Argeus the Paladin
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Chapter 25
Tale of the F-System
“It's... not... over... yet... I am... the ruler... rightful ruler of Greenglaze... will bring it back to... its... former glory... won't end like this...”
“Of course it won't, Faerie-kun.”
Those words were followed by a soft, cool palm placed on the Elven prince's forehead. The abrupt sensation, comfortable as it was, caused his eyelids to twitch in an attempt to reopen as quickly as he could. There could have been no need to hasten, since the palm left his head as suddenly as it came. The coolness yet to leave his forehead at least managed to tune his sense back to action.
He was lying on a bed and covered with a warm blanket, that was for sure. His heavy eyes suggested that he must have slept a few hours too many. Finally, the smell of chemical in the air was extremely light, but distinct enough to tell Faegard of his location. In either world, being sent to a clinic too often was never a good thing.
It was difficult for him to even think of what had gotten him involved with the clinic yet again for a few seconds. His head was still swirling, his memories blurry, his waned strength still yet to recuperate. But there was one thing he still remembered. Casting too many spells without resting and completing the unhealthy combo with another cluster of medium-high level magic in quick succession was a very bad thing for a wizard's mental integrity. Not even a good reason couldn't exactly excuse his complete disregard of professional safety standard.
”Oh well,” Faegard mentally shrugged. ”Can't exactly get out of some fight of that caliber without losing anything...”
“Alright, Faerie-kun, enough sleep-talking,” the voice continued in a caring, yet cool and somewhat teasing tone right next to his ears. “You don't even have a fever. Save those words until you are absolutely sure you are going to die, wouldn't you?”
The warm breath blowing above his face bear the faint, yet refreshing fragrance of mint. If any of the pain in his cranium was still persisting, the combined effect of the hand, the voice, and the sweet breath was enough to temporarily negate it. As much as he enjoyed the company, something told him that staying down wouldn't be a very wise idea any longer.
A mild, yet stinging pain resounded in Faegard's head the moment he started regaining his touch again. Slowly he lifted his left eyelid, then his right, turning his head left and right a little, as if trying to shake off the pain. Still, his eyes was blurry, half from the pain and half from the long sleep. He could only guess his visitor from her voice, though it was already an easy task.
The first thing Faegard realized upon regaining his sight wasn't exactly a comfortable one any more. A couple of artificial brown hair dipped atop his cheek, brushing against his eyelids, tickling his skin just as the cool breath blew against his face. Aya was leaning against the bed and stooping over him as she spoke. Her face was barely a couple of inch from his, looking straight into his eyes, her hair forming some kind of a cover curtaining off the limited space between them. A mysterious smile bloomed on the Lieutenant's lips, one of both concern, relief and mischief all at the same time.
“Lieutenant Saionji?” he asked, his voice regaining vigor with each word spoken. Or rather, vigor came back to his voice by means of absolute awkwardness. “What are you...”
The elf was silenced by a quick kiss on the forehead. For a second, he thought he had touched a burning subject. A strange heat wave spread all over the point of contact, spreading down his cheeks, all the way to his neck, turning all within its wake into a shade of crimson. He tried to speak, but the heat wave somehow had locked his jaws solid, leaving it open in a rather ignoble stupor unfit for a prince.
The Lieutenant looked as if she was only waiting for that moment. Immediately she stood upright and covered her mouth. It didn't help much, as it was only less than five seconds before she burst out in full laughter. Her eyes looked teary as she laughed hard, as if she had never been allowed to before. If only Faegard had the least idea what was going on, Aya's hearty laughter itself was worth at least a good smile or two, but he didn't.
“Priceless, Faerie-kun, priceless!” she remarked between her gasps. “If only you could look at what you was like a second ago! Absolutely, hilariously priceless!”
“I don't know what you are talking about, and I don't think I exactly like the way this is going,” Faegard tried to stop her, “And last time I checked, my name was written down in the books as 'Faegard, not Faerie. I was not so diplomatically named to honor the fey population of my homeland, however it sounded likely.”
He sounded neither convincing nor convicting. Persuasion was a no-no when he tried to pull out a righteous speech with his speech pattern cluttered up with stammers and his expression ruined with an overall visage as red as a beetroot. If anything, he only made Aya laughed harder. It was not until the person in charge entered the room that order was restored somewhat.
“Lieutenant Saionji, this is a hospital!”
At the doorway of the cubicle stood a certain nurse with a mass of long, dark hair, with hands were planted firmly on her side, her eyes flared and her mouth twisted in a clear expression of displeasure. In full uniform, with a trolley in front of her, she appeared to be as professional in her trades as could be. However, being scary was not one of them, and incidentally what she was absolutely the worst at.
