CHAPTER 6
Maiden of Dawn Ablaze
1
Snow and Sun. Uppermost floor.
Something felt weird.
Thinking back on it, Iska had this strange feeling festering in his chest since they had this chance meeting.
…This princess.
…She’s full of openings. She’s just standing there.
Mizerhyby. The purebred.
With the giant window behind her, she spread her arms as astral energy released from her body, bright like daybreak.
But that was it. He couldn’t detect any sign of that energy turning into an astral attack.
“Now I will show you the most glorious power in the world.” Her lapis lazuli hair seemed to catch wind.
It was coming. What Iska saw as he prepared himself wasn’t an astral attack.
A soldier had dropped down. A soldier wearing a mask like a royal guard had leaped down from the ceiling of the fifteenth story.
…From above?
…No way. I thought this was the top floor!
There had been a hidden level. He had really believed this was the topmost floor. Even Sistia had been convinced of that; she had failed to notice the additional person despite Echo.
“I will make you part of a glorious legion.” Mizerhyby touched the armed soldier’s back.
Iska heard something set ablaze. A mark like the one on Mizerhyby’s forehead lit up the soldier like a halo.
“Let there be light—Glory.”
His vision went red.
The astral power of fire lit in the royal guard’s hand and flared, aiming for Iska and the books indiscriminately.
Bookshelves turned right to ash. The windowpanes broke from the blast, shattering into pieces and falling far below to the ground.
“Hmm. Seems like you’re kinda powerful. I powered you up by about three levels.” Princess Mizerhyby smirked.
She slowly looked over the dividers that separated parts of the room. Those had been blasted to pieces, the floor and ceiling of the fifteenth floor charred.
“But you have no control. And without that, it’s a double-edged sword, now that I’ve strengthened your astral power.”
“I apologize, Your Highness,” said the masked soldier in a voice that was surprisingly young, delicate, and feminine. She was staring at her own palm. “…Is this really my astral power?”
“It’s pleasant, isn’t it? Yes. Your astral power has been blessed to be a level close to that of the Founder’s descendants.” Mizerhyby pushed away the bangs covering her forehead, revealing the astral crest like she were showing it off.
“Now, rise, former Saint Disciple. How long will you pretend to be fallen?” The witch had a luminescence as brilliant as dawn, and her lips formed a smile exuding joy and dripping with contempt. She pointed at the piled rubble. “Vichyssoise told me that if I face you, I mustn’t assume I have won. She said I must treat you like you’re alive even if you’ve fallen, even if you’ve stopped breathing, even if I tear you up into five or six pieces.”
“…Now that’s mortifying.”
The pile collapsed audibly. Iska pushed away the rubble pressing on his shoulders and stood from the charred floor.
“What?! But there were so many flames—”
“Shush,” the princess scolded her subordinate. “Huh. You really are alive. I asked just to see if I could trick you. It was worth asking, it seems. I’m pleased. Could you possibly be immortal?”
“Of course not. And I didn’t pretend to just fall down, either.”
He almost started coughing, but he stopped himself by force. He’d inhaled soot and smoke, which made his throat smart violently. His hair was plastered to his forehead, probably glued down by the blood oozing from there.
…Did Mizerhyby’s power create that explosion?
…Oh, wait. The flames came from the soldier next to Mizerhyby.
Iska hadn’t been prepared. Though Rin had told him about Glory, Iska was drawing a blank. The information had been zapped from his brain from this short interaction, and he needed to start defining this power from scratch.
There was a possibility that the purebred’s power was far more dangerous than anything in Rin’s explanations.
…She strengthens the powers of her followers?
…Oh, please! It isn’t something so weak.
He had never seen flames of that magnitude.
Even the mages from the astral corps could barely manage to light an Imperial military vehicle ablaze. They didn’t have the power to level an entire floor easily several hundred square yards in size.
“Are you trying to investigate my power? It seems you have enough knowledge of astral power, former Saint Disciple. But the more knowledge you have, the more your speculation grows and the further off course you go.”
The astral crest on Mizerhyby’s forehead was a deep purple. Its shape was warped, radiating out from a single point. Nowhere in Imperial datastores had anything similar been listed.
“How about you disappear while you think it over?” This was Mizerhyby’s decree.
Another person arrived from the hole in the ceiling. Another royal guard covered in flameproof clothing. The astral crest of Glory burned bright on their back.
“…There were others?!”
And she had already powered up this person. The two royal guards spread out their arms, and a loud noise rang out in Iska’s ears as dozens of lights appeared on the floor.
“Are these mines?!”
They were directed ballistics.
Flames scattered in all directions except directly behind him. The power was designed to annihilate everything other than the mage controlling the fire.
Another explosion.
The blast peeled back the floor, flipping it over right from under Iska’s feet. The ceiling was ravaged by the flames, melting before his eyes. He could barely breathe through the heat wave and the dense cloud of soot and smoke.
“Hmm. Maybe that was overdoing it. Preparing a legion of two to receive one mercenary might have been a bit much,” Mizerhyby said.
Though the royal guards flanking her sides were average fire astral mages, their skills had been boosted to the highest levels when they were showered in Glory. This was why Mizerhyby was called the walking vortex. Those loved by Princess Mizerhyby could be given power that set them on the level of the Founder’s descendants and become part of her Legion of Dawn.
“The two of you can go down. If the Lou’s attendant is taken, then our victor—”
“You really think that?”
A white blade cut through the smoke.
Iska leaped, holding his breath. The fiery winds would have scorched his lungs had he inhaled. In one bound, he slipped past the two guards and headed right up to Mizerhyby.
“…You survived that?!”
He had needed five minutes.
Just like he didn’t know much about Mizerhyby’s power, Mizerhyby didn’t know about the white astral sword. It invoked the hellfire that Iska had sliced through, creating a wall from the resulting air current. He had intercepted the blast from the mines.
“You think you stopped me?”
“…Both of you!”
Before Iska could close the distance between them, Princess Mizerhyby launched herself off the ground in a hurry.
That single step had made the difference.
Iska’s sword, impeded by her subordinates, just barely cut through the empty air.
“Aw, so close,” she taunted.
“This is what I wanted.”
“Huh?” Mizerhyby’s mocking smile disappeared.
The sword had caught on something, even though she had thought she had made it out safe. Something yellow and cut in the shape of the sun…
“My earring?!”
“You called this the Gregorian Descant, right?”
He had no idea what that meant, but he knew the earring held an important secret.
Iska’s hunch turned into belief when he saw Mizerhyby’s indignation.
…I was right.
…There’s something going on with this earring!
That was why the princess had kept it on her person at all times. This was how she had prepared for Salinger’s raid.
“Curse you!”
“Let’s strike a deal,” Iska suggested.
Before the royal guards could lift their hands, he threw himself into the black smoke and disappeared.
“The Hydra should know exactly what we’re after. Don’t forget that.”
Iska ran like he never had before.
His destination? The first floor. All to escape the building.
No Comments Yet
Post a new comment
Register or Login