Dragonskyt
Ashen one, hearest thou my voice, still?
- Location
- Kiln of the First Flame
Intrigue! Plotting! Politics!
Trust nobody, everyone just wants to use the two!
Trust nobody, everyone just wants to use the two!
The Steep Path Ahead [Familiar of Zero AU]
- Thread starter shadenight123
- Start date
Mizu
Software Developer
- Location
- Victoria, Australia
Wow, didn't know the Gandalfr runes could actually run out. The bearer overwhelmed by numbers, sure, but the magic beginning to vanish due to how much is being used is new to me.
Oh yes, and we've got confirmation that Josette is acting on Charlotte's orders here, which is nice. Not sure why, or what orders, but it's nice to know.
Dimensionist
Grandmaster of Apologism, Keeper of the Faith
- Location
- Bangalore, India
Callled it~
Fakers, the lot of them. Gilgamesh would have an apoplexy.
Fakers, the lot of them. Gilgamesh would have an apoplexy.
Dude wtf are you on about? That doesn't explain his behavior with Louise from the beginning at all. Only rune fuckery could explain that.
Chapter Sixty-Two
- Location
- https://discord.gg/z9tBvbh
Chapter Sixty-Two
For a refreshing change of pace, the first one to wake up from the fatigue induced sleep turned out to be Saito. He awoke to a depressingly bleak reality of being carried between the strong arms of Jacques, rather than with his head resting on the lap of a cute girl, but he was still alive, so things couldn't be that bad.
His vision was slightly blurry, but he could make out buildings of some form.
"Uh?" Saito groaned as an aching pulse hit his head, soon followed by a full-body pain that seemed to sink deep into his muscles. "Where?" he gurgled.
"Mister Saito woke up!" Jacques said, his voice carrying quite the hurried tone in his words. Near him, Josette took a deep brief of relief.
Captain Morgan -Bleu- struck with his boot a nearby door and cracked it open, allowing them entrance before Jacques flung Saito at him, and turned to close the door with a wall of dirt. "The windows too!" Bleu exclaimed, as Saito's vision finally put in where they had ended up.
Once, it had been a normal house, perhaps a whole building filled with rooms for the poor to live in. Now though, it was as if it had come out of a splatter movie. There was blood everywhere, and bits and pieces left behind to rot away -a couple still twitching.
From upstairs, a corpse shambled its way down, only for Jeanette's daggers to easily slam through the Undead's legs, letting it fall down the remaining stairs. Josette's staff was shining a soft white light as it gingerly touched Saito's forehead, and then moved to slam with strength against the back of the Undead's neck.
The corpse remained down, finally 'dead'. Saito's body was still in pain, but he could move now, at least long enough to stand back up and take a deep breath.
The windows of the ground floor had meanwhile been barred by rock pillars, which Jacques had created with surprising ease.
"We are safe for now," Jacques said.
"Back doors?" Saito hazarded. "In zombie movies-there is always a backdoor, or a cellar-"
The rattling from a side door was soon met with Jacques' quick thrusting of both hands on the ground as the earth rippled, allowing a wave of dirt to form right in front of the door, barring it from ever being opened. The man sighed in relief.
"Well, this is clearly the difference in experience showing," Bleu said with a cheerful smile, tipping his foppish hat at Saito. "We'll be in your care once more, Mister Adventurer."
Saito nodded, his eyes looking around his 'party' for Louise. She was knocked out cold on the back of Jacques, sleeping soundly and strapped on tightly. "He-He won't wake," Josette said in a timid voice. "He's not hurt-just...tired? The Cure spell can heal wounds, and sores, but if he's unconscious-"
"It's all right, he already did a lot so he's earned his rest," Saito said with a chuckle, tapping his chest with his right fist, and letting his gauntlet reverberate against his breastplate. "Trust in me then, Adventurer Saito will see you all to safety...if someone can tell me what's going on though."
"Oh-Uhm..." Jeanette's face blushed lightly as she neared him, "W-We sort of ran all the way here," she said timidly, fidgeting with her fingers and looking shyly away. "Y-You were r-really amazing back then!" she added, both hands to her chest and her face bright red.
Compared to Josette's 'innocent cuteness', this 'maiden cuteness' was pretty much a guaranteed critical hit. Still, Saito couldn't help but hold on his ground even as he felt most of his rationale slip away.
"I-I think so too!" Josette said suddenly, her eyes all stars and shining jewels. "I-I mean, the way you went to help brother Jacques and how you swung your sword, and then you were thrown in the air like-like 'waaah'," she moved her hand up, "And then you went 'kabam! Swish! Swish-Swish-Swish!'," she made a gesture with her hands similar to 'spinning', "It was just so cool! I couldn't help but stare in amazement!"
There was the sound of broken wood, as the dirt holding the main door of the building closed began to shake.
"Let's move upstairs," Saito said. "Then we can see about getting to another building from the roof," he added.
"Uh-We are nearly out of Willpower, Mister Saito," Josette said with an 'ashamed' look. "B-But we can hold our own in a fight if it comes to that!" as she said that much resolutely, she held her staff in both of her hands, fires of determination brimming in her eyes.
"Yeah! Don't underestimate us just because we're girls," Jeanette added, the daggers she had thrown returning to her hands thanks to light breezes of wind. "We trained really hard to become great adventurers!"
Saito simply laughed as he pulled out his dagger, taking a deep breath as he felt his muscles tense and then relax. It was probably for the best if he didn't overuse his familiar power, or he'd end up fainting again and now was clearly not the time for that. As he carefully sidestepped the corpse and began to walk up the stairs, he muttered a quick prayer for the deceased, bowing his head slightly as he passed the dead body by.
The stairs creaked as the stench in the air made Saito's head feel heavy, or perhaps it was the lingering fatigue. It was impossible to knock-out an Undead, and if they were as fast as the living, then the only thing he could do was to dismember them in order to take their 'weapons' away.
This meant cutting off their heads and their arms, and hoping they wouldn't kick them to death.
Someone on the upper floors had apparently had the same idea as him, since the number of limbs that were rolling about was pretty high. Sure, the arms were merely pulling themselves across blindly, but they appeared to latch on to anything vaguely resembling a limb, forming a sort of dangerous floor he really didn't want to trudge on.
"We could levitate over them," Bleu whispered, "But Jacques' a bit too big for the hallway."
Jacques had been doing his best to 'shrink' as much as possible, but even he couldn't do miracles. He was carrying around his weapon and Louise, so-
Saito blinked. "Hey, can you make other things with your iron slab?"
Jacques gave a single nod, and thus, Saito smiled. The stairs where at the far end of the hallway, and as everyone carefully stepped aside, Jacques transformed his weapon into a 'ball'. "Now," Saito said, "We push."
Captain Bleu smiled with his rapier in hand. "I have just the spell for pushing."
"We need to conserve Willpower," Saito pointed out. "So...We push the old way."
Jacques planted both arms on the sides of the ball and gave a curt nod. "Stay behind me," he said with a grumble, Louise still peacefully asleep on his back. "I will open us a path."
And then he charged with his feet stomping on the floor, the sphere of iron crushing to paste anything on its path, even the random Undead that had peeked from a nearby room to stare at the reason for the noise coming their way. The sphere changed near the end in a morningstar of sorts, which Jacques yanked back in order to let it arc over their heads and slam down on the floor behind them, cracking it apart in a shower of splinters and creating a natural rift between them and the Undead that had begun to pour out of the doors.
"We climb," Saito said grimly at the numbers coming through the main door one floor below -and which the hole had aptly showed them. "We climb fast," he added, taking to the stairs two steps at the time.
It was as he was about to turn the corner that Josette's staff grabbed him by the feet and pulled him back, "Be careful Mister Saito!" she exclaimed as he fell down, stopping an inch away with his nose from what seemed like a wire, an absurdly sharp wire.
There were hooks planted on the floor, and wires all around the hallways. Somebody had taken great care in the job done, and as Saito couldn't help but think of a way to prevent all of this work from being destroyed -they needed to pass, but this as a way to stop the Undead seemed pretty great- a figure appeared from the other side of the hallway.
"Color me impressed," a very familiar voice said with a warm tone, "If it isn't Sir Saito!"
"M-Marteau!?" Saito exclaimed in wonder, staring at the man on the other side of the trapped hallway. "What are you doing here!?"