”That is why they say the gods and goddesses are unfair. Some women look absolutely hideous when they want to look cute. And some... the other way around.”
Had it not been for fear of rudeness towards the Nagoyaka princess, Faegard wouldn't have been able to hold that remark solely in his thoughts. But now that he had seen her, the elf was convinced that he was not the only one to admire her beauty even on the days she should wake up on the wrong side of the bed. Adding Lieutenant Saionji into the equation, the next line he thought of could only have been a logical conclusion.
Right, so I guess it's one hilarious comment from Lieutenant Saionji coming up next!”
But contrary to the logical conclusion, Aya's laughter waned instantaneously. A spark of seriousness rekindled in her eyes as her mouth returned to normal. Knowing what kind of identity Tsuki Nagoyaka had, such fearful response from even the most playful of person like the Lieutenant was only logical... or not.
“Sorry, Tsu-chan,” Aya smiled at the nurse. An understanding and compassionate smile, even. Effectively her move kicked the ball back to the nurse, as she awkwardly withdrew her quasi-fearsome facade, a reddish hue flaring on both her cheeks.
“No, I mean, err...” she stammered, her neck bent a little as her left feet tapped on the floor, “Saionji-san, please keep your voice down, that's all.”
And then she walked into the cubicle, stood in front of Faegard's bed and smiled at him.
“You are mostly okay, Elfblade-san,” she said. “Oh, and Captain Ritter and Kuro-kun would like to see you as long as you are ready. It's something important, they say.”
“I see,” Faegard nodded. “I must have troubled you and your colleagues while I was asleep, wasn't I?”
“It was nothing really, Elfblade-san,” Tsuki replied. “You've only been sleeping for about ten hours now. It's... nothing, really.”
Only then did Faegard have a chance to take a clearer look at the girl, only to let out a gasp of horror. Frankly speaking, the way her voice sounded and the state of her body did not match at all. Her voice was still lively, if not even more hyperactive than the last time they met, but her face said otherwise. Her eyes were sunken in, leaving two visible black marks below each. Her irises' color were bleak and bleached. And the paler tone of her skin, if anything, only confirmed that Tsuki had been undersleeping and overworking in the past few days they didn't meet. Knowing humans and how their bodies would stop working if they were unable to sleep for a whole third of a day, an inherent weakness that his people would often look down on, it didn't make any sense at all. He was about to voice out of concern when someone else did it for him.
“What's wrong, Tsu-chan?” Aya asked, holding the nurse by the shoulder as she stared at her unhealthy face. “You must have been working yourself sick again, aren't you?”
“I'm okay, really,” Tsuki answered cheerfully, but her face looked anything but. “Now if you would excuse me, Saionji-san. We have plenty of casualties to take care of these days.”
She was right, judging from the number of allied jets being reduced to smoldering meteorites over the sky during the fight and testified by the various, thought mild, groan and moans over the place. Still, it appeared to Faegard as if she was avoiding a conversation as he looked at her figure backing out of his cubicle. The complication didn't leave Faegard's head until Tsuki and her trolley had quietly shuffled along the corridor. And when it finally did, Aya's remark gave Faegard another one to think about
“This doesn't look right,” she said. “No, this is so wrong on so many levels, however I look at it.”
“What? What is wrong?” Faegard asked out of curiosity and some degree of concern. “You mean, this battle or Princess Nagoyaka?”
“There isn't actually even that hassle much about this battle. Sure, we lost around a hundred pilots and another forty or so is injured in various degrees, but that is all in a day's work,” Aya said, the ease at which she spit out the morbid fact was astounding. “Tomorrow, it may be Kuro, Captain, even you or I. It's war. We've learn to live with it and have our own way to adjust,” she paused, supporting her chin with her left hand as she raised her eyebrows, thinking hard. “But Tsuki's case is another, entirely different story altogether.”
“You also saw it, Lieutenant?” Faegard asked.
“She doesn't look right, talk right,... and smell right,” Aya continued, looking quite furious as she spoke. “It isn't like the last few times – this is apparently some potent drugs they've used on her.”
“Did you say... drugs?” Faegard gasped in horror. “You mean, something like dried blackadder venom boiled with bellgrass roots and prepared with a Hypnotize Creature spell with an effect a dozen times stronger than Dwarven Thunderale and can cause a plethora of ill side effect from nausea, hallucination, potential insanity and yet anyone hooked to it is unable to give up how strong their will is?”
“I wish,” Aya shook her head. “Knowing Tsu-chan... narcotics are far better for her health than the kind of stuffs they give her. All the time.”
