The day entered the glittering night. Phoebe came to offer Phoebus to come down and rest. The bright, rather large, yellow moon showed the building blocks' silhouette on the mountain. That eventide wind blew gently, swishing hundreds of colorful paper flags, arranged on strings along the complex. The dancing wind also carried fragrant smoke on every street. A monastery compound that could produce its own light owing to the lanterns that watched the pathways, making it look like a small town on the mountain peak.
There was the smallest monastery on the summit—the central and main monastery—protected by other convents. There, gathered several people dressed simply. Most of them were monks, except for a man and woman in a pair with slightly decorated armour—they were the combat mages. Everyone was waiting for one of the bespectacled young monks who sat cross-legged in their midst, gazing at blank space. His hands were stretched out with their palms bent in front, fiddling with the swirling circles and components of the tangerine magic. Every time his fingers touched a magical character, it glowed and moved at the will of its master. How adept the young monk was, to move magic inscriptions without looking at all—his eyes were wide open while his irises sunk beneath the lids.
Sometimes his hands shake. Occasionally, he was assaulted by epilepsy. Before long, he startled himself, startling the others.
"How is it, Tenshin? Did Master Ito's marker spell work? Can you find the child?" the male war mage dressed in sleeveless light brown cloth asked him a question.
"Marker...." The boy named Tenshin still had his consciousness hampered. Truly, he was like a person whose spirit had just returned to his physical body after a long journey across continents. "Oh, M-M-M-Master Ito's marker spell? T-the spell worked! I-I… I found her! T-that g-g-girl."
"Why do you stutter like that, Little Brother?"
A friend of Tenshin saw his face as red as a steamed crab. His face blushed even more when the question emerged.
"T-that girl…."
Slowly, the atmosphere went quiet. Tenshin did not provide an after statement.
His friend then attempted to pull his spirit which was about to flee again. "Hey, hello! Anyone home?"
Tenshin was still half-conscious, but the way he spoke was rather lively. In his daydream, he again replied, "Oh Ko, you will not believe what I just saw. Her fiery red hair… A pair of gentle pomegranate eyes… An adorable worried mien… An innocent girl. 𝘛𝘩𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳 𝘥𝘳𝘢𝘨𝘰𝘯𝘴, she's remarkably charming, as comely as an elf!"
"You didn't send your astral consciousness all the way just to have a crush on that child of prophecy, did you, Little Brother?"
"Looks like someone's in love, here!" said a female war mage. This particular woman was of Svarga nationality, who stood next to the brown-clothed mage, earlier called "Ko". Tenshin, who was pensive before, goggled. He just realised he had just expressed his fondness for the girl to the monks, and for such a shy person like him, it was akin to revealing his abashment to the masses! He wanted to scream before his hand quickly covered his mouth. There was nowhere to put his honour now.
"NO, NO, NO! I-I did not mean… I… eh… she… no… AHHHH!"
"Hey everybody, Tenshin is finally in love!" Ko exclaimed to the other nearby monks.
The female war mage earlier also teased her blushful friend, "Tell me again how she looks!"
"STOP! STOP!"
"You were asked to find the girl, and you stalked her instead? Oh, naughty boy!"
Tenshin shook his head while growling. He covered his ears to avoid 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘢𝘮 escaping from there. Such an unusual scene for a monastery. It was possible that their spiritual approach was distinct from the others.
"Hey, what is the commotion about?"
The brief noise had lured someone out of the convent with the sliding door. That person was "Believed-To-Be Merlin", the abbot of the small monastery. Flat his face was, but his eyes stayed firm, not caring the thick eyelashes blocked them.
"We found the child, Master!" said the male war mage.
"And Tenshin fell in love at first sight, Master!" added the female war mage.
"BOTH OF YOU—"
"Hmm, so the Child of Miracle is a girl…." Merlin was reflective for a moment.
"MM-Master Merlin, I-I did not mean to s-stalk her because—"
"Oh, so you admitted it! You've been stalling all this time so you can keep staring at her? No wonder something's strange because it's impossible for astral travel like that to take half an hour, much less for an expert like you!"
"G-GANIKA!"
"That's good news to hear," the abbot replied, instantly putting on a gleaming look on his face. "If we have the girl, I expect you to make her comfortable here."
The countenance of the embarrassed Tenshin showed the signs of exploding. "Huh… eh… HUUHH! M-Master! What the… MASTER! I-I cannot d-do such a t-t-thing h-here!"
