Category: Axis

At the same time that Nihil was talking to Ignis, Stella was pouring over the inscription pattern, memorising each and every minute line that was marked down on the blueprint. At this point her aim was just rote memorisation, so she put off trying to decipher and understand it’s construction until after she and Stella had met their master.

In order to not distract her sister, Lunam was passing the time by catching up with a couple of old friends that lived within the capital. The group of five people were sitting around a table in the busy pub section of Stella and Lunam’s inn, enjoying a few drinks. After the small talk had passed, the topic naturally shifted to Lunam telling stories of Diei Noctis’ escapades over the recent years.

After excellently portraying some of the exciting battles and quests the party had gotten into – including the various stories of how the group had gradually grown to be quite so big – Lunam took a long draught of the water that was on the table in front of her.

“A couple of interesting guys have been travelling with us recently. They work as bards, so they probably would have told those stories better than I did.” She laughed in high spirits.

“Oh? Did they have any good legends to tell you guys?” A small, fairy-like girl, with sparkling gold hair, asked from across the table.

“They did share one, but it directly contradicts history and that didn’t sit too well with Stella especially.” Lunam laughed awkwardly in response to the girl called Rashida.

“That’s got me interested now too.” A tall lady with mint green hair and pointed ears piped up from next to Rashida.

With nods of assent from the other two present, Lunam was forced to summarise the song Nihil had performed then.

“Before we start, can one of you cast a soundproofing barrier, please? It doesn’t align with history and the atmosphere’s a bit tense in the capital at the moment.” Lunam requested after some thought.

Only once the barrier was in place, did she start telling the story Nihil had described. By the time she’d finished, the group of four had shocked expressions and even had tears in their eyes that they steadfastly refused to let fall.

“That’s definitely a new take on Avalon’s history.” A strange voice that seemed neither totally present nor completely absent, agreed.

This voice belonged to one of the four people sitting around the table with Lunam. He was a special type of demon that didn’t have a physical form. As such people from this ‘Soul Clan’ wouldn’t have a choice except to become a mage – as they had no body they could cultivate.

The final member of the small group was a low-ranking demon with a light red tail and a matching pair of wings. Despite his bloodline, he was still a decent mage falling into the upper end of average. In fact everyone in the group Lunam had met was a mage at least at the upper average level.

As mages from the Mage’s Guild, they were guaranteed to be skilled. Average and weaker mages would invariably end up in the Adventurer’s Guild (which is why the Sun and Moon adventurers didn’t have any even in such a large party).

The small girl named Rashida was a half elf, half dwarf cross. The green haired, tall woman was called Mel, and she was a pure blooded elf. The translucent demon from the Soul Clan went by the name of Seis. Finally, the pretty boy, red winged demon’s name was Rood. They were all old friends of Stella and Lunam, and used to be part of the same party before they all transferred to the mage’s guild and the girls had founded Diei Noctis. They’d still often bump into each other on various quests, though.

At this point Mel spoke up quietly. “Actually I have heard whispers of this story back in Alfheim.”

“You have?” Lunam asked, surprised.

“We elves are naturally longer lived than humans, so it’s not unusual for our histories to be more accurate – especially when the humans are deliberately trying to hide the truth.” Mel pointed out.

“Why would they try to cover that up, though? It’s a very touching story.” Rood questioned, confused. Demons lived for roughly the same length of time as elves, but they were more solitary and generally didn’t bother with passing down histories.

“The problem isn’t with why it was founded, but with how. It’s not apparent with this story, but it’s actually set before the Great War.” Mel explained.

Avalon’s official history stated that the country was formed after the Great War in an effort to help the survivors’ lives regain a sense of normalcy and peace.

“This Nihil seems to have deliberately worded it so that the timing wasn’t obvious.” Mel continued in an impressed tone. “So I’m sure he already knows of the father and son’s crimes following the end of this story too.”

“Crimes? Just what did they do?” Seis questioned, thoroughly intrigued by his friend’s teasing.

“Haha, ok I’ll stop beating around the bush. We already have a soundproofing barrier up, so I might as well just say it bluntly.” Mel laughed. “In an effort to increase their country’s power rapidly, and to completely establish their rule, they caused the Great War.”

