I wanted to say something somewhat spoilerish, but I’ll leave you to think about it yourself. Anyway, I’ll leave you to enjoy this long chapter now. This already long chapter actually gained ~200 words after editing!
Episode 86 Breakthrough
The faceless Fatalist with her black hair in a bun approaches Kunai and Fayvard stoically, undeterred by their raised weapons. Her slender figure casts a long black shadow as the sky progressively grows a brighter shade of orange, the sun beginning to set after a long day. “O Heavens, bless me for the magic I cast now,” she mutters in a low, hoarse voice.
She walks straight up to Midori and pulls Fayvard’s sword out of her back, tossing it onto the ground at Fayvard’s feet with a clang. Then, she casts a spell with such rapidity that Kunai and Fayvard can do nothing but watch. Silently, she heads straight for Recelo now, striding past Kunai and Fayvard without glancing at either of them as she prepares to cast the same spell again.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Kunai growls warningly, brandishing Myou threateningly.
The woman ignores him. She casts the spell on Recelo, as a faint white light envelops his body momentarily before evaporating altogether. Miraculously, his severed arm reattaches itself completely to his shoulder, as if it has never been cut at all.
Fayvard narrows his eyes and bares his teeth. “What are you casting on them? Healing spells?”
“Exactly,” the Fatalist replies in her womanly voice. “I am Seraphe, the Fatalists’ only true medic. My abilities as a healer far surpass those of any mere human.”
“Damn it!” Kunai curses, leaning forward angrily. “We can’t have you healing them right after we beat them fair and square!”
“And why not?” Seraphe asks pointedly, taking notice of Kunai at last. “They are my—” Her voice trails away as she sees Kunai’s face. A glimmer of something akin to recognition shines from her eyes even behind her mask.
Kunai stares back with a puzzled look on his face. He turns uncertainly to Fayvard, but the latter does not seem to have noticed anything.
“You damn woman!” Fayvard howls, grabbing his sword and sprinting forward with the intention to strike Seraphe with it. Seraphe quickly gathers herself again and teleports out of the way, reappearing swiftly behind Kunai and Fayvard without a noise.
Fayvard spins, doggedly chasing after her. With amazing rapidity, Seraphe responds by firing a bullet of white light from an unseen weapon. Skidding, Fayvard dodges out of the way just in time. Instead, the light strikes Kunai near the ribs. He doubles over, grabbing his side painfully.
“Crap! Kunai, you all right?” Fayvard asks, turning hurriedly next to Kunai.
“Y-Yeah…” Kunai mutters, wincing nonetheless. “I wasn’t hit that badly. It was only a scrape…”
“You will not die from that attack,” Seraphe announces from behind her mask. “I am only a healer. However, I have completed what I have come here to do.” Seraphe gestures towards Recelo and Midori, before continuing, “My technique may not have restored them to full health, but I have done my job. My master now awaits. Well then.” Without another word, the Fatalist vanishes into thin air.
“Damn it…” Fayvard hisses under his breath. “How convenient that the Fatalist would have a healer that could just come and go whenever she pleases, healing the enemies we worked so hard to defeat!”
Next to Fayvard, Kunai continues to stare silently at the space Seraphe had stood. He stands with his mouth slightly open, and his eyes widened ever so slightly with awe and confusion. “Who was that woman…?”
Meanwhile, on the ground, Recelo suddenly awakens with a groan. His eyes jerk open with surprise, before he slowly pushes himself back into a sitting position. He inspects his reattached arm, flexing it experimentally. “Tch…I hate owing favors, but it looks like I owe that Seraphe big time now.”
With a grunt, Recelo picks up his Doombringer, heaving it so that it rests across his shoulders. He stares down at Fayvard and Kunai. “Well, shall we continue this battle then?”
Zack and Mira scuttle breathlessly down an empty hallway in the Fatalists’ castle, coming to a halt at yet another corner. His breathing still ragged, Zack peers over beyond the corner, checking for any signs of enemies.
