by Tj Dixon
“None.” Imogen says and Lupine nods.
“So why attack someone who could defeat the Fallen Angels for them?” I ask but nobody seems to have an answer.
“Your majesty.” Karina says as she approaches me.
“Take the prisoners and army back to Nirvali. I’ll figure out a way to take down that barrier.” I tell Karina.
“At least keep some body guards here. There could be other enemies nearby.” Karina warns me.
“Lupine and Imogen are enough.” I tell Karina.
“What?!” Lupine gasps.
“Understood.” Karina says unhappily, but she’s nowhere near as unhappy as Lupine.
“At least leave one company behind!” Lupine protests.
“There’s no need.” I tell Karina and reopen the portal in reverse to take the army back to Nirvali.
“It will take a little longer with prisoners.” Karina warns me and then begins barking orders to the army. They herd the dejected prisoners through the gate. The prisoners are clearly unhappy but they are also afraid. Karina takes advantage of that fear to make them move even quicker than her own army. At this rate perhaps it won’t take that long after all.
“I hope they don’t cause any trouble back in Nirvali.” Lupine says.
“Don’t worry. Karina won’t let them.” I assure her.
“I suppose I can see why you have so much faith in General Karina, but I don’t why you have so much faith in me. I can’t protect you against an entire enemy army if we are attacked.” Lupine warns me.
“Imogen can hide us if that happens.” I tell Lupine.
“Do I really need to? You have the stone we worked so hard to make.” Imogen complains.
“I don’t want to waste it. Anyway, we don’t want to fight if we don’t need to. For now I need to focus on keeping the portal open. After that I need to work out a way to get inside the temple. That barrier looks a pain.” I tell Imogen.
“Fine, fine. I’ll hide the three of us when the portal shuts. Or should I just hide the two of us?” Imogen jokes.
“We could leave the fighting to Lupine, couldn’t we?” I joke back.
“Hey, you two!” Lupine protests.
“Is that any way to speak to your king?” Imogen asks.
“I mean, you majesty, please don’t abandon me.” Lupine begs.
“Relax, we were just joking.” I tell her.
“I wasn’t.” Imogen says.
“That’s enough teasing. I need to focus.” I warn Imogen.
“Ok. The angel stone seems to be working just as planned. It doesn’t seem so bad now, that we had to miss the latest volume of our favourite manga.” Imogen says.
“What?! The latest volume is out?” I ask Imogen and almost drop the portal in shock.
“Yes the latest volume of Naru Toad came out today.” Imogen tells me.
“But the first edition was preorder only!” I tell Imogen.
“I take that back. It wasn’t worth it. I got too caught up trying to copy Baka Rangers XVII with our latest invention.” Imogen says with tears welling up in her eyes.
“Can’t you just buy the second edition?” Lupine suggests and we both look at her like the idiot she is.
“But then it wouldn’t be the first edition.” I tell her.
“It wouldn’t come with the poster either.” Imogen says.
“It came with a poster! No!!!! Which character?” I ask.
“It was a surprise. They must have announced it by now, but I can’t tune into their communications from here.” Imogen tells me.
“I suppose it may be better not to know.” I say with a sigh.
“It had just better not be Sakura.” Imogen says.
“You only like her because she’s got the same name as your legate.” I tell Imogen.
“That’s not true!” Imogen protests.
“I can’t understand having favourite characters. I like them all equally.” I tell Imogen.
“That’s a lie.” Imogen insists.
“Well other than the male ones and the ugly ones.” I say.
“Just because they’re ugly on the outside doesn’t mean they’re ugly on the inside.” Imogen says.
“I know, but if you can draw them however you want then why draw them ugly? Why not make all of them cute?” I ask.
“Because not everyone has the same tastes.” Imogen answers with a shrug.
“Some people have terrible tastes.” I tell her.
“They really do.” Imogen agrees.
“For example…” I start to say but Lupine cuts me off.
“Everyone’s through the portal.” Lupine tells us.
