“The old you would never have protected garbage like that. I see now that you shouldn’t have left…You should have continued your battles in Telskyura…with us.”
“Are you…seriously saying that to me…?! Who would…who would ever want to stay in that place…?!” Tione hissed, glaring with deep-rooted resentment.
Argana’s eyes narrowed as a small smile formed on her lips.
“You still regret…killing Seldas, don’t you?”
In that instant, time seemed to stop.
“And yet, by killing her, you grew stronger, did you not?”
Tione’s eyes went red.
“NNNGGHH!!!”
An unintelligible roar erupted from the depths of her throat.
Forgetting herself, forgetting the pain, she let the madness take control and charged toward the other woman in an uncontrollable rage.
“That’s far enough!”
It came the moment before her fist hit its mark.
The sound of two short claps echoed throughout the street.
Though quiet, the voice that called out to them possessed a godlike sovereignty, and Tione’s body gave an instinctive shudder. Her tightly curled fist loosened as she returned to herself. Argana turned in the direction of the voice.
It was Loki, together with the rest of Loki Familia’s adventurers, including one very out of breath Lefiya.
“If things get any more heated ’round here, people are gonna get hurt. Not cool.” The goddess narrowed her eyes; she had only just arrived from the direction of the wharf but was already holding the battlefield in the palm of her hand. Rakuta, looking even more like a rabbit than usual, darted forward to grab the young girl, still sprawled out on the ground, and pull her out of harm’s way.
Tiona and Aiz lowered their fists and sword respectively, eyes directed toward their goddess.
“Argana. Bache. You two, too.”
The voice came from closer this time, from the opposite side of Loki and near where Tione and Argana had been fighting.
It was Kali, carting along a number of her followers.
“Apologies, Loki. Seems the outside world was a little too much for my girls.” She shook her head with a sigh and a (seemingly forced) grumble as her eyes met Loki’s. “Shall we share the blame? After all, your Sword Princess and her friends did a number on my girls, too.”
“Oh, whatever. Just scat, will ya? And I don’t wanna see you or any of your ‘girls’ again,” Loki scoffed, brushing her hand at them as though swatting at a bug.
While Bache had come out of her battle with Tiona unscathed, the group of Amazons Aiz had been fighting hadn’t fared so well and were in various states of injury. The girls in question were glaring daggers at Aiz and her sword while Aiz herself seemed none the worse for wear despite having been vastly outnumbered.
Kali simply smiled, then turned on her heel.
“Ta-ta, Tione.”
“…”
Argana and Bache walked past them, Bache as silent as ever and Argana throwing them a sidelong glance as they made their way first past Aiz and Tiona and then, finally, Tione. The rest of the Amazons, too, fell in line obediently behind their goddess and made their exit.
“M-Miss Aiz! Miss Tiona! Are you two all right?!” Lefiya immediately started for the two girls.
“I’m fine…thank you,” Aiz replied as she resheathed her sword, appreciative of the elf’s efforts in fetching Loki.
Tiona rubbed at her arm. “Yeeeouch…she really did a good one on me!” she hissed, and, indeed, bruises were already beginning to pop up all across her copper skin.
As much as she bemoaned the pain, however, there was something more important on her mind, and she threw a glance toward her sister.
“Miss Tione…” Lefiya and Aiz, too, noticed the direction of her gaze.
The girl in question was standing in the middle of the deserted road, her back to them.
Her eyes followed the retreating group of Amazons until they’d disappeared in the distance.
“Seems this is more serious than I thought…” Loki murmured, and the words caught on the breeze and circled their way toward Tione.
Tione brought a hand to her still-aching chest, oblivious to the blood that stained her mouth, as the wind played with her long black hair.
“Ngh…”
Seldas.
The name stirred in her heart—a name she’d kept buried for so, so long and, with it, the memories that haunted her. It was a piece of her past she didn’t want to remember.
She felt lost, confused, simply staring up at the sky overhead, as blue as the landscape of her memories.
The sky had been blue that day, too.
And it was stifling hot, baking the arena in the fiery heat of the sun overhead.
The ground of packed earth was already stained a brilliant red from the day’s fresh blood.
“Se wehga! Se wehga! Se wehga!”
The deafening roar surrounded her. Cheers. Cheers for her, Tione, standing her ground in the middle of the arena. Praise and adoration rained down on her tiny frame from every corner of the stands.
“Se wehga” was a phrase unique to the Amazons of Telskyura.
Translated roughly, it meant “Thou art the true warrior.”
She couldn’t make out anything over the thunderous ovation, her sense of hearing all but useless as she made her way toward the opponent in front of her. Hands shaking, she pulled the mask off the prone body—from the Amazon she’d killed—as the girl’s blood spilled out like a fountain onto the ground below.
She knew this face.
It was the face of the girl who’d tended to her wounds, who’d slept beside her so many nights, who’d breathed life back into her cold, dry heart.
The girl who’d been like a big sister to her, a mother to her, one of the most important figures in her life.
“Seldas…”
Though the name passed Tione’s trembling lips, Seldas’s eyes had already descended into darkness. Never again would they respond to her voice.
There had been a rule regarding who fought whom in the rites.