“What?”
“She is different from us all – she doesn't have to adjust herself to the life of war. She joined the army to adjust to her existing problems in the first place when the war waltzed in on us. As if she wasn't already suffering all the time,” Aya said, as if talking to herself to vent her own dismay. “But no, they just have to make life more difficult for her. Some really nice people they are.”
“Join the war to solve her own issues?” Faegard rolled his eyes. “Well, I hope that's not because of the same reason I've been thinking about...”
“Wait, what? I've been speaking all the time?”
The look on Aya's face at that time would have been hilarious according to her definition, but it absolutely wasn't to her. Her eyes opened wide, her mouth a little, and the way she stared at Faegard was somewhat frightened and regretful. And with that expression, she was left in a trance for a good half a minute, to Faegard's perplexity
“Lieutenant?” Faegard asked in concern.
“Okay, Faerie-kun,” Aya said pleadingly, sitting down on his bed and placed both hands on his shoulders. “Never mind what I have let loose just now, alright? Promise me to forget it, and don't tell anyone whatever happens, alright?”
“My apologies, Lieutenant,” Faegard shook his head a little. “An elf's promise is effective for as long as he is alive or otherwise canceled, which means several centuries or sometimes longer. It is imprudent for us to promise everything and anything at a whim.”
There was a brief silence of displeasure. Aya's eyes twitched, and so did the twin strands of hair protruding over her mass of brown hair. Her forehead wrinkled, perhaps from calculation, disappointment, or both. But there was one thing Faegard knew – her eyes were especially convicting and disapproving, as nothing more than a single gaze from her cold, sharp eyes sent a freezing chill up his spines.
“Lieutenant, I'm sorry. I take back what I said,” Faegard promptly retracted his terms. “Take it this way then. I need a justification. Tell me why I have to keep a secret.”
For a second, Aya's gaze read 'I'm not sure if I should forgive you just yet,' bringing another chill to shiver the poor elf.
“I could say Tsuki's tale is as good as a military secret at this stage, which is true. I could also say they would evict you from the army if you fail to keep it secret and take your ticket home from you, or worse, imprison or dispose of you, which can also be true,” Aya finally said. “But... I trust you, that's all.”
“Trust me?” Faegard asked back in astonishment.
“If you think of Tsuki and me as friends, or something just slightly less,” she continued at a much lower tone, “or something just slightly... more,” at this point it was reduced to barely a whisper, as if she wouldn't care whether the elf understood her or not, “you will keep it a secret. Her secret... will permanently shatter her life, or worse, if more people know. You wouldn't honestly want anything bad to happen to her, would you?”
Faegard didn't even have to wait until Aya finished her speech before he gave a nod of approval. Having now regained control of his limbs, the elf then raised up from the bed, stood in attention in front of the Lieutenant, and raised his hand above his head.
“If that is the case, then it is decided,” and formally declared. “I, Faegard Thunderwood Elfblade, son of King Elladin Frostbriar Elfblade of the Kingdom of Greenglaze, hereby swear upon the name of the holy deities, my bloodline, the sovereignty of the kingdom and the heritage of the Elven people of Greenglaze, that I will not, be it willful or by deceit, for the sake of myself, the deities or my people, to friends or foes, elves, humans or dwarves, feys or outsiders, gods or goddesses, reveal anything that Lady Ayaka Saionji had unwillingly informed me today about Lady Tsuki Nagoyaka, her family, friends, foes or anything related thereof. Should I break this holy oath, may I suffer a most horrible of deaths, may my name ever be tarnished in the noble records of my noble people like that of the most despicable of criminals, and may my soul ever be tormented under the endless wretch of the Nine Hells!”
His oath was met with no answer whatsoever. When he turned to the Lieutenant, she was in a confused stupor, like an uninitiated being having just stumbled upon the vast wisdom of the Great Library of the Ancients.
“Lieutenant Saionji?” Faegard asked, shaking Aya's shoulders with all his strength. Still, it took him a couple of seconds before he could bring her back to reality.
“That... is your promise?” her face looked like it was torn between admiring and ridiculing Faegard's long speech, resulting in an even more perplexed look. “Do you realize I don't understand half of what you just said out there?”
“I'm a member of the elven royalty of Greenglaze,” Faegard explained. “Naturally, the hereditary power in the hands of my family means that our promises can't be taken lightly. It is customary of all my promises to be thusly sworn in the name of the gods, and... it wouldn't be nice if I break it, you heard it.”
“That is... a little overkill, isn't it?” Aya asked, her eyes showed apparent dread. “Is the sort of things you called upon going to...”