““““What!?”””” A collective shout rang out.

“Wait, wait, wait. Why would that even help them!?” Rashida asked, shocked.

“I’m not sure what they were actually planning – if they meant for the casualties to be as high as they were, or not. But, if you think about it, the result was that the races’ hostility to each other grew; the population decreased by a lot; and they were one of the more powerful groups of humans since they had been fully prepared for the war far in advance of everyone else. By the time the Inter-Species Council had calmed the war down enough that the pact could be signed, the Royal Family were the only possible representative that humans could send to sign it.”

The other four people at the table all had shocked looks on their faces, like they couldn’t quite believe just how smoothly it had gone for the two.

“What the hell!?” Rood’s muttered exclamation effectively summed up everyone’s thoughts at that moment.

“If even you know this much, then how could the Inter-Species Council let them get away with it?” Seis asked.

“No-one knew about it until much later. At that point it was too late to do anything. Even now, these are only rumours flitting around in Alfheim. Though the reality is that the Inter-Species council are greatly suppressing Avalon’s Royal Family.” Mel answered.

“Perhaps this is part of the reason why Prince Pravus is so hostile to the other races?” Lunam mused.

“That would explain a lot.” Seis agreed, nodding his head.

At that point, Rashida looked outside at the moon high in the sky. “Ah! It’s this late?”

“We should probably go back to our own houses.” Rood agreed.

After they’d all said their goodbyes, Lunam made her way over to the counter to talk to Hera.

Making her way up the stairs, Lunam softly opened he door to her shared room with her sister.

“It’s about time to wrap up your studying today.” She gently reminded Stella after seeing the girl still absorbed in her research.

“Mmn …” Stella agreed, still looking at the blueprints.

Just then an enticing smell made its way to Stella’s nose. Glancing up, she saw her sister holding a tray of delicious food and a tall mug of hot chocolate with whipped cream and chocolate chips. Seeing this, her eyes lit up and she immediately stopped what she was doing.

“Thank you!” Stella exclaimed at the same time that her stomach let out a loud grumble.

Lunam just laughed and handed the tray over. While watching her sister eat, Lunam asked how the research was going.

“Mmh, it’s taking a while, but I should be able to try it out for the first time tomorrow.” Stella replied around mouthfuls of food. As she ate, her cheeks bulged out, reminding Lunam of a hamster.

Smiling gently, Lunam told Stella how their friends we’re doing. She didn’t talk about the last conversation they’d had though, because she had no way to set up a soundproofing barrier, and Hera’s warning about there being prying ears was still fresh in her memory. She decided to tell her only after they’d left the capital again.

* * *

While Nihil was describing his few memories to Ignis, he had been fiddling with the various weapons in the room so that he didn’t have to see his friend’s reaction. However, once he’d finished speaking he didn’t even have time to turn around before Ignis had slung his arm over Nihil’s shoulder, ruffled the man’s hair, and unhesitatingly declared “No matter how old you are, or what you’ve done before, I know who you are right now. You’re my best friend.”

“You might want to withhold that statement until you see the next room.” Nihil had briefly mentioned what he’d done, but hearing about something, and actually seeing it were two completely different things.

Seeing his friend’s serious expression, Ignis nodded his head. Judging from the plethora of weapons in the room they were currently in, he had already started to form an image in his mind of the next room.

Stepping through the door, the room that greeted him was a lot plainer than Ignis had expected. He’d been picturing a stone table with various large torture devices around – such as an iron maiden or a stretching table. By contrast, the chain and hook was completely innocuous.

Despite this, Ignis could clearly see just how much the room had been used in order to get such a uniform coating of the walls, floor, and ceiling. In truth, such a revelation was a bit of a shock to the system, and he had to take a few steadying breaths before his emotions calmed down enough to properly focus on the woman currently hanging in the middle of the room.

While Ignis was getting accustomed to his surroundings, Nihil’s eyes seemed to get just a little more lifeless – he had a feeling that this room was just scratching the surface of what he’d done in the past. If this had been a normal situation, Ignis would have noticed this minute difference in his friend immediately. As it was, he was too distracted and didn’t spot it at all, and by the time he looked at his friend, Nihil had automatically hidden the change. It was unknown whether he’d even noticed it in himself.

