//------------------------------// // Count the shadows - NECESSARY_EVIL // Story: A Certain Magical Friendship – Context_SHIFT // by Sora2455 //------------------------------// Rainbow Dash had destroyed a Shadowbolt by electrocuting it. A certain gutsy fighter had punched one to death. Applejack had washed one down the drain. Touma had negated another one’s very existence. Nightmare Moon herself had dismissed one. Including the original, that accounted for six of the ‘Nightmare Moons’ from the park. ... Wait a minute. Hadn’t there been seven to begin with? And, for that matter, what had happened to the magicians who had been chasing Index? Nightmare Moon was a threat from a time when much of today's common knowledge had yet to be discovered. Even if it had been, only a small number of people would be familiar with the beginnings of science due to the scarcity of information sharing. Thus, it should come as no surprise that she didn't actually know what 'triangulation' was. She just knew, more from experience than anything else, that the more spread-out the searchers were, the easier they found the task of location. (Common sense applying, of course.) Since she had failed to notice the Sun being restored in the sky, her only criteria for the one who would have done so was 'powerful'. Hence, when a strong flare of magic appeared in the city, Nightmare Moon paid strict attention. It was a trap, of course—magic could not be felt at any distance unless it was in use, and at this range? The magician was just burning power to paint a sign on themselves saying 'come get me'. That said, just because it was a trap didn't mean Nightmare Moon was going to avoid springing it. The magician in question was standing in the middle of one of the wide streets of Academy City. (Nightmare Moon didn't know what a 'six-lane' road was, nor that the structures overhead were called 'overpasses'.) There was a spell up with which she was unfamiliar, but the sense she got was that the spell was there to keep interlopers away. Nightmare Moon wished she'd known such a spell—it would have saved her much frustration earlier. Maybe after she had crushed this challenger she would tear the knowledge of its casting from their broken mind. The magician was a girl of the east, as was everyone Nightmare Moon had seen this night that did not come from her sister's quaint little town. She wore one of the thin shirts that seemed to be a fashion of this time, but knotted up under her rather impressive bosom. She wore pants—again, a woman wearing such things seemed to be acceptable now—but one leg had been sliced off. The odd ensemble was completed by the seven foot long sword she held out vertically, gripped in both hands, still in it's scabbard. Nightmare Moon took this all in in a glance, evaluating the other magician. No doubt, the mismatched cloth would have magical significance, but really? Her impassive look melted away into her usual arrogant smile. "I see fashion and good taste have vanished altogether while I was gone." The woman’s eyes tightened, her grip on her sword following suit. "I am Kanzaki Kaori. " She ground out "One of less than 20 Saints in this world." "And I am Nightmare Moon." The woman in question replied, not at all impressed. "The Queen of Eternal Night. Are you the one with designs to end my reign?" "I may be. Are you the one who removed the sun from the sky?" "I am." "Then I stand your opponent regardless." Nightmare Moon tilted her head back, a wry smile on her face. "Then come and meet your doom, ‘saint’." No other words needed to be exchanged. Kanzaki made the first attack. "Nanasen." Kanzaki’s sword peeked just slightly out of its scabbard. That very instant, seven long cuts appeared on Nightmare Moon's body, stretching all the way from the right of her hips to her left shoulder. On a normal opponent the cuts would not be enough to kill, but they would be painful, and they would be dangerous. Nightmare Moon was not a normal opponent. Kanzaki had not attacked the face of her enemy, and only that part of her remained solid. The rest darkened and blurred into dark cloud, and the Nightmare Mist she had arrived with spread out to fill the wide street. With an almost childishly sinister laugh, she disappeared entirely behind the magical shroud of water vapour. Kanzaki stared intently at her opponent. In truth, she had not expected that attack to do much. Any magician that did not have at least this level of protection would have been defeated already. But now she saw her opponent's first line of defence and could begin to analyse it for weaknesses. When the mist rushed towards her like a wave on a beach, Kanzaki noted to herself that it was apparently also her first line of offence. The wave of attack magic crashed into the support column behind the Saint. Despite the concrete and rebar having been