*
Karell twists her waist and gives a quick swing, a thundering boom crackles in the air as her fist impacts the space in front of her.
"... What? Did you expect something elegant? We're breaking in, going against the sole function of Oblivion Magia through brute force." (Karell)
The function that she mentioned was that Oblivion Magias served to isolate a target. The target could be anything, but in essence it is to seperate. It is a pure technique that uses absolutely no skills and magic circles, relying purely on magical particle density to forge a new time and space. To make it clearer in another perspective, it's akin to taking in someone into your own house, then creating the walls of the house as you go along.
What they were greeted by after entering the dark hole created by Karell was... A dimly lit room. It was too dark to see the ceiling or any walls, only the floor was visible and they were standing on some wooden tables. The floor was strewn with miscellaneous items like that of baby toys and small home furniture that had been savagely crushed apart.
"What the hell is this..." (Kaede)
A slight shiver coursed down her spine as she observes the unexplainable objects that were scattered around. The other 2 kept silent, they surveyed their surroundings and ignored Kaede's confusion. In the first place, they assumed she was exaggerating since they weren't aware of her predicament. She didn't receive Kaori's memories from before The Great Disaster, a 'childhood' was merely a vague description with no particular feelings attached to it.
Surely even Kaori would have enjoyed such a carefree period of his life, but it wasn't something that Kaede will ever chance upon. All this time, she could only imitate Kaori's behaviour from her memories and try assimilating into social groups that way, if pushed to ask the reasons behind her actions, she would simply reply that 'it was what Kaori would do'.
She employs her radar to get a reading on the surroundings, since it was dark now they needed information. Her 2 companions were relying on her for this, since they stood vigilantly by her side while wordlessly assenting to guarding her while she does her thing. She lowered her body onto the table and placed her right palm over its surface, sending subtle vibrations through its material and into the ground.
"... This isn't a unique room, there are countless others with a similar makeup. Children's toys and tables that seem like a party was cut off halfway.
The infrastructure for this rooms is like a neatly cordoned off board of checkers, they fit regularly to make an endless field of these. The air is barely travelling between rooms. " (Kaede)
She spoke after opening her eyes and standing back up. She got off the table and the other 2 followed. It wasn't as if the floor was dangerous, so staying on top would just be them letting their paranoia run wild. But neither of them hated prudence, they let Kaede check around the place to see if there were any anti-intelligence magic in place that would impede their information gathering.
In other words, she would be the bait if her search alerted the enemy. At the same time, she would also be their trap sniffer that would sniff out any traps lying in wait. The floor was deemed safe at the last moment when Kaede stepped onto it, before that they weren't even sure if a floor existed. It was so dark someone might as well have pushed their teamate off a cliff to test it out.
"... Do you sense anyone else nearby?" (Barius)
"... You're right, that Would be the biggest concern here. Unfortunately the darkness is also obscuring my radar somehow. I can only see up to 10 rooms around us...
My radar doesn't operate with magical particles in a manner skin to echolocation, anyone could do that. Instead, it produces a new form of magical particles on a different wavelength that transmits information to me then vanish instantly. Up till now, there basically wasn't anything that could go against this different energy... But... " (Kaede)
" So it's working bonkers here... That's not good, likely a high grade enemy created this place. My sense of space is also getting distorted like yours.
There's 2 possibilities here. A passive area effect that dulls all of our senses is in effect here, or the enemy is already conscious of us since entering and has begun their attack. " (Karell)
Listing them down for us, was there actually any choice for us? A battle all primitively came down to defending against every ambush and landing every assault. The one that lands more hits win. In a single rush, we traversed through multiple rooms while being vigilant for any forms of threats. Barius was ready to activate her skills at any moment to carry us away from danger, Karell was ready to make a bunch of shields. Usually enemy attacks couldn't simply 'move through' her defence and is forced the collide against her formidable guard head on.
"In that direction, there's a faint sense of life...!" (Kaede)
They rushed in the pointed direction as fast as their feet could carry them, practically disintegrating any door in the way, the residual heat caused smoke to waft off their limbs as they arrive.
A few metres away from them was a mass of black slop wriggling around like a living thing, it looked to be the extension of some kind of creature as meaty black flesh stretches down from the ceiling to link with it. Four muscular limbs stretch off from its body to occasionally make contact with the ground, they were as dexterous as an ape's limbs as they scratched off the floor with immense force.
"What the hell is that thing!?" (Kaede)
"Ahhh!!!! How would we know!!!" (Karell)
Barius was the only one of them who stared at the unfamiliar creature with mild interest before looking around the room for something else. The creature was also alert as it stood with hairs standing on its ends and watched them silently while silently making a decision.
"Hey...! What are you doing...!?" (Kaede)
She shouted quietly to Barius while keeping her eyes on the monster in the corner. At the same time she desperately tugged onto the soft hem of Barius' jacket. She couldn't understand how Barius could keep her composure in front of something so grotesque. Barius merely gave it another side glance before turning to Kaede.