“Wake up.” Nihil calmly said.

Contrary to what most people would expect, this actually was enough to wake the woman up. But that wasn’t surprising to the two men, after all Nihil had used magic to project his voice even into her subconscious.

In a confused and dazed state, Scarlet focused on the two before her and her face paled when she remembered what situation she was in.

“N-no matter what kind of t-t-torture you put me through, I-I won’t t-talk.” She stuttered out in an unconvincing tone.

“That doesn’t matter.” Ignis replied when he realised that Nihil wasn’t paying attention. He casually nudged his friend before asking the first question himself.

“Who exactly sent you after us? And how much did they tell you?”

Scarlet’s face paled even more – it was clear that she was desperately terrified of the one who’d given her this mission. In a similar fashion, Ignis’s face also blanched a second or two later.

“No way!” He exclaimed as he fell a step back. “Callum? I thought he was …”

Hearing this name, Nihil snapped back to his senses as he tried to reassure his friend. “We’re not in the same situation anymore. I also have some of my memories back, so I am a lot stronger now too.”

Stepping in front of Ignis, Nihil’s eyes hardened as he started asking questions again once Ignis seemed to have calmed down somewhat.

“How much of our past do you know?”

“Well, I’m now wondering if Callum has any connection to you guys, at least.” She mocked. Seeing Ignis’ reaction was enough to make her feel confident again.

Naturally she’d wondered how Ignis knew it was Callum who’d sent her, but she assumed that she must have said the name out loud by accident. He had always terrified her, after all. Luckily it seemed to have had the same affect on her captors as well, so she didn’t panic too much.

With all this going through her head, Ignis had to indicate to Nihil that he didn’t get what they needed. Receiving his friend’s signal, Nihil’s eyes flashed as he struck her left cheek bone with some brass knuckles that Ignis hadn’t noticed his friend pick up from the other room.

“Remember the situation you’re in. You don’t have the luxury to be able to look down on us.” He all but snarled viciously. “How much does the Royal Guard know about us?”

Ignis glanced worriedly at his friend, but quickly refocused his gaze back on the captive who was spitting out some blood that had trickled down her cheek into her mouth.

Scarlet showed her bloody teeth in a scathing smile as she replied. “I. Won’t. Tell. You.”

This time however, Ignis had gotten what he needed. This allowed Nihil to move on, but the man still spitefully struck her again in the same place as before. Hissing in pain, Scarlet just clenched her jaw and glared at Nihil, while thinking some vicious swear words in her heart.

“What exactly were your orders?” Nihil asked his next question. This time Scarlet didn’t actually mind answering as she knew it would serve to further piss them off.

“Haha! Callum doesn’t actually care about the red head so much, but he’s desperate to get you back.” She replied smugly, knowing exactly what would be in store for him when he eventually got recaptured. “You can’t run forever. We will hunt you down, and make you wish you’d never been born!”

This ferocious fanaticism concerned Ignis, so he frowned and focused even harder on the person in front of him. A few seconds later his eyes widened and he flung his gaze over to his friend.

That can’t be true! Ignis thought vehemently. But … what if it is? I can’t tell him until I know for sure. The way he is now, he’ll just accept it as fact without verifying it, and he’ll hate himself even more.

“Why is Callum’s goal so important? Aren’t people strong enough already? More power will only create more destruction.” Nihil asked without waiting for his friend’s signal.

He wasn’t sure why he was quite so certain of this fact, but something in his subconscious was telling him he’d experienced this for himself.

Grabbing Nihil’s elbow, Ignis dragged his friend back into the other room.

“What’s going on with you? Ever since we joined up with Diei Noctis you’ve been letting your emotions show a lot more easily.” Ignis started. “While that’s normally a good thing, if you let them overwhelm and control you then you’ll be no different than a magical beast.”

Ignis’ words managed to get through to his friend, but it still didn’t look like Nihil was ready to talk about it yet. He wasn’t sure why, but Ignis instinctively felt that bad things would happen if Nihil ever got too caught up in his own emotions. For most others, Ignis would have been happy to see them coming out of their shell, but he only felt a growing sense of dread whenever he saw his friend doing just that.