designed to hold up the great weight of the overpass above, great cracks formed in the structure. The great mass of mist lazily drifted through the air, but Nightmare Moon paid it no mind. Her head was tilted up at the correct angle to see Kanzaki as she completed her leap though the air, having jumped over 20 metres upwards onto the overpass to avoid the attack. ...it should go without saying that Kanzaki was not a normal opponent either. The Saint glared down at her opponent. "Nanasen." Nightmare Moon was ready for it this time, but the attack still came too fast for her to properly react to. The attacks this time focused on her tendons – the ones in her forearms and ankles. For one very undignified moment all Nightmare Moon could do was hang limply in the air as her magic automatically repaired the damage. Despite flopping like a dead fish, one hand made a vague upwards gesture. The cloud of Nightmare Mist drifting under the overpass moved once again with purpose, surging upwards into the concrete structure. Kanzaki leapt well clear of the road, angling to fall back down to street level. Thanks to her superhuman acrobatics, Kanzaki was unaffected by the overpass suddenly breaking apart into large chucks of rubble. However... Nightmare Moon clenched one hand, and rather than allow the rubble to just fall to the ground, the Nightmare Mist enveloped them. Kanzaki's eyes widened as the chunks of concrete were spat out at her like deadly watermelon seeds. Twisting her body around in the air, the Saint swung her sword around. Each and every one of the rubble flying towards her was hit by an unseen attack and pulverised into rock dust. Nightmare Moon frowned. She began to stride forward, and with another gesture called her mist back to her side like a loyal puppy. Kanzaki's feet finally hit the ground, her body landing so lightly it was hard to imagine the great forces that had occurred on her path down. “You are holding back, Saint. Does the fate of the Earth really matter so little to you?” Nightmare Moon's voice echoed out clearly across the battle field. Only her outline was visible though the dark cloud that surrounded her. Kanzaki's eyes narrowed at the taunt. This time, she didn't bother calling her attack. Instead, there was a noise like a blender in operation as an uncountable amount of slashing attacks struck Nightmare Moon and the mist that bore her name. The form known as the Queen of Eternal Night was reduced to her gaseous state faster than the human eye could process. For several seconds, the endless combo of strikes continued to precisely destroy any attempt of reformation on the part of the cloud. Kanzaki's eyes stared intently at her target, like a hunting bird at their prey. “Pathetic.” Abruptly, the rain of attacks halted. Kanzaki suddenly clutched her oversized nodachi tight as the sword was nearly wrenched from her grasp. In the abrupt stillness, seven wires could just be glimpsed stretching from Kanzaki's blade to Nightmare Moon's mist. “You have power.” Nightmare Moon acknowledged, reforming to the side of the entrapped wires. “And you have speed. But ultimately, your attack relies on slicing your opponent, which makes it useless against me! You cannot cut one who is above such things!” Apparently, the Saint's slicing attacks were not her swinging her sword faster than could be seen. Rather, she was controlling these wires with her magic to form seven near-invisible blades. But now that her main method of attack was sealed, Kanzaki had been removed as a threat. …or rather, that was what Nightmare Moon had thought. Kanzaki herself did not seem to share this opinion, suddenly shifting her stance and leaping forward. As she moved, she moved her sword just so, and the slack in her wires started to form into recognisable patterns – But a sudden surge of unfamiliar Mana throughout the area caused her to suddenly drop to the ground, aborting whatever she had been attempting. Just as surprised, Nightmare Moon’s head whirled around, trying to take in the whole area at once. When she had arrived, she hadn’t noticed; but small pieces of… (What was the word? Nightmare Moon asked herself. Ah, yes; paper.) Small pieces of paper were scattered sparsely across the fronts of the buildings to the sides of the road, to the bottom of the overpass, some even on the road itself. Inked on each were two Germanic runes. There was a deep, masculine shout that echoed across the street. “Innocentius!” There was a third magician present. In the space between one second and the next, the air changed from a cool July night to the dry, hot air of a burning house. A sound blared out, sounding like a fusion of the roar of a fire and the roar of a predator. A monster had appeared behind Nightmare Moon. It looked as though it was made out of fire, with a black, oil-like core. It held the vague shape