“That was even quicker than coming here.” I say in surprise. I then close the portal and walk towards the barrier.
“Is it safe to get close?” Lupine asks me.
“Yes. As long as you don’t touch it there’s no danger. The barrier is formed of active dimensional magic. Anything that touches it will get sent to other dimensions in lots of little bits. I suppose it isn’t actually a barrier, because it doesn’t stop anything. You could call it a dimensional mixer or chopper or similar, because it just moves anything that it comes into contact with it like a portal would. The only difference is that a portal focuses on safely moving anything that enters it, whereas this focuses on moving anything that enters it in a very unsafe manner.” I explain.
“Wouldn’t it have been good to have warned General Karina about how dangerous it is?” Lupine asks.
“Only an idiot wouldn’t realise.” I answer and Imogen nods. Lupine opens and closes her mouth a few times before saying anything else.
“Couldn’t you just open your portal inside the temple?” Lupine asks when she has recovered her senses.
“Don’t be stupid.” I say in unison with Imogen. I then explain to my idiot bodyguard. “If you knew the exact location you could open a portal from another world directly inside the temple. The problem is that the mixer or whatever you want to call it obscures the coordinates. It’s not like a simple map where you can calculate based on the coordinates around it. If you were enough of a genius you could calculate them, but the complexity is so great that it would be easier to calculate where a drop of water in the ocean would be a billion years from now. I certainly couldn’t and neither could Imogen.”
“That does sound hard.” Lupine says.
“Here will do.” I say and sit about five feet from the shimmering orange mixer. It feels cold from this distance even though it looks a bit like fire.
“So what now?” Lupine asks.
“Now I analyse it. Imogen, please hide us. Lupine, please be quiet.” I say and without listening for a response I start to analyse the mixer. I’m not sure how much time has passed but by the time I am done the sun has set and looks like it will rise again soon. “We’re not going to take the mixer down.”
“Have you given up?” Lupine asks.
“After missing the first edition of the latest volume of Naru Toad you better not have given up, you lazy stupid son of a twig!” Imogen warns me.
“I haven’t given up. We just don’t need to take the mixer down.” I tell Imogen.
“Explain yourself.” Imogen warns me.
“We just need to trick the mixer into not mixing us.” I tell Imogen.
“And how are you going to do that?” Imogen asks curious now rather than angry.
“The mixer uses up a lot of mana.” I tell Imogen.
“A lot, but not as much as an effectively impenetrable shield would.” Imogen says.
“I know. That was clever. Very efficient, but the fact is that it does still need a decent power source. So where do you think the power source is?” I ask.
“It would have to be inside the mixer.” Imogen says and then her eyes go wide.
“Exactly, so the power source is in the mixer, but not getting mixed.” I tell Imogen.
“So we just need to identify how it knows not to mix the power source and then trick it into thi
nking that we’re part of the power source.” Imogen says.
“That was the hard part.” I say with a nod.
“You’ve already figured it out?” Imogen asks.
“Yes. I considered all sorts of complex answers, so when I realised how simple it was I was annoyed at myself for overlooking it.” I answer.
“So tell me already, you damned son of a twig!” Imogen yells and glares angrily at me for keeping her waiting.
“It knows that it is the power source because it feeds power to the mixer. A precise level of power at a constant rate and wavelength.” I tell Imogen.
“Do you know the exact wavelength and rate?” Imogen asks.
“Yes.” I confirm.
“How do you plan to replicate it?” Imogen asks.
“With the angel stone of course.” I answer.
“I suppose that makes sense. Should we use the bodyguard as a test?” Imogen asks.
“We could do.” I agree.
“I understand. It would make sense to use me as a test subject. If anything happened to your majesty it would be a disaster for all of Nirvali.” Lupine says a little teary eyed.
“Damn, she’s no fun.” Imogen says.
“You’re right. Let’s go.” I say.
“But…” Lupine protests as I pull on her arm with Imogen sitting on my shoulder. “You should use me as a test. We really can’t afford for anything to happen to you.”
