Kibamaru's silent admission was followed by a pin drop silence.
"A-Auditors, you say...? Why are they interested in Ren?" Kibamaru's eyes fell on Akagami Shinjiro, the divisional commander of the fourth division. He was the youngest of the five commanders, being at 17 years of age- but the fact that he was able to sit with these individuals in the grand hall meant that he had strength to back up his position despite his age.
Kibamaru crossed his arms over his chest. "Hell if I know. But the fact of the matter remains that Ren has something that the Auditors want and he's not willing to give it up,"
"So you called the Ashes to set up a fire and frame him with trumped up charges?!" Shinjiro questioned, his red eyes narrowing into thin slits.
Kibamaru shook his head. "I didn't frame him," he said, quietly.
"Then-"
"I didn't set the fire either,"
At this, everyone's eyes sharpened as the hall descended into silence. After a moment, "Could this be about the 'Life Steal'?" Toshiro asked, abruptly.
Everyone's eye fell on him. Kibamaru frowned, thinking. "Go on,"
"Life steal could absorb the user's life force in exchange for tremendous power equal to that of gods," Toshiro continued. "What if...a god received that kind of power?" he asked quietly.
Kibamaru's eyes widened slightly. The others all discussed in hushed tones, all not daring to think farther on the topic. The very possibilities left them shivering in trepidation.
"That wouldn't make sense then,"This came from Akagami Gin- the divisional commander of the third division. Like Nagahide, he also didn't have the trademark red hair and red eyes that was common to those of the Akagami clan. Although he was a Mana-artist of the fire-series, his flame was a unique fire called the 'white divine flame'. Although it may sound glorious and grand, but the reality of the situation is that the white flame users are the most unfortunate of all the Flame-series Mana-artists.
As the name suggests, it is a divine flame, a possession of the gods that not even the gods would handle carelessly. So, to be able to wield it means that the wielder always has to bear a price. That was that whenever the wielder uses his divine flame, it chips away a small bit of his life force. The longer he uses it, the more his life force his burnt up by the divine flame.
It is the most powerful of flames of the fire-series, but also the most dangerous. Wielding it, is like handling a double-edged sword. It was this concept of the divine flame that ultimately led Ren to develop his weapon- 'Life Steal' as well.
Another interesting fact was that every generation only has one divine flame wielder. From Kibamaru's generation, it was Akagami Gin and from Kibamaru's predessor's generation, that is the 16th clan head's generation, it was Akagami Shin, Gin's father.
Unlike the first, second, fourth and fifth divisions where the divisional head was the strongest of each division, the Third Division was unique in the sense that the divisional head was always the bearer of the White Divine Flame.
Whenever the previous Divine Flame User burns out his life force and dies is the moment a new Divine Flame wielder is born, with the divine flame manifesting within its successor. Because of this, the Third Division was the only division that had seen quite a lot of faces occupying the divisional head's position in a single decade than any other divisions and the only division that passed its Divisional command in a hereditary manner.
So, it was quite normal to see such divine flame users restrict such a powerful force within one-self using various magic tools such as Mana restrictors.
Mana-Restrictors come in many shapes and sizes, and Gin had opted to use two Mana-earrings, and a choker with a golden bell. His high neck shirt was opened up to his collarbone, partially revealing the black flame-like tattoo that ran along the right side of his neck, and the right side of his face and disappeared under the fringes of his short, silver hair.
This tattoo in itself was a Mana-restrictor as well. One of the most powerful of its kind.
Mana-restrictors come in three types.
Lesser restrictors are all commonly used mana-restrictors that are used to apprehend Mana-artist criminals and to disrupt their Mana-flow within their veins, making them unable to freely wield Mana.
Life restrictors. An advanced version of Lesser Restrictors that are used to restrict Mana-beasts. It was not just humans that were affected by the Blue Sunset incident, after all, and these Mana Beasts were a by product of that Mana wave that swept through the world during that incident. They are an evolved race of normal beasts and have high intelligence enabling them to gather and organize amongst themselves. Life Restrictors are used to capture such beasts and completely disconnect the mana-flow within themselves, making them unable to wield Mana.
God Restrictors. These were an altogether different type of mana restrictors. During the early years after the Blue sunset incident, there were a lot of people who were unable to freely wield their Mana, and often self-imploded due to an over-abundance of mana. Mana engineers of that time, came up with the idea of using these restrictors that gathered Mana from the surroundings and slowly guided them towards their wielder, slowly making them get used to the feel of mana and gradually letting them wield it.
These types of restrictors, restricted excess mana within a vessel, and only let out a small portion of mana that it deemed the user would be capable enough to handle.
God restrictors have two types. Physical types come in the form of small jewelry. However, these have a limit to the amount of mana that they could restrict so for a powerful Mana-Artist, it is normal to use at least a few types of these physical jewelry to restrict their mana to a satisfactory level. They act as seals on certain levels of their user's powers.
The other type of God Restrictors are Ink types. These were the most dangerous and the most powerful of all the restrictors. They are skin deep, and the mana flowing within the pattern ensures that they act in opposite to the mana flow within the user, neutralizing the mana flow from within, reducing a mana- Aritist to a very mediocre level. Most would not use these types of restrictors. Only the most powerful and dangerous of criminals were branded with such types of restrictors making them completely unable to wiled Mana.