of a human being, though it's digits were too long and its head was misshapen. Where it stepped, and for metres around, the asphalt underfoot melted like ice cream. It was the Witch-Hunter King, Innocentius. An ancient curse of the non-magical kind dropped from Nightmare Moon's lips, reflexively giving the attack command to the Nightmare Mist. Kanzaki's wires were flung towards her, the mist that had held onto them so tightly now throwing them away as it rushed towards its new target. Innocentius took a step forward, the road bubbling as unbearable heat pressed down. Fire burst between its hands, forming into a crucifix of white-hot flame. With both hands, it swung that cross through the incoming cloud of mist. A frustratingly familiar hissing noise reached Nightmare Moon's ears as unimaginably hot fire vaporised her main weapon before it even got near. “Fire lights the darkness.” Nightmare Moon had to squint to see past the incredibly bright flames, but there was an outline of a person that lined up with the magic she was feeling. The new voice, booming out above the roar of the fire, came from that direction. “Fire banishes the cold.” Innocentius took a step forward, and Nightmare Moon took a step backward. The feeling of a sword-tip pressing between her shoulder-blades reminded her that she had two opponents. “Fire wards away monsters.” Nightmare Moon launched herself upwards and forwards, escaping the sword and the fire monster. For a moment, she raced away through the air uncontested. Her escape attempt was foiled as one of Kanzaki’s wires wrapped around her (still solid) ankle and yanked her back down to terra firma. Innocentius moved closer. If she tried to fly away again, even as a cloud, the fire monster would be in position to vaporise her before she could get away. “Essentially, one could say that fire is a power that opposes the night.” Innocentius blazed with a fire so hot and bright that it reminded her of her sister, those few times she had truly gotten angry. Nightmare Moon decided immediently that she hated it. She had managed to gain some distance, but that was rendered meaningless as Kanzaki gracefully leapt clear over her head, flanking her. Nightmare Moon struggled to her feet, getting a good look at the second magician now that Innocentius’s light was not washing him out. His face was that of a boy on the cusp of becoming a man, which was ridiculous given that he stood over six feet (180cm) in height . Various piercings were dotted around his face, his hair was coloured bright red, and a strange black tattoo on one cheek. (Nightmare Moon did not know a barcode when she saw one. Likewise, she couldn't identify the small object clutched in his teeth as a cigarette. Throwing herself into whatever dream she could reach had kept her language skills relevant, but not much else.) “My name is Stiyl Magnus. But tonight you can call me Fortis931.” Behind him, Innocentius roared. “You invoke your Magic Name?” The figure of Nightmare Moon levitated unnaturally to her feet. “Very well. I was not planning on showing you mercy regardless.” “You were supposed to maintain the People-Clearing Field. I had this under control.” Kanzaki told Stiyl, looking at him from the corner of her eye. Her attention was still mainly focused on Nightmare Moon. “As much as it pains me to play into a cliché,” Style puffed on his cigarette “you were taking too long.” “Do not take me lightly.” Nightmare Moon spat, her feet settling back down on the ground. “I am the Queen of Eternal Night, who stole the day forever from you!” A pulse of magic set up a summons: Come to my side, o servant of mine... “Restoring the sun isn't that hard.” Stiyl said calmly. “We have here a master of Shinto magic. All we have to do is use the legend of the Amano-Iwato – the ‘cave of the sun goddess’. Using a magical dance, we can 'draw the sun out from where it is hidden'.” He clearly meant for it to remove her confidence. The sun's absence was her ultimate victory condition – while it remained, Nightmare Moon was winning with each passing second. Taking that away would halt her scheme in it's tracks. That said... Nightmare Moon threw back her head and laughed, loud and heartily. Innocentius roared, and Kanzaki's sword drew menacingly close, but… “Fools. It is indeed true that the sun returned to the sky that it was banished from.” Stiyl and Kanzaki shot surprised looks at each other, but Nightmare Moon continued talking. “But I removed it again. So tell me, magicians – why is it still missing? Could it be that returning the sun to the sky is a task so difficult you would rather face me in battle then see which of us would run out of power first?” Finally, her servant had arrived. “As far as I am concerned, you two have achieved nothing. Now, Tantabus – finish them off!” Kanzaki's sword dropped from her suddenly limp