“It’s perfectly safe.” I tell Lupine as I set the angel stone to the right wavelength and prepare the power transfer rate to match the mixer’s stones.
“Just make sure you get the right rate and wavelength.” Imogen warns me.
“I have.” I tell her and enter the mixer. It’s cold. Really damn cold. I wish it was fire. I’m fine with fire, but I hate the cold.
“This feels nice.” Imogen says.
“Don’t let go, please don’t let go!” Lupine begs.
“Did you say let go?” I joke.
“No!!!” Lupine yells.
“It doesn’t matter if he does. You’d still be covered.” Imogen says.
“There was no need to spoil my fun, Imogen.” I complain.
“You wouldn’t want her to embarrass us when we get out. Just imagine if she wet herself.” Imogen says.
“I wouldn’t do that!” Lupine protests.
“We’re almost through, so quiet please.” I warn Lupine and Imogen. A few moments later we emerge from the mixer to the astonished faces of a group of catmen. They were just sitting around lazily but as we emerge their eyes and mouths open wide in shock. A few moments later they jump up as if to defend themselves.
“We’re allies.” I tell them quickly. They all look at me dubiously.
“Take us to my legate, Sakura.” Imogen says.
“Isn’t that the faery that was locked up?” One of the catmen asks his comrades.
“Yes, she was with the elf murderer.” Another catman answers.
“You locked up Sakura?” Imogen asks in shock. The catmen look worried. Then Imogen laughs so badly she has to hold her chest and stomach.
“They’re dangerous.” One of the catmen growls.
“Take us to your gods then.” I say quickly before the situation really does get dangerous, for them. Not that I want to harm them, but without the right inventions to hand and with the angel stone out of attunement thanks to the dimensional mixer I would have a very hard time keeping both us and them safe. Imogen, Lupine’s and my safety come first.
Chapter 22 (Cherry)
“Dairon, Elucia and the faery have been released, nya!” Neko calls out as she races into our room. Aventurine gets up and goes over to greet her.
“That’s great.” Sherry says to me and I nod happily. We aren’t the only ones who are happy either. Everyone in the room seems enthusiastic about the news. Why not? Dairon helped us a lot and even if we don’t really know Elucia or Sakura as well as we know Dairon, they are Dairon’s friends. Why did the catmen decide to release Dairon though? Are Peter, Juliet and the Kuroneko back? Wouldn’t Neko have said that first if they were?
“There’s more!” Neko calls out. I look up at her curiously. “Two dwarves and a faery walked through the shield thing covering the temple. They came here to help us, but they need some volunteers. It will be dangerous, but we can help save Peter and defeat the Fallen Angels!”
“I’ll help!” I call out and jump up. Again it’s not just me. Sherry is just as quick and so are Aventurine and Asuna. Yusa, Lilian, Tomo, Tabi and Mirai are only a moment slower.
“Me too.” Helski says after a pause.
“We’ll help.” Fire Rose says and Water Lily nods in agreement.
“How many does that make it?” Neko asks looking like she’s in a bit of a daze.
“Twelve of us from this room.” Sherry says.
“That’s almost enough.” Neko says.
“I’m sure Rin will help.” Aventurine says.
“She will and Yu Kii will. Jenny too.” Neko says.
“That makes fifteen. How many do you need?” Aventurine asks.
“Sixteen, nya.” Neko says.
“You’ll help, won’t you?” Aventurine asks.
“I can’t. Hermes and Midori can’t either.” Neko says unhappily.
“Oh…” Aventurine says.
“I’ll help.” Angelika says sounding very nervous.
“That makes sixteen!” Neko says gleefully.
“So how do we help?” Aventurine asks.
“Follow me and he’ll explain. It was a bit too complicated for me.” Neko says and we gather around her.
“I bet it wasn’t that complicated.” Helski mutters.
“Even Rin couldn’t follow it.” Neko says a little awkwardly. “Only Sor and Kuroneko seemed to have any idea what he was talking about.”
“If Rin couldn’t understand it, what chance do we have?” Helski mutters.