"... That's probably the owner of this place. Think about it properly, the Oblivion Magia took away the residents of this town. The demons would just straight up kill the residents, not kidnap them.
That meant that we could deduce the Oblivion Magia is for evacuation. The owner of this labyrinth would be on our side and looking for demons at the moment.
What I find more alarming is the present state of the residents... I have to confirm their safety. Could you lead us there? " (Barius)
The black creature with fur darker than the void gives what could be seen as a little nod, as it actually began to lead the way. They follow this surreal sight for a bit, all while Kaede questions why the owner trusted them this much. Perhaps they simply recognised Barius' status as a commander, or the basic fact that they weren't demons leds her to trust them.
She could see the use in such a creature. Essentially the labyrinth owner's real body is kept somewhere else in a safe place, and this body while possibly more fragile is used as an avatar to subjugate the enemies, as if she was in a game.
Considering how the creature was the one leading them to the other humans, perhaps they could trust it. They enter a room with tables horizontally lining both sides of the room from where they walked in, there was a single door at the end with layers of chains and more layers locked tightly over it.
"Open it." (Barius)
It looked hesitantly at Barius and bared its mouth like apparatus with countless rows of sharp teeth. Barius stared straight at it without breaking a sweat, softly asserting her authority by releasing her aura. After a minute or 2, the creature bent and began fiddling with the chains. By extension, this entire place is an extension of its body, the chains began to vanish under its command.
A few shadows rush over from one of the distant tables, entering the room in a flash of black. One of them was promptly caught by the scruff of the neck using Kaede's arm before she swiftly sliced its head off with her rapier. The body was armoured with heavy metal and thick magical robes, it was practically the very image of a medieval knight. Likely sent from the demon country, characterised by inhuman characteristics such as his blue skin and sporadic horn growths over his limbs and neck.
Her rapier had almost caught onto one of the horns by mistake, it would have have sliced down his body through the wrong trajectory.
"Oi! Is this fine? You let some slip in. Are you fattening them up like livestock or something?" (Kaede)
"Pfff!!" (Karell)
"... You made it empty right? You can't possibly have trusted me in one try, that's why you stared at me for so long." (Barius)
Ignoring Karell who wasn't used to Kaede, Barius turned to the creature and began interrogating it. Despite Kaede being fully serious, it was taken as a joke... Well, perhaps it should be a joke anyway. She was playing a fool, but she spoke with a strained and tensed voice. She would truly be infuriated if Barius had just let the demons kill some innocents in front of her.
As if showing off her work, the monster opens the door with glee... To reveal an empty room. Well, it wasn't empty now, there were a few armoured demon soldiers standing around. They must have been hiding from the labyrinth's master for a while now, though this was likely just a small group. There was most likely numerous detachments still roaming around.
A blue light converges in front of one of the demons, drowning the air in heat and pressure as the wind roars from its forces. It's armour shone brilliantly under the cluster of blue light as she expertly wove it into her palms. At that moment, it felt like there was nothing else in the world but that brilliance flickering and swallowing everything up.
"Sorry, but I need to make it back home. There's someone waiting for me." (Demon)
A family huh. 'What a shame' was the first thing that came to Kaede's mind. First and foremost, the demon in front of her was someone's family. While it sucked to think about, Kaede would like to believe if circumstances were different they could be friends instead. But right now was the worst possible circumstance for that, after all they were at war. Kaede couldn't save the ones right in front of her who needed saving, all she can do is afford them some respect.
"Someone waiting for you? There's many people in this labyrinth right now who are waiting to be freed. It's unfortunate, but I'll put an end to it. This journey of yours." (Kaede)
She takes out her void rapier, holding it in a drawing stance as if it was in its sheath. Her right arm grips its handle as its blade faces her back. Her left hovers over the handle guard, as if waiting for her instructions. At the next moment, the air around her rapier roared with a similar intensity as black wind originating at the rapier's guard continuously pours out like a storm. It released ferocious energy without pause as a stream of black flows out of its hilt, threatening to swallowing everything into the abyss like a gaping maw.
With this, Kaede knows she wouldn't lose to the dense beam of energy that the Demon was about to unleash. In a battle between magic beams, Kaede's would tear through the enemy's with ease due to its properties. It became less of a contest of power and more just a display of one sided beating.
During the fated moment, the beam of light blue flashed it's surroundings as it travelled towards Kaede. Kaede answered in kind with her sword beam. Black and blue beautifully met in the centre-before black swallowed blue and travelled towards its user. There was no contest in the middle, it looked like Kaede's attack had devoured the other and assimilated it, growing larger in response as it blasted towards the demon at high velocity.
There was no mercy to be found, it made contact with the demons in an instant and left in an equally fast fashion, leaving nothing behind. Not even a trace of armour or scorched land was left, the beam tore them apart into residual so small that the naked eyes cannot see anything left but fine dust.