“I should probably tell you what I’ve learned from our captive.” Ignis quickly changed the subject.

He had a bloodline ability that let him read the flow of mental energy around a person and accurately decipher what they were thinking at that moment in time. Ignis had only relatively recently discovered this ability so he wasn’t all that good at using it yet. As a result if a person had mental defences set up, or wasn’t currently thinking about something when he was trying to read them, then he couldn’t get much useful information. This was why Nihil had had to prompt Scarlet with the questions earlier, since even if they refused to answer out loud, people usually couldn’t help but to think of the answer when prompted.

“Most of the Royal Guard aren’t aware of the specifics, they just know that Callum was researching how to allow people to both cultivate and develop their magic as well. They know that you are the key to this, and that you aren’t human so they don’t think that forcing you to take part is wrong.” Ignis explained. “It almost seems like they were all brainwashed by the prince when they were training to enter the Royal Guard.”

“That could be a problem – even for the inter-species council.” Nihil muttered in response. “Do we know what the average Avalon citizen thinks of these human supremacist beliefs?”

“She didn’t think about that, so I’m not sure. But she also had orders to keep her actions a secret from the general populace, so I would guess that they’re not all on board with that line of thinking.

“Since Callum doesn’t care about my whereabouts too much, it seems that we were successful at convincing them that I was just another failure, though.” He answered helplessly.

“That’s great. I wasn’t sure if we’d let it slip during our escape.” Nihil replied with obvious relief. “What about the earlier questions?”

“She was only sent as a scout to figure out where we are. Despite her fame for the ‘Scarlet Blade’ incident, she’s actually much better at stealth than combat so she only attacked us because we discovered her.”

“That’s unexpected – her sonic attack didn’t exactly seem to lend itself to stealth.” Nihil commented.

“It could have been developed to help her during combat – it does effectively stun most non-human opponents.” Ignis pointed out, shrugging his shoulders.

“That is true.” Nihil realised and smiled at his friend. “If she was sent to locate us, then how much has she told her sergeant?”

“That’s the problem. She told them we were travelling with a group in this area. Luckily she only found us after we split up and she doesn’t know the group by name, but it might still be best to leave the adventurers – for their sakes.” Ignis was worried that they’d drag people into their mess and that someone would get hurt because of it.

Since they had already disappeared for a while, it might be better to just stay separated like this until they managed to either resolve the situation or report them to the inter-species council.

“Where is her squad? I’ll check in on them quickly.” Nihil decided to check on the situation before he committed to a particular option.

In response Ignis just furrowed his brows while he concentrated hard on sending a set of coordinates and an image to his friend. Receiving the information, Nihil opened a gate and stepped through, leaving Ignis and Scarlet behind.

Just as the sun was dropping below the horizon, a small shift in the stalker’s movement alerted the group to her awakening.

“Heads up.” Klaus warned the group.

Linley stepped forward to question the girl’s intentions.

“So, what’s your name?” He decided to start off small to gauge how willing she would be to answer their questions.

She raised her chin arrogantly and sneered as she replied. “My name is Scarlet Blade.”

“That’s a rather strange name.” Klaus scoffed, suspecting she was using an alias to fool them.

“No way! That Scarlet Blade?” Merry exclaimed in surprise. “There’s no way you’d be that easy to capture if you were truly her.”

“Huh? Who is she?” Klaus turned to ask Merry.

“She’s an elite assassin in the Royal Guard. No one knows her real name, but they say she earned this one when she slaughtered an entire ‘evil’ guild alone. As you can imagine, by the end of the massacre her sword was scarlet with the blood of her victims.” Nihil explained coldly, disgust dripping from his voice.

An ‘evil guild’ was just a generic term to refer to groups of people that cultivated or practiced magic through ‘evil’ methods. Some of these methods were harmless, but went against the teachings or religion of the country they existed in. However, some truly were despicable as they increased their powers through sacrificing innocent lives – and not a small number either. The group that Stella and Lunam grew up in was an evil guild of the latter kind. However, the kind of evil guild that Scarlet slaughtered was the former type. Since they were harmless, Nihil didn’t care for this woman one bit.