The ex-chef laughed, his white hat replaced with a leather cap and his figure a bit leaner than before. His armor had a slightly chewed-on appearance, and the cleavers by his belt had seen a fair share of use, but he still seemed in high spirits. "Why, surviving the end of Brimir's patience of course! What about you? Is your partner-" Louise' head peaked from Jacques' shoulder, still asleep, "Oh, I see-there he is!" he laughed. "Well, just a moment," as he said that, he moved near the hallway's side where a large wheel seemed to have been placed with a couple of nails and some bits and pieces of scrap.
As he began to turn it, the wires stopped being in tension and all fell down. "Careful with the hooks, those I can't remove!" he added as Saito managed to nimbly jump past them, the rest aptly choosing to levitate their way through. With a few quick cranks, the wires were tensed once more.
As soon as he was done, Chef Marteau turned towards Saito and lunged, his arms as big as logs squeezing the boy's life out of him, or at least, 'amiably' doing so.
"Boy am I glad to see you!" he laughed cheerfully, moving him right and left. "I knew the moment I saw the light out of the window that it could only be Sir Louis and his magic, and I couldn't help but hope you'd be coming this way! Oh-Oh how much I prayed the Gods for it to be true!" he sighed in relief, holding the hug which was starting to turn quite awkward.
"Ahem," Bleu coughed politely. "Could we...have an explanation of what's going on here? And...presentations?"
Marteau smiled, and happily let go of Saito, "Please do come in! It's a bit cramped, but it's the best I could find in such a hurry."
And as he gestured to the room he had come out from, they stepped inside.
The room was indeed cramped, especially with Jacques.
Well, Jacques and a group of scared young children huddling together with what looked to be a beautiful, bountiful, blond-haired girl with a large hat over her head.
For a refreshing change of pace, the first one to wake up from the fatigue induced sleep turned out to be Saito. He awoke to a depressingly bleak reality of being carried between the strong arms of Jacques, rather than with his head resting on the lap of a cute girl, but he was still alive, so things couldn't be that bad.
His vision was slightly blurry, but he could make out buildings of some form.
"Uh?" Saito groaned as an aching pulse hit his head, soon followed by a full-body pain that seemed to sink deep into his muscles. "Where?" he gurgled.
"Mister Saito woke up!" Jacques said, his voice carrying quite the hurried tone in his words. Near him, Josette took a deep brief of relief.
Captain Morgan -Bleu- struck with his boot a nearby door and cracked it open, allowing them entrance before Jacques flung Saito at him, and turned to close the door with a wall of dirt. "The windows too!" Bleu exclaimed, as Saito's vision finally put in where they had ended up.
Once, it had been a normal house, perhaps a whole building filled with rooms for the poor to live in. Now though, it was as if it had come out of a splatter movie. There was blood everywhere, and bits and pieces left behind to rot away -a couple still twitching.
From upstairs, a corpse shambled its way down, only for Jeanette's daggers to easily slam through the Undead's legs, letting it fall down the remaining stairs. Josette's staff was shining a soft white light as it gingerly touched Saito's forehead, and then moved to slam with strength against the back of the Undead's neck.
The corpse remained down, finally 'dead'. Saito's body was still in pain, but he could move now, at least long enough to stand back up and take a deep breath.
The windows of the ground floor had meanwhile been barred by rock pillars, which Jacques had created with surprising ease.
"We are safe for now," Jacques said.
"Back doors?" Saito hazarded. "In zombie movies-there is always a backdoor, or a cellar-"
The rattling from a side door was soon met with Jacques' quick thrusting of both hands on the ground as the earth rippled, allowing a wave of dirt to form right in front of the door, barring it from ever being opened. The man sighed in relief.
"Well, this is clearly the difference in experience showing," Bleu said with a cheerful smile, tipping his foppish hat at Saito. "We'll be in your care once more, Mister Adventurer."
Saito nodded, his eyes looking around his 'party' for Louise. She was knocked out cold on the back of Jacques, sleeping soundly and strapped on tightly. "He-He won't wake," Josette said in a timid voice. "He's not hurt-just...tired? The Cure spell can heal wounds, and sores, but if he's unconscious-"
"It's all right, he already did a lot so he's earned his rest," Saito said with a chuckle, tapping his chest with his right fist, and letting his gauntlet reverberate against his breastplate. "Trust in me then, Adventurer Saito will see you all to safety...if someone can tell me what's going on though."
"Oh-Uhm..." Jeanette's face blushed lightly as she neared him, "W-We sort of ran all the way here," she said timidly, fidgeting with her fingers and looking shyly away. "Y-You were r-really amazing back then!" she added, both hands to her chest and her face bright red.
Compared to Josette's 'innocent cuteness', this 'maiden cuteness' was pretty much a guaranteed critical hit. Still, Saito couldn't help but hold on his ground even as he felt most of his rationale slip away.
"I-I think so too!" Josette said suddenly, her eyes all stars and shining jewels. "I-I mean, the way you went to help brother Jacques and how you swung your sword, and then you were thrown in the air like-like 'waaah'," she moved her hand up, "And then you went 'kabam! Swish! Swish-Swish-Swish!'," she made a gesture with her hands similar to 'spinning', "It was just so cool! I couldn't help but stare in amazement!"
There was the sound of broken wood, as the dirt holding the main door of the building closed began to shake.
"Let's move upstairs," Saito said. "Then we can see about getting to another building from the roof," he added.
"Uh-We are nearly out of Willpower, Mister Saito," Josette said with an 'ashamed' look. "B-But we can hold our own in a fight if it comes to that!" as she said that much resolutely, she held her staff in both of her hands, fires of determination brimming in her eyes.
"Yeah! Don't underestimate us just because we're girls," Jeanette added, the daggers she had thrown returning to her hands thanks to light breezes of wind. "We trained really hard to become great adventurers!"
Saito simply laughed as he pulled out his dagger, taking a deep breath as he felt his muscles tense and then relax. It was probably for the best if he didn't overuse his familiar power, or he'd end up fainting again and now was clearly not the time for that. As he carefully sidestepped the corpse and began to walk up the stairs, he muttered a quick prayer for the deceased, bowing his head slightly as he passed the dead body by.
The stairs creaked as the stench in the air made Saito's head feel heavy, or perhaps it was the lingering fatigue. It was impossible to knock-out an Undead, and if they were as fast as the living, then the only thing he could do was to dismember them in order to take their 'weapons' away.
This meant cutting off their heads and their arms, and hoping they wouldn't kick them to death.
Someone on the upper floors had apparently had the same idea as him, since the number of limbs that were rolling about was pretty high. Sure, the arms were merely pulling themselves across blindly, but they appeared to latch on to anything vaguely resembling a limb, forming a sort of dangerous floor he really didn't want to trudge on.
"We could levitate over them," Bleu whispered, "But Jacques' a bit too big for the hallway."
Jacques had been doing his best to 'shrink' as much as possible, but even he couldn't do miracles. He was carrying around his weapon and Louise, so-
Saito blinked. "Hey, can you make other things with your iron slab?"
Jacques gave a single nod, and thus, Saito smiled. The stairs where at the far end of the hallway, and as everyone carefully stepped aside, Jacques transformed his weapon into a 'ball'. "Now," Saito said, "We push."
Captain Bleu smiled with his rapier in hand. "I have just the spell for pushing."
"We need to conserve Willpower," Saito pointed out. "So...We push the old way."
Jacques planted both arms on the sides of the ball and gave a curt nod. "Stay behind me," he said with a grumble, Louise still peacefully asleep on his back. "I will open us a path."
And then he charged with his feet stomping on the floor, the sphere of iron crushing to paste anything on its path, even the random Undead that had peeked from a nearby room to stare at the reason for the noise coming their way. The sphere changed near the end in a morningstar of sorts, which Jacques yanked back in order to let it arc over their heads and slam down on the floor behind them, cracking it apart in a shower of splinters and creating a natural rift between them and the Undead that had begun to pour out of the doors.
"We climb," Saito said grimly at the numbers coming through the main door one floor below -and which the hole had aptly showed them. "We climb fast," he added, taking to the stairs two steps at the time.
It was as he was about to turn the corner that Josette's staff grabbed him by the feet and pulled him back, "Be careful Mister Saito!" she exclaimed as he fell down, stopping an inch away with his nose from what seemed like a wire, an absurdly sharp wire.
There were hooks planted on the floor, and wires all around the hallways. Somebody had taken great care in the job done, and as Saito couldn't help but think of a way to prevent all of this work from being destroyed -they needed to pass, but this as a way to stop the Undead seemed pretty great- a figure appeared from the other side of the hallway.
"Color me impressed," a very familiar voice said with a warm tone, "If it isn't Sir Saito!"
"M-Marteau!?" Saito exclaimed in wonder, staring at the man on the other side of the trapped hallway. "What are you doing here!?"
