'Longinus?! DRAGON?!' My head snapped to the gauntlet that Ise was gawking at. That explained the odd feeling I had when I examined his body, and now that I was examining it, I could definitely feel the power radiating from its jewels, and I was honestly a little terrified that it had the power to take down Gods.
And Rias said it was one of them, how many precisely?
...
"Now that is settled, it is time for you to kiss your ass goodbye." Not knowing my thoughts, Rias held out her hand and summoned a ball of dark energy that immediately set off every single alarm bell in my head to get away. At least I found out the origins of the scent of nothingness, because that power was seriously 'empty' in feeling.
"Could you hold off on the attack for a moment?" I came forward and faced Rias. "I still have some unanswered questions that I need to be resolved."
"Fine." She raised an eyebrow at my request. "Better make it quick though." I nodded before turning back to Raynare.
"Do you really think I would answer to a mere human like you?" Raynare asked in the ever haughty tone of hers. Too bad for her I got a counter ready for that.
"Stab!"
"AAAAAAHHHHHH!"
She screamed while clutching her hand that was reintroduced to my Black Key, all while being subdued by others pinning her shadow into the ground. This time I loosened my concentration and let the blade spread its influence on her hand, darkening her skin and spreading up her arm and stopping just short of reaching her neck. That ought to be a good motivation for her now.
"I have some questions regarding your orders to hunt us." I made sure to use my full height to my advantage and loomed over her. "One of your own, the blond angel girl, said that you called them out to help you in this mission to find Asia and Ise, before killing them and taking their gears. Now that I heard the story from Rias, it does answer some questions, but that opens up something else."
"Mainly, the part of regulating orders."
"What is the problem with that?" Ise asked as he looked between the two of us.
"Because on my way here, I encountered another Fallen Angel, and the reply I got was really different from the blond." I lightly tapped the Black Key to send minor jolts of pain as a reminder. "One thing I had noted was the fact that the older ones knew that you were going against the orders of your superiors to kill Ise and Asia, and that attaining their Sacred Gears was something not even approved by them."
"That is a lie, it is just AHHHHHH!" Raynare screamed suddenly as the Black Key in her hand started to vibrate hard and the scriptures on it started to glow a menacing red.
"Oh, I forgot to tell you, this little fellow hates liars, so it tends to get a little edgy when even a little white lie is told." I gave that lie with a straight face as the blade stopped moving and she panted hard to control her pain. The truth was the Black Key was extremely sensitive to anything remotely evil in nature and intent, so it did not care whether she was telling the truth or a lie, it just wanted to destroy her. And I underestimated how much the Black Key really wanted to kill her and thus did not hold off enough of its effects.
But I guess that little slip-up did the trick.
"Okay! You are right, I and the senior members partaking in this mission know what is really going on!" Raynare wailed as she tried to use her Prana to stop the progress of the Black Key's destruction of her arm. "Mitelt was the only one I lied to about this operation! I told her that this was something that the higher-ups were worried about, and that they wanted us to kill them!"
"But you couldn't do so without them realising, you needed a distraction of sorts. That was when I came in right?"
"When Lord Azazel informed me about you as a possible target, I realised that was the only chance we could get to take them both out and possibly take both if not one of their Sacred Gears!" She spat that bit out with a hint of spite in her tone. "So in that manner, I could deal with the both of you by monitoring both sides while moving to secure Twilight Healing."
"Then why do you need Twilight Healing?"
"Because of its abilities to heal you dolt! I could become a High Level Angel with its power, and besides no one would miss a girl who was excommunicated from the church for healing a filthy devil!" Raynare gave that reply in an angry tone. I turned to look at the blond girl who still on the pew breathing lightly. From the little I have seen and what I knew of Ise's character, it would seem that this girl was one of the nicer folks around here, and the gentleness may have goten used by someone.
"One last thing, and this is something I wish to confirm from you guys as well." I turned to face Rias who have been looking on with a thoughtful look, not the least disturbed by the swords around us. "Is it possible for a Fallen Angel to ascend back to Heaven and be a True Angel again if it commits an act of good?"
"What are you talking about?" Rias frowned at my question. "It is impossible to do so, once an Angel commits an act of sin and casted out of Heaven, that Angel is forever banished from the Sky and made to traverse the world with blackened wings as a sign of its sin. No amount of good deeds can allow it to go back home." She looked to Raynare with narrowed eyes. "Ah so that was how you convinced the other one then."