“Happen to me should I accidentally tell someone? Well, think nothing of it. And I do mean that literally,” Faegard smiled at his superior. “You know, I don't have any intention to spill the beans anyways.”
“But...”
“You told me earlier, Lieutenant Saionji,” Faegard gave a broad smile. “You are something more than just friends to me.”
******
Captain Ein's quarter was not in its best hours when Faegard arrived there. Although the room had escaped the fiercest of battle without taken a direct hit, a long range cannon shot piercing the hull just five yards below had seriously wracked the room's frame. Most of the electrical equipment in the room was offline as a result, and the rest of Squad 12 considered themselves lucky to be able to talk under a dim, fickle low-output light. Which, Faegard could add, the Captain's smile was brighter than. The Captain, who had got his machine blown nearly to oblivion, and had at least a broken arm and a couple of cracked rib that would possibly not heal before a week, judging from his bandages, that was.
Einherjar Ritter was sitting on his bed alone, naturally, with his laptop side-by-side when Faegard and Aya entered the room. From the way he abruptly shut his machine with an audible slam, the elf almost got a feeling that they were intruding on Ein's privacy somewhere along the way. The man didn't seem to be overly disturbed, though, as he quickly pointed to the two chairs next to the bed.
“Welcome, guys,” he said, in a voice rather too cheerful for someone that badly injured. “Sorry I couldn't arrange for something better, but you know the drill.”
“Don't expect much from a bachelor who doubles as a soldier and anime otaku, yes,” Aya giggled as she pulled the elf into the room, striding towards Ein's place. “You seriously need to get a girl, Captain!”
“That would naturally interfere with both my job and my hobby. Request turned down,” replied Ein with a mischievous undertone as he sat upright.
“Sorry for intruding, sir” Faegard said and meant what he said quite literally.
“Taken a lesson in Japanese culture already, haven't you?” beamed the Captain as he glanced at the duo. “Good job out there, recruit!”
“Err...”
The way he spoke made it impossible for Faegard to make out whether he was joking or totally serious with his words. The second possibility seemed much more viable, though.
“Oh well, never mind,” the captain was about to shrug, if his bandaged arm didn't ended up hindering that gesture. Instead, on his face strung an extremely awkward grimace of sudden pain.
“Are you alright, sir?” Faegard hastily asked.
“Not much worse than you, I believe,” Ein smirked. “I've told that Zakawa Black, and I will tell you just as well. I will die someday, but before that, it's hard to keep me down. VERY hard.”
“Ein, where's Kuro?” Aya asked her superior, looking around the room. “You said he will wait for us with you, didn't you?”
“For some reasons, he was no longer... interested,” Ein replied. “But whatever he needs to know I have already filled him in,” he gazed at the elf. “So this effectively leaves only you out of the loop, Faegard.”
“I must have dozed off way longer than usual, sir,” Faegard said apologetically. “Did I miss out something major while I was absent?”
“What can I say?” Ein looked at the elf from top to bottom, amused by his genuine curiosity and enthusiasm. His voice was still far from serious as he began speaking. “Ten hours aren't all that much, you know. Barely enough to watch an average-length series, without intro or ending,” at that point, he started to look more serious. “But today is a special day. I can just say that in the past ten hours, we have completed more than what we've been doing for the past week. Had I been able to actively participate in it, I'd have had no regret.”
“Did something happen, sir?” Faegard leaned towards his captain excitedly.
“Long story short, the Uchuu no Tsubasa is ours. Or at least, 95% of it,” declared Ein. “We have secured both the research and development team that is in charge of its construction and primary service and the necessary papers. As well as the deepground subway leading to the hangar. And secured the launch path.”
“But what about the ship itself?” Faegard inquired. “I suppose we've gotten hold of it now, haven't we?”
“Not yet,” Ein smirked. “There is a reason why I said 95%. There's a little complication, of course. Recovering the ship itself will require a task team to take control of it and make a break for it. Out of the middle of an enemy-controlled area. In broad daylight. Within the range of well a hundred anti-air/anti-space turrets of various sizes and outputs.”
“Which means that the battleship's power source is a...” Aya snapped her finger.
“Solar-powered core, yes,” nodded Ein. “Just like the Daimyo, making it rather unsound to attempt to launch it in the middle of the night.”
“Not recovering the ship itself makes the job 95% done?” Faegard blurted in disbelief. “Why this... faulty logic, sir?”
“If you were in the shoes of the leaders, you would know that the blueprint itself if more important than the ship,” Ein shook his head.
“Precisely, the leaders of the Union does not particularly trust us that much.”