“Say, Zack,” pants Mira, her long purple hair frazzled with sweat due to the heavy sprinting.
“Hmm?” Zack murmurs absently, his concentration focused on clearing the path now before the two of them. He gestures with his hand for them to make another wild dash forward, but pauses when he sees Mira’s face contorted with thought. “Somethin’ wrong, Mira?”
“Since I’ve gotten here, there’s been a lot of confusion so I haven’t had a chance to ask, but…where’s Headmaster Ryuu?”
Almost immediately, Zack’s face begins to pale. The usual smile hovering about his lips disappears, replaced by a tiny frown. “Let’s go, Mira,” he mutters in a low and uncharacteristically brisk voice.
“Wait!” Mira interrupts shakily, holding Zack back with a hand on his shoulder. “Please, Zack. No one’s said anything and it’s obvious judging by your face that something happened. I need to know what happened to Headmaster Ryuu!”
Very little light can be reflected in Zack’s eyes. At last, he sighs. “He’s dead.”
As the news painfully sinks in at a snail’s pace, Mira finally widens her eyes. Her jaw quivers slightly. “No…no way… You’re kidding, right, Zack? There’s no way Headmaster Ryuu’s—!”
Grimly, Zack shakes his head. “I didn’t wanna be the one t’tell you about it, but I guess there’s no point lyin’ about it. He was killed…by Arai.”
‘That’s right, he was killed by Arai.’
With a thud, Mira sinks to her knees, unable to bear her grief any longer. Her hand, still wrapped around Zack’s shoulder, now tightens, as she fights back the tears already streaming down her face.
“Let’s go, Mira,” Zack says again, patting her gently on the same hand she holds onto him with. He rises to his feet, peering once again around the corner. However, this time, as he stares out one of the windows lining the hall, his eyes widen with recognition. “The Rift Army…what’re they doin’ here?”
The empty, white walls drag endlessly on as Cynthia navigates her way through the maze that is the Fatalists’ castle. Each intersection and fork in the road appears the same as the last. Stopping at another intersection, Cynthia peers down the passageway running directly perpendicular to her.
“Everything in here looks the same…” she mutters softly, narrowing her eyes. At her side, she clutches her Kandine tightly near her. “I have to find the others soon…!”
Cynthia gulps. She charges forward, continuing down her current pathway silently at a sprint.
Howling madly, Recelo charges straight at Kunai and Fayvard, swinging his Doombringer wildly as it crashes towards the ground. At the last second, Fayvard steps in front of Recelo, blocking Recelo’s attack with his sword.
Glancing over his shoulder at Kunai, Fayvard shouts, “Kunai! You go on ahead and get to Arai! There’s no point in wasting any more time out here. I’ll take care of this guy!”
Kunai can only look on with incredulity, his sword drooping by his side. “You gotta be kidding me! I’m not gonna leave behind yet another comrade! I’m not gonna let them kill you too, Fayvard!”
“I’m happy you think about me that way, Kunai,” roars Fayvard, his back facing Kunai, “but go! You have to—”
Just as Kunai turns, a glimpse of golden light flashes by his side. He pivots back to face Fayvard, as an arrow of gold has now pierced Fayvard directly between the shoulder blades. Fayvard freezes, the blade of light clearly driven deep into his back. Blood leaks out of the growing wound.
Midori stalks past Kunai, fully healed, her light bow still glowing warmly in her hands. She frowns as she passes Kunai, not even bothering to look at him, all her concentration focused upon Fayvard.
“That is vengeance for putting your blade into me,” Midori announces acidly. She inspects the wound, tracing the flow of blood down Fayvard’s shoulder with her bright green eyes. “Hmm, I’m a little bit disappointed. It seems that alone wasn’t enough to kill you. Fine then.”
Her hands barely moving, she lets loose another shaft of golden light. It sings through the air in less than a second, before sinking into Fayvard with a sickening squelch not too far from the point of the first arrow.