hands. Her eyes were open so wide one might get worried they were going to fall out. Small tremors echoed across her body. Stiyl yelled in surprise and anger, and Innocentius answered, surging toward Nightmare Moon as a sea of flames. The fire giant was ignored, however, as Nightmare Moon glared at Kanzaki. “Quit struggling you fool, do you not know when you are defeated?!” Nightmare Moon roared, and Kanzaki's body abruptly relaxed. “Nanasen.” The blur formerly known as Kanzaki snatched her sword from the ground and, in one fluid motion, swung it and its wires out at super-speed. Sticky-taped to every visible surface were slips of paper, each bearing the same two Germanic runes. Considering how they had flared with magic when Innocentius had been summoned, it was an obvious leap that they were crucial to the fire giant's presence. Kanzaki's wires turned every nearby rune paper into confetti. The instant she did so, Innocentius's roar gained a pained note to it, and the monstrous summon seemed to destabilise, its outline blurring. It flew backwards until it reached runes that were still intact, then it recovered its form. The fire giant burned brightly, but it did not attempt to move into the area now empty of runes. One of Nightmare Moon's fingers moved to point at Stiyl. “Good. Now him.” The red-haired flame magician clutched his cigarette in his teeth so tightly he nearly bit clean through it. “Nanasen.” Kanzaki whispered softly and serenely. As soon as she did, seven wires tore through Stiyl's body so fast a normal human would only know they were there by the shockwaves they left as they passed. His body was ripped to pieces so quickly it seemed like a joke. There, alive and well, then suddenly gone. The last look on Stiyl’s face was one of shock and pure terror... … … Nightmare Moon sighed. This entire confrontation had been competently ridiculous from the start, but she would have thought that this time the obvious result would have prevailed. “You know, you really had me worried for a second there.” ...or at least, that is how it should have happened. Stiyl breathed out a cloud of smoke, one hand on his head, standing in the same place. He was, infuriatingly, completely unhurt. “Converting Kanzaki to your side should have been an instant death sentence for me. And yet, I'm still alive.” Nightmare Moon stared at the flame magician with hate. “Kanzaki knows how I fight. If she was actually trying to kill me, she would have tried much harder than that.” Nightmare Moon was only half paying attention, the rest of her mind focused on the figure of Stiyl before her. A twitch of her finger had Kanzaki slice it to pieces once more. Stiyl’s body blurred very slightly were the wires passed through him, but otherwise he displayed no reaction. “But that didn’t happen. You haven’t converted her to your side at all – she's just a puppet, doing exactly what you tell her.” Nightmare Moon closed her eyes. Ignore what she could see – she would need to rely on what she could feel. With her new servant keeping the fire monster away, she needed not fear harm to herself. “I do have to give you credit, though. I didn’t think some no-name magician like you would be able to control a Saint.” Nightmare Moon felt raw, liquid hatred rising in her. Stiyl’s mana was calm and composed, like his demeanour. This infuriated Nightmare Moon, but told her nothing of why he was not lying in pieces. Even her mana would fluctuate when her magic was reassembling her body… … “You’re an illusion.” She snarled, opening her eyes to glare at Stiyl. He just puffed on his cigarette in response. “What? Me, fool the senses of the great Nightmare Moon?” He mocked. “Surely you jest.” “I have told you already not to take me lightly.” Nightmare Moon warned. “If you were authentic, I should be able to sense the mana flow from your body to that monstrosity over there!” She pointed at Innocentius accusingly. -Puff, puff- “Heh.” Stiyl muttered. “Not as stupid as you look.” “Tear his runes apart.” Nightmare Moon ordered Kanzaki. “All of them.” The Saint shifted her stance, her thumb on the hilt of her sword… and made no further attempt to move. Nightmare Moon turned to face Kanzaki, her expression furious. “I order you! Eradicate every trace of him!” It was only when she turned to face her that she noticed that, somehow, more of that man’s runes had been plastered across Kanzaki’s front. Kanzaki's body tensed. “Nanasen.” … Nightmare Moon straightened up, her face unreadable. “I see.” Kanzaki’s wires had carved the same runes into the ground that Stiyl had on his slips of paper; over and over again until the ground was littered with them. “Surrender.” Kanzaki growled. Instead of the serene blankness it had held before, Kanzaki's face now showed the fury of someone who had been made a fool of, and did not appreciate it in the slightest. She