The ex-chef laughed, his white hat replaced with a leather cap and his figure a bit leaner than before. His armor had a slightly chewed-on appearance, and the cleavers by his belt had seen a fair share of use, but he still seemed in high spirits. "Why, surviving the end of Brimir's patience of course! What about you? Is your partner-" Louise' head peaked from Jacques' shoulder, still asleep, "Oh, I see-there he is!" he laughed. "Well, just a moment," as he said that, he moved near the hallway's side where a large wheel seemed to have been placed with a couple of nails and some bits and pieces of scrap.
As he began to turn it, the wires stopped being in tension and all fell down. "Careful with the hooks, those I can't remove!" he added as Saito managed to nimbly jump past them, the rest aptly choosing to levitate their way through. With a few quick cranks, the wires were tensed once more.
As soon as he was done, Chef Marteau turned towards Saito and lunged, his arms as big as logs squeezing the boy's life out of him, or at least, 'amiably' doing so.
"Boy am I glad to see you!" he laughed cheerfully, moving him right and left. "I knew the moment I saw the light out of the window that it could only be Sir Louis and his magic, and I couldn't help but hope you'd be coming this way! Oh-Oh how much I prayed the Gods for it to be true!" he sighed in relief, holding the hug which was starting to turn quite awkward.
"Ahem," Bleu coughed politely. "Could we...have an explanation of what's going on here? And...presentations?"
Marteau smiled, and happily let go of Saito, "Please do come in! It's a bit cramped, but it's the best I could find in such a hurry."
And as he gestured to the room he had come out from, they stepped inside.
The room was indeed cramped, especially with Jacques.
Well, Jacques and a group of scared young children huddling together with what looked to be a beautiful, bountiful, blond-haired girl with a large hat over her head.
Quadhelix
Professional Windmill Hunter
In what way?
Guess who's coming to dinner.
- Location
- NY
guess taff-chan makes her appearance.
double your familiar powa saito go go, as well as your harem size.
double your familiar powa saito go go, as well as your harem size.
Chapter Sixty-Three
- Location
- https://discord.gg/z9tBvbh
Chapter Sixty-Three
Marteau took a small breath, and smiled kindly to the worried-looking girl. "Don't you worry now, Miss Westwood, this fellow here is going to get us out of trouble real quick, him and his partner are some of the finest lads I've ever met," he winked at her, which did little to reassure the girl, but she did grow less fearful, trying an awkward, but quiet, smile.
"Well," Marteau said, "Guess I should start from the beginning. You see, Sir Saito, I was going my way when Miss Matilda, the Headmaster's secretary at Tristain's Magic Academy, stopped me asking if I wanted a job. I could feel it a mile away that it really mattered to her, but she couldn't leave to do it. I don't know how she found me so quickly since I had barely reached Tristain, but she was quite worried about her sister here," he pointed at the blonde. "She needed someone to go and fetch her from this cursed place, since it was starting to get too hot for her, but she couldn't just up and leave, and then there was the matter of the orphans which Miss Westwood, bless her heart, really, took care of-"
That would have explained the children, most of which were now quietly looking at them, a few even shyly smiling at Bleu or Jeanette's tender smiles, or at Josette's cheerful waves of her hands they answered with light giggles.
"So off I went. It wasn't hard. Being a mercenary for hire and with a past of it, I had all of my experience to go with it. She gave me this old box, saying to open it near the woods of Westwood and go around until Miss Westwood came to fetch me," here his voice dropped slightly, "I know little about magic, so I guess it's pretty standard fare to hide a fair maiden in the woods, I think."
He chuckled next, "And boy what a fair maiden, isn't she one?"
Saito couldn't help but agree with a nod, Jacques actually doing the same until Jeanette's foot stomped down so hard on his own to make him wince and freeze. Meanwhile, Louise's feet began to massage Jacques' kidneys, small muttered curses making the grown-up man swallow nervously, glad he was not the actual receiver of them.
"And that's when things started to go down the drain. It can't have been more than a few days ago, but all of a sudden, the dead didn't want to stay dead anymore. By the time I had Miss Westwood and all the orphans lined up and ready to go, well..." he swallowed thickly, "I'm just a normal man, not a knight like you or-"
"Mister Saito's a knight?!" Josette said excitedly, her eyes wide. "Woah-just like the stories!"
"Oh, ops," Marteau brought a hand to his mouth, "Shouldn't have said that?"
"It's not important," Saito replied. "What happened?" he asked next, his voice a whisper.
"I managed to reach the city gates before they closed them at least," Marteau said with a hint of pride. "Had it all set up with a friend in Londinium. You might have met him shambling downstairs, poor old Sartre retired after an arrow got him in the family jewels," all the men in the room winced in sympathy, "He was never the same afterwards, but at least he wasn't as bad as Scarron. Poor bloke lost it all to a mercenary with a large hammer that-"
"Enough-" Saito winced in sympathy, and phantom pain, "Enough."
Marteau chuckled, "Sorry, Sir Saito, it just helps to talk about lighter things-"
"Then what must have happened isn't really something we want to know," Bleu said.
Marteau took a shuddering deep breath. "I got them safely in here, but the stupid captain of the ship we had hired wouldn't budge. They weren't going to sail until the day was right, and the blockade made it all the more difficult to do so. I think the blockade's in act to keep these things down, I guess. Such a plague of Undead-one has to wonder who's the one leading them all and why. Nothing short of a plague from the Gods themselves could make this happen. Perhaps it has to do with the death of the rightful King of Albion, but those are just the tales I heard from the few that passed below our windows..."
Marteau shook his head. "I don't think any made it outside. We've been lucky we weren't planning on showing ourselves out much, what with the war and how pretty Miss Westwood is, I know how some men think just because they've got a symbol on their chests that allows them to arrest people, so I-well, I did my best," he pulled his leather cap off his head, and sighed, clutching it. "I don't know if you can, but can you at least bring a few children away with you?" he pleaded. "I know I'm asking a lot, Sir Saito, but-if there's not enough space on the ship then-"
"We don't have a ship to leave," Saito said. "We had one getting here, but-"
"But it went down," Bleu said. "However, I am a capable captain, and I am a Wind mage just like Miss Jeanette here," he tapped his chin. "If we can reach the docks, and if there's still a ship working, we can leave this blasted place behind." He sighed. "Truly, one has to wonder where the mages all went to allow for such a thing to happen-"
"They were probably the first to die," Marteau said. "It's usual fare to hit the nobles first in a battle, so the majority of them died during the civil war-and those who didn't are probably safely tucked away on the ships of the blockade, holding them aloft with Wind Magic."
"Leaving innocent people to die," Josette whispered with her hands to cover her mouth in horror, "How-How despicable!"
"It's probably because nobody thought that there could exist a mage capable of controlling so many Undead at once," Bleu said, taking his hat off and kneeling in front of 'Miss Westwood' with a warm smile, his eyes however on a young child who was clutching on to the older girl like a lifeline. "Hello, fair lady. My name is Morgan Bleu, but I am Bleu for my friends. May I have your name? I always ask the name of the people who are going to board my ship."
The child looked away from Miss Westwood's bosom with a fearful look, but at Bleu's warm smile sniffled a bit, and then whispered her name out quietly.
"Ah, that is a pretty name, Miss Marie. Now, you have nothing to fear, because you see that man over there? He's so strong, he can cut in half dragons! And that boy on my friend's back? He's so strong, he wiped out a whole army of Undead just outside the walls! I know it's night now, so it's a bit scary, but tomorrow morning, we'll all be out of this dreadful place and on a flying ship. And I'll be the captain," Bleu spoke softly, his voice not wavering once, "But I'll need someone to hold on to my spyglass for me," he added, pulling out from his breast pocket a small copper cylinder. "So-How about you become my First Mate?"
The child looked at the shiny object, and then at Bleu's smile.
She gripped at the spyglass with a small shy smile, and that was all that Bleu needed.
He stepped away next, a mouthed 'thank you' coming from Miss Westwood as the child had been the most scared of the lot.
"If Louis gets better by tomorrow," Saito said, "He can probably level up the road from here to the docks."
"That wouldn't be wise," Marteau said. "The ships that are blockading the port aren't there just for show. The only reason they haven't blown up the whole city is that it's their capital, so they kind of need it -and we're close to the palace, which means there's all sort of important documents in it, coupled with-"
"The palace is nearby?" Saito asked, his eyes now firmly determined.
"Well, yes, it's just down the street, but Sir Saito-" Marteau's words were cut off by the boy's firm shaking of his head.
