Face of Eternity : The Little Angel

I bolted past the church doors and shouted for the bishop.

“Azori!” I announced. “Hello! Azori!”

Eventually a clicking sound rang out from a wall off to the left side of the chapel. A hidden door slowly swung open.

A young nun's head peeked out. It was Sister Connie.

“Yalda?” She ran over to me, wiping the worried sweat from her forehead. “Thank goodness. We need your help!”

“What's wrong?” I asked, my friends finally catching up to me.

“The sky has gone dark and monsters are everywhere!” She closed her eyes and clung tightly to a rosary. “When Sister Ruth started saying nonsensical things, I thought it was the end of the world.”

A few children came out from the hidden door like ducklings. They all quietly crowded behind Sister Connie.

“The world isn't ending, I promise,” I told her. “But we need to find Bishop Azori. He'll know how to stop this.”

I hoped he would know, or at least be able to help us. He seemed like the most experienced person here, at least.

“Azori is at the Lesser Tabernacle. He's praying that we’ll be delivered from this trouble.”

“Yalda,” Uncle started, “head up there and talk with him. I'll be with you shortly once all the people around are safe inside here.”

“Okay, Uncle.” I nodded as he left.

Before I could run off too, someone approached me from behind me and put a hand on my shoulder.

“Finally, I caught up to you.” It was Emily, the private contractor. “What a mess this place turned into, eh?” She snickered, holding up a wooden box. “Special delivery for Yalda Asamo.”

This must have been the cool armour I asked her to make for me.

And cool it was! There was a long white jacket with decorative blue lines on it. Then it had this cool battle skirt too. I was most excited for the metal chest plate and shoulder pads though, those looked so shiny!

Oh, and she got me shoes too. I never wear those, so it was kinda weird getting used to them…

I got it all on me right away. I didn't even need Uncle’s help this time. Not that he could, since he was still helping people get inside the church. It fit like a glove, and it felt really comfortable to wear.

“Wow! You're really good!” I cheered, doing a few power poses and pretending I was a superhero.

Sister Connie and the other children snickered, probably because I looked a little silly posing like I was. If it brought up their spirits, then it was worth it.

“Glad you like it!” Emily stood proudly. “Nobody is as good at doing last second jobs as me.”

Professional procrastinators might have something to say about that.

I made sure to thank her a ton for this. It really made all the difference to my confidence. But I noticed that my old dress was at the bottom of the box. I guess she didn't use it.

"I figured you'd want this back, so I just threw together something new with similar materials." She shrugged with satisfied smile.

Thinking about it now, I did like my dress a lot, especially for lounging around. It also was one of the few things I could just slip into without much trouble, so there's that.

“Anyways,” she started, “mind If I hang out here for a bit? The creepy stuff outside isn't exactly my forte.”

I didn’t see any reason for her not to hang around here. She’d be safe with everyone else.

In the meantime, Sister Connie, Marek, Yamin, Indena and myself headed to the tabernacle chamber.

~☆☆☆~

The fire in the Lesser Tabernacle was bigger and brighter then when I last saw it. Its flame burned so strong that its heat could be felt from the hallway.

Sister Connie said I was the only one from our group who was allowed to enter, so they all stayed behind and I went in alone.

A group of seven clergymen were surrounding the fire, all bowing low to the ground and praying super hard. The bishop was on the other side, standing at a podium and leading these men with very concise words.

I didn't do anything to hide my presence, so he noticed me the moment I stepped around the fire.

“Saint Yalda!” he gasped, causing all the other clergy to look at me. “Our prayers have been answered! Help has arrived to deliver us from evil.”

“So be it!” all the men chanted.

He stepped down from the podium and walked up to me.

“Saint Yalda, what is it you require? Allow me to provide any service I have within my possession.”

I informed him about the situation outside, telling him what the Reaper was doing to people and what he was after. It prompted him to speedily gather up a few crates from around the chamber and put them in front of me. When he opened them, I saw all sorts of weapons on the inside.

“The day has come that you must draw a sword against evil. Please, choose one, and fight the darkness for us all.”

“Do I have to pick a sword?” I asked, seeing an awful lot of them.

“No. It's just what the scriptures read that I am supposed to say. Pick whatever you'd like.”