Knowing their leaders’ past, the party automatically assumed that the guild Scarlet destroyed was also the latter type. As such, they didn’t notice the disdain in Nihil’s voice, and were suitably impressed by Scarlet’s history.

“That’s amazing. That must have been a tough battle.” Klaus replied in awe.

At the same time, Linley looked towards Nihil and Ignis. “That means she’s with the Royal Guard.”

His implication was obvious – it was highly likely that her targets were the two boys before him.

“Now that you people know who I am, you should realise that I won’t stay captured for much longer.” Scarlet spoke up haughtily.

“Who were you targeting?” Nihil asked, pointedly ignoring her comment.

Nihil knew that she was likely after himself and Ignis, but he had no intention of blowing their cover until she confirmed this objective herself.

“Do I really have to tell you? I should think that much would be obvious.” Scarlet replied, rolling her eyes. “My mission is to track you two boys down and retrieve what was stolen from us, and to bring you back with me – by any means necessary.”

“Great job you did there …” Nihil replied sarcastically.

“Just how bad of an assassin do you have to be to get captured as easily as you did?” Ignis piped up mockingly. “It seems that your so called ‘perfect record’ is just a result of weak opponents.”

“Seems like you’ll have some trouble fulfilling your mission.” Nihil said before the woman could voice her complaints. “Anyway, how much does the Royal Guard know about where we are and who we’re with?”

“Ha! Do you take me for a fool? There’s no way I’d tell you that.” Scarlet replied, effectively distracted from the earlier mocking.

“OK then, how far away are the main troops?” Nihil asked a different question after looking towards Ignis and seeing him subtly nod his head.

“Are you kidding me? If I didn’t answer the previous question, what makes you think I’ll answer this one instead?” Scarlet asked incredulously.

“Well, it’s not like it hurt anything to ask.” Nihil replied, shrugging. He then continued in a sarcastically optimistic tone. “But maybe you won’t mind answering how many are pursuing us?”

“Of course I mind!” She angrily responded, then she turned to face Ignis and continued. “He’s an idiot, right?”

At these words Linley and the others quietly chuckled to themselves, while a frown flitted across Ignis’ expression.

“Since you refuse to tell us anything, I think we should confiscate your belongings and ditch you somewhere the Royal Guard will find you.” Nihil commented with a bright smile, while he shook his head at his friend to prevent him from acting rashly.

“You just try it.” Scarlet replied viciously, suddenly releasing a wave of magical power that shredded the rope tying her up.

“Crap! Sorry guys, I didn’t realise she was a mage!” Linley exclaimed in frustration as he quickly released a flurry of small blades similar in size to a scalpel. They travelled at tricky angles, seemingly magnetically drawn towards their target.

It was clear that the group was a seasoned party of adventurers, as everyone was instantly up and prepared for battle. Frowning, Nihil stood back from the fight and disappeared into the tall grass without anyone noticing.

Very soon, Archer’s blades also joined Linley’s in their attack, surrounding Scarlet with a whirlwind. Scarlet resisted the attacks for a few seconds before releasing a spell that caused the blades to all fall motionlessly to the ground, revealing her form covered in several small scratches.

“A pathetic attack like that wont work on me!” Scarlet exclaimed as she whipped her hand out horizontally and unleashed a wind blade attack on the group, knocking Claude back as he skilfully stepped in to use his whip to counter the magical attack before it hit Linley and Archer.

Having successfully blocked the magic, he flicked his wrist to send out a rapid counterattack that managed to strike her squarely across the front of her neck. Taken by surprise, she coughed and spluttered for a second before forcing out a furious roar to use a sonic attack that blasted into everyone’s ears.

This attack was especially effective against this particular group that comprised of elves, demons and mysterious beasts. Even as a half-demon, Claude’s senses were still just as strong as a pure blood’s. Most of an elf’s senses weren’t particularly better than those of a human’s, but their vision and hearing wouldn’t lose out to those of a mysterious beast. As a result, the sonic attack was just as devastating to Merry, Alexis and Lucas as everyone else present.