"Marteau, Louis and I haven't come here just for sightseeing purposes," he said in a soft voice. "And if Louis' knocked down, then it's up to me to finish the job. I'll have better luck at night. I can't see the Undead, but the Undead can't see me in turn, can they?"
"If you say so, Sir Saito," Marteau whispered, "But if one of them acknowledges you, then they all will."
Saito shrugged. "So what if they've got a hivemind? I've survived worst odds, and the blockade-it's only on this side of the island, isn't it?"
Bleu's eyes snapped open in wide realization. "Oh-Oh I see now!" he smiled, "The Reconquista has this port blockaded, but the Royalist side might let us go if we bring them something of worth! Maybe they haven't been hit by these Undead as hard as the Reconquista has been, after all Newcastle's is a fortress city, while Londinium was a pretty big port city-there's a difference between having a moat and not having one-"
"Yes, now stop babbling. You are scaring the children with how excited you are, Captain," Jeanette said with a low hiss. "We could all go together, it would be safer-"
Saito shook his head, "You are all low on Willpower, and this is something only Louis and I can do. He's knocked out, so-" he smiled, "I'll do fine. I'll stick to the rooftops until I reach the palace. Marteau...can you lend me a couple of hooks and a rope?"
"Sir Saito...is this so important you would risk your life on it? This is quite close to suicide, and the only reason I am not saying it is, it's because I am an optimist," Marteau spoke in a whisper, as if not to scare the children.
"I'll be waiting for you lot on the rooftop of the palace once I'm done," Saito said. "Bring the ship around and you'll find me there."
"I can see I won't easily convince you otherwise," Marteau muttered, "So I can only hope whatever you're doing is worth it," he added.
Well, he was going out in the middle of the night to seek out five letters that could pretty much be hidden in secret compartments all throughout a palace more than five times a large sized mansion.
However, he didn't need to find the letters as much as ensure their destruction.
Louise was out, so there was only one thing he could do.
He just had to set the palace on fire.
He knew from experience that the kitchens of the Magic Academy had oil and fat to spare, and those things?
Those things could burn.
He couldn't help but chuckle quietly to himself at the thought that he would be greasing the walls of a palace filled with Undead just to set it on fire.
If he said so himself, this was the most suicidal plan of all suicidal plans.
Thus, it was guaranteed to work if he made it work.
Marteau took a small breath, and smiled kindly to the worried-looking girl. "Don't you worry now, Miss Westwood, this fellow here is going to get us out of trouble real quick, him and his partner are some of the finest lads I've ever met," he winked at her, which did little to reassure the girl, but she did grow less fearful, trying an awkward, but quiet, smile.
"Well," Marteau said, "Guess I should start from the beginning. You see, Sir Saito, I was going my way when Miss Matilda, the Headmaster's secretary at Tristain's Magic Academy, stopped me asking if I wanted a job. I could feel it a mile away that it really mattered to her, but she couldn't leave to do it. I don't know how she found me so quickly since I had barely reached Tristain, but she was quite worried about her sister here," he pointed at the blonde. "She needed someone to go and fetch her from this cursed place, since it was starting to get too hot for her, but she couldn't just up and leave, and then there was the matter of the orphans which Miss Westwood, bless her heart, really, took care of-"
That would have explained the children, most of which were now quietly looking at them, a few even shyly smiling at Bleu or Jeanette's tender smiles, or at Josette's cheerful waves of her hands they answered with light giggles.
"So off I went. It wasn't hard. Being a mercenary for hire and with a past of it, I had all of my experience to go with it. She gave me this old box, saying to open it near the woods of Westwood and go around until Miss Westwood came to fetch me," here his voice dropped slightly, "I know little about magic, so I guess it's pretty standard fare to hide a fair maiden in the woods, I think."
He chuckled next, "And boy what a fair maiden, isn't she one?"
Saito couldn't help but agree with a nod, Jacques actually doing the same until Jeanette's foot stomped down so hard on his own to make him wince and freeze. Meanwhile, Louise's feet began to massage Jacques' kidneys, small muttered curses making the grown-up man swallow nervously, glad he was not the actual receiver of them.
"And that's when things started to go down the drain. It can't have been more than a few days ago, but all of a sudden, the dead didn't want to stay dead anymore. By the time I had Miss Westwood and all the orphans lined up and ready to go, well..." he swallowed thickly, "I'm just a normal man, not a knight like you or-"
"Mister Saito's a knight?!" Josette said excitedly, her eyes wide. "Woah-just like the stories!"
"Oh, ops," Marteau brought a hand to his mouth, "Shouldn't have said that?"
"It's not important," Saito replied. "What happened?" he asked next, his voice a whisper.
"I managed to reach the city gates before they closed them at least," Marteau said with a hint of pride. "Had it all set up with a friend in Londinium. You might have met him shambling downstairs, poor old Sartre retired after an arrow got him in the family jewels," all the men in the room winced in sympathy, "He was never the same afterwards, but at least he wasn't as bad as Scarron. Poor bloke lost it all to a mercenary with a large hammer that-"
"Enough-" Saito winced in sympathy, and phantom pain, "Enough."
Marteau chuckled, "Sorry, Sir Saito, it just helps to talk about lighter things-"
"Then what must have happened isn't really something we want to know," Bleu said.
Marteau took a shuddering deep breath. "I got them safely in here, but the stupid captain of the ship we had hired wouldn't budge. They weren't going to sail until the day was right, and the blockade made it all the more difficult to do so. I think the blockade's in act to keep these things down, I guess. Such a plague of Undead-one has to wonder who's the one leading them all and why. Nothing short of a plague from the Gods themselves could make this happen. Perhaps it has to do with the death of the rightful King of Albion, but those are just the tales I heard from the few that passed below our windows..."
Marteau shook his head. "I don't think any made it outside. We've been lucky we weren't planning on showing ourselves out much, what with the war and how pretty Miss Westwood is, I know how some men think just because they've got a symbol on their chests that allows them to arrest people, so I-well, I did my best," he pulled his leather cap off his head, and sighed, clutching it. "I don't know if you can, but can you at least bring a few children away with you?" he pleaded. "I know I'm asking a lot, Sir Saito, but-if there's not enough space on the ship then-"
"We don't have a ship to leave," Saito said. "We had one getting here, but-"
"But it went down," Bleu said. "However, I am a capable captain, and I am a Wind mage just like Miss Jeanette here," he tapped his chin. "If we can reach the docks, and if there's still a ship working, we can leave this blasted place behind." He sighed. "Truly, one has to wonder where the mages all went to allow for such a thing to happen-"
"They were probably the first to die," Marteau said. "It's usual fare to hit the nobles first in a battle, so the majority of them died during the civil war-and those who didn't are probably safely tucked away on the ships of the blockade, holding them aloft with Wind Magic."
"Leaving innocent people to die," Josette whispered with her hands to cover her mouth in horror, "How-How despicable!"
"It's probably because nobody thought that there could exist a mage capable of controlling so many Undead at once," Bleu said, taking his hat off and kneeling in front of 'Miss Westwood' with a warm smile, his eyes however on a young child who was clutching on to the older girl like a lifeline. "Hello, fair lady. My name is Morgan Bleu, but I am Bleu for my friends. May I have your name? I always ask the name of the people who are going to board my ship."
The child looked away from Miss Westwood's bosom with a fearful look, but at Bleu's warm smile sniffled a bit, and then whispered her name out quietly.
"Ah, that is a pretty name, Miss Marie. Now, you have nothing to fear, because you see that man over there? He's so strong, he can cut in half dragons! And that boy on my friend's back? He's so strong, he wiped out a whole army of Undead just outside the walls! I know it's night now, so it's a bit scary, but tomorrow morning, we'll all be out of this dreadful place and on a flying ship. And I'll be the captain," Bleu spoke softly, his voice not wavering once, "But I'll need someone to hold on to my spyglass for me," he added, pulling out from his breast pocket a small copper cylinder. "So-How about you become my First Mate?"
The child looked at the shiny object, and then at Bleu's smile.
She gripped at the spyglass with a small shy smile, and that was all that Bleu needed.
He stepped away next, a mouthed 'thank you' coming from Miss Westwood as the child had been the most scared of the lot.
"If Louis gets better by tomorrow," Saito said, "He can probably level up the road from here to the docks."
"That wouldn't be wise," Marteau said. "The ships that are blockading the port aren't there just for show. The only reason they haven't blown up the whole city is that it's their capital, so they kind of need it -and we're close to the palace, which means there's all sort of important documents in it, coupled with-"
"The palace is nearby?" Saito asked, his eyes now firmly determined.