I had a feeling they'd be doing that a lot around me. If they say something weird, I'll know why now.

It was undeniable that these weapons he was presenting were all conveniently here for me. Some of them looked like the ones the inquisitors were using. What's even stranger was how armed the church's forces seemed in general.

“You guys seem pretty ready for battle,” I commented.

“We are called to be prepared for the war in the End Times…” He laid out a few more weapons. “But I've lost a lot to war in my youth,” he said in a sullen tone. “I know what one must do to survive.”

With all the weapons he'd brought, I didn't really see one that clicked with me. Everything here was in amazing condition though. There were even a few guns too.

“I don't know which to pick…” I looked at a sword, then a gun, but both felt meh. There was even a sword with a gun for the hilt, but that just felt silly.

That wasn't the weirdest weapon here. There was a giant sword, like ridiculously huge and wide. How could anyone swing this thing? It looked like a giant's cooking knife. Then a big hammer that would spin like a drill when you swung it. And I don't even know why there was a yo-yo with spikes in here!

Maybe if I were in an anime some of these crazy weapons would be cool, but I had to think more practically.

That was when something glimmered off in the corner of the room. It was way behind everything, so I walked over to check it out. An old case stand had caught some of the blue flames light. I wiped the dust off the glass and saw a really rusty looking spearhead inside. Honestly, calling this hunk of oxidation a spear at all was like saying a pile of bones was a living animal.

That comparison hit a little close to home.

If I was even thinking about using this in battle, I'd be out of my mind. Just holding it was making it crumble.

-Preliminary item scan initiated-

…

-Scan complete-

-Initializing Predictive Virtual Reconstruction Enhancement-

…

-PVRE; complete-

-Stardust weapon(s) now available!-

-Spear of Destiny has been added to inventory!-

Woah!

My head automatically scanned the rusty old spearhead and recreated what it might have looked like in my memory. Now I had the option to summon it with stardust? Too cool!

According to the HELP menu, the way to summon the spear was to call to it and force the image in my head out into reality with stardust. How hard could that be?

“Spear of Destiny!” I shouted, causing a rod of stardust to form in my palms. The rod warped until forming a more complete version of the spear I had just been inspired by.

It was a translucent blue weapon and glowing. I’m not sure why it was blue, since stardust was clear or white, but it looked cool. It was heavy, and much bigger than I wanted it to be.

I just gazed up at it for a second. It looked super cool. It started to fall to one side from my lack of practice with holding it straight, but I quickly tugged it back, regaining balance.

“Of all the weapons, I would have never imagined this old one would be yours,” the bishop chuckled. “We don't even know where this came from. It's been here for a long time.”

All I knew was that for some reason, this weapon was exactly what I was looking for. A spear would give me range, and it wasn't hard for me to make. It did take up a lot of stardust to bring out, but that was a small price to pay for using something so awesome.

"I'll take on all the bad guys with this!" I took it with both my hands and swung it around.

Sadly, it had more control over me and I toppled over from its weight.

"Waah!" I yelped as I landed on the ground.

The bishop was looking at me with a very conflicted expression. I didn't want to think that all the hope just drained out of him while watching me fall over, but I chose to ignore it and get back up.

"Alright. One more try! Hyaah!"

I swung the spear again, barely preventing another fall.

"A spear is a jabbing weapon." The bishop said. "Trying poking with it."

I jabbed it forward with much better success.

You know, before I made silly of myself while trying to use this thing, I probably should have realized that this would only be useful in my combat mode. When that was active, I had a pretty good increase of strength.

~☆☆☆~

Back out in the hallway before the chamber, everyone was still there. Uncle, inquisitor Daniel, and scribe Anthony had joined them too.

Inquisitor Daniel was telling Anthony about everything that happened up till now so he could write it down. At least, he was telling from his own perspective.

“She spoke such beautiful new commands from heaven. I was moved so greatly to tears! The rage of my heart calmed, and I saw the light."

"Incredible!" Anthony said, feverishly writing every word he said. "This is wonderful news!"

They were treating it like what I said before was revolutionary. But to me, it felt like common sense. 'If you give love, you'll get it back in return.' Pretty simple.

"I'm sure this'll sell thousands of copies," Indena sarcastically commented, sassy as usual. "You'll be a best selling author I bet."