But Tione and the others had misunderstood that rule.
The reason they’d not yet had to fight any of the girls from their same room was simply that the right moment hadn’t come. As they strengthened the vessels of their flesh, so, too, did they strengthen their bonds with their roommates. They created friends, family for them to love.
And then, they were made to kill those loved ones.
This was their way of unleashing their anger. Of forcing them to overcome their grief. Of drying the tears from their eyes.
This was how they created “true warriors,” ones free from all manner of emotions and perfectly molded for combat.
Everything was part of this procedure for manufacturing warriors.
No…NO…
Something shattered. The world Tione had once known crumbled around her the moment she removed that mask.
For the very first time in her life, as she laid her hands upon the girl she’d loved, she knew how to differentiate right from wrong. She realized how twisted, how mistaken she’d been—cutting down her peers without so much as flinching, just as she’d killed the monsters before them.
On that day and in that place, the girl she’d so looked up to, the only mother she’d ever had, had taught her an important lesson—the agony of losing someone you loved.
She’d hurt her. No, her country, her goddess, these warrior-manufacturing traditions, her brethren had—
As tears of fury cascaded from her eyes, Tione turned toward the sky and roared.
“Se wehga! Se wehga! Se wehga!”
Thou art the true warrior. Thou art the true warrior. Thou art the true warrior.
The chant was deafening. Lauding the tiny girl in the arena, howling at the heavens. Christening her a warrior of old, having passed the test and now one step closer to the gods.
But to Tione, the words were nothing but a curs
e.
It was her fifth birthday. The day Tione had killed the one she loved…and advanced to Level 2.
Tione’s eyes would never see clearly again.
The moon in the sky overhead cast its light across the mountains, forest, and lake.
Night’s curtain had descended over Meren.
Off to the north, the great walls of Orario stood tall, visible from every corner of the small port city and its comparably undersized parapets. Not even the shadow of night masked the view. The glimmer of light from the city itself, hidden within its mighty walls, flooded out in harsh contrast to the surrounding darkness. Orario wasn’t called “the hottest city in the world” for nothing—one would almost think night never fell the way the sleepless city’s brilliant lights stained the sky. While the sight of the bustling city was old hat for the denizens of Meren, it was enough to stir the hearts and hopes of those for whom Orario was their journey’s end.
And while the nightlife of Meren couldn’t compare to that of its bigger sister, by no means was it going to go down without a fight.
Magic-stone lanterns hung from the port’s columns and buildings, bathing its main road in warm orange light. A festival-like atmosphere buzzed about the marketplace and its open-air stands, the whole street brimming with endless throngs of passersby. Travelers joined the ranks of shipwrights and fishermen, all of them solicited by the sounds and smells of freshly cooked seafood as they wandered from one tent to the next.
Needless to say, the port was a busy place—a true melting pot of foreigners.
In the bars, too, demi-humans and even a few gods mingled, hitting it off with all manner of new conversation partners.
“How’s Tione lookin’, Riveria?”
It was in one such bar—a little establishment not far from Loki Familia’s hotel—that Loki bided her time now. When the high elf appeared, she called out from her place at a small two-person table surrounded by the din of the enthused clientele.
“Even with Tiona and Aiz at her side…she isn’t faring well. She took quite the beating. Especially her heart,” Riveria explained as she pulled out the chair across from the goddess and sat down. “It doesn’t look good,” she added, guiltily almost, as though blaming herself for not having been at the scene of the fight. Still busy collecting information, by the time she, Alicia, and the others had rushed over upon hearing the commotion, all that was left was a deserted street and the girls of Loki Familia watching over a motionless Tione.
Once they’d finished repairing the storefronts they’d destroyed after apologizing to a very flustered Rubart and company, it was already evening. Since then, most of them had returned to the inn, which was exactly where Riveria had been prior to this meeting, doing her best to heal and soothe a broken Tione.
As Riveria sighed, Loki took a swig from her mug of ale.
“I know we’ve gotta continue this investigation, but…it’s startin’ to look like we might need to get Tione and her sister back to the city sooner rather than later.”
“Tiona should go quietly, but I doubt Tione will back down without a fight…”
“Hmm…You and I’ll talk to her.”
As concerned as they were for the two Amazonian sisters, however, they had a more important topic to discuss. The real reason they were meeting in this bar was to exchange the information they’d uncovered regarding their elusive violas.
And so, the goddess and vice captain of Loki Familia began their conference, away from the prying ears of the rest of their familia.
“All righty then, let’s go over everything we know first. We know that Tiona and Tione found nothin’ off-kilter on the lake bottom. The ol’ seal was tight as ever. While they didn’t probe every nook and cranny down there, I think it’s safe to say the second Dungeon entrance we’re lookin’ for isn’t in the lake…”
“Which would mean that however our flower fiends got there, they used a route on the surface.”
“’Zactly. If I had to guess, they’re in the sewers. And someone’s cartin’ them to the lake. We just need to look for somethin’ fishy…boxes or cages or somethin’…and then we’ll find the mastermind behind this whole thing.”
Riveria nodded.