"Well, yes, it's just down the street, but Sir Saito-" Marteau's words were cut off by the boy's firm shaking of his head.
"Marteau, Louis and I haven't come here just for sightseeing purposes," he said in a soft voice. "And if Louis' knocked down, then it's up to me to finish the job. I'll have better luck at night. I can't see the Undead, but the Undead can't see me in turn, can they?"
"If you say so, Sir Saito," Marteau whispered, "But if one of them acknowledges you, then they all will."
Saito shrugged. "So what if they've got a hivemind? I've survived worst odds, and the blockade-it's only on this side of the island, isn't it?"
Bleu's eyes snapped open in wide realization. "Oh-Oh I see now!" he smiled, "The Reconquista has this port blockaded, but the Royalist side might let us go if we bring them something of worth! Maybe they haven't been hit by these Undead as hard as the Reconquista has been, after all Newcastle's is a fortress city, while Londinium was a pretty big port city-there's a difference between having a moat and not having one-"
"Yes, now stop babbling. You are scaring the children with how excited you are, Captain," Jeanette said with a low hiss. "We could all go together, it would be safer-"
Saito shook his head, "You are all low on Willpower, and this is something only Louis and I can do. He's knocked out, so-" he smiled, "I'll do fine. I'll stick to the rooftops until I reach the palace. Marteau...can you lend me a couple of hooks and a rope?"
"Sir Saito...is this so important you would risk your life on it? This is quite close to suicide, and the only reason I am not saying it is, it's because I am an optimist," Marteau spoke in a whisper, as if not to scare the children.
"I'll be waiting for you lot on the rooftop of the palace once I'm done," Saito said. "Bring the ship around and you'll find me there."
"I can see I won't easily convince you otherwise," Marteau muttered, "So I can only hope whatever you're doing is worth it," he added.
Well, he was going out in the middle of the night to seek out five letters that could pretty much be hidden in secret compartments all throughout a palace more than five times a large sized mansion.
However, he didn't need to find the letters as much as ensure their destruction.
Louise was out, so there was only one thing he could do.
He just had to set the palace on fire.
He knew from experience that the kitchens of the Magic Academy had oil and fat to spare, and those things?
Those things could burn.
He couldn't help but chuckle quietly to himself at the thought that he would be greasing the walls of a palace filled with Undead just to set it on fire.
If he said so himself, this was the most suicidal plan of all suicidal plans.
Thus, it was guaranteed to work if he made it work.
Ars Poetica
ULTIMA RATIO NEMO OBLIGATUR
- Location
- The Kingdom of Fiore
- Pronouns
- He / Him / His
Ah, burning down a palace to deal with some pesky bits of information in the middle of a medieval zombie apocalypse. Truly this is the work of mainstream Shade.
Parselmaster
Silent Balancing Scale
- Location
- Mid-West, USA
Shade... I am loving this, but seriously... Are you possessed by your muse? I just keep getting a battery of alerts for updates to this gem.
Being farther north (in winter) will do this. Having higher altitude would clear you of the horizon faster, so you'd see the sun earlier and longer.
Silver W. King
King of Adventures
- Location
- The Nasuverse
Holy shit, why does Saito sound so goddamn badass all of a sudden?
- Pronouns
- she/her
Honestly not sure why Saito cares about completing the mission so much, or why he thinks all five of the letters are in the palace, or why he can't wait for Louise to wake up and his runes to recharge before attempting his suicidal plan based entirely off assumptions.
You have glow-in-the-dark runes on your hand, idiot. But I wish you good fucking luck attempting an instant-failure on detection stealth mission with normal stats.
The only suspicious light that's been cast on his earlier behavior is on his initial desire to protect Louise, as the runes have been shown to move him in his sleep to protect her with lethal force. But even if the initial spark was caused by the runes they ended up forming a real bond pretty quickly.
Last edited:
- Location
- NY
saito really was a badass when you think about it, it is canon that he literally held off a 30k+ army by himself.
Though his later feats get mixed in with modern day weapons.
as for sneaking, the runes shouldn't be a issue as he could just wear a glove over that hand or fingerless gloves if he needs skin contact.
though his other hand could just hold a weapon and trigger as well.
Though his later feats get mixed in with modern day weapons.
as for sneaking, the runes shouldn't be a issue as he could just wear a glove over that hand or fingerless gloves if he needs skin contact.
though his other hand could just hold a weapon and trigger as well.
RazorSmile
ROB Used To Be A Knife Missile
I think this here is what they refer to as Insane Logic Logic. No Trolls necessary.
Chapter Sixty-Four
- Location
- https://discord.gg/z9tBvbh
Chapter Sixty-Four
Hiraga Saito was not a spy. He had not trained in parkour. He knew absolutely nothing about how to pick a lock, or how to appear inconspicuous in a crowd of dead people. All that he knew was that as long as he held a weapon in his hand, he could go faster than normal, swing harder than normal, and do things slightly better than normal.
Sometimes he also did thing quite inhumanly better than usual, but those were rare exceptions.
True to his thoughts, the Undead were shambling all around the roads below, but not one of them had reached for the rooftops. A few times, Saito had to hide and hold his breath inside a chimney as an Undead Dragon had flown about, but after the second time, he had emerged so covered in soot he could easily blend in with the surroundings.
It was if nobody bothered cleaning their chimneys.
Course, he had climbed his way up to the roof by crawling inside a chimney, dagger clutched tightly in his right hand, but the runes' flicker was easily hidden with a good dose of soot and dust.
Saito was glad he wasn't allergic to it.
He was also glad he had grabbed the rope and the hook, because swinging from one rooftop to the other wasn't always easy, and his knees were starting to plead with him for mercy -a mercy he could not concede them.
If he had to ponder on why he was doing it, then the answer would be pretty simple.
He was doing it for Louise's well-being. This mission was important for her and her family's future, and while it was true that she had been the one to bring him over, he had been the one to touch the damn green portal. They had gone through enough stuff together now that it was long since past the 'recriminating' phase. It had happened, it was water under the bridge, it was time to turn a new leaf.
So now he was doing it because he was genuinely trying to help his friend, Louise, who would be in a pinch if they failed to complete the mission. He also was relatively sure that if he started a big bonfire, it would keep the ships of Reconquista busy with it, and allow them to leave far more easily. Maybe it would even break the blockade, making it possible to head straight for Tristain on the double.
That was, of course, if the letters were in the palace and not aboard one of the ships.
But while Saito couldn't be sure the letters were inside the palace, it was better to just burn it down as a safety and then proceed from there. It wasn't like they could prove it was Tristain that set their palace on fire in the middle of a frigging zombie apocalypse. And if the letters were indeed there, then it would all be for the best. If they weren't, then Reconquista was still going to lose whatever there was of precious inside their 'government' seat.
And if the Cardinal wasn't satisfied by that? Then he'd just have to send a group of templars to do the job with their holy light spells that did extra damage to the Undead, because this was the most he could do.
The palace was, surprisingly, not on a hill. It had been built with a large square in front of it that gave no cover, and the amount of Undead that were rummaging around made it pretty clear that when they had attacked, a lot of people had tried to enter the palace to stay safe. There were crude barricades in place, but the gates had been trampled and opened up, and a few Undead dragons swished their tails around the gardens, monsters of various nature pretty much doing the same.
The main gate and front doors had been pried open by a powerful force, and it was pretty clear that the ground floor would be packed to the brim with corpses. Saito clutched the dagger with one hand and the hook and rope with the other. He slid down the rooftop of the house closest to the palace's wall, and then rushed across the street like a blur, jumping and throwing at the same time his hook, allowing it to grip against one of the windows' iron bars of the first two floors.
He didn't stop there though, his feet planted on the surface of the wall began to move upwards, his free hand easily holding on to the rope. Marteau sure knew his way around knots. Had he been a sailor, perhaps?
As Saito climbed up, he planted his feet on the window's bars, and held both of his hands up to the ledge of the third floor window, not touching it by a good hand. Taking a deep breath, his eyes tearing up from the effort in his muscles, he flexed his legs and jumped, holding on to the ledge and pulling the rest of his body up.
He came thus face to face with an Undead on the other side of the window, both of its eye-sockets empty and yet staring at Saito's very soul. The boy had the dagger between his teeth, which was the only reason he didn't scream in fear, and merely tightened the hold on the ledge.
