Chereads / Mikael's Tale: The Ring of Seven Pillars / Chapter 14 - The Soul Thief

Chapter 14 - The Soul Thief

It was around three in the morning, Prospounae and Valon were training in the arena while the other boys were sleeping. The saint sleeping next to the window woke up with a strong light hitting his eyelids, it was Seraphim, flying next to the room and calling 41. He signalized the saint to go to the garden in front of the window and so he did. \\

—What did you do with the armor? — Seraphim instantly asked. \\

—What do you mean? \\

—Did you do Anything with the armor while I was gone? — He asked in a slightly anger tone. \\

—I used it… If is that what you mean… \\

Seraphim stood in silence. \\

—Did something happen? — 41 gently asked. \\

—Congratulations. \\

—I am so confused right now… \\

—You successfully stole my armor. — Seraphim said while giving the ring to Mikael. \\

He stared at the ring as if he was seeing it for the first time. Seraphim stood there as the ring responded to the cavalier and the night armor appeared on Mikael's body. \\

—Why are you giving me this? — Mikael could clearly see the despise in the Archduke's eyes — Something happened when you tried to wear it… \\

—The armor only responds to you right now. — Mikael smiled — So wear it proudly, until your life gets claimed by destiny. Mikael, The Soul Thief… \\

Seraphim turned around and walked away. Haamiah and Skael were hidden nearby trying to listen to the conversation, Seraphim walked by them and said: \\

—Hope you two are enjoying the show.\\

They did not answer.

It was pure chaos, since Idiofyel came back to work in the forge, everyone is working at full speed trying to complete the gold soul demands. When Mikael reached the bottom of the well he heard two people shouting and fighting, he entered the forge and saw Caliel holding a giant hammer while being held by five other blacksmith and Idiofyel screaming at him with the arms of his armor equipped. \\

He walked closer and asked to one of the Cavaliers there what was going on, she explained that they have been discussing ever since Idiofyel entered the forge. The fight was nothing but yells until Idiofyel found a weapon Caliel was making for one of the new cavaliers, when he saw it, Idiofyel called it a trash and said he was going to make something better than Caliel's rapier attempt. The Silver Cavalier lashed out in anger and tried to attack the gold soul just before Mikael arrive. When Caliel saw Mikael there staring at them he quickly grabbed the sheath with the rapier inside it and ran to Mikael.\\

—Here boy. Deliver this to Asphela before this bonemeal can touch it.\\

—Oh… Cool, when did you finished? \\

—I'll tell you later. — Caliel turned to Idiofyel prepared to receive an attack. \\

When the gold soul placed his eyes on Mikael, his rage persona frowned and stopped; instead of rushing to attack as he normally would he stood there and deeply stared at the cavalier's eyes. \\

—Hello — Mikael gently said — If I remember correctly there are somethings you need to tell me… \\

The forge silenced. \\

—I don't need to say anything to a little thief like you… \\

—Hey… be careful how you talk to the little thief… otherwise your head may roll out again… — Mikael said gently smiling. \\

They entered the armory; Mikael was the first one to speak. \\

—I'm going straight to the point. I have three questions for you about the armor. What is that Gi thing? Is there more of it? And what are the names of all the weapons you made for Mikael. \\

Idiofyel's scowl became even more defined, after thinking for a while he, reluctantly, answered the boy.\\

—The cleavers have a special characteristic that Seraphim asked for. With them you can use the seven basic elements for simple attacks, I'm sure you noticed that Gi is earth and you just wanted to confirm that with me. — Mikael nodded — Water is Neró, wind is Ánemos, fire is Fotiá, lightning is Astrapí, light is Fos and darkness is Skotádi... I hope you remember everything I said because I'm not going to repeat myself. \\

—I will, don't you worry. \\

—Now... what have you seen in your dream exactly? \\

Mikael described his dream to the Cavalier that listened carefully and then thought in silence for several minutes. \\

—There is something you need to know about your armor. — Idiofyel seemed much more serious than usual — Armors are equipment used to increase the cavalier's strengths and protect him from his weaknesses, we give them personalities and characteristics so they can choose a cavalier whose skills will be suited to the style of the armor. In this country, it is forbidden to create an armor that have no personality...\\

—Why? — Mikael interrupted him. \\

—Because an armor with no personality can be used by anyone, even by those with no mana in them. If someone like that tries to use a normal armor, he will be rejected by it because normal armors refuse to be claimed by people with no mana. But armors with no personality do not have that kind of security point, if they are claimed they will try to appear regardless of who is summoning them. If it is someone with no mana, they will try to pull that type of energy in the user body until they are able to appear; since they don't have any in it, the armor will try to do anything until it finds something that it can use. If it is an armor that needs a lot of energy to be summoned, it can kill the user in the process. \\