So to be actually willing to suppress oneself to the level of mediocrity when one had such power, it just goes to show how much willpower Akagami Gin possesses.
But even with such powerful restrictors, Akagami Gin was still one of the most powerful of Fire-series Mana-artists within the clan, which just goes to show just how much powerful the divine flame truly is.
Those who wield the flame of the divine must be ready to wield death.
This was the most common saying among the divine flame users. The moment the Divine flame manifests within one self is the moment that they should walk hand in hand with death, because with the divine flame, you'd never know when you'll die. So every day, a divine flame wielder wakes up is another day that he should give his thanks to the gods.
What made Kibamaru admire Gin was the fact that he was always happy-go-lucky and smiled without a care in the world. His smiles and jokes always manages to light up the atmosphere, despite the fact that he himself was in a desperate situation.
And such a cheerful Gin was now frowning, with a never-before-seen somber look on his face. It was very disconcerting.
"What doesn't make sense?" Kibamaru asked.
"'Life Steal absorbs the life force of its wielder in exchange for god-like strength,' That's what you said, isn't it, Toshiro-san?" Gin asked.
Toshiro nodded.
"Then, why would anyone as powerful as the Auditors want something that devours their life force? I mean, they are strong Mana-artists. Life steal has a time limit. Moreover, once the time's up they age 50 years. I don't get why anyone would even consider such an exchange of power where the wielder is the one being on the losing end, much less powerful ones. The time limit isn't even one minute. It's ten seconds, as well!" Gin mused.
Kibamaru frowned, pondering. Toshiro shifted in his seat. "The outcome of a battle can be decided within a second. Not to mention ten second even one second would be enough to completely decimate the entire planet if such a powerful guy grabbed a hold of even more power. Now adding on the fact that they already possess the power to subdue the entire planet, gaining more power even for second-"
"They could change the entire world structure from the foundation!" Nagahide sucked in a cold breath.
Toshiro nodded, grimly. Kibamaru looked from one face to the next, then sighed. "It's only a speculation," he said. The others looked at him, startled. He shrugged. "We don't even know whether that was reason they wanted Ren in the first place," he said.
"You gave the order to the Ashes," Toshiro pointed out. "If it's anyone that should give an answer it should be you. Tell me, are we answering to the Auditors now?" he asked the question that had been bugging everyone's mind since the beginning but was afraid to voice out.
Truthfully speaking, it bothered Toshiro quite a bit. Ever since that time when both sides of the world called out for a peace treaty unanimously upon the intervention of the Auditors, he had been feeling uneasy. As a military man, it was not in his nature to leave a battle unfinished, and he disliked these types uncertainties within the battlefield- where no one could fathom or even gauge out the other party's true strength- the most.
And the fact that the five main families and the Union's upper echelon gathered together before signing the peace-treaty and then the next day both sides called off the war didn't sit well with him.
It was like a mantis stalking the cicada only to realize that there had been an oriole behind it all alone, watching its struggle from the side with amusement. It wasn't a good feeling at all...Toshiro thought, gritting his teeth.
Kibamaru was patient in the face of Toshiro's question. He closed his eyes and sighed, exasperated. "No. We are not answering to the Auditors," he said.
Nagahide seemed to have realized something as he looked at Kibamaru. "Are you shielding Ren, perhaps, Kibamaru-dono?" He asked.
At this everyone's gazes fell on the expressionless face of their commander. Kibamaru's lips quirked into a rare smile. "How very astute of you, Nagahide,"
Toshiro and everyone included, who had waited with bated breath finally let out a sigh of relief. Toshiro chuckled. "The most safest place is the most dangerous one. Going by that logic, I suppose you plan on sending him into Gigalamesh?" he asked.
Gigalamesh was built during the six years after the end of the third world war. It was a four year project and was finally unveiled to the world as a maximum security prison that imprisoned powerful Mana-Artists.
With its walls encompassing at least half of the continent, and its depths reaching down into the ground and even going half way down to the seabed, it was hailed as a 'hell on Earth' where you couldn't break in or break out.
Another interesting thing about this is that there were no wardens or prison guards that are on active duty in Gigalamesh. It was like a small country of its own that functioned on the rule of strong rules over the weak. Only those with strength can survive here, and weaklings have next to no human-rights.
What made both the Union and the civilian Mana-artist worry-free about such a place was the fact that its walls are made of a material known as 'Maneu'. It was a metal that completely neutralizes Mana and absorbs Mana like a sponge without letting a single drop of Mana leak to the outside, dispersing its among its many molecules that makes up its structure.
Therefore, no matter how powerful a Mana-artist thye cannot break in or break out using mana, and because of its high strength and hardness like diamond, using normal methods to break in and out of the prison was out of the question as well. Although the prison's innerworkings were somewhat questinonable as long as you kept to yourself, then one can survive within it for a long time.
It was exactly because of this and he believed in Ren's resourcefulness that Kibamaru orchestrated this incident, so as to get Ren within the prison walls and out of the Ausitor's eye-sight without causing a fuss.
With Ren's intellect, Kibamaru didn't have to explain his plan at all as Ren instinctively understood without being told.
Yare~yare~ His subordinates sure give him a lot of trouble, Kibamaru thought with a wry smile. Mah~ at least now, we could by some time and figure out exactly how we're going to proceed from here on out, He thought, turning his head and looking out the window...