"Of course, that's not what I meant, young man!" Merlin brought his face closer to the conventual. His voice became softer. However, his tone was hideous. "She shall be brought here to prepare for what will become her destiny in the future. This applies to you, too. Preventing the destruction of the world is the most essential than the temporary desire of flesh! Don't let yourself cloud your own priorities. Do you understand, Tenshin?"
Tenshin swallowed hard. "Y-your guidance is understood, Master Merlin."
Ganika and Ko, the two war mages, remained indifferent and keep annoying Tenshin. Although they were also educated by Merlin, they were not under the supervision of the master as part of the monastery, so they often did as they pleased. Meanwhile, Tenshin could only make a thick sound of awkwardness when he was nervous or embarrassed. Perhaps the monastic life was not the right way of life for him.
Merlin then walked in between them and helped Tenshin to stand up. "In any case, you've done a good job, Tenshin. Now, let's pick up the promised child."
A glimmer of praise and a pat on the shoulder soothed his heart a little, but not for the shame of the man, who always felt inferior to almost everything.
"Master! A-as your order!"
Tenshin threw his hands forward again. His palms touched each other to form a triangle, and the space in front of him began to "crack"….
***
Skycastle, the symbol of the western magic splendour full of brilliance, was now destroyed by the battle of magic between the east and west factions—the western faction with the mystic art of Wizardry, while the eastern with their Eastern Rite Sorcery. The wizards swung their wands like swords, and the sorcerers trounced the bodies of the western mages with their magic circles like double shields.
Amid a messy fight, Haddock and Bartholomew seemed good at waving their wands. From firing flares to shaking the enemy back and forth as if playing a string puppet. Several elite wizards gathered before the triumvirate—Alicia, Nadine, and Gilmore—to block the approaching sorcerers who wanted to kidnap the owner of the Divine Grace. Even if it was only a handful of sorcerers, their strength was not to be underestimated. They were so determined to hurl strong magic and physical attacks at the girl's protectors. Those who were less than half the Magisterium's number did not feel cornered at all.
Fortunately, those stubborn sorcerers—three in total—had been pulled back by Haddock with a levitation spell from behind, then flung them forward, hitting the other sorcerers and wizards who were busy whaling. What did they expect? They are in the middle of a scuffle. It was natural for friends to ram friends by accident!
"Some of you!" pointed Haddock at the few wizards. "Escort Alicia and her friends. Find a way out through the back. Hurry!"
"But how do we get out?" Gilmore replied frantically. He stretched his hand towards a distorted side, where there should be a door.
"Let me handle it!" Alicia took out Orb from her small backpack. It brought her memory back to the past—when her mother told her bedtime tales of all kinds of magic. From what she knew, Reality Bending magic was rooted in the use of Protos particles, the power of Khaos, with the practice of Western Rite Sorcery. The result of the forbidden experiment was a spell that could turn an object into whatever the caster wanted, even from nothing. This eastern rite's version was rather unfamiliar to her. The magic was different, too. It did not change the substance of an object but tampered with the object's profile–translation, reflection, rotation, and dilation. The magic manipulated the geometric transformations of existing materials, dispensing them in such a way as to produce abstract forms, disrupting the human senses.
However, if what she learned was true, they both had something in common: they needed the power of Khaos to be activated.
Merlin peeked at them in the middle of a skirmish. He and his group alone were enough to overwhelm the wizards of the Magisterium.
Merlin ambled. One by one ran to attack him. He calmly dodged, parried, until he counterattacked with his fists. Yes, outside of the Reality Bending spell earlier, the abbot did not appear to openly cast his magic. He literally pounded the faces of the wizards with his own fists. They were even more surprised when Merlin easily parried the magic shots with his hands as well. In their imagination, he was not a mere man!
But to Merlin, he was being generous. He did not want to show any more magic when Reality Bending was enough to make his foes scramble. If this was the same Merlin as Merlin thousands of years ago, each and every spell of his, the result of centuries of learning, would overstep the rationality of today's strongest magus!
It was the turn of another pair of two wizards to come in his way. Seeing their colleagues battered by him, they did not want to be too aggressive. They have an idea. The two wizards, male and female, combined their powers. From the tips of their sticks came out electric currents that merged with each other, gathered, and got bigger with time to form a giant electric ball. There was a tingling sensation in its surroundings. Merlin felt it as well, holding back his steps. In awe, he remained frozen as the two shrieked.
