Odyssey of the Guardian Emperor

Alistair, dressed in black armour, casually—if a little too casually—walked over to Byron and retrieved a green, elegant vial from his Storage Bracelet. He lifted the man's bruised head, corked the vial open and tipped it on his cut lips, allowing the liquid to spill down his throat. The cuts on his lips were the first to vanish as the elixir took effect.

"You've got some ner…" Avaros started talking, only for the boy to raise his hand for him to stay quiet. The fact that the Dark Mage stopped talking sent ripples of murmurs through the Red Cloaks, something that only worked to anger the Dark Mage.

Alistair returned the bottle to Byron's lips and let out a bored sigh, "I'll be with you in a minute."

Byron's body lit up with a faint green glow, and he coughed up a worrisome amount of blood. His eyes flickered open as soon as the swelling had gone down, panic set inside them, "You shouldn't have come back here. They'll…"

"Hush now! We'll talk about your betrayal later," Alistair stopped the man. "There is still a lot of dark magic in your system. You'll need to see a Healer after." He finished that with a wink, knowing well that the man would know which 'healer' he was talking about.

"You must have a death wish, boy?" Alistair was rudely interrupted by the Commander of the Emperor's soldiers, his voice grating on the boy's ears like the rusty wheels of an old wagon.

Alistair took note of his words but didn't give as much as an acknowledgement. He placed Byron down and turned to the men before him. Counting them now, he felt a shiver run down his spine. Alistair didn't need Spirit Sight to know what he'd walked into.

Today, that technique was utterly useless. Each one of these hooligans was already in the Stone Rank, a monster like Darth and in the middle of them stood a man in black scaly apparel, boasting Dark Magic and the Metal Temper Rank. It was obvious that Alaric was out of his depths here, and yet, he stared at the men with contempt(or some version of it).

"You know what I think?" Alistair started, "I think my death was signed the moment you decided to beat Byron to this point just because you couldn't wait a few days for your little trap to work. I mean, if you could beat him like this, I wonder what you have in store for me."

"You're mistaken!" the commander yelled out, "We're not here to beat…"

"Yes, child. You are indeed mistaken," Avaros interrupted the Commander before he could finish his words, the shadows around them growing deeper and quivering with a thick murderous intent, "Yours won't be a thorough beating, but a slow and painful death."

The Commander went pale in the face, "But, S-sir, we were told to take him alive."

"Rest easy, Commander. This was never the boy we were looking for. Check his Temper rank," Avaros spoke calmly, but his voice was filled with so much vengeful venom that it made Alistair reconsider his life's choices. "I've been a fool to believe the drivel coming from even bigger fools. He's not even Glass Temper."

Gasps rippled through the soldiers as they activated their Spirit Sight to confirm what the man had just said. Alistair smirked with glee as he stood before the men, "And so what if I'm not of the Glass Rank? Did you somehow hit your head and begin to believe a Metal Rank was strong enough to defeat me?"

The shadows quivered and the ground quaked in response to Avaros's rage, threatening to swallow everything whole. The man was in a bad mood, having taken this long to find Alaric, and even now that he thought they'd found him, it'd turned out to be untrue. The air turned cold and lightning crackled with a thunderclap in the sky above, "You just don't know when to shut up, do you?"

Alistair cracked open a wide, deranged smile filled with mischievous glee like that of a devilish imp, 'What a frightening expression that is!'

Time slowed.

One second, Avaros was standing in front of the soldiers, and the next, he was in front of Alaric, his palm open wide enough to cover the boy's entire face. In a fraction of a second, he could smash the boy's skull into the wall and end this farce.

Alistair's body hadn't moved an inch, and it still didn't move when the hand came within an inch of making contact, only for him to vanish, along with Byron's body.

Avaros's hand swiped at nothing and ripped a large hole in the building in front of them. Byron's body appeared several paces away while Alistair appeared right behind the Dark Mage, spinning with a vertical kick that slammed right into the Dark Mage's neck.