Grimacing due to the pain, some blood even dripped from Ignis’ ears as he tried, in vain, to muffle the deafening roar with his hands. The others were doing much better than him, but they still couldn’t remove their hands from their ears.

At this point Lucas sent a bolt flying from his crossbow. Luckily he’d loaded it before Scarlet had started screaming, and was standing further away from her due to being a ranged attacker. However, he still couldn’t completely remove his hands from his ears, so he had to fire the shot one-handed. This wasn’t as easy as it sounds, since he used a heavy crossbow so that he could use it as a makeshift shield in case he was forced into a close-quarters battle.

As could be expected from his desperate attack, he missed his mark but still managed to shut her up for long enough for Alexis and Merry to send their own arrows flying her way.

Growing annoyed with the protracted fight, Scarlet gathered a massive amount of the world’s energy and manipulated it to form a tornado that spread it’s diameter to blow back the entire party – with one exception that is. Scarlet had managed to grab Ignis before casting her spell, so she took him with her as she disappeared from the surrounding area. Despite the chaotic situation, she still didn’t forget her mission. She had noticed Nihil’s absence after her sonic attack failed, so she decided that she should save time by avoiding the fight altogether.

About 5km away, Nihil was planning an ambush in a clearing, when he heard a loud roar coming from the direction of the party.

“Shit! She had a sonic attack?” Nihil swore to himself, worried about how Ignis was coping with it given his exceptional hearing.

Nihil had known that the adventurers wouldn’t be strong enough to defeat Scarlet. Besides, there were some questions he wanted to ask her – ones he couldn’t with everyone else around. He’d asked Ignis to stay behind to keep an eye on the woman, and help guide her to the ambush point if she didn’t head in the direction Nihil had predicted.

Nihil was much better at stealth than Ignis, so that was why Ignis had been the one to stay behind. However, with this development he started to think that it would have been better if they had switched their roles.

Shaking his head Nihil decided to trust his friend’s abilities and focused on the direction Scarlet should be coming from, as he didn’t know how long he’d have until she arrived. He didn’t have to wait too long, as she soon came flying over with Ignis in her arms.

Scarlet was human, but she was using her wind magic to improve her speed by supporting herself in the air.

Given that the practitioner didn’t have an innate racial ability (such as the demons’ or dragons’ wings, even some bird-type mysterious beasts had the natural ability to fly), flight was something that was only possible for wind specialised mages, or for the high level wind attribute expert cultors.

It was more difficult for cultivators to fly, as it required emitting a large amount of their internal energy out of their bodies. As such they could only use this technique for short periods of time to help them escape. There were legends about special cultivation techniques that altered the body of the practitioner, causing different animalistic traits. Some of these techniques could supposedly even allow a cultivator to grow wings. However, these types of techniques were incredibly rare – if they even actually existed, that is.

Seeing his friend’s still bleeding ears, Nihil’s expression turned severe as he became almost as angry as he was when that had happened back then. The only difference now was that there was only a single enemy.

Furiously slashing his hand down in a chopping motion, Nihil opened up a spacial crack in front of the two figures. Spacial and flame magic happened to be Nihil’s specialties, and most of the time he could barely use any other spells without enchantments.

This spacial door just looked like a slight shimmer in the air, so Scarlet didn’t notice that anything was there – nor could she dodge it. As a result, she ended up flying full force into the ground (which was where Nihil had set up the exit). With his spell, he had skilfully separated Ignis from Scarlet’s hold, and the boy fell through a second crack that had appeared next to Nihil.

Catching his friend, Nihil worriedly checked Ignis’ condition. Nihil’s expression relaxed when he confirmed that the boy had just been knocked unconscious, but he soon narrowed his eyes again when he heard the sounds of Scarlet struggling to get up.

As a mage, she naturally had a much more fragile body than cultivators, so the force with which she hit the ground was enough to break her arm and give her a minor concussion. Groaning in pain, she shook the stars out of her eyes and growled in anger. If she hadn’t been an elite in the Royal Guard, an onlooker could’ve easily believed that she was actually a high level mysterious beast in human form.

