Chapter 76 - New Sparks

While the young man spoke, Athena analyzed her situation.

She had been awake two weeks ago, but awareness of her hadn't returned until then. Plus she had the problem of her condition...

(Hm... I have mana, but I can't control it and...) Athena closed her eyes. (...Are the Akashic Records...locked?) But the problem doesn't just stop there. (Hm...? Can I feel two other mana inside me?)

Athena felt two strange mana inside her body and hers. It seemed to try to devour each other and that hindered the internal flow of mana in her body.

(This way will be impossible to do anything. First I have to discover the origin of these other mana.)

Athena took a deep breath and concentrated on herself.

Inside her, Athena saw the three mana, gold, white and blue.

The white mana was dense and calm. It was her mana.

The gold was aggressive and faded. It was the mana originating from Excalibur.

Finally, a blue, it was the only mana that had a form. It displayed the form of a sleeping dragon and ignored the attacks of the golden one who was attacked by the white one.

(What a mess... I turned into a dragon for "one second" and it happens...) Athena was starting to think of a way to put things in place when she heard something she couldn't ignore. "What did you say?"

"That you are ungrateful." Hercules complained.

"No, before that..."

"Huh? Hmm.. That I should have let you die two years ago."

"Two years? Not two weeks or months, but years?" Athena's face paled. "I disappeared for two years... They sure think I'm dead... What am I going to do?"

"Them? You came from the islands in the sky, right? How can we get there?"

Athena was thoughtful and then looked at the young man. "You are strong?"

"Hercules is pretty strong!" replied the girl with pink eyes.

"Hercules?"

"That's the name I chose after giving up hope of returning to our world."

"Not "ours". Yours..." Athena corrected. "I couldn't go back even if it had a way... I was reborn here." Athena looked away. (The body at least...)

"Whatever. "Hercules" is a much cooler name than my given name." Hercules said and looked at the children who shook their heads. "And to answer your question. Yes, I am strong."

"Alright then let's go to the far north." Athena said and stood up.

"What now?" Hercules frowned. "It's getting dark."

"AND?"

"We have children here."

"..." Athena looked at the four people and sat back down on the floor. "In the morning then." Athena said and closed her eyes. (If I fix my mana, I won't need you anymore and I can go alone.)

***

"That's not the kind of magic that would have the effect you said either..." Naphe said as she closed another grimoire.

After the destruction of Tarna and half of the Tower of the Mages, Naphe found herself a widow and alone.

She wandered for months until Mifa found her and hired her to help with her research into spells.

Now she was in Athena and Mifa's room, behind a mountain of books and spell scrolls looking for a spell that would cause the spellcaster to disappear.

"What if it's a magic that only Athena can use?" Naphe considered.

"It's possible?" Mifa asked.

The look of someone who was about to lose everything on Mifa's face, made Naphe's heart ache at the thought of her husband, Verio.

"Anything is possible for someone who has become a dragon but... There is still hope." Naphe said.

She really wanted to believe those words.

Mifa turned her eyes to the parchment she was reading, but she could no longer concentrate.

Feeling a heaviness in her back and a lump in her throat, she sniffled, holding back tears.

Mifa had already cried a lot and sometimes still cried the longing she felt for Athena. But she decided to be strong and that's why she controlled herself and swallowed her tears.

(I'll find you.)

With that thought in mind, Mifa put the parchment aside and picked up another grimoire.

(It doesn't matter what time. I'll bring you back.)

Her mind was clear and she was about to focus on reading when the door was opened abruptly.

"Your Highness, Princess Serien got into labor!" Said the maid.

"Huh?" Mifa looked at the woman with a confused expression. "I'm not the child's father, you know? Where's the duke?"

"A thousand pardons, but the duke has returned to Mizha."

"Did you call a shaman, healer or midwife?"

"Yes but..."

"Speak, woman!" Mifa yelled at the shy looking maid.

Mifa starts to think that something had happened to Serien.

"Your Highness, Princess Serien doesn't want to be alone and said to call you..."

Mifa frowned and breathed a sigh of relief and rose from her seat. "Naphe, that's all for today."

"I can go too?" Naphe asked. She has never had children and has never seen a birth before. Her curiosity spoke loudly.

"I do not mind..."

"Your Highness..." The maid protested.

"No problem. What can Serien do? Spit the baby on me? Let's go."

***

In the far north of the world, in a castle of stone and ice echoed hysterical laughter. The demons throughout the castle cowered in fear at the laughter.

The owner of that laugh was happy to receive the news that Mammon has gone back to hell.

The demon lord who hated the other demon lords. A divine being who fell and was cast out by her father. A god who has lost her divinity.

Lucifer beat her white wings happily as she showed her expression of pure happiness to Leviathan and Azazel who looked nervous before the woman.

"Has he gone back to hell?"

"N-no. He was completely destroyed."

"Pffffft!!!! Ehehe..."

"L-Lucifer, this is a serious p-problem..."

"AHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! HEHEHAHAHA!!!"

