a pipe connected to the building's system.

Having a brain the size of a pea, Starry didn't know when to stop. It thrust its giant head into the pipe, but there was no way it was going to break through. Nevertheless, it tried once again, like a dog that was oblivious to a glass door, and with each jolt, the pipe was slowly breaking apart. Even with the noise of Starry's rock-solid head reverberating against the pipe, it still wasn't enough to alert the two cretins busy with who knows what.

Like a butterfly flapping its wings to a hurricane, Starry stuck the pipe one final time and finally, it managed to fit its head inside. However, a new problem arose. The rat was nowhere to be seen, it was long gone, and all of Starry's work was for naught. Now it was stuck with no one to notice it for the time being.

Attempting to escape the pipe's captivity shook it more, the fasteners were starting to come off. Starry had no hands to support itself, it only relied on the strength of its legs.

Despite all efforts, it was still stuck.

※※※

— This pretentious prick…

Juno was tired of Nathan's nitpicking. As much as she was one to follow the rules, she could never bring herself to follow Nathan.

— I'd rather much follow Lloyd's antics than yours.

"For the love of God, Juno, please just follow along this one time," Nathan pleaded, "Believe me, I would love to do this solo as you would probably too, but we're stuck with each other for this year, so we're just gonna have to manage."

"You make it sound like we're always at each other's throats," Juno looked at him with a blank expression.

It was true that the "team" did not exactly see eye to eye with each other, but they were friends… to an extent. They have known each other since middle school, with exception of one or two among them. But it was their first year together as a team.

"I mean, I tolerate you guys—"

"Yeah, that might just be you."

At that point, Nathan had already lost focus on the conversation. For what felt like an entirety, he finally noticed Juno's owl, Starry, stuck in the pipe, still trying to escape. He could not believe his eyes for a second. Naturally, he should quickly run to her rescue before a catastrophe might happen, but, for some reason, he fell numb.

The worst-case scenario was flashing before his eyes.

Not being a talkative halfwit, Juno noticed Nathan's strange shift in expression but didn't make much of it other than he just quit. She went back and held her monocle to check on the little creature. It was still there. She looked back at Nathan, out of concern, and he was still in his petrified state. Then, she noticed his eyes were looking elsewhere.

"What are you looking at—"

She stood back up again and turned around.

"Oh no!!"

Much to her shock at seeing her pet owl's head shoved into something as small as a pipe, she immediately ran to its rescue.

"Why didn't you say anything sooner?" She looked at Nathan.

No response.

The fear that this situation might become bigger began to swell up. If the pipe was to break, it would surely fall, probably alerting the Dragooun. Alerting it wouldn't be much of a problem, but if it were to scare it…

Juno couldn't imagine what would happen.

"Nate!" She called out to him, "Can you hurry up and give me a hand here? Use your ability or something."

Environmental Manipulation, the ability to manipulate or shift pre-existing objects to whatever the user wanted, granted their imagination doesn't stray far. That was Nathan's power. It was nothing special, but it was quite handy in various things. And now, it was needed more than ever.

He swallowed his tongue and quickly reached for his pen in the blazer's pocket.

But it was already too late.

All it took was Starry giving itself a final pull and all hell broke loose. The giant mess of an owl was finally free, but so was the pipe attached to the building. And so, like pieces of domino, the nails started to come off, and one wreck led to another.

Nathan hurried over to the edge of the building to eye the falling pipe. If he played his cards right, the worst-case scenario might be prevented. He waved his pen, a platinum fountain, in the air and started writing.

Words took form right in front of him but they weren't going to take effect until the sentence was over — granted it was a detailed one.

He tried bending the pipe backward, to do anything to prevent it from hitting the ground. The noise from the nails coming off was already too much, but that didn't necessarily mean the dragooun was long gone. It was still just a sound to it.

Using his special techniques, Nathan felt immense fatigue. Writing required exerting a lot of energy, especially mental energy. Nevertheless, he held onto the bent pipe like a man literally holding onto it with a rope. Even the pen had its own energy as well, it was starting to feel heavy in his hand.

It wasn't always this exhausting. Earlier, he bent the street light to his will with little effort. The difference this time was that he panicked, causing his thoughts to be distorted.

"Watch out!" Juno called out to him.

Before he could heed her warning, he was already in danger. His strength wasn't enough. Instead of pulling the pipe to his side, he was the one being pulled. A slight slip up from the edge and he immediately lost his balance.

He was done for.

However, unlike Nathan, Juno wasn't one to lose her thoughts in tough situations. She unbuttoned her blazer, grabbing her special pen from the inside pocket, and then set up her book on the ground. Quickly flipping through the pages, she got back to the page about summoning circles. Even though she had most of the spells used in her writing memorized, nothing was as efficient as transcribing the chants straight from the book — that was why she kept it with her at all times.

— Yes, that's it.

Relief seemed all over her as she finally found the right spell.