Ignis may have turned out to be ok, but Nihil was still furious with her. Now that his friend was unconscious, there was no one left who could even try to calm Nihil down. Frowning, Nihil’s eyes locked onto his opponent – focused on first capturing his opponent. Fortunately it wasn’t a difficult problem for him at all.

Taking advantage of her dazed state, Nihil launched himself towards her, leaving a deep imprint in the ground from the sheer force he’d he’d applied to his right foot. He covered the 20 metres between them with just one stride. Stomping down with his left foot, he efficiently halted his forward momentum and punched Scarlet’s stomach at the same time. Even with just a fraction of his strength, the woman was sent flying backwards as she choked, desperately trying to breathe again.

While she was still spluttering on the ground, Nihil flipped his palm and a pair of heavy manacles appeared and dangled from his hand. Clasping the chain, Nihil approached Scarlet. Grabbing her wrists he attached the manacles so that her arms were behind her back.

Naturally she had tried to resist, but Nihil’s arms hadn’t even budged a millimetre so her efforts remained futile.

“Damn you, bastard!” Scarlet snarled as she flung her head back to glare at Nihil.

“Hey, you’re the one who was chasing us. It’s not my fault that your superiors underestimated our strength.” Nihil responded calmly.

“DAMN IT!” She shouted in frustration. After releasing her pent up frustration, her face relaxed again. “Have you already forgotten? It’s not that easy to subdue a mage.”

Under Nihil’s mocking smile, Scarlet’s expression quickly changed from smug, to confusion, to concern, and then finally to full-blown panic as she finally figured out what was happening.

“Y-you have Azoth Shackles!?” She exclaimed in shock. “It shouldn’t be possible for -“

She quickly shut up when she remembered just how easily the two boys had managed to steal those high profile items from her bosses. If they could swipe even the void-space storage ring, then naturally some anti-cultor shackles wouldn’t have been a problem. What she didn’t know was that the manacles were actually a ‘souvenir’ from their past.

At this point, Nihil dragged Scarlet over to another space door. Throwing her in, he turned around and carefully carried Ignis through with him.

The other side of the spacial crack opened up to a simple concrete room. The only things present were dark copper stains, covering almost every tile on the floor and walls; a chain and hook, hanging from the high ceiling; and a single door in the corner. It was clear that the room had been used a lot in the past.

Nihil brought Ignis through the door, leaving Scarlet sprawled on the floor. Behind the door was a small, simple room with a comfy-looking sofa. However, the wall decorations weren’t nearly as innocuous. Every available surface was covered in vicious weapons and strange looking devices.

Gently laying his friend on the sofa, Nihil returned to the main room. Strangely, neither of these areas had any other doors or windows – except the one door connecting the two.

Removing the chain from one of the manacles, Nihil brought Scarlet’s hands in front of her, and then reattached the chain. Next, he hung her chain on the hook dangling from the ceiling. Scarlet glared fiercely at Nihil while she let out a sharp grunt of pain and surprise.

Nihil decided to wait for Ignis to wake up again before he questioned Scarlet. This would probably turn out to be faster and definitely more reliable than simple torture. Besides, there was no way for her to escape these rooms without Nihil knowing immediately. After all, this was a pocket dimension that Nihil had created a long time previously. He continuously supplied it with his own magic, so it was extremely stable despite being such a small dimension.

Normally the larger a pocket dimension, the more stable the space would be. This was because the creator of a space was effectively transforming a section of the void into a usable area. This meant that the larger dimensions could produce their own energy fast enough to supplement the energy being drained by the void. However, smaller dimensions couldn’t produce enough energy fast enough, so the difference had to be constantly made up by the mage. Most people would install formation stones around any sized pocket dimension in order to mark out the boundaries.

For a smaller dimension, though, these stones had an added benefit of acting as batteries in the case that the mage stopped being able to supply energy to the area for some time. Formation stones would only have a finite amount of energy however, so any normal smaller dimension would inherently end up being temporary and unstable even when properly in use. As such, unless the magical energy was periodically replenished, the domain would collapse in on itself once the batteries were completely drained.

In this way, it was easy to imagine just how sturdy Nihil’s dimension was compared to others’. Especially considering the years that he was unable to provide magic to sustain it at all.

