She followed up with some time dilation spell that gave her speed that could make Lancer proud, using that momentum to try and stab me with the pointed end of her staff, but only succeeding in tearing a portion of my shirt.
Damn it, the charms on the shirt was not something I could stamp out easily like a newspaper machine!
...
Kicking her back to get some distance, I used the moment to project a few weapons to fire at her. As expected she conjured up a barrier to block them, but did not account for the detonation of the weapons and the force behind them, sending her away to the wall. I used that opportunity to get closer and deliver a slash at her, but she dodged at the last second, leaving a huge tear in her dress that threatened to drop off.
"Watch it!" Celina yelled as she tried to hold her clothes on with a spell. That provided me with the distraction to fire off a few arrows at her in the hopes of disabling her at best, but she quickly twirled her staff to knock them away.
"Oh no you don't!" She stabbed her staff at me, tearing away more of my shirt before following it up with a wind blast that sent me to the other side, causing one of my swords to cut one of the water pipes and depositing its contents over me and the floor.
"Now where are you, little magician?" Celina cooed while I got up from the wet ground, soaked to the bone while the pipe poured out blocking both our views. With a split-second decision and a reminder to replace my wardrobe, I tore off my shirt and projected a simple hanger to hold it in place before holding it in front of me, one hand ready to do what I knew she would try.
"There you are!" She took the bait and stabbed the staff forward to hit the shirt, only for her staff to be grabbed and pulled, and by extension herself, forward towards me. I took her surprise and delivered a hard punch to her diaphragm, causing him to double over in pain before using a spectral blade to seal off her circuits temporarily. In her haste to get away from me, the blade snagged on her dress and caused her dress to tear off, leaving her close to naked and soaking in the water as she went back through the downpour. Ignoring her cries of embarrassment, I ran through the blanket of water and tackled her to the ground, knocking her to the ground and herself to unconsciousness.
"Damn, that took a while." I stood up unsteadily and shook off some of the water from my body and my hair. I was getting a little careless there, and that cost me time and my good shirt and jacket. I projected one fire blade to dry myself off while using another blade to seal off the pipe to stop more water pouring around me. With that done, I looked around the area to make sure there were no more stragglers. There was no other people around, so at least I got everyone in this area, all I had to do was round up the ones I knocked out and secured them for deportation and interrogation. I nodded to myself as I turned to look at Celina before pausing at the odd sight.
Why was Celina sporting a red face with a smile, and was that blood coming out of her nose?
...
It took a little longer to get to the others than I needed considering I had to secure, immobilize and hide the mages in a separate shed that is protected with multiple layers of spells and hidden with even more spells. Then along the way I had encountered other enemies whom I have to kill or stun and move for interrogation later, thus extending the time needed to get back.
Though I was wondering about the health of those I caught. Most of them were females and they seemed to be stunned with some type of mental spell considering their red faces, rapid breathing and dilated eyes each time they looked at me. Four of them even started bleeding from their noses like Celina.
My thoughts got put on hold when the scent and feeling of the barrier changed and the noises of fighting paused for a moment before resuming. From the looks of it, I would guess that Ise and the others managed to defeat whoever held Gasper captive and got to hold back on his Sacred Gear. That was good, so now we would have the full strength to counter this assault.
It took a fair bit of backtracking due to destroyed portions of the building that made it difficult to get around, but I managed to get back to the Occult Club Building without too much issues. Along the way I spied the bodies and destruction around me, privately thinking this was a fool's errand on the attackers, getting slaughtered in such a manner. I stopped at the doorway to face the wreckage blocking my way in before looking up to where the room was. With a sigh, I reinforced my legs and jumped high into the air and slightly over the wrecked room, hovering lightly in the end before coming back down with a loud thump, alerting some of the people there.
"Ah, so the Steel Mage has returned?" Azazel called out from his end of the room. "Considering your state, I get that you met some of our unwanted guests?"
"Took a while to get back, there were a lot of enemies." I answered as I stood back up to look around, noting the few attackers who were bounded and set aside. "Are these your set of attackers?"
"Yup." Azazel motioned to Ise, Kiba and Koneko who just arrived with the recently freed Gasper. "They also encountered some of their own, but they were able to secure them safely."
"I see." I frowned at the smaller numbers. "Where are the rest?"
"Cleaning house." Azazel replied.
"Shirou." I turned to face Ise as he came up to us. "Are you okay? You looked like you just went through some crap."
"These attackers are very persistent." I nodded at Kiba and Gasper. "Nice to see you again, and how are you Gasper?"
"I... I am fine!" The little trap squeaked in a voice much higher and cuter than he should sound. "At least I am getting some control over my Sacred Gear, thanks to Ise-Senpai."
"Okay that is good. How about you Koneko?" I turned to the little girl only to blink at the odd manner she was looking at me. "Koneko, are you okay?"
"….." She was silently looking at me with wide eyes, a blushing face and her cat ears were standing up right, twitching every so often. And for some odd reason, her eyes became more animalistic and there was the odd feeling of me being hunted.
"Koneko?"
"We are back!" Xenovia called out as she, Irina and Mitelt came into view. "We are able to deal with the group at the hall, so we are good for GPHH!" Her tongue got caught as they stopped in front of me, their eyes going wide and their faces turning red.
What the, them too?!
"GABU!" I turned to find both the Gremory and Sitri Peerage having just returned from the respective fights, looking a little worse for wear, and were now standing still with open mouths, wide eyes and reddening faces.
Crap, the curse must be spreading!
"Are you girls okay?" I got closer to them to check for any symptoms of a curse on them, but that seemed to make their faces go redder. Ruruko and Meguri were lightly stuttering some odd gibberish, Tsubaki and Reya looked ready to faint any minute now, and scarily enough, Tsubasa and Momo were giving rather predatory stares at me.
Crap, what type of curse did they get hit with?!
"Erm, Shirou?"
"What is it, Ise?" I turned to him who had a complicated expression. "Do you know what it is they are cursed with?"
"Kind of." Ise scratched his face while looking to Kiba who let out a resigned sigh.
"You might want to put on a shirt." Kiba spoke while pointing at me. "I think they are getting distracted."
What?
"You want an indication, look at them." Sirzechs pointed to the female angel, Griselda and Akeno with a teasing smirk. I turned to face Emilia, noting how red-faced she was and how her wings were flicking between white and grey. Griselda on the other hand was blushing rather heavily and Akeno was letting loose a very scary smile while the scent of ozone and leather was at an all-time high. It took me a moment for me to connect the dots, but when I did, there was only one thing I could say.
"Oh~"
...
A/N : The Story Needs More Power Stones ;)
PS : if we can reach 400 Stones by the end of the week, I will throw you an extra chapter
...
if you want to read ahead of the public release you can go to my p atreon :
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