[Moonlight Shade Seal]

"I am the envoy of Vishnu," she began writing the words she chanted, "Defying all there is that is sacrilegious, I call upon thee. By the tool of creation, thy power shall turn to my mind of rest and soul of purity. Henceforth this chant brings, Moonlight Shade Seal."

For what felt like an eternity, Nathan found himself almost facing the ground floor. He had already accepted his failure. If he didn't die, he'd be stuck in the hospital for weeks, or even months.

But that wasn't going to happen, for Juno's spell finally worked.

Instead of slamming into the ground, Nathan's fall was halted by an invisible force. Opening his eyes, he found himself standing atop a faint round surface, it mimicked a summoning circle (but it wasn't quite one as it summoned no one). As he restored his balance, the circle floated upwards, back to the roof of the building.

Back on the surface, Juno was resting on her knees, facing the chant she wrote, and holding her pen forward. The moment Nathan made it back safely, she dropped her arms to the ground, resting on all fours.

Just like Nathan's technique earlier, this chant had exhausted almost all of her powers. She breathed in and out as if she was just freed from a chokehold. Her sweat was dripping onto her book.

"T-Thanks…," Nathan was ashamed; ashamed that he couldn't do anything, ashamed that he made the situation worse, ashamed that he had, possibly, the best writer on the team exert all her energy to save him from his mistake.

"...yeah…," she was still exhausted.

It was then, after the dust was cleared, that they heard the sound of more nails coming off. The butterfly was still flapping its wings.

Juno had lost power over her legs, so she couldn't move. Nathan, on the other hand, rushed to the other side where the dragooun lied beneath. Failing to do anything, he watched as each pipe broke apart from the rest until all of them were down on the ground.

The impact the fall made certainly shocked the dragooun. And just like a scaredy-cat, it jumped out of the dumpster and ran away in fear.

If only it stopped at that…

The little purple creature screeched in fear, before starting to grow in size.

— Dammit!

Soon, the "little" creature became too big for the small alleyway. The adjacent building's walls began to crumble, and so did the building Juno and Nathan stood on top of. It began to sink into the ground as if it was being absorbed by quicksand.

There was no time to focus on the dragooun anymore. They needed to flee and save their lives.

"Quick," Juno, with great effort, stood up and reached to her owl, "Hop on!"

Starry was big enough to fit three people on top of it, so escaping with it was the only plausible solution. It rested on the ground to help its jaded owner get on top of it. Despite that, it still waited for Nathan, it was aware that there was someone else supposed to join them. But the ground was collapsing faster than Nathan was on his feet. Fearing for its owner's safety, Starry swung her wings open and began ascending upwards.

Just at the last second, Nathan managed to jump and grab hold of the owl's feet.

As it started flying away, the owl felt its speed deteriorating, that was when Juno realized that Nathan was barely hanging on the owl's feet. With each passing second, his hands were slipping away.

"Let go!" Juno yelled.

"What? Are you out of your mind? There's no way—"

Seeing as Nathan wasn't going to listen to her, Juno quietly whispered an order to Starry, who understood everything she said. The owl immediately obeyed her owner's command, and then yanked Nathan away from its feet, before flying down to catch him.

Instead of dropping on the ground as he feared, he landed on the owl's back, beside Juno.

He let out a huge sigh of relief, "I think I'll need some new pants after this."

"What? Whatever… you're welcome." Juno said, "And you could have used your ability. You didn't need my help."

"Yeah…"

Anxiety still consumed Nathan. It was a troublesome matter to him. Sometimes he would panic and forget all he was taught, and sometimes he would achieve his plans with flying colors — this was one of the former times. He had always believed it relied on what kind of target he was facing, if it was a fully sentient being with patterns, then he would have no problems, but if it was a creature with unspeakable capabilities, then who knows? Perhaps that was why he determined it was better to eliminate the dragooun while it was still weak.

— No, that's enough!

He lightly slapped his cheeks to wake himself from this trance.

Simultaneously, the, now giant, dragooun was rampaging through the streets behind them. It was slowly approaching them, even though its target wasn't them. That was when Nathan thought of something, something to finally put himself to use. Given that the situation now required them to stop the creature at all costs, Nathan thought of using the environment to his advantage.

The street before him was almost perfect for his plan. There were three street lights on each side. To Nathan, however, he saw those lights as good substitutes for ropes; ropes hopefully strong enough to hold back the dragooun. It was a relief that he still maintained an ounce of imagination, even if it was repetitive.

"Can you keep a steady speed?" He asked Juno. If he were to stand and use his ability, he needed to maintain balance and not fall off the, already flying, owl.

Juno eyed him for a second, she figured he had a plan and refrained from arguing. "All right!"

The owl's speed waned. Nathan rose to his feet, with a pen in hand, and set himself in position.

"Are you sure you know what you're doing?"

— Yes!