His breathing erratic, his heart pumping at a thousand miles, he pushed the rest of his body on the ledge, and then looked to the side, where a small decorative balcony was. He jumped, pushing with his right hand against the wall for an added push. His feet landed on the ledge, but his arms flailed as he ended up nearly losing his balance on the wet marble. Holding on to the side of the wall with his left hand, he took a deep breath, carefully pulling himself back up.
He spat the dagger back into his left hand, and proceeded to fiddle with the lock. It always worked like this in movies. There was the iron hook that went into the iron circle, and if one managed to pull it out with a thin enough-and the window was open.
Saito felt like a moron, and would have slapped himself on the forehead if not for the fact making any noise, especially with a blind Undead just a window away, was not a smart move.
He crawled inside slowly, letting the light of the twin moons illuminate the room he was in. It was a sort of small congress hall, with lots of wooden seats flung aside and a few corpses rolling about on the floor, mostly moving back and forth between a clattering window and the rustling pages of a book.
Careful not to make too much noise, he walked on the lush carpet below him a single step at the time. The kitchens would be in the back, on the ground floor. The servants always came in from behind, and if he could find one of those 'servants' service tunnels that led from the kitchens directly into the dining rooms, then he'd be set for a quick job.
Marteau had explained to him that it didn't really matter if he greased the whole building. He just needed to burn down enough of it that the rest would crumble anyway. Grease fire wasn't easy to put out, and there was always a barrel of grease in the kitchens.
A lone shadow passed over Saito, making the boy cling to the wall he had been following until then. An undead Gryphon cawed slightly from the rooftop nearby, and then flapped both of its wings, one of the two half torn off, and flew away. Holding his breath, Saito kept walking.
He had a faint hint of a plan, and not even a map of the place.
On the other hand, he could walk from one side to the other of the palace, and climb down.
The Undead weren't really thick in numbers within the palace's upper floors however, but again, perhaps the nobles had held on long enough to be evacuated aboard the flying ships, leaving behind only those too slow to reach the rooftops.
It was possible that the higher Saito went, the less Undead he'd find.
He opened the window and looked down, his expression one of mirth as he saw a treetop reaching all the way to the second floor, which meant that if he dropped from there, he could safely land in the palace's backyard.
It would then be a matter of finding the kitchens, but he could do this.
Clenching his left fist around the window's curtain, Saito swiftly sliced away most of it, proceeding to tie an extremity to a door's handle, and clutch on to the other side as he dropped down to the second floor.
He could have tried circling the palace whole, now that he thought about it, but this way was probably safer. 'Probably' being a key term, since in survival games with zombies, one never knew when they'd pop out from the shadows.
Case in point, Saito had been expecting a 'scare-jump' the moment he found the servants' door for the kitchen, and as he slowly opened it, the back of the chef came into view. The chef was a portly man, who had died and was now standing there with his eyes looking at the broken down door where a barricade made of the kitchen's table hadn't been enough.
Keeping his breath steady, and glad the man hadn't turned at the noise of the door opening, Saito went back outside.
A rock in hand, he hit the trunk of it lightly while hiding behind the door.
As expected, the Undead Chef rushed for the noise with a quick gait, stopping only once it became clear it had been nothing more than a branch rustling about. Perhaps alerted by the Chef's movement, a few more hidden Undead came out from the corners of the kitchen, drawing near to the man's frame in front of the tree trunk.
Well...that had been a lucky choice.
Stepping inside, Saito proceeded to most aptly close the door of the kitchen. He wasn't going to make it back up the same way he had made it down with a barrel of grease, and he doubted he could pretty much lift a whole barrel of it.
What he could do was grab a pot very, very quietly and fill it up, before quietly driving the dagger through the wood with a few sharp turns -as if it were a screwdriver- and let the grease pour out on the floor. He stepped back, and moved near the ashes of the once burning cooking fires.
How did the chefs lit so many fires at the same time?
And the answer was easy.
'Magic'.
Chefs had a magical version of 'matches' which lit up with the push of a button. At least, high-class chefs had such a thing. Those who didn't had good and old sulfur matches that did pretty much the same. Saito was incapable of doing a lot of things, but he was more than capable of lightning up a match. As he carefully made his way out of the kitchen through the broken door in front of him, he kept dripping grease on the floor as far as he could.
The whole purpose of 'Servants Quarters' was to keep them as separated as possible from the 'Nobles Quarters', which meant that while there were stairs that led directly up to the Nobles' rooms, they were for the most part centered around the maid side of the Servants Quarters.
A small curtain did in fact cover up a stairway that went upwards right outside the dorms of the female servants, and Saito didn't have to bother looking for a map because the Undead lingering around that area were positively female.
The grease finished, the pot empty, Saito lit the match up and watched as the fire began to spread, before throwing the pot straight against the head of the female servant closest to the stairs, taking that moment of distraction to literally disappear up the servant's stairway.
First part of the plan, setting fire to the palace, was now underway.
The second part of his great plan, 'find out where the letters are while making your way to the rooftop' could now begin in earnest.
There were a lot of flaws in his plan, like, for example, the presence of flying Undead who could reach the rooftop, or the flames propagating faster than he could climb the floors, or the risk of more Undead piling up on him than he could face, but all of those neat drawbacks and flaws to his 'great plan' didn't enter Saito's mind one bit.
He had to reach the top floor.
He just had to.
Hiraga Saito was not a spy. He had not trained in parkour. He knew absolutely nothing about how to pick a lock, or how to appear inconspicuous in a crowd of dead people. All that he knew was that as long as he held a weapon in his hand, he could go faster than normal, swing harder than normal, and do things slightly better than normal.
Sometimes he also did thing quite inhumanly better than usual, but those were rare exceptions.
True to his thoughts, the Undead were shambling all around the roads below, but not one of them had reached for the rooftops. A few times, Saito had to hide and hold his breath inside a chimney as an Undead Dragon had flown about, but after the second time, he had emerged so covered in soot he could easily blend in with the surroundings.
It was if nobody bothered cleaning their chimneys.
Course, he had climbed his way up to the roof by crawling inside a chimney, dagger clutched tightly in his right hand, but the runes' flicker was easily hidden with a good dose of soot and dust.
Saito was glad he wasn't allergic to it.
He was also glad he had grabbed the rope and the hook, because swinging from one rooftop to the other wasn't always easy, and his knees were starting to plead with him for mercy -a mercy he could not concede them.
If he had to ponder on why he was doing it, then the answer would be pretty simple.
He was doing it for Louise's well-being. This mission was important for her and her family's future, and while it was true that she had been the one to bring him over, he had been the one to touch the damn green portal. They had gone through enough stuff together now that it was long since past the 'recriminating' phase. It had happened, it was water under the bridge, it was time to turn a new leaf.
So now he was doing it because he was genuinely trying to help his friend, Louise, who would be in a pinch if they failed to complete the mission. He also was relatively sure that if he started a big bonfire, it would keep the ships of Reconquista busy with it, and allow them to leave far more easily. Maybe it would even break the blockade, making it possible to head straight for Tristain on the double.
That was, of course, if the letters were in the palace and not aboard one of the ships.
But while Saito couldn't be sure the letters were inside the palace, it was better to just burn it down as a safety and then proceed from there. It wasn't like they could prove it was Tristain that set their palace on fire in the middle of a frigging zombie apocalypse. And if the letters were indeed there, then it would all be for the best. If they weren't, then Reconquista was still going to lose whatever there was of precious inside their 'government' seat.
And if the Cardinal wasn't satisfied by that? Then he'd just have to send a group of templars to do the job with their holy light spells that did extra damage to the Undead, because this was the most he could do.
The palace was, surprisingly, not on a hill. It had been built with a large square in front of it that gave no cover, and the amount of Undead that were rummaging around made it pretty clear that when they had attacked, a lot of people had tried to enter the palace to stay safe. There were crude barricades in place, but the gates had been trampled and opened up, and a few Undead dragons swished their tails around the gardens, monsters of various nature pretty much doing the same.
The main gate and front doors had been pried open by a powerful force, and it was pretty clear that the ground floor would be packed to the brim with corpses. Saito clutched the dagger with one hand and the hook and rope with the other. He slid down the rooftop of the house closest to the palace's wall, and then rushed across the street like a blur, jumping and throwing at the same time his hook, allowing it to grip against one of the windows' iron bars of the first two floors.
He didn't stop there though, his feet planted on the surface of the wall began to move upwards, his free hand easily holding on to the rope. Marteau sure knew his way around knots. Had he been a sailor, perhaps?
As Saito climbed up, he planted his feet on the window's bars, and held both of his hands up to the ledge of the third floor window, not touching it by a good hand. Taking a deep breath, his eyes tearing up from the effort in his muscles, he flexed his legs and jumped, holding on to the ledge and pulling the rest of his body up.