The remnants of the Evils, and perhaps their one possible connection to the creatures, could well be somewhere within this very port.
“You learn anything new from your huntin’ today?”
“Mostly more of the same. Given how calm things have been on the waterfront lately, everyone’s more concerned about pirates than they are about any sort of monster. No one had even caught a glimpse of a viola before yesterday’s attack.”
“What about the folks at the Guild?”
“I was only able to speak with the branch manager—a human man named Rubart. Admittedly, I…have my suspicions,” the high elf conceded, one eye closing.
“Anything you can pinpoint?”
“There was just something unnatural about the whole conversation. The way he brought up the topic of Kali Familia, completely drawing my attention away from the violas…”
Loki wasn’t one to second-guess Riveria’s judgment.
While Finn may have been the brains and intuition of the group, Riveria was surely its all-seeing eye of perception. Her ability to discern others’ hearts could prove victorious even against Aiz’s defenses, much like a motherly sort of insight.
“What about Alicia and crew’s trip to see the gov? They learn anything?”
“Unfortunately, they were thrown out on suspicions of Guild involvement. Nigh unapproachable, it seems. The conversation itself was entirely one-sided.”
“Hmph…Involved with the Guild, sure, but we’re still not from around here,” Loki grumbled, bringing her mug to her lips.
Riveria was silent as the goddess picked at her food—a fish fillet with faintly greenish oil and sauce—before finally speaking up.
“And what of you? Were you able to acquire any new information? You went to see Njörðr, did you not?”
Loki grew even quieter.
Fork hand coming to a stop, she threw a quick glance up at the high elf.
“Hey…you don’t think Njörðr could be dirty, do ya?”
Surprise flashed in Riveria’s jade-colored eyes. “You really suspect Njörðr could have anything to do with this?”
“It was just a thought…”
“I find it difficult to believe, even absurd. While I may not have spent a great deal of time with him, the lengths he went to in order to help others like me when we first arrived on our journeys to Orario were extraordinary. He is, above all else, a man of character,” the high elf asserted, not a trace of doubt in her voice.
Loki scratched at her head awkwardly.
Having known the other god since their time in the upper world, this was something she knew all too well, herself. And yet, there was something she just couldn’t shake from their earlier exchange.
“Us gods have a hard time tellin’ when another god is lyin’. S’not like with you kids. Still…Njörðr, he…was never very good at it. At least from my perspective,” Loki explained, recalling the image of Njörðr with his back to her, avoiding eye contact.
It had been that moment that Loki knew.
“He’s hidin’ somethin’ from me. I know it.”
“…And that ‘something’ is related to the violas?”
“That I don’t know…but he’s certainly got a guilty conscience about something.”
Riveria shook her head. “I don’t believe it…”
As Loki sat there, her follower’s eye narrowed at her in disbelief, a strange feeling washed over her—one she’d never before felt. There was a flower-shaped shadow looming over this peaceful port town. And while it didn’t unsettle her, so to speak, it was still in sharp contradiction to everything Aiz and the others had uncovered today. That’s what bothered her. The fact that she just couldn’t figure it out.
Loki let her head fall.
“This whole thing migh
t be bigger ’n all of us…or maybe more tangled would be the better way to put it.”
There were a number of characters she couldn’t bring herself to trust. Three, if she only included humans and gods.
Rubart at the Guild, Borg at the manor, and the patron deity of Njörðr Familia himself.
There was a good chance one of those three was the puppet master Loki was searching for.
“…What are we to do about Kali Familia?” Riveria finally asked, still mulling about Njörðr.
Loki grew quiet.
“Do you believe they’ve nothing to do with any of this?”
“As much as I worry ’bout Tione and her sister, they’re not high on my radar. Whether or not they’re completely innocent, though…” she trailed off, displeased with her vague answer. Finally, after another moment to think, she continued, trying to put her instinct into words. “…I can’t help but feel like there’s some sorta thread connecting ’em. It’s tiny, one you can’t see no matter how hard you squint…but a thread nonetheless,” she mused, almost to herself, as her eyes widened ever so slightly.
Riveria brought a hand to her chin in thought.
The din of the pub around them wove itself through their silence. Craving alcohol to lubricate the gears of her thoughts, Loki sought out her mug only to find it devoid of ale. She stuck out her tongue in displeasure before waving the empty stein high. “I need a top-up over here, old man!”
“Guzzlin’ them down tonight, I see, milady. Somethin’ on your mind?” the owner of the bar, an old raccoon, asked as he traded out the empty mug on her table for a new one full of ale.
“Oh, this and that. Lots to think about when my cute little kids are involved, you know? Only choice is to drown my troubles!”
“If you have any Alb Water, I’ll take that,” Riveria spoke up when it came her turn to order, never one to touch the drink herself.
“Come to think, you notice anything weird goin’ on lately, old man? Doesn’t have to be big. Just somethin’ you might have noticed in passin’,” Loki said nonchalantly, downing half her ale in one gulp.
“Anything weird, huh…?” the raccoon murmured. “You know, just so rightly there was somethin’! Amazons! Been seein’ ’em everywhere in the streets lately…”
Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? On the Side: Sword Oratoria, Vol. 6 Page 11
