Chapter 359

"There's a lot of them here, evil mountain." Tia whispered to Gagaran.

"And no sign of evil guards." Tina added.

"They're not that stupid." Gagaran replied, "How many places have we hit… how many priests, how many monasteries…?"

"They can't guard everywhere, evil mountain." Tia answered, but Gagaran shook her head. "I don't like this. I don't like this at all."

Ahead of them stood the long house which housed the acolytes and novices. On the grounds around it stood a great field of flowers, so many types that Gagaran could not name even one in ten of them. 'I doubt even Lakyus would have recognized them all.' Anguish ripped through her heart, 'Why hasn't she… where is she…?' Gagaran bemoaned, in spite of her anger, her face twisted and lip quivered, her body shivered as she tried to think, remember, and forget, all at the same moment. 'How could you?!' She asked for the thousandth time as she recalled the blood red eyes of their Shorty, still and tranquil in death.

That such a cruel end could come to her little sister sparked the hatred for the faith that killed her, all over again.

The vibrant field of flowers of every shade swayed back and forth in the steady billowing breeze, but the trees which surrounded it stood strong and steady, offering excellent concealment from any danger.

But Gagaran still didn't like it. Her twisted face became a tight set jawline, and her large meaty hand clasped the branch of the tree behind which she hid.

"We wait." She said at last, "We can beat any common guards coming our way, but after the swath we've cut, they'll be sending stronger ones. They may already have, and this… this is far, far too quiet."

"Will you just attack, already, I'm getting bored." A voice came out of the darkness.

"The fuck?!" Gagaran jumped backward twenty yards, trees shattered in her wake until she slid to a stop just before the crashing noise ended.

Tia and Tina jumped into the shadows and vanished without touching so much as a green leaf.

A long, low whistle which had an upward change to the pitch, replaced the crashing noise. "Hmpf, was that really necessary?" The hidden speaker asked, "I'll have you know I like trees, and I'm not at all fond of seeing them destroyed by big oafs."

"Come out here where I can see you, and call me an oaf." Gagaran snapped and brought her hammer from her back to a guard position in both her hands.

"Fine." The voice said and a spark caught an unlit torch, bringing it to life, and from out of seemingly nothing a young man with ink dark hair appeared, his face wreathed in shadows and flames, he was a good looking figure, younger than Gagaran by a few years at a glance and clad in black and silver plate armor.

"Who're you?" Gagaran asked, her instincts screaming at her to get away. 'Nobody should be able to avoid Tia or Tina's senses… nobody…"

"I'm the man whose vacation you have interrupted." The young man said as he approached with steady, fearless steps.

A pair of Kunai came out of the darkness, he batted them both away with one swipe of his spear, the metal objects pierced the ground to stand upright. "Do you have any idea how hard it is for me to get time off? The sweetbark trees will be at their peak of perfection soon, and instead of being over in Demalbion, I have to come all the way out here and hunt you three down. That's a massive inconvenience and I'm very cross with all of you."

"That's a long name." Gagaran said, and repeated his entire statement to him.

He stopped, cocked his head, and then broke into a boyish grin as he realized it was a joke.

'I've got to buy time.' She said and began uttering the various martial arts she knew by speaking with her jaw clamped shut.

"Very funny, almost funny enough, but… not quite. No, not quite enough… I guess I should give you my name though. If I'm going to kill someone anyway, it costs me nothing to be polite. Or that's what Raymond has always said." He shrugged and leveled his spear, "I am Cenna Tachoni, Captain of the Black Scripture, and the strongest of the Godkin… well, except for one, and she might not count. It depends on how you think of it really…" He paused and scratched his head, "Do you think awakened children of the Elf King count?"

"I-I'm sure I don't know." Gagaran's heart pounded like a horse's hooves, she activated every martial art she knew, and when four kunai came out of the darkness and they too were batted away like buzzing mosquitoes, she could still feel sweat beginning to form on her skin beneath her armor.

"Oh… well it doesn't matter anyway. You've already delayed my vacation, all that really matters is that you haven't got a chance, so the question is, do you want to die quick and clean, or quick and dirty?" Cenna asked, and the weight of his strength crashed down on her, like eyes looming over her and promising death, like a baby bird caught in the eyes of a hungry serpent, for that instant, Gagaran could not move.

When it cut off, Gagaran whispered, "Run."

"Evil mountain?" Tia and Tina spoke both at once.

"You heard me. Run! I'll hold him back for as long as I can!" Gagaran shouted.

"Nope." Cenna said and put his spear on his shoulder, he tapped it there and shook his head.

"What do you mean, 'Nope' ahh… Cenna?" Gagaran asked, eyes darting around in the dark for a solution.

"I mean I can't have that. I really can't. I don't really like the priests much, and I mean I really don't like them. But I'm afraid I can't have you killing them just willy nilly. So you have to die here." He said and when two dark bullets emerged out of the shadows, he simply ducked and avoided them both.

"What if… what if we ran in the direction you're going on your vacation…" Gagaran grasped at straws, but it seemed to strike a nerve.

"Go on…" Cenna said with a polite and deferential wave of his hand toward the mountain of a woman.

"We'll 'run' in the direction you want to go on your vacation in… and you 'chase us' that way. Then… you have good reason to just 'leave' when you're… finished." Gagaran licked her lips, she could feel it, almost see it, the casual way that power seemed to crackle invisibly around the human in front of her.