He came thus face to face with an Undead on the other side of the window, both of its eye-sockets empty and yet staring at Saito's very soul. The boy had the dagger between his teeth, which was the only reason he didn't scream in fear, and merely tightened the hold on the ledge.
His breathing erratic, his heart pumping at a thousand miles, he pushed the rest of his body on the ledge, and then looked to the side, where a small decorative balcony was. He jumped, pushing with his right hand against the wall for an added push. His feet landed on the ledge, but his arms flailed as he ended up nearly losing his balance on the wet marble. Holding on to the side of the wall with his left hand, he took a deep breath, carefully pulling himself back up.
He spat the dagger back into his left hand, and proceeded to fiddle with the lock. It always worked like this in movies. There was the iron hook that went into the iron circle, and if one managed to pull it out with a thin enough-and the window was open.
Saito felt like a moron, and would have slapped himself on the forehead if not for the fact making any noise, especially with a blind Undead just a window away, was not a smart move.
He crawled inside slowly, letting the light of the twin moons illuminate the room he was in. It was a sort of small congress hall, with lots of wooden seats flung aside and a few corpses rolling about on the floor, mostly moving back and forth between a clattering window and the rustling pages of a book.
Careful not to make too much noise, he walked on the lush carpet below him a single step at the time. The kitchens would be in the back, on the ground floor. The servants always came in from behind, and if he could find one of those 'servants' service tunnels that led from the kitchens directly into the dining rooms, then he'd be set for a quick job.
Marteau had explained to him that it didn't really matter if he greased the whole building. He just needed to burn down enough of it that the rest would crumble anyway. Grease fire wasn't easy to put out, and there was always a barrel of grease in the kitchens.
A lone shadow passed over Saito, making the boy cling to the wall he had been following until then. An undead Gryphon cawed slightly from the rooftop nearby, and then flapped both of its wings, one of the two half torn off, and flew away. Holding his breath, Saito kept walking.
He had a faint hint of a plan, and not even a map of the place.
On the other hand, he could walk from one side to the other of the palace, and climb down.
The Undead weren't really thick in numbers within the palace's upper floors however, but again, perhaps the nobles had held on long enough to be evacuated aboard the flying ships, leaving behind only those too slow to reach the rooftops.
It was possible that the higher Saito went, the less Undead he'd find.
He opened the window and looked down, his expression one of mirth as he saw a treetop reaching all the way to the second floor, which meant that if he dropped from there, he could safely land in the palace's backyard.
It would then be a matter of finding the kitchens, but he could do this.
Clenching his left fist around the window's curtain, Saito swiftly sliced away most of it, proceeding to tie an extremity to a door's handle, and clutch on to the other side as he dropped down to the second floor.
He could have tried circling the palace whole, now that he thought about it, but this way was probably safer. 'Probably' being a key term, since in survival games with zombies, one never knew when they'd pop out from the shadows.
Case in point, Saito had been expecting a 'scare-jump' the moment he found the servants' door for the kitchen, and as he slowly opened it, the back of the chef came into view. The chef was a portly man, who had died and was now standing there with his eyes looking at the broken down door where a barricade made of the kitchen's table hadn't been enough.
Keeping his breath steady, and glad the man hadn't turned at the noise of the door opening, Saito went back outside.
A rock in hand, he hit the trunk of it lightly while hiding behind the door.
As expected, the Undead Chef rushed for the noise with a quick gait, stopping only once it became clear it had been nothing more than a branch rustling about. Perhaps alerted by the Chef's movement, a few more hidden Undead came out from the corners of the kitchen, drawing near to the man's frame in front of the tree trunk.
Well...that had been a lucky choice.
Stepping inside, Saito proceeded to most aptly close the door of the kitchen. He wasn't going to make it back up the same way he had made it down with a barrel of grease, and he doubted he could pretty much lift a whole barrel of it.
What he could do was grab a pot very, very quietly and fill it up, before quietly driving the dagger through the wood with a few sharp turns -as if it were a screwdriver- and let the grease pour out on the floor. He stepped back, and moved near the ashes of the once burning cooking fires.
How did the chefs lit so many fires at the same time?
And the answer was easy.
'Magic'.
Chefs had a magical version of 'matches' which lit up with the push of a button. At least, high-class chefs had such a thing. Those who didn't had good and old sulfur matches that did pretty much the same. Saito was incapable of doing a lot of things, but he was more than capable of lightning up a match. As he carefully made his way out of the kitchen through the broken door in front of him, he kept dripping grease on the floor as far as he could.
The whole purpose of 'Servants Quarters' was to keep them as separated as possible from the 'Nobles Quarters', which meant that while there were stairs that led directly up to the Nobles' rooms, they were for the most part centered around the maid side of the Servants Quarters.
A small curtain did in fact cover up a stairway that went upwards right outside the dorms of the female servants, and Saito didn't have to bother looking for a map because the Undead lingering around that area were positively female.
The grease finished, the pot empty, Saito lit the match up and watched as the fire began to spread, before throwing the pot straight against the head of the female servant closest to the stairs, taking that moment of distraction to literally disappear up the servant's stairway.
First part of the plan, setting fire to the palace, was now underway.
The second part of his great plan, 'find out where the letters are while making your way to the rooftop' could now begin in earnest.
There were a lot of flaws in his plan, like, for example, the presence of flying Undead who could reach the rooftop, or the flames propagating faster than he could climb the floors, or the risk of more Undead piling up on him than he could face, but all of those neat drawbacks and flaws to his 'great plan' didn't enter Saito's mind one bit.
He had to reach the top floor.
He just had to.
In what way?
Guess who's coming to dinner.
From the beginning, Saito has been a complete doormat. He doesn't even lash out at her in his own head. At no point has he snapped in the tinest way from all of Louise's shit to the immense amount of psychological pressure he should have been in since he was summoned. Him being Japanese had nothing to do with his cultural norms. Said cultural norms were being used to stereotype Saito, and I think even if they were true they don't apply to this fic. Louise was a complete stranger, not a figure of any kind of authority, and another individual =/= "society". And lastly, Saito is supposed to be an otaku like the target audience of the LN, and those are outcasts of society. Someone said Saito was a doormat because of his culture, and it was as wrong as it is now.
It seems @shadenight123 is going against the trope of the Gandalfr being OP like in most fanfics and Louise not discovering her Void powers until much, much later. Rather, Louise is already a pretty powerful void mage already and Gandalfr is just okay.
Dragonskyt
Ashen one, hearest thou my voice, still?
- Location
- Kiln of the First Flame
Looks like Saito has been playing some Dying Light...
Chapter Sixty-Five
- Location
- https://discord.gg/z9tBvbh
Chapter Sixty-Five
Saito's luck ran dry the moment he stepped out of the servant's stairway. The servants themselves would have thought about using such a method to quickly escape together with the nobles, so the nobles had, in turn, done something to prevent the majority of servants from slowing them down.
They had simply put up walls of rock and dirt and allowed the Undead to eat the servants, even as they had probably begged for help.
The walls had then crumbled, but the vast amount of Undead that surrounded Saito the second he stepped out of the stairway told him that the second floor was not a place to stay by idly, or to stay by at all.
Undead were as fast as they had been in life, only without that silly thing known as 'having to catch one's breath'.
Saito needed to catch his breath, but he could outpace all of them, especially so if he took an alternative route that the Undead couldn't follow. When the cawing sound of a Gryphon was accompanied by the beast slamming through the window, squawking indignantly at his sight, just like the rest of the Undead hot on his heels, Saito did not hesitate.
To hesitate was to die, especially when you were running from a horde of hungry brain-eaters.
So, Saito jumped right out of the broken window, the Gryphon pursuing him with both of its rotten wings flapping open. The boy hadn't jumped however meaning to go right ahead, but had jumped with the intention of doing a back flip once his feet had firmly planted themselves on the ledge of the window.
He did just that, like an Olympic athlete who was doing the tall-jump, and held on to the ledge of the window of the floor above. The horde one floor below could jump, but not as tall as him. The Undead dragons that stalked the rooftops, apparently, could simply jump down and roar at him.
Perhaps yes, he should have thought a lot more about his great plan of 'finding the letters'. No, seriously, he should have.
He couldn't though, not when he was just about to become dragon-food. As the dragon came for him though, Saito jumped right atop his snout, and without even breathing, proceeded to rush across the whole length of the creature's body, jumping off its tail and landing straight through the window on the other side of the courtyard, cracking it open and covering himself in deadly glass shrapnel.