—Why are you telling me this? \\

—Because your armor did not have a personality, at least, not until you started to wear it. — Mikael was incredibly confused — Seraphim asked me to make Mikael for him with very specific abilities and details and to make sure that the armor would like him, he asked me not to put a complete personality on it, so I placed one that would accept anyone and then would change its personality based on the user. The plan was to Seraphim be the first one to use the ring but... as you know... there was a problem in that part. \\

—Wait... You two did something forbidden... and now you are telling me everything. \\

—Unfortunately. \\

—Why? \\

—Why what? \\

—Why are you telling me this? — Mikael shouted — If you broke the law, why are you telling me? What if I tell someone what you two have done?\\

—You can't. \\

—Why not? I haven't done anything wrong yet, and I don't want to pay for a mistake that you two did. \\

—Yesterday night, after Seraphim failed to wear Mikael, he called me in his office to ask what happened to it. He told me everything he knew about you... and I must say, you are probably the luckiest unlucky living person. \\

—What do you mean by that...? \\

—He told me that your SPEP is five, right? \\

—Yes... Isn't that supposed to be a lucky feature? \\

—Of course. The only problem is that no armor will never choose you.

They stared at each other in silence for a couple of seconds. \\

—Tell me... before you had Mikael, any armor wanted to be with you? \\

…\\

—If you hadn't found Mikael, an armor that could not reject you, you would never find another armor to wear. And, if you tell anyone else about it, they will take Mikael away and dismiss you in the end of the year, because you won't be able to use another armor. It doesn't matter how strong you currently are, or how much potential you have, without Mikael you won't be nothing. \\

—I am sure that if I tell them everything, they will let me have the armor. \\

—You really don't know Karabu and the people in Internal Affairs, that is not how they work... but it is everything fine, since the armor has a personality now, we don't need to worry about it.\\

—If I don't need to worry, then I'm back to my starting point. Why are you telling me this? \\

—I'm telling you because you using the armor at full power, will also be forbidden. \\

Mikael was intrigued. \\

—The cleavers can use the seven basic elements, but can you? One of the other prohibitions related to apparel is that the armor cannot provide powers to the Cavalier that the one would not have a chance to develop by itself. \\

—Why is that? I thought they wanted strong Cavaliers, independent of the power source, it can be utilized.\\

—It does, but what happens when the Cavalier gets too armor-dependent? Imagine his armor gets stolen during a conflict, it already happened before, I'm sure you know Raphael's old armor, ValonVorum. He won that armor in the war, Seraphim "gave" it to him. Its last user was too dependent of it, and he is dead now... My point with the history is — Idiofyel started to walk in circles around Mikael — You should not use the elemental power of Kentaurus and Toliman. People will see and eventually realize what is going on... — Mikael started to smirk.\\

—Don't you worry about it. Soon I will master all of the elements. — He lifted his hand and made a small ball of water above it. \\

—Your element is ice, make water should be the easiest thing for you...\\

—Well, it is not. It took me a good time to be able to do this.\\

—Even more reason why you should listen to what I'm saying.\\

—Don't you worry, I will be careful. But now... You haven't told me the name of the other weapons yet...\\

—Oh... that... You said that you got to the second pillar in your dream, right? \\

—Yes.\\

—The name of the bow is Gamma Velorum...\\

Mikael repeated the words and the dark bow appeared in his left hand. It was a heavy bow, big and imposing with small details at the two ends, with the rope tied to them being hard and thin. Mikael was surprised, there were no arrows with the bow; when he asked Idiofyel about it, the Cavalier responding saying that he could fire anything from the bow as long as it fitted between the string and the riser.\\

That was the last information Idiofyel gave to him, according to him, even if he tells the boy the name of the other weapons, it would not work until he went back to the pillars and conquered them himself. The same way he went to the bottom of the well to find the cleavers, he needed to complete the other tests in order to get the other weapons.

