Zero No Tsukaima Fan Fiction ❯ Zero No Tsukaima Darkness Rising ❯ The Unlocking ( Chapter 11 )

The Unlocking

 

The sun begins to rise and birds begin to sing songs that make the whole situation seem like a bad dream, but the truth is that it is all true. Some maniac has amassed an army and with it has burned down a town, captured and completely took over Louise's mind, and on more than one occasion nearly killed a majority of the Holy Knights.

Now that they are within Germania it is only a matter of time before the final confrontation with that man and his army. After the last incident Seth deemed it necessary to find and re-recruit Kai Tutor into the Holy Knights, God's Heart. Luckily keeping tabs on certain people has become an art form for the Knights and since Kai is such an important person, keeping tabs is a necessity.

 

 

Saito now knowing that Louise is still “savable” is much happier than he was when he convinced himself that there was no way to get the woman he loves back, “So Seth, this guy Kai where is he?”

Seth runs a bandaged hand through his hair and picks at the wrap around his head, “He should be just west of here, so if we follow the road on the left we should find him in no time.”

Rain slaps his bandaged hand making him flinch, “Stop picking at that wrap, I'll take it off you when we rest again.”

Hina looks at Airo, “Are you feeling better?”

“Yes, thank you.” Airo's voice always sounds different when he speaks to his wife, like he still feels embarrassed about something.

Zion runs a finger down the scar on his face and takes in a deep disappointed breath. Tabitha lightly gabs her elbow into his gut, “What is wrong Zion?”

“I haven't been any help to Airo or Seth this whole time. I arrived late at the academy I couldn't catch up yesterday,”

“Hey Zion could you come up here I need your eyes.” Seth waves from the front of the group but they don't stop walking. Zion walks past Airo, Hina, Rain, and Saito and gets next to Seth. “If you see anything out of the ordinary then quietly tell me.”

Zion nods and begins to scan the area around them inconspicuously.

Rain walks up beside Seth opposite to Zion and takes his hand. Saito looks at the gesture and smiles thinking about all the times he was with Louise and as he tries to remember the good times he keeps thinking of the times he was caught at the most inopportune moments with no explanation to give that would save himself the lash or a magical explosion. Finally one time replays in his mind. Louise had been summoned back to her home and she was told she would leave the academy and be forced into marriage unless she had found a noble to marry already. She struggled through the day trying to say something until she became so frustrated and demoralized she went to the dock and sat down in a little boat she used to sit in when she was little to think. He found her and somehow ended up on top of her in the middle of the lake. The first time they had an overly passionate moment, though once again the golden emblem stopped him from continuing with his passionate conquest, that and her father finding them after the boat reached the shore on the opposite side of the lake.

Saito closes his eyes and smiles, “Best day.....”

“Down!” Zion calls out and everyone quickly begin to get on the ground. A blizzard of ice shards begin to come into sight.

Before she can get down all the way a shard cuts into the side of Rain's arm and she tries to be strong, but lets out a cry of pain.

“Rain!”

“Seth...”

As the shards pass by Seth stands back up and Zion quickly makes a wall of earth in front of them.

Seth kneels down beside Rain and removes his wrap and ties it around Rain arm to absorb and hopefully stop the bleeding from the deep cut. Seth stands up and turns to Zion, Airo, and Saito, “Ready?” They nod and he then turns to Hina and Tabitha, “We will need some help if this mage can summon up so much magic so quickly.” They nod and Zion lowers the earth shield and they begin walking in the direction the shards came from.

More ice in much larger pieces materialize in the middle of the road and fly at the four. Tabitha and Hina quickly use wind magic to force the ice to the left of the group.

A man with a tattoo over his right eye materializes in front of the group. “So with two mages I guess my long ranger attack won't do me any good.” The man lifts his hands above his head and then points to the ground and everything begins to freeze around the group.

The area all around them becomes frozen and covered in snow or ice, like winter had hit in a controlled area. Zion gets in front of the others and lifts his right hand, fire begins to grow from his palm until it is completely covering his right hand, “You want to use ice magic?”