A cold chill ran down Faegard's spines when he realized the presence of the fourth voice in the room following a much quieter sound of the door opening and closing. Quickly turning back to the doorway, Faegard took a firsthand view of the newcomer, and he didn't like that one bit.
The newcomer was dressed in white from top to toe. White shoes, white pants, white longcoat, even white hair and beard to go with. A pair of glasses adorned his eyes, since his age was probably not cutting his eyes any slack. He was slender and seemingly meek, his face pale, his sunken-in cheek and high forehead gave out a mild skull-like analogy. One of his legs was shivering every other step he took, and his bony, shaking hands had to clasp together as he walked. Everything about the look of his visage screamed lich at the highest pitch possible. And yet, in his bespectacled eyes burnt the fierce flame of knowledge, without even the least bit of malice or addiction. That was the sign of a true scholar who studied for the sake of knowledge rather than power, a dying breed throughout the various realms of Mediava.
He would have resembled an elder, venerable practitioner of the arcane art better had it not been for the particularly unnerving aura around him. A kind of aura that could easily deceive an inexperienced paladin into mistaking its owner for evil, even if he were anything but. But a wizard like Faegard had learnt too well about that kind of syndrome to jump to a paladin's hasty conclusion.
“Professor!” Ein exclaimed in horror as he sprang out of his bed towards the person in question. Taking the man's clasped hands, the Captain quickly supported him towards the nearest chair and sat him down. Only when he was seated did he stop shivering somewhat, his two clasped hands relaxed. But once every few seconds, his left knee would still jerk up for some unknown reason.
“You needn't have, Einherjar,” the man said in a friendly manner, as if trying to subvert his haunted-sounding voice resounding in an odd way across the room in a manner similar to a banshee's cry. “You are the injured one in this room. I'm only an old man who can't control his limbs as well as he'd like.”
“Professor, you shouldn't have walked all the way from your room up here!” Ein sounded much more anxious than he was usually. “Heck, you aren't even that well to begin with! I said I will take the group to see you once we're through with the basics!”
The newcomer was about to answer Ein when he was interrupted by Faegard's inquisitive eyes, gazing at him from top to toe.
“Sunken eyes and cheeks. Weak and cold hands and feet. But more importantly, mental fatigue to the point of permanently scarring the capability to use magic, no, to even live normally. You... must have suffered from chronic stagnant magic into the last stage,” Faegard mumbled as he finished his examination. “Only those so direly in need of magic and yet so atrociously deprived of it can have that sort of presence. Who ARE you exactly?”
“So that is how the people in your world refers to the ailment that my kind have been suffering from since time immemorial,” the bearded professor said. “And yet I am still convinced that there would still be no cure from this distant, unknown world of yours.”
“You know about me?” Faegard asked hastily.
“Naturally, Captain Ritter had taken the convenience to inform me about the presence of a magic-wielding elf from a world far away,” explained the professor. “We will have to work together for a long time, Mr. Elfblade.”
“Who is this man, Ein?” Aya also voiced her question, looking very uneasy, before turning to the person himself and asked out of considerateness. “Are you okay, sir? I... I don't think you feel too well, do you?”
“Ah, I forgot to introduce,” Ein said as he returned to his seat. “This is...”
“May I have the pleasure, Captain,” the man interrupted. “The name is Dr. Friedrich L. Banner, Professor, Ex-Dean of the Australian National University's Applied Metaphysics Faculty, or may I call it... magic to fit your understanding, Mr. Elfblade.”
“You are a researcher of magic?” Faegard exclaimed in glee. “Never did I expect to find someone of my profession in this world as well!”
“Applied Magic, that is,” Professor Banner shook his head. “Magic and how it can be used to fuel and bolster various aspects of life, up to and including the apex – wars.”
“Dr. Banner here is also the chief designer and engineer of the Uchuu no Tsubasa, the first Union battleship that can theoretically run on magic,” Ein added. “I'm sorry not having informed all of you before, but some information just can't be spread around before the time is due.”
The next moment saw the room reigned in silence, as both of the listeners were dumbfounded at the revelation.
“I... I just can't believe that there are those who can use magic in our own world,” Aya finally said in utter disbelief. “I thought the whole magic, witchcraft and wizardry school was just a fantasy drawn by a very imaginative mind...”
“Wait a second,” Faegard followed up. “It is next to impossible for any human to naturally learn to use magic. The only exception is to be mentored by an elf and with plenty of luck involved. So how can you pull that off in a world that is not even populated by anything but humans?”
“You are right,” the professor nodded. “Naturally, humans can't use magic. No, most of them doesn't even know it exists, and those who know may not even believe in it at all. But I am not.”
“Then what are you?” Faegard rolled his eyes.