The wounds were many, but none deadly -and he wasn't wearing armor just for sport.
If only he hadn't dropped his shield back with the ship, perhaps he would have had more luck. Still, he couldn't stop and ponder about it. His heart was beating like crazy, and time was running out. The dragons were turning towards him, but then they stopped with their heads through the broken window, growling and snarling and sniffing the air.
Saito was not on their radars any longer.
With a last threatening growl, the Undead dragons snarled and returned back up to the rooftops, leaving a frozen in place Saito to bless the back of the full-plate armor that was a lonely block of fused iron standing there just as decoration, but good enough to block out the sight of the Undead dragons.
Him being covered in soot, ashes and smelling like grease had probably helped.
Carefully sliding free of the armor, he could see the plumes of smoke emerging from the first floor where the kitchens were, the popping explosions of the barrels of oil and grease mixing together into a fire that could hardly be doused with mere water.
The Undead didn't even seem to care that they were on fire, and as Saito waited a brief second to watch, a burning maid simply shambled about uncaring, spreading the fire across the furniture and the paintings, not really caring either way.
Maybe he should have thought the plan through better.
"Up we go," Saito whispered to himself, quietly sticking close to the wall. He really should have been looking out for the stairs, or for indication on where the stairs were. By the time he did find the stairs up to the fourth floor, the fire had already spread to the second floor, and didn't seem inclined to stop.
Well, if he said so himself, the 'set fire to the palace' part of his plan was getting along quite nicely.
It also helped that the Undead had no sense of self-preservation at all, utterly not caring about whether the flames were burning them to ashes or not.
The fourth floor wasn't the last by a long shot, but it had way less rooms, and way more stacks of paper. If the fires spread up to this floor, then the palace turning into a charred crisp would be pretty much set in stone.
The few Undead that shambled about weren't even much of a trouble, mostly rotten or outright putrefied. Whatever 'plague' there had been, the oldest Undead had come from here. Maybe this explained why it had turned the city so quickly into a death trap. It hadn't spread from the outside to the inside, but from the inside to the outside, striking the mages first and then moving on to the commoners, hitting the 'army' stationed outside last.
It didn't explain how Marteau had managed to get everyone into the city at first with no one none the wiser, unless the Undead had been corralled outside to meet with the army, and spread it there and then?
Marteau had said the 'Undead' could be controlled. But for it to spread in such a way, such a wicked, desired, way...
The fifth floor was pretty much the last floor of the palace of Londinium, and the main office of the Reconquista's resistance was at the far end of a hallway that had no guards, and no people, remaining.
Saito couldn't help but feel unease at the sound of a soft, female sobbing coming from beyond the door however.
He knew about ghosts, and specters, and he had heard of female wraiths, and potentially there were a lot of creatures that could appear as females -like demons, Saito knew demons were real-ish in this world, something about an old flame of Louise's father being one, or something of the sorts. He hadn't asked for clarification when the man had threatened his manhood if he tried anything untoward with his daughter, and had cited what he had done to that old 'demon-possessed' flame of his.
All that Saito knew was that a sobbing woman, at the heart of a Zombie Plague, could not be a good sign.
He simply had to be careful not to startle the Witch then.
Saito's luck ran dry the moment he stepped out of the servant's stairway. The servants themselves would have thought about using such a method to quickly escape together with the nobles, so the nobles had, in turn, done something to prevent the majority of servants from slowing them down.
They had simply put up walls of rock and dirt and allowed the Undead to eat the servants, even as they had probably begged for help.
The walls had then crumbled, but the vast amount of Undead that surrounded Saito the second he stepped out of the stairway told him that the second floor was not a place to stay by idly, or to stay by at all.
Undead were as fast as they had been in life, only without that silly thing known as 'having to catch one's breath'.
Saito needed to catch his breath, but he could outpace all of them, especially so if he took an alternative route that the Undead couldn't follow. When the cawing sound of a Gryphon was accompanied by the beast slamming through the window, squawking indignantly at his sight, just like the rest of the Undead hot on his heels, Saito did not hesitate.
To hesitate was to die, especially when you were running from a horde of hungry brain-eaters.
So, Saito jumped right out of the broken window, the Gryphon pursuing him with both of its rotten wings flapping open. The boy hadn't jumped however meaning to go right ahead, but had jumped with the intention of doing a back flip once his feet had firmly planted themselves on the ledge of the window.
He did just that, like an Olympic athlete who was doing the tall-jump, and held on to the ledge of the window of the floor above. The horde one floor below could jump, but not as tall as him. The Undead dragons that stalked the rooftops, apparently, could simply jump down and roar at him.
Perhaps yes, he should have thought a lot more about his great plan of 'finding the letters'. No, seriously, he should have.
He couldn't though, not when he was just about to become dragon-food. As the dragon came for him though, Saito jumped right atop his snout, and without even breathing, proceeded to rush across the whole length of the creature's body, jumping off its tail and landing straight through the window on the other side of the courtyard, cracking it open and covering himself in deadly glass shrapnel.
The wounds were many, but none deadly -and he wasn't wearing armor just for sport.
If only he hadn't dropped his shield back with the ship, perhaps he would have had more luck. Still, he couldn't stop and ponder about it. His heart was beating like crazy, and time was running out. The dragons were turning towards him, but then they stopped with their heads through the broken window, growling and snarling and sniffing the air.
Saito was not on their radars any longer.
With a last threatening growl, the Undead dragons snarled and returned back up to the rooftops, leaving a frozen in place Saito to bless the back of the full-plate armor that was a lonely block of fused iron standing there just as decoration, but good enough to block out the sight of the Undead dragons.
Him being covered in soot, ashes and smelling like grease had probably helped.
Carefully sliding free of the armor, he could see the plumes of smoke emerging from the first floor where the kitchens were, the popping explosions of the barrels of oil and grease mixing together into a fire that could hardly be doused with mere water.
The Undead didn't even seem to care that they were on fire, and as Saito waited a brief second to watch, a burning maid simply shambled about uncaring, spreading the fire across the furniture and the paintings, not really caring either way.
Maybe he should have thought the plan through better.
"Up we go," Saito whispered to himself, quietly sticking close to the wall. He really should have been looking out for the stairs, or for indication on where the stairs were. By the time he did find the stairs up to the fourth floor, the fire had already spread to the second floor, and didn't seem inclined to stop.
Well, if he said so himself, the 'set fire to the palace' part of his plan was getting along quite nicely.
It also helped that the Undead had no sense of self-preservation at all, utterly not caring about whether the flames were burning them to ashes or not.
The fourth floor wasn't the last by a long shot, but it had way less rooms, and way more stacks of paper. If the fires spread up to this floor, then the palace turning into a charred crisp would be pretty much set in stone.
The few Undead that shambled about weren't even much of a trouble, mostly rotten or outright putrefied. Whatever 'plague' there had been, the oldest Undead had come from here. Maybe this explained why it had turned the city so quickly into a death trap. It hadn't spread from the outside to the inside, but from the inside to the outside, striking the mages first and then moving on to the commoners, hitting the 'army' stationed outside last.
It didn't explain how Marteau had managed to get everyone into the city at first with no one none the wiser, unless the Undead had been corralled outside to meet with the army, and spread it there and then?
Marteau had said the 'Undead' could be controlled. But for it to spread in such a way, such a wicked, desired, way...
The fifth floor was pretty much the last floor of the palace of Londinium, and the main office of the Reconquista's resistance was at the far end of a hallway that had no guards, and no people, remaining.
Saito couldn't help but feel unease at the sound of a soft, female sobbing coming from beyond the door however.
He knew about ghosts, and specters, and he had heard of female wraiths, and potentially there were a lot of creatures that could appear as females -like demons, Saito knew demons were real-ish in this world, something about an old flame of Louise's father being one, or something of the sorts. He hadn't asked for clarification when the man had threatened his manhood if he tried anything untoward with his daughter, and had cited what he had done to that old 'demon-possessed' flame of his.
All that Saito knew was that a sobbing woman, at the heart of a Zombie Plague, could not be a good sign.
He simply had to be careful not to startle the Witch then.
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Quadhelix
Professional Windmill Hunter
Okay, but "culture" and "mind control" aren't the only two possible explanations.
When Saito was summoned in this story, Louise was his only source of food, shelter, and companionship. She was his only guide to the area, his only ally against the wolves lurking hungrily about, and the only one likely to take an interest in seeing him returned home.
So it's not entirely outside the realm of possibility that, by the time circumstances had changed, he had already bonded with her.
Kore wa Flag desu ka?