Zion lets the fireball loose and the man dodges the ball of flame quite easily but as the flame hits the frozen ground it completely dies and leaves no remaining damage to the frozen ground. The hand points at the group and another bunch of ice shards fly at them. Tabitha and Hina once again use wind magic to force the shards away but fail to notice the large tidal wave of snow behind them.

Rain stands up and tries to stop the snow wave with her own blast of fire but her magic quickly fails and they are buried.

“I have just about enough of the girls in the peanut gallery helping you four fight.” The man lifts his left hand and the ice in front of him begins to grown and take a frozen shape of his body, “Now we can have fun.” The man suddenly disappears leaving only the four ice monsters.

The four ice men charge at the group and form weapons out of there body.

Airo flips over his attacker but is struck before he lands as the ice man has made a staff out of ice. Airo quickly gets to his feet and is quickly put back into a defensive situation as he can't find an opening to attack the ice man. He backs into a tree and is struck in the side but the ice staff.

Saito quickly pulls out Derflinger and the ice monster creates two blades out of it's over arms and charges at him. The ice man brings down its left arm making Saito have to block the strike but a horizontal slash form its other arm cuts the front of his thigh. Saito tries to stay standing but the pain makes his leg buckle and it stuck on one knee try to just not get cut.

Zion creates fire around his fists and the ice man has frost floating all around his body. Zion and the monster whip their arms towards each other and the ice and fire meet in the middle of the two causing a brilliant light show as sparks of fire and shards of ice dance around them.

Seth is slugged in the gut and struck again with a backflip kick from the ice man. He stands back up and looks at his runes, not happy to find them still not active. “Shit.....”

Airo catches the staff with his hands but the staff head turns into a spear and he kicks it away and dodges behind a tree to avoid getting stabbed. Airo pulls out his knives and jumps out form behind the tree but the ice man is gone. Airo turns around to make sure the monster didn't run around the tree but he is struck again from the side as the ice man begins to form out of the ice on the side of the tree. Airo rolls back to his feet and crouches so that he can move more quickly on the ice, “Great.....”

Satio dodges another diagonal slash and cuts his blade right through the middle of the ice man halving him. The upper half falls to the ground but the bottom half just grows another upper half. “Oh no....”

The display of fire and ice is disrupted as Zion can't continue to use fire because of the cold air all around the area. He lets the fire die and quickly dives to the right to dodge the oncoming ice blast. He points to the ground behind the ice man and more importantly the tree as it suddenly gives and falls right on it crushing it into the ground. As the tree settles the snow and ice that launched up from the tree crashing to the ground begins to come together and reforms the ice man's body, “Not fair.....”

Hina and Tabitha emerge from the snow wand-less but they have an unconscious Rain as she took the brunt of the snow wave being much closer to the middle of it than them. They look on in shock as the four warrior in front of them are having trouble with men made of ice.

Seth catches the ice man's fist but the thing jumps and connects with a kick to the back of his head making him stumble. The monster sweeps his legs and does a front flip driving what would be it's heel into his chest. Seth rolls away from the ice man as it stands back up.

“Come on, runes, I need you're help. I can't do this without my power. It's that stupid books fault for sealing my runes in the first place.” Seth glances past the ice man and finds that the girls had gotten out of the snow but Rain isn't awake. The ice man lifts it's leg to hit an axe kick but Seth rolls away from it and scrambles to get his pack. He quickly opens up the pack and pulls out the book. The ice monster kicks him in the gut before he can get out the wand and nocks him away from his pack.

Airo, Saito, and Zion are all back to back as the three ice men slowly make their way towards them.

Saito looks to Zion, “What should we do?”

Derflinger interjects before Zion can speak, “You need to find out where that ice guy is. He is the one who made these things so if you get him maybe those things will stop.

Saito looks to Zion, “I need to to launch a ring out fire out from this spot.”