“You have a cruel streak don’t you.” Scarlet spoke up at this point.

She’d just got her breathing under control, after getting accustomed to the pain from being hung from her broken arm, but Nihil just ignored her.

“They didn’t warn me about any of this. How come you’re so freakishly strong!?”

“Naturally they couldn’t tell you about that which they do not know.” Nihil begrudgingly answered her, just to shut her up quickly.

“But shouldn’t they have found out stuff like this while that was happening?” In her pain, Scarlet unwittingly let something slip that she immediately regretted. “I-I just meant when you were stealing the void-space storage ring!”

Her hurried attempt to explain away her slip up only gave her away even more. At this point, Nihil’s expression had gotten even colder, with his golden eyes almost appearing black in the dim lighting of the room.

* * *

Just as a dangerous glint appeared in Nihil’s eyes, he seemed to notice something which cleared his expression slightly. Punching Scarlet’s stomach once again, he knocked her out and headed back into the smaller room.

Ignis was just rubbing his head and sitting up when Nihil entered.

“How are you feeling now?” He asked in a quiet voice, worried that a louder sound would cause his friend even more pain.

“Ugh, like someone’s crushing my brain in their fist.” Ignis replied with a groan.

Hearing this, Nihil quietly approached his friend and gently rested his hand on Ignis’ head with a frown as he concentrated. Nihil let out a small stream of magic and Ignis’ tense jaw loosened a little.

“Eat this and regain some of your strength.” Nihil instructed his friend after conjuring another dense green flame similar to the one Claude had seen him produce before.

“Thanks.” Ignis replied before obediently eating his fill.

By the time he was done, Nihil was looking like the weaker of the two instead.

“Where are we, by the way?” Ignis asked, licking his lips in satisfaction from the meal.

“My pocket dimension.” Nihil responded in a steady voice, despite his pale complexion. “Well, I had to use it a few times before we met, but it’s been a while since I’ve come here.”

“Before we met? You regained your memories?” Ignis questioned, realising the significance of what his friend had just said.

“It’s all a bit jumbled, but I understand the gist of the parts that have returned. But I get the feeling that I’ve only unlocked one part of the seal on my memories.” Nihil replied with a flash of frustration quickly passing across his expression at the end.

“That’s great! We’re one step closer to figuring out who you are!” Ignis exclaimed in excitement.

“Is it a good thing?” Nihil muttered.

“Why wouldn’t it be?” Ignis asked in concern.

“Well, I can sense my mana coming from the rest of the seals … so I’m pretty certain they were placed by me.” Nihil explained. “Perhaps I would be better off if I didn’t remember it all. I think I know enough now to understand the key points, and I don’t like the direction they’re headed.”

“No matter what you choose, it’s your decision to make.” Ignis responded gently, then continued in a slightly sterner tone. “Though, for what it’s worth, I think that you should face yourself honestly and straightforwardly. And that would require you regaining all of your memories.”

Smiling wryly, Nihil let the matter drop with a sigh as he thought through his friend’s advice. Honestly, even just the existence of this pocket dimension was enough to raise warning flags in Nihil’s mind – just why would he have needed such a room that was obviously designed with dark purposes in mind. Nihil just couldn’t think of any legitimate reasons for doing so. He could also say with confidence that he could get anyone to talk – no matter how loyal or stubborn they were – as long as he could get them into this space.

Shaking his head free from these dark thoughts, Nihil knew that he wouldn’t be able to properly mull it over within just a few minutes. As such he changed the topic back to the memories he currently did remember.

“Recently I’ve been having these images flash through my mind. And, from what I’ve understood of them, I seem to have lived longer than either of us first guessed.” Nihil started, feeling somewhat apprehensive about his friend’s reaction to his following statement.

“Oh?” Ignite prompted, thinking that it would just be a difference of a century or so.

“I can remember my birth …” Nihil explained in an attempt to stall the conversation slightly.

After saying this, Nihil mustered up his courage and started describing the relatively few memories he currently had. Despite trusting Ignis completely, he was still nervous as to what his friend’s reaction would be upon learning the truth.