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Standard disclaimer: I don’t own the series. Heh, maybe I should just put one of these suckers up and call it a day?
AN: Heh, hey. The next chapter. This chapter was a pain in the ass to write, BTW. My flying monkeys are slacking off… that and my computer seemed to freeze up in Word every single time I tried to write something down. Ugh. I just hope this story is easy enough to read. I feel like my flying monkeys could write a better chapter. Heh, I originally went in another direction with the second part of this chapter, but decided to change it at the last second. I do believe that Anime Monkey and Nina Windia will be pleased… (looks all knowingly)
Wow, just some odd ramblings from an idiot. Hehe, please forgive me for the odd opening for this chapter. It really doesn’t have anything major to do with the chapter… I just thought it might be cute. Enjoy the chapter.
It seemed like a good idea at the time. It really did. The nice, shiny toaster would be perfect for… yeah. So, the next question would be how would one go about getting it? After all, it was all the way on the counter and she was only 3’4”. This would prove to be a great problem.
Of course, a little thing like height never stopped her before.
The little girl pushed strands of light brown hair out of her face and straightened out her pink and white jumper and looked around the kitchen for a step stool. She grinned slightly when she found one and pushed it up to the counter. She stepped up onto the top step and frowned. She was still too short. This called for a chair!
She quickly ran over to the kitchen table and grabbed the back of one of the chairs. She would have to be quick, or they would catch her. She began to tug the chair over to the counter, but stopped dead in her tracks when she heard the front door open. She waited a moment to see if anyone would enter the kitchen. When no one did, she resumed her trek over to the counter.
She placed the chair against the counter and began to climb up the chair. She stood up in the chair and was about the climb up onto the counter top when the chair started to wobble a little bit. She placed her hands on top of the counter to keep herself steady, but it was proving to be difficult.
The chair started to give way and she could feel herself go airborne. She screamed as she closed her eyes. Okay, so getting the toaster to shoot rocks out of was not such a good idea. In fact, it was downright stupid. All she wanted to do was find out how far rocks would fly after they got ejected from the toaster. Bread didn’t seem to go very far.
But none of that mattered. She was about to be a pancake on the kitchen floor. She was only four, after all and falling from a five-foot tall counter could seriously hurt. She thought something was weird. It was taking far too long to hit the floor.
“I thought I told you to leave the toaster alone…” an irate and exasperated voice said above her.
She had panicked and hadn’t even realized that she had been caught before she hit the floor. She opened one eye and looked around. She was being held in a cradle position. She looked up. Looking down at her with a look that told her she was grounded for life was a one Jin Uzuki.
“Um…” she really couldn’t think of anything to say. She knew that she was dead meat.
“Is that all you can say?” Jin asked as he adjusted his hold on the little girl. He placed her on the ground and knelt down to be on eye level with her.
“Um… it was a science experiment?” she tried. Surely if it was in the name of science, maybe he would go a little easier on her?
No such luck. “There are such things as making a solar powered car, or growing bean sprouts,” Jin muttered. He closed his eyes and shook his head. “You could have gotten really hurt Momo. What were you thinking anyway?”
The little girl, Momo, grimaced. “I just wanted to see what would happen… hey! How did you know what I was gonna do?”
Jin grinned slightly as he stood up. Yui poked her head into the kitchen. She shook her head when she saw the knocked over chair. She placed her head in her head and sighed. She then held up her hand and shook her head.
“Wait, don’t tell me. I don’t think I want to know…” she muttered as she walked back into the living room.
Momo looked up at Jin. “Am I in trouble?”
Jin hid a grin as he picked up the chair and placed it back at the table. He then turned his attention to Momo.
“Hm, let’s see. How’s this for an answer… is the sky blue?”
Momo thought for a moment. “Actually, the sky is every color BUT blue. We see every color but blue, so we think that we see the color blue, but we see every color but blue.”
Jin was quite proud of himself. He managed to keep from laughing. “Ah, I see. So you actually HAVE been paying attention to what I read to you. But, you managed to repeat yourself three times. Once would have been enough.”
Momo nodded. “So, I’m not in trouble?”
Jin shook his head. “Oh, you’re in trouble, all right,” Jin said as he gently pushed Momo out of the kitchen.
“Oh, please don’t make me eat what you cook,” Momo said.
Jin gave her an odd look. He shook his head and stopped in his tracks. “Eh, what? What’s wrong with my cooking?”
Momo spotted Yui. “Mommy! Daddy’s gonna make me eat his cooking again!”
Yui, who was sitting on the couch, merely glanced up at the two. “Jin, quit threatening Momo with your cooking. Momo, use your indoor voice.”