"Mmm…" Yamin hummed uncomfortably, like she wanted to say something to her.

Scribe Anthony laughed at Indena.

"Holy books are free to the public," he winked. "But good try with that."

"I bet they are." She folded her arms and looked out a window. "Some good a bunch a' books are gonna do if we don't actually stop the Reaper."

"Not that I agree with her logic," Marek started, "but we do have to do something about these demons."

With all these people here, we had the best chance to figure out a plan.

Uncle was already a step ahead of us on that.

“If the Reaper is attracted to mana, we'll give him as much as he wants.” He opened up the window and looked towards the three mana pylons off in the distance. “Switch those on, and I doubt he'll be able to resist all the mana they'll create.”

Even if the mana energy attracted him over there away from the city, we still needed a way to actually defeat him.

“How do we stop him after that?” I asked.

“Once he's inside, we make the towers go nova,” Uncle said.

Oh, I get it. He wanted me to use the Stardust Nova power inside the tower with the Reaper.

“Hold on. Will nuking it work?” Indena questioned. “I thought stardust is the only thing that can kill demons,”

“That's exactly what we'll be using. The Young Mistress is able to utilize stardust to create a massive explosion.” He turned to me, a minor amount of dissatisfaction on his face. “It'll strain her a fair bit, and the explosion may cause damage to the surrounding area around the tower, but it would be enough.”

Marek raised his hand.

“I can issue an evacuation order in the city if it's within range. Everyone could head for the castle on mount Inai.”

“I already tried that,” I said. “They wouldn't evacuate because they said nobody could see anything wrong.”

The bishop shook his head in disappointment.

“So few are taking your arrival seriously.”

He was right. To be honest, it felt like he wasn't either to some degree, since it was weird that he wasn't bringing out the fanfare to the rest of the world. I guess at the end of the day I was just a kid, and I wasn't very strong either. Even if I am this Eighth Star, proving it to the world was another story.

“We could always ‘fake’ a monster attack,” Yamin sheepishly suggested. “Then an evacuation order might go through.”

"How would we do that?" Indena asked, causing Yamin to turn away. "We didn't have a monster, 'specially not one we could fake."

There was another option, but it might get me in trouble.

I could hack into the city's mainframe again and force on the alarm sirens once more. At that point, Marek could inform the people that a monster attack was imminent and that they'd have to start heading toward the castle. It would seem a lot more official with a politician warning them. Then the inquisitors could create safe paths for the people to get there.

Not foolproof, but it was an idea. Uncle and everyone liked it enough to give it a try.

“Uncle, you'll need to go with all the civilians to the castle,” I said. “They'll need you to protect them. The inquisitor's can go and make safe paths for the people heading there.”

“And who's going to watch over you while you head to the pylon?” Uncle asked.

Indena raised her hand.

“I'll keep her safe.”

Uncle shook his head.

“You'll get caught up in the nova. She won't be able to use it.”

I'm pretty sure that even if someone was in range, even if I didn't know, my systems wouldn't let the nova happen.

“Then I'll just run away before that happens."

"You'd run that like a video game on outdated hardware," I said.

My joke made Yamin laugh.

"Yeah yeah…laugh it up, sparkle face." Indena blushed.

This brought up another problem. How were we going to get there?

"Ahh! Marek groaned. "If only my car hadn't exploded…we could have used it to drive there."

Any car would work for that really, but I think he was just going to the stages of grief.

"No, Marek…" Yamin started, "your car didn't explode. Yalda took the one in the garage."

"Yours just has witch guts all over the bumper. Ha!" Indena laughed.

Marek did not like that comment…

The bishop did have a few vehicles, but he also made a point to say that the roads weren't exactly safe to drive over with all that demon sludge water.

"If only I could fly!" I growled. "Uncle, how long until I can fly?"

"That's up to how well you can use your wings," he answered. "But given your track record, it'll be a while."

"Gahh!" His honesty is brutal!

Yamin poked my arm. I looked at her.

All she did was quietly gesture to the open window, then turned back to focus on the conversation.

There was a little blue bird sitting there, and he was looking right at me. It was the same one I'd followed in the forest.

Which means, a certain witch was nearby, and I think she wanted to see me.