“Maybe we don’t need to understand. Rin agreed to help even though she couldn’t understand.” Lilian says. Lilian was our only Year 1 student even before most of our newer members left for Utopia Camerona, so she may be able to understand even if Rin doesn’t. She’s right though that we may be able to help even if we don’t fully understand the plan. We only need to understand it well enough to do our part. I just hope the dwarves can be trusted.
“Let’s follow Neko and hear for ourselves.” Aventurine says.
“Yes, please follow me.” Neko says and leads the way out of the room. We all follow. Sherry and I are near the back because we weren’t quite as quick I’d have liked. It can’t be helped though, and I don’t imagine it will actually matter.
We follow Neko down the straight grey temple corridor until we reach the decimated temple entrance. There’s still a lot of rubble but at least it is in piles now. We easily avoid the piles of grey stone rubble as we walk past where the entranceway used to be.
More disturbing than rubble are the piles of ash where the catmen had piled up enemy corpses. We saw the corpses piled up when Aventurine and I returned after setting up the orange shimmering barrier. I pray that nobody we knew was involved in the attack. I am confident my mother wouldn’t have gotten involved in Perry’s scheming, but the same may not be true of my friends’ families. It’s a pity ringleaders like Perry never seem to face justice. It’s always the people they manipulate who end up dead.
Past where the entranceway was we continue on through the straight temple corridor. At the end of the corridor is a shiny black stone door that contrasts with the dull grey of everything else I’ve seen in the temple. The door opens on its own just before we reach it. Past the door is a black stone room with a large black stone throne. The Kuroneko is sitting on the throne in catwoman form with Sor standing beside her. There are large fiery torches on the wall every ten feet or so lighting the room well.
Standing in front of the Kuroneko and Sor are Emi, Rin, Jenny, Jimmy, Yu Kii, Midori, Hermes, a black male dwarf in black armour and wearing similar b
lack armour is a female dwarf. Rin and Yu Kii are in school uniform. Midori and Hermes are in their miko outfit like Neko. Jenny and Jimmy are in leaf woven clothing that apparently the elves made for them. Sor and Emi are wearing that ridiculous outfit Yu Kii made for them. Pale grey shorts, white bandage around their breasts, open black leather jacket and pale brown sandals. The Kuroneko is wearing plain white robes. She looks tired.
If Peter hadn’t told us about the dwarves I never would have guessed that the pale skinned, slim, short, red haired and blue eyed girl in armour was a dwarf. A green haired and green eyed faery is sitting on the right shoulder of the male dwarf like Lucy sits on Peter’s shoulder sometimes. I look around and see Lucy on Hermes’ left shoulder. I missed Lucy the first time because of the angle.
“Neko, how many did you get?” Hermes asks.
“All thirteen, nya!” Neko answers.
“That means you have the sixteen mages you needed, dwarf, so what next?” Lucy asks.
“I’m still annoyed that you’re not one of them.” The male dwarf says.
“That’s not my fault!” Lucy yells at him.
“I know. You’re too small to use the stone.” The dwarf says.
“And whose fault is that?!” Lucy yells at him.
“But it would be a waste if you grew big.” The dwarf says. Lucy just glares at him.
“So what next?” Sor asks impatiently.
“Next each of the users has to take an angel stone, activate it and learn how to use it effectively. Then we can go and conquer hell with Peter.” The dwarf says.
“Wait, did you say we?” The faery on his shoulder asks.
“Yes. Of course I’ll be going too. I wouldn’t want to miss the fun.” The male dwarf answers.
“Grunti, you can’t go. You’re the king. It’s too dangerous.” The female dwarf beside him says.
“More importantly Grunti, how long do you plan on making me wait for the next volume?!” The faery asks him.
“How is that more important?” The female dwarf asks indignantly.
“Of course it is.” Both the male dwarf and faery say together.
“But I have to see these angel stones in use. The next volume will just have to wait. I promise I’ll be back before the next one after that is out.” Grunti says.