Jin shrugged. “What’s wrong with my cooking?”
Yui grinned and started to list off what she thought was wrong with Jin’s cooking. Momo grinned. Both parents were distracted and apparently had forgotten about the punishment that she should have received.
“Oh, and Momo? Don’t think you’re off the hook for that,” Jin said over Yui’s ramblings. Momo grimaced. He was good. How did he know what she was thinking?
“Parents know everything,” Jin grumbled. He was starting to really get irritated with Yui. He didn’t think his cooking was that bad.
Momo blinked in confusion. Wow, her daddy really could read minds. Or so she thought. Maybe it was one of those things that parents did. Or maybe he had some flying monkeys that were keeping an eye on her. Who knows?
Light and darkness were clashing against each other. Images rapidly flashed through his mind at light speed.
There was a flash. He saw a mighty ancient stone temple that had images of lions carved in it in the middle of a golden plain. At the heart of the temple, he was a young Woren woman with short fiery red hair, dressed in ceremonially battle gear. In her hands was a small brown metal key that seemed to have many faces etched into it. The faces were depicted as ones that were screaming out in agony.
Another flash. He was at the bottom of the ocean. He could see another ancient stone temple; only this one had appeared to been Manillo faces etched into the stone. He could see a young man with long silvery hair, tapered ears, and dressed in white and silver armor. He was holding a small key that had wings flanked a nearly flat carving of a king in ruby that was set in the metal.
Flash. A young girl with long black hair that was adorn with a gold headdress, dressed in dark black and blue kimono-like robes stood at the entrance of a well hidden cave in the middle of a forest. She too was holding a key, made of the same gold metal that the others had been. The key had a face in a small circle that was atop the key. An oak wreath surrounded the circle and a little further down from that was an eye shape on the key.
Flash. He was surrounded by many trees. In the middle of this sea of trees stood a giant mighty tree. In front of the tree was a young grassman holding a key carved entirely of gold and faintly glowing. The top was a circular disk with three needle-sharp spines protruding evenly around.
Flash. He was back at Angel Tower. At the top of the tower was a young girl with light blue hair, dressed in a pink and purple dress. Giant wings the color of the sunset protruded from her shoulder blades. In her hands was another small key made of gold, its length filled with decorative spines and curls. At the top was a flat circle engraved with a green carving of a young woman.
Flash. He wasn’t sure where he was, but there seemed to be a sea of stars all around him. Floating in the middle of the stars was a young woman with long, flowing purple hair, dressed in dressed a white gown with a blue and gold crisscross design that looped from the top front of the dress to about her waist with a gold ring on the front of the dress that had blue strips of fabric hanging down the lower part of her dress and gold arm bands on her upper arms with the same blue material attached to them. In her hand was another key, this one also golden with a cross-shaped ruby setting in the middle of a circle with two rings on either side of the circle and two golden spirals that laced itself around the rod of the key.
He knew each of the keys. He had gone looking for them along time ago. The thing was, these keys hadn’t been seen in over a thousand years. He also recognized the holders of those keys.
Names came rushing back to him. Katt Chuan. Spar. Mina Windia.
Other names echoed through his mind, but he was unable to latch onto them. The other three were nameless… and faceless.
One word echoed throughout the nothingness. Avatar. He had seen the Avatars of the Gods. Realization suddenly hit him like an atom bomb. Before he was able to make it out, his entire world went black.
In the darkness, he could see it. A giant blood red eye encircled in flames was staring back at him. He could hear the cries of the damned echoing through the abyss. Then, he heard a voice that even after all the lifetimes, still chilled him to the bone.
Give me your strength. Give yourself to God… Become God’s strength…
He screamed. He didn’t know why, but the voice scared him. It drove right to his core and shook his entire being. He didn’t even know how to even begin to combat such a thing. He knew he was screwed. The owner of the voice took on a physical form, and he screamed.
Ryu’s body jerked and he was thrown out of his odd dream. He groaned as he opened his eyes and brought a hand to his face in an attempt to shield out the sunlight. He tried to sit up. He felt like thousands of knifes were being stabbed into his stomach, so he quickly aborted the effort to sit up. He moaned just laid there. He highly doubted after a dream like that he was going back to sleep.
Downtown Wyndia was usually chaotic during the midmorning rush. What was even more chaotic about particular morning was the young woman that was marching down the sidewalk. She managed to weave in and out of the masses as she headed to her destination.
Most people that she passed paid her very little mind. The young woman was relatively short, about 5’3”. She was dressed in a greenish-blue formfitting shirt that stopped at her hips with white puffy sleeves and a pair of short beige shorts. She had on a pair of white high heel shoes and had on a choker around her neck. Her long brownish blond hair was pulled back into two buns on either side of her head with two pigtails falling out from the buns that fell to about her shoulders.