The wise man clasped his hands again, resuming his rhythmic shivering, as if faced by something bothersome.
“I am, or should I say, used to be a member of the Crimson Society,” he said with a sigh, “the gathering of scientists of the vampire kind, sponsored by the colonial government before the First War. In other words, I happen to be a vampire who practice magic as well as science and dabbles in the polymerization of both.”
His reveal didn't seem to be a very wise option, since 'horror' didn't even begin to describe the look on the face of both his audience at that moment.
“V... v... vampire?” Aya jerked in horror, jumping backward from her chair, nearly knocking it down. Next thing she knew, she was holding up her sidearms and pointing it at the wiry professor, her hands shaking, her face terrified, just like a would-be victim in a standard slasher film. Faegard's reaction was not much less violent, audibly chanting a combat spell, so that his palms flared up in a threatening glow.
“Not one more step, then, creature of the night,” Faegard called out in standard paladin practice. “Let the gods in the higher heaven judge you and your blasphemous existence!”
“Everyone, everyone, calm down!” Ein sprang up, standing between the two disturbed soldiers. “Professor Banner here would do us no harm!”
“You are standing by a vampire, Captain?” Faegard didn't lower his hand, even though the channeling spell was pointing right at his commander's chest. “What sort of blasphemy is this?”
“There is a huge chance he will just bite out necks off, Ein!” Aya shrieked.
The next thing Ein did seemed to make no sense whatsoever. He clonked his two subordinates on the skull with his only knuckle one after the other, causing an audible sound in each case. While Aya was clutching her head, Ein snatched the gun from her hand with utter triviality, and the knock itself was enough to disengage Faegard from chanting any more of his dangerous incantations.
“You, miss,” Ein told Aya, his voice hardly discernible between jest and chastising. “How many times have I told you and Princess Nagoyaka to cut down on fluffy vampire novels that isn't even accurate for the love of whatever deities there are?”
“And you, sir,” Ein turned to the elf, shaking his head, his tone now added with a large amount of amusement. “You've just proven the 'lawful stupid Paladin beating the crap out of any non-lawful non-good creature' myth right to an extent. You Pallies do need to ease up once every so often, indeed.”
“But...” the duo responded in unison.
“That's alright, Captain Ritter,” the professor said before Ein could get another word in. “I could have lived with keeping this away from the rest of your 12th Squad, but since we will have to work together, a mutual trust is required.”
“As if I can trust an undead,” Faegard roared.
“As if I were an undead,” Professor Banner calmly said. “If I were one, you, as the magic user you boasted, capable of sensing any reanimation or soulbinding magic in the vicinity, you should have been able to tell right off the bat, shouldn't you?”
The professor's observation stunned Faegard for a couple of seconds.
“I... well, I can't sense anything that vile about you, but...”
“There are a lot of myths and misconceptions about our kind, and two-cent novels don't help our cause much,” Professor Banner continued. “I would have to spend whole days to clarify those misconceptions to you all, but I'm afraid we don't have the time or the patience right now.”
“Let's make it this way,” Ein continued, patting his two subordinates on the shoulders. “Colonel Albert knows about the professor's identity. So does Kuro's father. So does the Captain of this ship. So do many of the high-ranking top brass all around the world with proper clearance. And so do I. Have any of us taken any dramatic action? No. Shouldn't it be self-explanatory?”
The next few seconds passed with Aya and Faegard looking at each other, then at the professor, then their captain, and finally back at themselves. Not a word was uttered while the Captain and the vampire professor sat calmly, waiting for an answer.
“Well, the fact that you can enter Ein's room without asking for permission would mean you are far different from the vampires I know,” Aya sighed. “As long as you don't bite me, I can care less.”
“But I've got my eyes on you, sir,” Faegard said with a clear-cut conviction. “If you try anything funny enough, keep in mind I am a Paladin besides being a wizard.”
“That I can swear,” nodded the professor with a smile. “Since, after all, I have a deal I would like to strike with you.”
“A deal?” Faegard asked. “First of all, remember that I am still wrestling with my inner conscience whether I can talk to you, let alone trust you.”
“Even if it has to do with a way to get you home?” smirked the professor.
Saying that those words had touched the elf's sensitive spot was an understatement. Faegard's eyes shone while the rest of his face froze solid, faced with some news too good to be true.
“A way... to get me home?” Faegard spoke cautiously, trying to withhold his excitement. “Are you sure about this?”
“How sure would you like?” the professor asked back. “Warping between planes is already an unpredictable job, you should have known this already. Warping between different worlds, or, in the worst case, different parallel universes, is several powers of magnitude worse. Even with the technology we have, there is never a certainty.”