"𝘍𝘶𝘭𝘮𝘪𝘯𝘦 𝘗𝘪𝘭𝘢!"
A giant electrical sphere darted, crushing the ground or whatever was in its way. Merlin was quite interested. Interested to see the current development of Wizardry magic. Impressed? Still a long way from that.
When the electric sphere hit the abbot's being, his body instantly "broke" into pieces! Those medium-sized pieces were real glass shards. Another magic trick from the sorcerer master. There was no way that 𝘣𝘢𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘳𝘥 died with haste!
Sure enough, the empty space between Alicia and the magicians tore apart. In the middle of the falling shards of glass, a hand appeared to grab the girl's neck! That hand was none other than Merlin's own!
"Please, don't run away, young girl! You must come with us." Merlin's upper body emerges out of thin air.
"Let me go!" Alicia turned around and blocked it with Orb. Merlin leaned slightly backward with ease. Before long, he was able to grip Alicia's arm! Nadine, who did not accept his treatment for Alicia, abruptly grab Merlin's left hand. Gilmore was about to throw a punch in the face before the sorcerer "broke himself" again!
The three of them searched around. Gilmore could hear glass falling behind him. Yet how The Divine had cursed Gilmore. The abbot's hand was already around his neck, then with all his might, he slammed the Big Yin far back! Gilmore hit a wall—or whatever was behind him—and suffered a concussion.
"GILMORE!" both shouted. Nadine raged, but she knew herself well enough. She could not lose sight of Alicia. Merlin, who was preparing to seize the owner of the Divine Grace, received a shot from Bartholomew. He was able to block the magic projectiles, but aftershocks then came from the other wizards insistently. Alicia gave the finishing touch with a burst of Arcane plasma, smiting Merlin's body, whose focus was split apart! Merlin was thrown back into the middle of the skirmish.
Now that the great threat had been removed for a while, the next goal was to undo the Reality Bending magic that trapped them all. Alicia started the synchronisation without further ado and neutralised the sides affected by Merlin's magic. The girl's assumption was correct. Merlin's version of Reality Bending was indeed the work of black magic. The power released was quite large, so to cancel it required heaps of energy as well. The purification process was quite slow. Each painful reach was equal to blades thrust through her skin. But that was not a new feeling anymore. Finally, after a long time, Alicia only managed to restore one side of the wall to its original order—the wall right in front of her. The other side of the building was still moving in an indistinct pattern. On the wall that returned to normal, there were a pair of doors. This was a golden opportunity to escape!
The wizards that Haddock had assigned earlier swiftly carried the poor, half-conscious Gilmore away. Together, they entered the room behind the doors and sealed them. Bartholomew summoned a bookcase monster from upstairs and descended from the balcony to guard the doors with the Anima-dator spell.
Merlin's three bodyguards protected his master until he regained consciousness. It did not take long for him to come to his senses, he woke up shortly after Alicia and the others left. He then declared a new order to his guards.
"Ko Zarni, Ganika, Tenshin!" he said, "Go after them. Get the girl. Crush all her bones if necessary. But don't let her die! I'll hold them here."
"On your command, Master!" The three saluted while striking an approaching wizard.
Suddenly, Haddock appeared above them. "Found you! 𝘍𝘙𝘈𝘊𝘛𝘐𝘖𝘕𝘌𝘔 𝘛𝘖𝘕𝘐𝘛𝘙𝘜𝘈 𝘊𝘜𝘚𝘛𝘖𝘚!"
As he jumped, Haddock shot a powerful bolt of lightning at the four of them. The brisker Merlin formed a giant magic shield, protecting his three "guards". A powerful surge of power boomed throughout the room. The young mages were dragged away, though they were unharmed.
"What is keeping you here? Go, 𝘯𝘰𝘸!"
Ko Zarni, Garnika, and Tenshin immediately slipped through the melee. Merlin confronted Haddock to do a magic fight with him.
"There's still a lot of wizards ahead of us, not to mention that Wood Monster!" exclaimed Ko Zarni, the one wearing sleeveless brown cloth.
"Upstairs!" said Tenshin, "Upstairs is quite deserted. I can open a portal there."
"You can still track down the girl with Uncle Ito's spell, right?"
"Of course, he still can. Why would Tenshin throw away the only access to the girl he has a crush on?" the third guard, Ganika, the Svarga sorceress rebuked them.
The flustered Tenshin suddenly slipped and fell after hearing her words.
"G-G-GANIKA! N-NOT THE TIME!" []