It wasn’t the young lady that the people paid mind to. It was the tall, spiky blond haired man that seemed to be her shadow that they were jumping out of the way of. He was dressed entirely in black and seemed to be sporting a permanent death glare on his face. He also had on a blood red cape that seemed to hide the lower half of his face.
“Please stop that,” the woman said, not even bothering to turn her attention to the older man. “People are staring…”
The man grunted. “Let them stare,” the man said in a gruff voice. “They seem to have nothing else better to do.”
“You’re just adding fuel to the fire,” the woman hissed.
“I do believe that would be you. You are fortunate that you can hide your…”
The woman turned on the balls of her heels. “Okay, enough!” the girl snapped. She grimaced when she saw several people staring. She giggled and looped her arm around the man’s.” Oh, come on Daddy! We’re going to be late for the movie!” the man gave her a bewildered look.
And with that, the girl pulled the man in the opposite direction of the Cineplex. The ducked out of sight and hid in a dark alley.
“I am your ‘daddy’ now?” the man asked. “I do know look that old…”
“Erm… had to think of something,” the girl said. The girl smiled and crossed her arms. “So, uh…”
The man grunted again and motioned at her to be silent. He reached behind him and pulled out a long sword from beneath his cloak. He swung the sword over his shoulder and looked around.
The girl just blinked and looked around also. She honestly could not find anything that was out of the ordinary. It was only then did she see her. The young ethereal Mary was standing at the end of the alley, a solemn look on her face. She turned to leave and then vanished.
The young woman knew exactly what that meant. Trouble.
She grimaced. The man glanced over at her and noticed her troubled expression.
“What is it?” he asked.
“I’m sorry…” the girl said.
The man gave her an odd look, but didn’t have time to even register the kick he received upside his head from the girl’s heel. He rapidly blinked a few times before his eyes rolled back and he slumped to the ground, unconscious. The girl caught him before he hit the ground and laid him up against the wall.
“Sorry,” she said. “But there is somewhere I have to go…”
The young woman bolted through alleyway after alleyway, looking for which way Mary had gone. Whenever Mary appeared before her, there usually meant there was some kind of trouble.
After all, that was how she met… and rescued Saria.
She skidded to a halt when she reached what appeared to be another dead end. She pushed herself flat against the wall when she noticed a dark looking man dressed in robes walk up to the brick wall. He pressed his hand against the wall and it shimmered. He when proceeded to walk right into the wall and vanished.
Right. Figured there would be magic involved.
The woman grinned slightly as she once again placed her nose where it didn’t belong. She walked right through the wall. The room on the other side was dark, save the torches lined up on the walls, casting an eerie glow throughout the room.
She froze and ducked behind a barrel when she saw that same man walk up to what appeared to be some kind of ornate altar. He placed a small boy on the altar, who looked to be no older than four or five. She fought the urge to be sick as the man drew a dagger from the sleeves of his robes.
He raised his hands high in the air and smiled, his dark teeth glinting in the light.
“Oh god!” the man said. “Please accept this sacrifice from your humble servant…”
The woman could feel the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end as a dark shadow appeared before the man. It took on the form of a hauntingly beautiful man with long blond hair, dressed in white and gold robes and a pair of white pants. The man seemed to glow with an ethereal light.
“You have done well, my faithful servant,” the man said in a smooth voice. “Now…” the man stopped. “You have been followed!” the man snapped.
“My god?!” the robed man cried.
“Dispose of the intruder and then pray for forgiveness!” the man snapped, then vanished.
The robed man jerked around and tried to looked for the girl. He roared and launched a fireball at some of the random barrels.
“Come out, you foul creature!” the man growled. “How DARE you defile this sacred moment!”
The woman didn’t need to be told twice. She stood up from her hiding place, her blue eyes blazing. She looked over at the boy and realized it was too late to save him. He was already dead. She pointed her finger at the man.
“What… have you done!?” the woman snapped. “You’re part of the kidnappings, aren’t you!”
The man laughed. “I see that you are full of energy! My god will be most pleased with you when I sacrifice you to him to become his strength!”
The woman got into a battle stance. “Dream on, sicko!” the woman taunted. She placed her hands on her hips. “I will punish you in the name of the land of Wyndia!”
“You speak bold words. Let us see if you are still strutting after I finish with you!” the man laughed as he started to glow.
His clothes tore and revealed scaled skin underneath. Horns grew from his head as his teeth formed into fangs. Giant wings ripped from his back and a massive tail slammed into the ground. He looked just like the demons she had heard about in the news. Did this frighten her? Not by a long shot.