Azazel lowered his eyes thoughtfully. (It's no use... Lucifer would never move by a demon...)

"Even after greedily eating one of my feathers... Ahahahaha! He... Hehehehe! Couldn't kill a human? Dahahahahahaha!" Lucifer wiped the tears of happiness and glared at Azazel and Leviathan. They were like two different personas. "And what do you want, Azazel?"

Azazel huddled in his chair and Leviathan had perhaps been sweating too much, as her chair was wet.

"N-no, we just came to inform you." Azazel said.

"Hmph~..." Lucifer leaned back in her throne. "Since heaven with Dad, you've always been cunning, Azazel."

Azazel looked away. He was cunning, but a fearful one. He always hated his older sister who was stupidly stronger than him.

"Why did it take you two years to inform me?"

"I…I went back to hell to be sure." Azazel said. "It took me two years in this world to get out of there again. But for me it was almost ten thousand years..."

"And you did all this to keep me up to date with things going on in the world? I can't believe it. As I said, you're cunning. Almost as cunning as Raphael..."

"Just thought you'd want to know precisely…-" Azazel shivered at Lucifer's sharp gaze.

"I'm only in this world because Faena opened the gates of hell back then. I don't have to worry about destroying Mom's world.

If I were to destroy a world, I want to destroy our old man's favorite world.

Get out. I'll let you live just because you brought me news that put me in a good mood."

Lucifer's lonely, happy laughter continued to echo in that castle for several more days.

Lucifer was glad there was someone out there who could kill the nasty demons in her place.

She wanted to find this person and looked at the ceiling of the throne room with some anxiety.

***

Sitting by the fire, Athena focused on her condition. She thought that was not good.

With Excalibur being part of her now, she no longer needed someone to use sacred spells and skills, but Excalibur itself was being the thorn in her side.

Because of the sword, Athena could not control her mana that was trying to devour the divine mana of the sword, which in turn was trying to devour the draconic mana that just slept.

(If I could extract these mana from my body...)

Athena started to force the mana out of her body, but this turned into a tug of war between her and the white mana. It was the only one to be slowly expelled.

(Tsk! You're not even a living thing, how can you go against your master?) Athena frowned.

"Look, Kalta, she's making a frown. Hihihi!"

"Stop it, Idna." Kalta scolded.

"She's so beautiful..." Said the pink-eyed girl.

"Malana, do you like girls?" Kalta asked and the girl said nothing without understanding what the boy meant.

"I like Malana!" Idna said while poking strange lines in Athena's back. "Look, she has pictures on her back!"

As soon as Idna said this, a pair of long reptilian wings with white scales opened.

Kalta yelled and ran outside calling Hercules.

Athena opened her eyes and looked at the wings. "Heh~... So that's what happens if I try to use draconic mana..."

"Look! She has a tail!" Idna yelled.

"Sis, what are you?"

"I want to ask the same question." Hercules said from the door of the hut. His arms full of firewood and Kalta scared behind his leg.

"...."

***

All over the palace you could hear Serien's screams and the midwife's encouragement.

This made everyone listening apprehensive, until the screams ceased.

"My congratulations, your highness, it's a boy." The midwife said with the bloody boy in her arms. "Healer, please..."

The woman gestured to the pale man in the corner of the room with a bucket in his hands.

"No, no, arghaaaar!" Serien roared again as the sweat practically squirted from her forehead.

"They are twins!" The midwife celebrated and handed the child to the maid. And returned to between Serien's legs.

"I'm gonnaaaaa...!! Argyaaaar! AAARH! Kill Veroooooon! Gyaaaaargh!!!" Serien said.

"I would do that..." Mifa said as she held the woman's hand.

The night was just beginning for Serien.

***

To the north, in the Veand Kingdom, the prince faced his victim in an isolated shed in the middle of a grove.

With both hands bound in shackles, a beautiful young girl with golden hair was hanging in the center of the place.

Despite the days she spent there, she resisted steadfastly and survived everything Edrik wanted to do, as she no longer had the strength to resist.

"How did my sweet, sweet Sadriha behave?"

The girl looked up and parted her dry, cracked lips then, she said in a weak voice. "W-well... I... I... b-behaved... well... mas-master."

A smile of joy spread across the prince's face. "Very well. I'm going to give you lots of love today too." Edrik said while caressing the girl's intimacies.

He stayed there for an hour, as he always did, and slipped through the trees after locking the shed and heading into town.

That was his routine.

Whenever he fled the palace, he went to the shed, used his victims, fed them, cleaned them, and left.

To disguise it, he went to the city where he met his friends and together they went to brothels.

But today was different.

Halfway to the meeting point with his friends, the prince took a detour when he felt hungry.

(I barely ate the breakfast...)

He went to the fair where he could find something he liked. It was there that he found what he had been looking for, for so long.

A beautiful lady with long reddish black hair, big eyes and red as rubies, and an innocent and yet mischievous smile.

"An elf?" The prince thought aloud when he saw the girl's pointed ear.

"Hm? Elf? No, your highness. That's a nymph.." Said the owner of the apple stand.