He rubbed his chin and gave it some thought. "I suppose there's no downside to it… plus I'll be far enough away that they won't want to wait for me to come back and explain it…" Finally, Cenna nodded and snapped his fingers. "Deal. I'll even let you put up a good fight, your friends can run west, toward Demalbion, if I feel them veering off to go elsewhere, I'll tell them to raise you from the dead just to punish you for their deception."

His spear snapped down in front of himself into the ready position.

"You heard him! Go!" Gagaran shouted into the dark.

"Evil mountain!" The twins shouted.

"I said, go! We knew this was going to happen sooner or later! Just go! Let me deal with this one and I'll rejoin you when it's all over." Gagaran slid one foot back into the battle position, ready to charge.

"A woman after my own heart, it's a shame, I might have liked you if things had gone differently." He shrugged, and felt the two in the shadows retreat.

Gagaran launched herself forward, she gave her hammer a swing downward, and the spear bearer put himself beneath it, his black spear overhead, the ground shook beneath them both as she put all her weight down on him, her teeth clenched.

"I. Won't. Let. You. Hurt. Them…" Gagaran gritted the words out, the torch the spear wielder once held still glowed from its place on the ground where it dropped, the fire began to spread out, catching on the grass and clawing its way toward the trees, climbing them like a winding snake before lighting them like giant torches being carried by the world itself.

The flames became an inferno and the heat promised to punish their bodies if the pair lingered on.

"I know." Cenna said just loud enough for him to be heard over the ever rising cacophony of the crackling, raging fires.

He then dropped one hand away from his spear and it came out, striking Gagaran in the guts and sending her flat on her back. The fire kissed the fragments of exposed flesh, but before she could scream, Cenna grabbed her ankle, spun, and flung her away, she bounced end over end, arm over arm, scattering sparks out of the woods and into the field of bouncing flowers maintained so lovingly by acolytes over centuries.

Cenna charged after her, but 'slow' allowing her time to rise up, he noticed that her hammer remained locked in her hand, and a fragment of admiration for her warrior spirit. She spun on her heel and swung the hammer wide, he ducked and slid, grinding flowers into the ground beneath his knees while the sparks started fresh fires in a dozen places that spread out to join together in a conflagration.

Smoke spired up into the dark sky and the orange glow lit up the area for miles around, he avoided her, ducking, weaving, flipping over her, again and again, she failed to land a blow while he struck her body with quick, rapid strikes that pierced her armor as if it weren't even there.

Blood replaced creamy flesh at her shoulders, thighs, calves, and finally her face. "I won't let you!" She shouted at him again and redoubled her efforts, "Gaaaaaaahhhh!" She bellowed and her hammer rose and fell, rose and fell, rose and fell again and again as she came at him from angle after angle, his spear blocking a blow only to have to block the opposite end a moment later.

"I won't die so easily! You won't take my sisters! I won't let you! Not another one! Not another! Not another!" She wept bitter tears and pounded away against her foe.

"I know." He said, and when she slowed down only by the slightest hair…

His spear thrust into her throat.

The taste of blood shot up over her tongue and ran down past her lips. The blurring tears in her eyes ran down into the red, dripping and commingling on the ground.

The conflagration's spread and reached them at last. Fire hissed on the ground when her bloody tears touched and extinguished the tiniest dot of burning flowers.

Gagaran's hammer slipped from her grasp and fell into the fires.

The heat that began to hurt… stopped hurting, her body… 'I feel so heavy…' She thought, her eyes looked down the length of the spear to the black haired warrior's face. He had one foot back and one bent at the knee, his left arm back and his other still held fast, one handed and at the end of the spear, her body still held upright.

'I never had a chance…' Gagaran acknowledged, 'But I can buy them a few more seconds…' She told herself, and rather than fall, her now free hands, with agonizing slowness, grabbed the spear, and she yanked herself forward.

Cenna's eyes widened with brief surprise, the lumbering mountain of a woman lunged along the length of his weapon, her neck passing through and through as her arms came out again to wrap around his body.

"Not… so… easy…" She gurgled her words out, spurting her blood all over the face and front of her killer as she used the last of her strength and began to squeeze. "Crush… crush…" She tried to say, but it came out as only a gurgling moan.

Cenna released the spear and allowed her the final effort, he waited until the last strength fled her dying corpse, and then with great gentleness he put her down into the bed of burning flowers. "You were one hell of a fighter. If they'd sent less than me, you might have had a chance." He said, and drew out his spear from the hole it made in her throat. He swept it out in front of him, scattering her blood away to hiss into the fire that turned night into day.

"I suppose I can go just a little bit slower… one more parting gift." He said as her hair caught and began to scorch her flesh.

He then turned, hopped to the top of the building, and leapt well beyond the reach of flames to begin a light jog after the two remaining murderers.

The body was charred black by the flames when the pair of hanzos grabbed it and dragged it through the gate. They emerged in the lab of Demiurge, and when he pointed to a metal slab, the invisible hanzo swung the body back and forth between them.

"Heave… Ho!" They shouted, and the thunderous clang of heavy flesh and metal upon metal rang out through the room.

"That's another one. And I'm making such marvelous progress with these…" Demiurge said and pressed his glasses against his crystalline eyes. A tiny, cruel smile spread over his face, "Keep an eye on the others, let them wreak havoc for a little longer, even if it means you have to distract the hunter, the fewer priests the Slane Theocracy has, the easier the Allfather's plans can be brought to fruition."

The hanzo's made a pointless show of bowing, and made their retreat back the way they'd come.

"Now," Demiurge clapped his hands together and rubbed them with a dragon's greed while he approached the charred corpse, "let's see what we can make out of you."