“Well...” Faegard shuddered a little at the idea. “Actually, Colonel Albert has already...”
“I am working under the Colonel's bid, with some degree of freedom albeit,,” reassured the professor. “On my part, I can offer you a lot more in exchange for one minor condition.”
“And what may that be?”
“I want this war to end as soon as possible,” the Professor said. “The longer it prolong, the more the F-System will stray from its original purpose.”
“You speak about the F-System?” Faegard asked back. “But I'm afraid I don't even know that much about it to consider what you are speaking. What it is for, who can use it, heck, not even what it is. And not even the Captain knows it. I can't bargain with something I don't have the slightest idea about.”
“Very well then,” the professor said. “I will tell you what you need to know about the F-System in order to carry out your duties.”
“I have guessed from what I've learnt from it,” Faegard stated. “Apparently it is a system that manipulates and amplify magic. An advanced technology several millenia superior to what we have where I come from, may I add.”
“Wrong,” the professor dismissed. “You seem to be a wizard well-versed in the theory of magic. Would you please tell me, then, what is magic? Why is it that only a selected few can use it while others sit around drooling at their awesome prowess?”
“Because magic is a form of energy dwelling directly in the interior body. May it be gained naturally, via meditation, communication with celestial beings, deities, or even the dead, studious learning and practice, or even by exotic means and practices, the root is the same,” Faegard said without even having to think. “But the root itself is not as important as the mental capacity of the possessor. It is the power of the mind that forges tis energy form to the point where it can distort reality the way the caster see fit. Even if that power is there, without proper practice and learning, someone with potent magic may end up never casting a spell in the whole of their life. That is why most humans cannot use magic, while their body may have what it takes, they lack the mental capacity to actually execute this power into the tangible form of spells.”
“As expected from a wizard,” nodded the professor in applause. “Yes, that is what magic is like in a nutshell. Alas, this power and lack thereof is the downfall of my people.”
“The downfall of... your people?” Aya asked back. “Do you mean the vampires?”
“Girl, stop and think for a second,” Professor Banner turned to her. “Why is it that our appearance is always portrayed in folklore as charming, charismatic, bloodsucking, magic-wielding complete monsters? It is not to project a niche in the populace's mindset of horror into a tangible mythical figure. It is because that's reality. Not entirely accurate, but part of reality nonetheless.”
The professor then looked at Faegard for a few seconds, and then said.
“Effectively, we vampires are what you elves would be like if you cannot generate magic naturally.”
“That is disastrous!” Faegard exclaimed. “Without magic to hold our body together, our – no, every living being's corporeal body will start to deteriorate extremely quickly. There are more than enough direct and indirect consequences to this to kill one in the most painful ways imaginable, given enough time!”
“Incidentally, human blood is also a source of rich magic,” continued the professor. “It is estimated that an average human has the magic output potential sufficient to level a two-storey building three times over, everyday. 90% of this potential output is locked in the source of their life – blood. What is the most logical conclusion would this reap us, a race that cannot generate our own magic to sustain our very livelihood?”
“You suck blood,” Faegard snapped his finger.
“Precisely. That is the way our people had always lived. And probably our one single biggest flaw.”
“Because you lot kill humans for a living and thus are complete monsters in the eye of the public?” Aya hastily asked. “Since it is necessary for your survival, you cannot even stop.”
“No, young lady. Contrary to popular belief, not all of us have the capability of directly feeding on human blood. 95% of us don't even have the fangs so well associated with us. And only a tiny fraction of the remaining 5% can actually process sucked blood so as to most efficiently convert blood into raw magic.”
“That means...”
“Yes,” the professor bent his neck. “The only bloodsuckers, the most famous of which had been portrayed with questionable accuracies by folklore, are also the most powerful of us all – vampire lords. Our people had to depend on them for our livelihood, since they are the ones who distribute our much-needed magic to the populace. Naturally these lords get the lion's share of their harvest, and all of those obscenely overpower the average human, even the average vampire.”
“It is an extremely feudal economic model,” Ein remarked. “Not going to work well, I suppose.”
“No, it worked fairly well for a couple of millenia,” the professor asserted. “Since, the average vampire doesn't even need that much magic to simply live. The lords can have all they want as long as we ordinary vampires don't starve of magic. And so for centuries, everything was fine. Every year, a few thousand humans all over the world would perish due to 'unforeseen circumstances'. Every year, a few millions of us vampires would carry on living. It is more or less a parasitic existence, but we all have to live.”
“Suddenly it doesn't sound as morally ambiguous as it used to any more,” Aya said.