“Why?”

“He has to be relatively close to use this magic I'm sure to protect himself he will use magic to block the flame or one of the ice men will randomly run to protect him. When that happens Airo I need you to charge at that spot and I'll follow in case you fail.”

Zion crouches and then quickly thrusts his hands into the air releasing a roaring ring of fire from around the group. The ring is suddenly broken by a blast of ice. Airo charges at that spot but is tackled by two of the ice men. Saito jumps over the third as it tries to cut him down and he releases a powerful wave of his own that slams the ice mage into the ground making him lose his concentration. The two that tackled Airo turn into snow but the one attacking Seth and the one with blade arms remain.

Seth ducks a kick and uppercuts the ice man landing the first good strike he's had on the monster the whole fight and he makes it back to his pack, “I hope this works.” Seth pulls out the wand and like every time before the lightning begins to encase him. The monster tries to hit him but the bolts shoot the ice man right off. The lightning's intensity increases as Seth holds onto the wand and book much longer than ever before.

'Come on Haimere why would you have made this book like this!'

Seth lets out a pain filled scream and a bolt of lightning strikes from the sky casting an impossible white light than incinerates the ice man nearest to Seth. A powerful blast of wind clears a majority of the snow away from the area.

Satio turns away from the blast, “What is happening!?”

Zion calls out from his place on the ground, “I don't know!!!”

As the light begins to fade so too does the wind. Until there is nothing left but a high pitched tone and Seth's body, completely covered by a white light.

As the light fades so too does the silhouette of Seth. A man stands in Seth's exact place. He is wearing white pants and a white long sleeve shirt with blue armor over his chest and shoulders and a long blue cape attached to his shoulders. His skin is a pale white and his hair is a silky straight blonde color. As he opens his eyes and looks past Saito with his hazel eyes he lifts his arm so that his palm is pointing right at the ice mage.

“Ego voco vos incendia...no!” A fire fall flies past Saito's head and connects with the ice mage incinerating him completely.

The whole area that turned to snow begins to completely disappear until everything is back the way is was originally.

Saito gets up and looks at the blonde that just incinerated a human like it was nothing, “Who are you? Where is Seth?”

The pale blonde looks at Saito with a disappointed frown, “Veneficus tribuo mihi ears intellego quod vox vocis ut dico.” A ring appears around the man's throat and slowly fades away, “I'm sorry but, what did you say?”

Saito is shocked by how the man can suddenly speak the same language as him, “I asked you where is Seth?”

“Seth, oh the boy who released me from my book.” The man pulls the book out from under his chest plate, “He is inside here, the wordless book, sleeping.”

Zion practically yells at the man, “Well let him out.”

“I'm sorry but I cannot do that, only someone who is willing can release the person in my book and I am not yet willing. He called me here, by my name.”

Airo looks at the wordless book, “Your name?”

“Haimere....”

“Uhhh....my head.” The group looks back and finds that Rain is slowly waking back up. She opens her eyes and at first doesn't notice the blonde, blue armored man standing before them. She looks from Airo to Zion to Saito and then takes a double take when she sees the forth man standing before her, “Who is that?”

“My name is Haimere, milady.” The man bows and straightens back up.

She looks around the group again trying to find Seth, “Oh-okay, but where is Seth?”

Tabitha helps her up to her feet, “He's in the book.”

“The book....THE BOOK! What's he doing in the book!?” Rain runs over and takes the book from Haimere's hands and starts flipping through the pages, “I don't see him, he's not in this book!”

“Milady,” Haimere takes the book back and places it back under his chest plate, “He is in the book I assure you, you cannot see him because he is sleeping.”

“Can't you wake him up?”

“He cannot be awoken until he is summoned back to this world.” Haimere looks back to Zion who is quickly deems as the smartest of the group, “So tell me good sir, why have I been summoned back to this world, what threatens the stability of this planet this time?”

Zion crosses his arms and scowls at the man, “Who do you think you are?”

“The hero of course......”