Fayvard screams in pain, now coughing up blood as well. The two arrows glitter electrifyingly as if in a testament to Midori’s mercilessness. Recelo steps back, allowing Fayvard to drop straight to the floor face forward. His sword lands nearby with a clatter on the bridge, soaked in his own blood.
Midori smirks viciously, her eyes cold and dark. “I will not be stopped no matter what!” She gazes down icily at Fayvard’s motionless body. She kicks him on the side with her foot. “That should do i—”
She spins and tries to step out of the way, but not quickly enough, as Kunai lunges at her, his eyes glowing with a menacingly golden light. He violently brings his sword swinging downward. Midori sneers again. “I have already learned the pattern of your attacks. You cannot—!”
Kunai throws down the full weight of his attack. “Power Explosion!”
Like a hammer, Kunai’s attack explodes with earth-shattering strength, until it suddenly erupts in a violent shower of fire and sparks.
Midori teleports backwards, leaping out of the plume of ash and smoke. She breathes a sigh of relief. ‘He changed up his attacks, huh?’
From the ground, Recelo gazes up with awe. “A combination of Power Strike and Explosion, huh? He definitely is becoming more of a Fatalist…” he mutters to himself. Suddenly, his eyes widen. “Midori! Watch out!”
“What?!” snaps Midori, still attempting to elude the reach of Kunai’s fireball. But without notice, Kunai slashes his way straight through the center of the blast, appearing once again at point-blank range in front of Midori.
“Soul Combustion!” he shouts at the top of his lungs, flashing past Midori with lightning speed. The attack strikes before Midori even has a chance to react. She collapses to the ground as yet another explosion engulfs her. With a furious blast, the ball of energy collapses in a whirlwind of chaos and debris.
“Midori!” Recelo cries, rushing towards Midori. But Kunai immediately steps in the way, swinging his sword with frightening speed and accuracy. “How dare you, bastard! Where are you getting all of this sudden power from, huh?!”
With a strangled cry of surprise, Recelo manages to stave off Kunai’s attack just in time, using his own Doombringer as a shield as he is pushed back on his heels. However, Kunai slides past Recelo, and in a flash, lands a devastating strike on him from across the side. Blood gushes out, as Recelo now too collapses to the ground.
As he falls towards the ground, Recelo watches Kunai hop past him and join Fayvard, immediately tending to his injuries. Dark bags begin to grow around Recelo’s own eyes as he lands heavily on the ground.
“Damn it…” he mutters weakly to himself. “Looks like this really might be the end for me… I’ve…let everyone down!”
Kunai tends quickly to Fayvard’s wounds, placing his hands over the spots where Midori has struck him. His hands glow with a bright green light, as he magically heals his companion’s wounds. The holes struck in Fayvard’s back gradually close, though the blood remains and the process remains painfully slow.
From the floor, Fayvard sniffs, opening his eyes weakly to see Kunai poring over him. He coughs, blood staining his pearly white teeth. “I see…your Fatalist powers allow you to even cast Heal…”
“Don’t worry, Fayvard,” Kunai mutters over him. “I can’t completely make you whole again, but I can at least close your wounds and stop the bleeding.”
“Tch,” Fayvard smiles, “to think that…you’re actually trying to save my life. You should just leave me alone and go meet Arai on your own. I’ll only slow you down.”
“Like I said, I’m not going to give up on a companion, no matter who it is,” Kunai says through gritted teeth. “I’ve lost too many to think otherwise.”
At last, Kunai finishes healing Fayvard’s wounds. With some difficulty, he helps Fayvard back to his feet, using his shoulder to help balance Fayvard. “Can you stand?” Kunai asks, groaning under Fayvard’s weight.
“Y-Yeah, a little bit,” Fayvard hisses weakly. “I’ll need a little help walking for now though.”
“Yeah.” Slowly, step by step, the two cross the bridge, entering the Fatalists’ castle at last, in order to meet Arai.