Before she could react, the monster launched itself at her and tried to grab her with long claws. She jumped out of the way. One major advantage she had from being a Wyndian was her bone structure was rather hollow. In other words, she was faster than this behemoth. And speed equaled a faster reaction time.
Before the demon knew it, she had jumped back and assumed a fighting stance, not unlike the one that she used as a child. However, she did not spend the past ten years not learning a thing or two. She had asked an old friend of hers to teach her to fight. Her friends taught her well.
Okay, so fighting in high heels was basically asking for trouble. She was the type, however, that just went around looking for trouble. She had always been too curious for her own good. In the past, this had gotten her in trouble a many of a time. But, as she grew older, she learned when to act and when not to. With maturity brought wisdom. She learned that there were other ways to fight than just hand to hand.
She had sought out Deis again for this simple reason. The naga-goddess was more than happy to take her on as a pupil. As Deis had said it, with wisdom comes understanding. When she had said that she knew her limits, and wanted to surpass them, Deis saw this as a sign of maturity from the girl.
In other words, this twenty-year-old girl that was currently staring down this monster, was armed to the teeth with magical attack spells.
Not that the demon knew that.
And it would cost him dearly…
The girl raised her hand. The air in the room suddenly became very heavy as the girl starting chanting the words to an ancient spell. The monster glared at her and lunged. Just before the monster got within an inch of the girl, the girl had finished the spell.
“Myollnir!” the girl screamed as a massive blast of lightning surged from the girl’s hands. The beast flew back and slammed into the altar. He growled and jumped back up and charged the girl again.
With more chanting from the girl, the room began to heat up. Like before, when the monster got right to the girl, the girl finished her spell.
“Sirocco!” the girl yelled as a wave of lava lashed out from her hands and struck the monster once again and sent him flying. He roared in rage and pain and jumped back up once more and slammed his tail into the ground. He lunged again at the girl.
Okay, this called for a last resort. The girl assumed a defense position and smiled slightly. She started to glow with a green and gold light. Two white wings that were tipped brown burst from her back and extended in length. The wings and the girl started to glow as a gold and green orb appeared in the girl’s outstretched hands.
The girl’s eyes flashed and she let loose the orb. It slammed into the monster at full force and sent him flying up against the wall. The light died down around the girl and the wings diminished in size and only covered her back to her waist. She sagged to the ground, exhausted. That attack always did her in.
She heard growling and groaned. The monster just got right back up and made another lunge at her. She closed her eyes, bracing for the impact. She just did not have enough energy to counter.
She suddenly heard a battle cry. She opened her eyes and saw a flurry of sword swipes at the monster. The man had apparently regained his senses and had appeared just in time to be her knight in shining armor. Okay, never mind he never wore armor, but that was another story.
With one more swipe, he plunged the sword into the heart of the beast. The monster screamed and convulsed. It then reverted back to his human form, as dead as a doornail. The man grunted and turned his attention back to the girl.
The girl looked up from her position from the ground. “Strife…”
The man merely looked at her. “Nina… I’m not going to ask you why you knocked me out… or why you are here fighting a demon…”
Nina grimaced as Strife extended his hand to Nina. Nina grabbed it and Strife helped her up. She gestured over to the crumbled altar and Strife nodded. He walked over and picked up the dead body of the boy. Strife let loose a surprised gasp when the body merely turned to ashes.
Strife turned his attention back to Nina. “One more Sirocco should be enough,” he said.
Nina cast the spell and burned the body of the dead demon. Nina then turned her attention back to Strife. “We… have a problem…”
“Yes?”
“I saw who he was going to sacrifice that kid to…”
“And?”
“That man… the one that demon called god… looked like Legence…”
Strife frowned slightly. “This… could be a problem.”
Nina nodded. “What are we going to do now?”
“I report this to the King,” Strife said.
“Okay,” Nina said. “But first, we must resume our original mission!”
Strife groaned. “I hate this. I really, really do…”
“Oh c’mon!” Nina laughed. “So you get stuck holding the shopping bags. It could be much worse!”
“I have to take you shopping,” Strife muttered darkly. “That is usually an ALL DAY AFFAIR! How can it get much worse that that!?”
Nina giggled, more out of nervousness than anything else. “Can we get out of here…this place is giving me the creeps.”
Strife nodded and they walked out of the enchanted room. This was the fifth demon sighting that month alone. Nina was beginning to become worried. What did that mean? What was going to happen to Wyndia?
And more importantly, what did Mary have to do with any of this? Did it have something to do with Ryu?
Nina could only hope that he was still alive. She could feel it in her bones. Soon… soon they would see each other again. Soon…
To be continued…