“We could have kept living like that until the Armageddon or Ragnarok or Gotterdamerung, whatsoever they call it. But things don't happen that easily,” the professor continued. “The turning point was the 20th century.”
“The Second Industrial Revolution,” Ein clapped in realization. “Suddenly, you vampires can no longer keep up with our scientific progress any more to waltzing around and whisking away a few thousand humans every year for consumption without any retribution.”
“When a powerful vampire lord is gunned to shreds by an anti-riot squad's assault rifles without even a chance to fight back, we realized that our doom was abound,” continued the vampire professor, his tone sullen. “All of a sudden, we were threatened with extinction through mass starvation.”
“That's a fine tale,” Faegard asked rather impatiently. “But what does this has to do with the F-System?”
“If you were the one in charge, my friend, what would you have done?” asked the professor.
“Either find a cure to this syndrome or use violence,” Faegard said without pausing to think. “If my people is threatened with extinction by whatever reason, I will personally lead my loyal soldiers into battle against our enemies. What we can't earn peacefully and rightfully will be handed to us on the negotiation table if we fight hard enough.”
“Yes. By the turn of the 24th century, we were at our absolute worst. Not a single year had passed without a fraction of our people starving of magic to death. Our population by then was barely a tenth of what it used to be in the early 19th century. And that is what our leaders planned to carry out – an all-out war against humanity.”
“Too little, too late,” Ein said.
“True that,” continued the professor. “It was a geno-suicidal idea at best – our fickle magic was the only weapon we had, and to counter that, humans had Mechanized Frames. A vampire lord on his own device won't last five seconds under the firepower of a then-modern Sanger-class MFF.”
“What happened next?” Aya asked.
“That is where a scientist named V. J. Laurent came into the stage. A vampire who had spent the past few decades dabbling in various fields of theoretical and applied science, she was able to propose her two permanent solutions to our problems. Namely, artificial blood and...”
“The F-System?” Ein guessed.
“Exactly,” professor Banner answered. “This is where my explanation to you come from, Mr. Elfblade. The F-System, or Falcon System, so named because its creator placed so much hope that it will help our people soar to the high sky as a species like a fearless falcon, is more than just a MF control interface. It's core function lies in the ability to convert various forms of conventional energy into magic and vice versa. For example, electricity, heat or radiation energy, with sufficient input from the controller, will be immediately and efficiently converted into magic – the 'food' that our people had been starved of for so long.”
“WHAT?”
Next thing Faegard knew, he was already standing, leaned towards the professor, his chair having collapsed behind him. The astonishment was too great to be concealed, however he tried to control himself.
“Does that kind of miracle exist?” Faegard asked hastily, full of enthusiasm.
“You've seen it yourself,” the professor said. “Any and every spell you have cast while sitting in the Shishioh's cockpit, including the battle this morning, used not your own magic reserve, but rather spontaneously converted the Shishioh's output into a virtually endless pool for you to use. In reverse, your magic was also converted into fueling the Shishioh's F-Barrier. It went both ways, turning the machine and its pilot into invincible war machines.”
“Then why is it a bad thing?” Faegard went on. “Having infinite magic reserve is the dream of each and every wizard to have ever lived!”
“The keyword is 'misuse', my friend,” a sad undertone lined Dr. Banner's voice. “Had the F-System been used as intended, everything could have been solved. Our people would have lived happily ever after, maybe even in peace with the humans we have been feeding on for eternity. Had it not been for the hawkish decision of the vampire lords' council this utopia would have been here right now.”
“And their decision was?” Faegard questioned.
“To form the Crimson Society,” the professor said. “A scientific society charged with researching the F-System and devise the most devastating uses for it in warfare. As for the people, only a token amount of effort was placed in utilizing the System as an alternative food source, so that they wouldn't starve as badly as they would usually. A great disappointment doesn't even begin to summarize how the creator felt, seeing her brainchild abused like that. And my mother lived her last years like that – in sorrow and despair.”
“You mean that V. J. Laurent is...”
“I am proud to call her Mother,” the professor closed his eyes in reminiscence. “Not everyone was born to a strong woman who took the fate of her people into her own hands and struggled till her last breath to see the future of her kind come true.”
With a long sigh, the professor continued.
“It's fifty years since my mother died. The task of setting right what once went wrong is now in my hands,” he turned to Faegard. “That is the nature of the F-System and its derivative. Now, whether it can be used to save lives or take even more lives depend on how this war ends. I place my wager on the Global Union Army and the likes of you, my friend,” his eyes locked on Faegard's a pleading look filled its hollow. “Will you lend me a hand, Mr. Elfblade?”
******
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