The blank ceiling, adorned with a golden pattern of spirals, sways in and out of view. A tinge of darkness cloaks the opulently furnished room, lighted only by the faint rays of periwinkle light coming in through the drawn curtains. Tau lies silently at the edge of his bed in the semi-darkness, gazing up at the ceiling with his empty green eyes. For just a moment, he closes his eyes. ‘Alicia…’
A knock sounds at the door. Glancing up at the door, Tau intones, “Come in.”
The messenger bows low before Tau, who does not get up to greet him or indeed acknowledge his presence in any way. Nevertheless, the messenger immediately begins speaking in a brisk but deferential manner. “My lord, the preparations for the Fatal Knights are complete. They await your command. Additionally, the enemy forces have been sighted by the scouts. They inform us that we outnumber them easily by a three-to-one margin.”
At last, Tau scoots into a sitting position, hunching over on the edge of his bed as he ponders his messenger’s words. The faintest of sneers crosses his pale but handsome face. He gives a curt nod of approval to the messenger. “Sure,” he mutters.
Without another word, the messenger turns to leave. However, Tau calls him again as he places his hand on the door. “Hey, one more thing.” The messenger turns, but not before receiving a Fairfrozen to the stomach. With a gasp, the messenger collapses to the floor, leaving a trail of blood in his wake.
Tau stands haughtily over the dead messenger, looking down at him with disdain. “Tch,” he spits, “that’s for not showin’ any respect. It’s not ‘my lord.’ It’s Tau. I’m not the kind of person that’s gonna seek out respect from the likes of you…”
The first stars of night begin to appear in the rapidly darkening sky. A tinge of purple has descended upon the orange sky, as dusk has begun to fall upon the world. The shadows begin to creep ever longer, creeping into the folds of darkness, though still the sun remains bright at the edge of the horizon.
Kunai and Fayvard sprint as fast as they can, heading towards the Fatalists’ throne room and their final confrontation with Arai. At last, at the very height of a set of stone steps, they come upon the balcony that overlooks the darkening world on one side, and hides the doors into the throne room on the other.
Breathing heavily, Kunai comes to a panting stop, Fayvard leaning weakly next to him. Still, Kunai’s black eyes are narrowed with intense focus, his eyes locked onto the massive doors behind which the throne room now lies.
“Arai…I’ve come for you at last!” Kunai exchanges a glance and a nod with Fayvard. The two slowly creep towards the wooden doors, which are closed shut.
Throwing his arm against the door, Kunai pushes. The door gives way and opens with a soft creak. The light of the setting sun quickly spills into the darkened throne room within, which is completely empty. Not a living soul is present within the room.
Only the Shield of Wizet can be seen inside, perched tranquilly in Arai’s empty throne.
Far above, at the very height of the Fatalists’ castle, lies a platform made of silvery stone and marble that opens up to the heavens. Already, a few stars twinkle overhead as Arai stands alone, gazing up at the wide, expansive sky above him.
Behind him lies a glittering staircase made of the purest crystal blue marble. It spirals downwards, winding down into oblivion back into the Fatalists’ world below. Upon this platform, enclosed on four sides by marble walls the color of the sky, no presence or sign of war exists. There is only an observatory gazing upwards towards the heavens.
A black rift in the sky has opened up, a massive fissure that splits the sky directly down the middle. Already, a loud, ominous rumbling pours forth from the wound in the sky. It does not sound like thunder, but rather something even more menacing.
Arai stares silently and meditatively up at the sky, his eyes fixating upon this large crack in the heavens. By his side, he clenches tightly in his right hand the sword that has taken the lives of three—the Sword of Nexon. Its white blade glimmers brightly even in the low light, ready to fulfill its duty at last.
“Grandfather,” Arai says suddenly and clearly, speaking directly to the crack in the sky. “Let us not wait any longer. I have come to kill you.”
—END EIGHTY-SIX—