Without answering her directly, Nathan went ahead with his plan. He naturally drew the words he needed within the air, with his focus lying solely onto the six street lights. His ability, limited as it may be, still required effort as any writing ability. Not only did he need to write about turning something ordinary into something completely nonsensical, but he also needed to be detailed about it, to make it believable, both in his eyes and others. At its core, it was a matter of bending a mirage from one's mind to others' to reality.

As the dragooun closed in on to the location, the poles stuck to the ground began expanding upwards. The, once rigid and metallic, street lights became completely flaccid and almost elastic. Despite that, it still maintained the metallic strength from within. If it was as loose as it appeared to be, there was no way it was going to hold the giant creature back. That was the merit of abilities such as Nathan's.

Passing the altercation phase, the limp poles immediately circled around the dragooun's legs, halting it in its tracks. Still, it wasn't enough to bring it down to its knees, but Nathan knew that very well.

"That's not going to hold!" Juno cried out, she occasionally glanced over to check on Nathan.

"I know."

His intention wasn't to bring down the creature, but rather to slow it. He knew the limits of his strength, and it wasn't going to stop that dragooun. But if it were to minimize the rampage, by just a little bit, then he had to do something.

Another factor in the loss of strength was the fact that he wasn't in a fixed position, they were constantly on the move with the owl flying away, so the range of his ability was deteriorating. Keeping the owl in place was out of the question.

The dragooun, unable to rid itself from the trap Nathan had laid, shrieked in anger. Instead of turning on to the offensive and blasting fire at Nathan and Juno, the dragooun did nothing. It sat down, appearing to have admitted its defeat.

That was what Nathan hoped for.

But reality always had tricks up its sleeves.

A normal dragon would only be limited to their fire, but this wasn't a normal dragon. It had another element within it. Suddenly, the dragooun's skin illuminated with a shade of blue, as if it was forming a magical aura. That illumination was soon followed by the sudden crystallization of its skin, freezing its entire body. It created a cocoon in which it can shield itself.

However, that was far from the truth. It wasn't trying to protect itself. The crystallization managed to cover the poles that held its legs as well. With that, the poles weakened and became entirely out of Nathan's reach.

— This damn thing is way smarter than I thought.

And just like that, the dragooun broke free. Having restored its freedom, it continued on with its rampage more than ever. For now, it was alert of the hostility coming from Nathan and Juno.

"Great! You made it angrier," Juno rubbed her hand against her forehead.

"Blame your stupid owl for blowing our cover!" Nathan expressed his anger.

"This "stupid" owl just saved you a few moments ago!"

Starry let out a cry of disappointment when it heard its owner making fun of it.

"Oh no," she was talking to it like it was a toddler, "I'm just making fun of him, Starry. I'd never call you stupid, not ever at all!" She rested her torso on its back, almost hugging it.

"Look out!"

The raging dragooun almost struck them down, if it weren't for Juno's quick thinking to fly upwards. It went full berserk, going as far as to destroy the buildings within its reach. All those buildings that were homes to citizens were absolutely gone.

Juno and Nathan both stared at each other with troubled looks.

This destruction of property was most definitely going to cost them their score — at least, they could rest easy knowing they won't have to pay back actual money for collateral damage.

"Well, I guess you're no longer the "Icy Purist" now, huh," Nathan tried to lighten the mood, although it was in a cold manner with his usual mundane tone.

Her eyes were full of shock, yet there was a faint smile drawn on her face. Nathan had to double-check on her from how strange it was. She finally ticked, the glass was down, that was what Nathan thought.

"About the scor—"

"It's heading towards the barrier!"

After the evacuation was done, the authorities — specialized writers with their own class — set up a spectral barrier to contain the threat inside, that threat being the dragooun. Spectral barriers were common among writers, they were specifically made to contain any being with a high amount of spectral energy. Writers were naturally born with spectral energy, but it was always kept at a minimum. There was no human writer or author able to imitate the high amount of aura a non-human or a Wonderland creature produced. A Paragon-Grade creature like that dragooun had quite a high amount of energy that even the barrier might not hold for too long — its spectral energy was higher than average, even for a Wonderland creature.

"Not if we stop it…"

Nathan jumped off the owl, he wasn't going to wait around until the entire district was in ashes. This time he regained his confidence.

With a swift motion from his pen, he easily reconstructed the bricks and stones from the damaged buildings before him and used them as points for traversal across the ruined street. Even though using the owl was going to be faster, Juno seemed to be in a world of her own, so it was very unlikely.

Just then, as he turned to the next street, Nathan noticed someone walking through the crosswalk at the end. It was surprising that there was still a citizen within the evacuation area.

— Oh no!

What was troublesome, however, was the fact that the dragooun was headed straight towards that person. Yet, they remained completely oblivious to their surroundings.

It was up to Nathan to do something, he traversed from building to building as fast as he could, while still keeping an eye out from the rampaging dragooun.

"Watch out!"