"I thought so." I turned back to find a really pale faced Raynare sweating like she had ran a marathon. "From what that woman said, it seemed that you tricked the little one into thinking that completing this mission would allow her to go back to Heaven, and I'm guessing the others were being misled to some extent as well?"
"Tch!" Raynare looked at me before grimacing as the Black Key started to get agitated from her rage. "Yes, I lied to Mitelt about the prospect of returning to Heaven. That girl fell from grace a few centuries ago and yet she still had delusions about returning to be alongside the Angels who would not even bat an eye at us. Heck, why would she want to give up all this freedom?! Freedom to properly choose, freedom to do whatever we want, and not having to care whether we could fall at any point in time?!" Her answer got pretty heated as she expelled all her frustrations from her heart. "And those guys, HAH! They actually believed that by getting the Twilight Healing, they themselves could become High Level Angels. The only way that can happen would be to have them sacrificed to properly force the gear to recognise their injuries and push itself into Balance Breaker in order to attain that power, which as you can see, I am the only one who can use it. So all of them are fools for my use!"
For a moment, everyone paused and gave her a glare of contempt, then the silence got broken when I let out a quiet laugh. It was a normal laugh, but the setting made it sound eerie enough that the Devils and Raynare were looking at me with slightly disturbed eyes. "What is so funny?!" Raynare demanded while looking at me like she was seeing a facet of what I could become.
"Oh? I just figured that your answer was most typical of villains." I stood up before turning my head to the opening while muttering a command. "Well, there's your answer, so what do you wish to do?"
"What?!" Raynare turned her head only to lightly gasp as the invisibility spell I placed on the young angel earlier fell apart to reveal the pale face of one betrayed by someone she trusted. I asked Koneko to bring the girl in so that I could see both their reactions while I questioned Raynare's faith in her crew. And much of what I thought was true regarding the young one called Mitelt; that despite her cruelty, she was still a naïve young girl at heart, and I felt a little disgusted at myself for using this method to reveal the truth.
"Mitelt! Save me!" Raynare cried out to the girl while stretching her arm out in desperation. But the blonde haired girl took a step back with an expression of betrayal and anger.
"You said that we were under orders to take the gear from the girl, you said that the girl and the boy were enemies to Lord Azazel!" Mitelt said it through clenched teeth. "You said that we could be forgiven and that we could go back home!"
"T~ this human tricked me! He is lying!" Raynare pointed at me in anguish as she tried to salvage the situation. "We are given orders by Azazel to take them down, and we can go back to Heaven! We just need to join forces and…"
"No!" Mitelt covered her ears and knelt down, shutting herself out of the world with her wings. "You were always like this, I don't want to hear your lies anymore! Just leave me alone!"
"Well, too bad for you, to be abandoned by your own due to your lies." Rias raised her ball of dark energy again. Raynare panicked and turned to Ise once again. "Issei!" My guts twisted slightly at hearing her voice changed back to the innocent girl on her date. "Please save me from the evil Devil! Together we can defeat her!"
Ise took a step back while having an expression of sorrow, disgust, uncertainty and painful regret. "Buchou, I can't do it, so please…" Those words sealed her fate, as Rias directed the ball at her and in a blink of an eye, she disappeared leaving behind a few feathers and a silver ring that dropped lightly on Ise's hand. Damn, I would rather not get hit by that.
At the same time, I really hated the manner I manipulated the conversation so that Mitelt could hear the truth. I could have used a geass to force the truth out of her but that may not be as effective or helpful as this. In a way, I was glad that Rin was not around to see me do this interrogation.
"Shirou, how is Asia?" Ise jolted me out of my thoughts and I turned to check on Asia again. She was fine in terms of being in a healthy state, but her condition was still at the edge of uncertainty. Even after Ise placed the ring back on her finger, she was still no closer to waking up from earlier.
"It seems the connection between her and Twilight Healing got damaged from the ritual." Rias looked at her while checking her brow. "In her current state, she would only continue to be in a deep sleep even with her Sacred Gear intact."
"Damn it! Is there really anything we can do?" Ise lightly cradled Asia's hands as fresh tears flowed down his face. "She did nothing wrong, so why did this happen to her?!" For a moment I considered bringing out the real Avalon to try and boost her chances, but Rias beat me to the punch by putting a hand on his shoulder and taking out a crimson chess piece, a Bishop if I recalled correctly.
Oh no, she can't be thinking of that method?
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Hey guys I really need you to throw some power Stones ;)
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