raised her sword up, still in its sheath, and settled into a stance facing Nightmare Moon. Innocentius roared once more, moving closer. Nightmare Moon did not reply, instead raising her arms up – – and Innocentius surged forward, and the Shadowbolt pretending to be Nightmare Moon was engulfed in fire that burned as hot as the very surface of the sun. It did not even have time to cry out. When faced with that unimaginable heat, even smoke was destroyed. Kanzaki glared at the seemingly empty space to her left. Stiyl’s body wavered like the pavement on a hot day, and his image vanished completely. Simultaneously, another Stiyl appeared with much the same special effect, now located where Kanzaki was looking. “People are always underestimating the uses of fire.” He muttered around his cigarette, leaning down to pull the rune papers off his partner. He was completely ignoring the look Kanzaki was giving him. “Though I’ll admit, creating mirages is a bit more than a simple beginners trick.” That wouldn’t be nearly so effective if you hadn’t learned how to hide your mana signature and create decoys. Kanzaki did not say that say that pointless statement aloud. With a distasteful look on her face, she slid her oversized sword all the way back into its sheath. That self-proclaimed queen had overridden control of her body, even through her divine Stigma. Unacceptable. A Saint was not someone you could control with outside force. She plucked the last of Stiyl’s paper slips off her bare midriff herself, and asked the question that sat at the forefront of her mind. “Since when do you know mind magic?” Innocentius’s roar ceased as Stiyl dismissed his summon with a vague wave of his hand. “Don’t be so surprised.” He picked his cigarette out of his teeth, glancing down at it. “In both eastern and western magic, the cigarette is a spiritual item for influencing the mind. By using the smoke to map out the inside of your head, I was able to determine –” “That’s not what I was asking.” Stiyl looked up. Kanzaki, who’s only expression had been grim determination for so long, had a hint of something else in her eye. “You learned it for her, didn’t you?” Kanzaki said, quietly. Stiyl didn’t need to ask her who she meant. There was only one girl she could mean. It doesn’t matter if I forget you. That… that just means I get to meet you all over again! …right? He put his cigarette back in his teeth, forcing his mind away from the memory of a terrified girl’s voice. “That so-called queen didn’t have Index with her. And I didn’t notice any remote communication spells.” Kanzaki keep her gaze on her partner for a moment longer, before looking away. “Neither did I. We were counting too much on our bluff about restoring the sun to spook her.” Just knowing a legend applicable to your situation wasn’t enough. You had to break it apart into its most basic symbols and reassemble it in your favour, incorporating those symbols into your equipment. It was not something that you could do on the spot. It didn’t matter how powerful or skilled you were. The sun was simply too fundamental to be affected by the casual whims of mortals. Well, unless… Kanzaki scowled, but forced herself to finish the thought. …unless you were on the level of the Index Librorum Prohibitorum. Some random magician that nobody had ever heard of, randomly appearing with magic powerful enough to switch the sun off like a light bulb? Not a chance. There was no way to gather that kind of power without attracting the attention of the major churches. No way, that was, without exploiting the same girl Stiyl and Kanzaki had been tasked with tracking down. Stiyl walked over to the nearest group of intact rune papers, picking them off the ground. The disadvantage of over-specialising in runes – his magic required him to prepare his battlefields in advance. “Whatever spell is keeping the day away is still active. Killing that queen wasn’t enough.” “If you hadn’t killed her,” Kanzaki pointed out “we could have interrogated her about her spell, and we’d know how to stop it.” Stiyl ignored the barb. Kanzaki was overpowered enough to be able to show mercy to her deadly foes. He wasn’t nearly that high up the food chain. “We need to find Index.” He said. “That’s the simplest way to solve this.” “…so all we have to do is destroy her world once again, huh?” Kanzaki’s whisper was so soft that Stiyl almost missed hearing it. He paused, stuffing a handful of rune papers into his robes. He turned, his mouth opening – A sudden surge of magic, off in the distance. Huge. Impossibly huge. No one of this power could possibly be here – not in the Bastion of Science. Not without the director-general’s permission. (Well, one such person had already appeared tonight, but she was dead now.) So who was this? Stiyl and Kanzaki exchanged only a brief glance before breaking out into a run.