During the night training, some of the cavaliers were training two on two combat, it was Asphela and Onami against Prospounae and Mikael. Valon and Thysíla were watching from far.\\

The teams were not balanced; Mikael was the one trying to attack Asphela but she was way too fast for him to hit with his heavy weapons. She was running around him trying to hit as many attacks possible with her new rapier, it was her first time using the weapon Caliel made. The sword was light and thin at the tip while the part next to the handle was slightly larger, since it was made from what used to be the horn of the armor, the rapier was a light blue blade with a golden guard. Caliel made a research about what powers Asphela had so far and made a sword that turned into lighting with Asphela and the rest of the armor. Her attacks with the rapier became so fast that none of the boys could follow them, she would get closer to attack Mikael and when he was about to counter it, she would just run away. In that same day, Onami talked to Idiofyel about her armor and he told her how to call her bow, Dux was its name. She was shooting as much as she could at Prospounae from a distance but her bow had only four arrows, it was more than enough for her, after the arrows hit a target, they would return to her quiver. Prospounae could not get close to her to attack and, if Onami stopped shooting, Asphela would quickly attack him and protect her partner.\\

After a couple of minutes fighting, Asphela killed Mikael and continued her onslaught against Prospounae. From outside of the fighting zone, a surprise visitor entered the arena and started to watch the fight, Valon and Thysíla stood paralyzed not knowing what to do. Mikael passed through the door and came face to face with Seraphim. \\

—Hello... — The boy awkwardly said. \\

—Good evening. \\

The other cavaliers inside the training area could not see what was happening outside.\\

—What happened to you... to grace us... with your presence? — Mikael tried to speak. \\

—I came here to apologize. \\

… \\

—Excuse me?\\

—Apologize. After what happened I realized that my actions and words did not match the position that I hold. \\

—It is all right. You were Really mad... I get it. \\

—Even so... I'm sorry. I will remove the title I gave you. \\

—The Soul Thief? \\

—Yes. \\

—No. — He shouted.\\

—What? \\

—Don't remove it.\\

—Why? \\

—Are you kidding me? That title is cool as hell.\\

—It is a shameful title, the ones with "thief" on them are used to insult the bearer. Besides, when I give you a title, it is marked somewhere in the armor, if I don't remove it, Mikael will be marked as a thief forever.\\

—Yea, but a thief of souls.\\

... \\

—Boy, you are not okay. Fine then, if is that what you want, I won't remove it.\\

—Thank you.\\

Seraphim sighed and smiled.\\

—I will be going now, already interrupted your training enough. Although, your death interrupted your training before I could...\\

—It was a tactical death, to distract my enemies and allow my comrade to kill them... — Prospounae was in the verge of death when he turned around to see it. Mikael turned to Seraphim with the same upright posture he used while bragging before and said — It seems that my comrade and I have a... problem in our communication.\\

—Yes, it does — Seraphim said laughing and turning around to walk away.\\

—Hey, — Mikael shouted to him — Don't you want to help us with our training? \\

—No, you guys are doing just fine. \\

—But having the Archduke, the most powerful Cavalier in the nation, here with us would be... amazing. — Seraphim still denied the offer — And... there are somethings Idiofyel told me... that I would love... to talk about it with you.\\

The Paladin stared at the boy from over his shoulder and smiled once again. \\

Seraphim called Valon and Thysíla who were sitting in the stands to participate with them. When the four cavaliers entered the glass, Asphela was trying to cut Prospounae's head off after Onami shot her enemy twice in the chest. They stopped fighting and kept staring at the visitors in the position they previously were.

—Change of plans guys... — Mikael said excited — We all are going to fight Seraphim...\\

They had no reaction. \\

—But... is everything cool with you two? — Asphela asked while freeing Prospounae.\\

—Yes, it is. He even offered train with us today as a form of apology.\\

—No, I have not. Mikael is basically blackmailing me, but, as a form of apology, I will allow it. For now. — Seraphim looks at the three cavaliers who were still fighting when he arrived — But this is a good opportunity to see how well is Haamiah training you.\\

The Paladin lifted his hand at Prospounae and Asphela and in an instant healed all of the injuries they had. \\

—This will be a six versus one, and since you guys are in disadvantage, I will let you choose in which battle ground the fight will take place.\\

They looked at each other and started to whisper, Seraphim patiently waited until they finished. Valon reached the glass near the door and the whole place started to transform. It was a massive open field with some trees in the distance, heavy rain poured through all of the place almost transforming it in a swamp. The students started to surround the Paladin in the same way they are used to do with Haamiah, Seraphim stood still, looking at them while they prepared themselves. \\

Mikael does not remember what happened during his confront with Seraphim, the Paladin lifted his right hand and a giant light blinded and then killed him. They know that Seraphim's element is fire because of the fire wings he can create so, the only strategy they could come up with was: choose a place with a lot of water and if they see him lifting his hand, they run away as fast as they can. Other than that, they will try to do the same thing they do against Haamiah.