There was a sound of a metal clang before the boy vanished again and appeared several steps away, limping with a pained expression.

"Son of a brick of dirty melted pig-iron… Arrrgghh!" he grunted.

"You idiot!" the commander yelled at the top of his voice, "And after all that talk about him not being able to beat you. I was almost convinced you had some trick up your sleeve."

"Commander, whose side are you on here?" Avaros turned to the large man in red.

"Yours, of course. I was hoping for a bit of a challenge. He is a bit of a local hero after all," the Commander admitted indifferently.

"Local Hero, my foot! He's weaker than the whole Black Generation. " I'm not impressed," the Dark Mage shrugged. "Now, deal with him. I can't believe my services were wasted on something like this."

As Avaros walked away, he spat something red to the side and rubbed his neck, massaging the spot Alaric had kicked, "And make sure you break him real good. He must pay for pulling such a cheap move."

Alistair watched the man leave while the commander and his soldiers took his place. "My my! The barbarians draw their true fangs. The Fangs of Cowardice!"

"What's that?!" the Commander growled.

"The big Steel Rank is afraid of an Unranked one. I made him bleed and now he's sending vermin after me," Alistair lamented, feigning great disappointment whilst watching the men grow more enraged by his words.

Avaros only scoffed as he took a seat behind the soldiers. "Tear him to pieces," his deep voice rumbled, unperturbed by Alistair's provocative commentary.

He was impressed, however, by the lack of fear in the boy's eyes. 'It's almost like he doesn't care for his life at all. He's a madman,' the man chuckled to himself, 'I haven't seen one like him since that wannabe hero who got himself killed by the Demon King.'

The commander was a man of large build, and while his rotund belly made it next to impossible for Alaric to take him seriously, he wasn't about to take him for granted. There was a reason he was the commander.

The boy smirked, "Just you?! I'd rather take on all of you at once."

The commander stopped to look at the boy and tilted his head, "You're stupider than I thought, kid. Yusa, take a crack at him. Break a few bones. Make sure he screams. With your ability, that shouldn't be too hard."

"A shame, really," Alistair sighed, noting how all this boasting had only sent him down the ladder. Normally, he wouldn't be bothered by Yusa, but the commander had just made a point of mentioning his ability, which made the boy's stomach turn.

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What was Yusa's ability? Surely, it had nothing to do with discovering the truth behind someone's lies, like they tried back when they'd just come to Melbourne. But they had failed then, hadn't they?

'Crap crap crap… I don't want them reading my mind,' the boy mentally screamed, doing his best to calm himself and look as cocky as he could.

Yusa walked up to him with a nod, "You know, Alistair. For a moment, I actually rooted for you. I thought you were clever, but this… this is just disappointing. I could never forgive you for this."

Just then, Alistair took a step back, then staggered and fell to the ground. His head was spinning so badly he could barely tell what was up or down. It was so bad, in fact, that he felt he was leaning against a wall even when he was clearly on the ground.

Yusa was quickly approaching, but Alaric didn't see him move before a fist rammed into his gut.

WHAM! A punch to the face. Alaric's head spun… 'What's happening? Wasn't I on the ground?'

[ Looks like he wields the power to disrupt balance… No, that's not quite right. It might be more than that. ] Alia observed.

'Yeah… Am I dizzy or is gravity shifting direction?' the boy struggled to understand, 'Or both?'

A kick sent Alaric flying into the road. He coughed up blood and struggled onto his feet, staggering while he did. Stars dotted his eyes only to clear instantly.

Yusa was coming, running at him full speed. Alaric got down with his legs in the way, tripping Yusa. Just like before with the Dark Mage, pain flared through Alaric's leg as though he'd just been hit by a charging stone rhino, 'What are these idiots made of?'

[ You're fighting Stone Ranks with an unranked human body. What do you expect? ]

Alistair felt his skin and muscles stitch themselves back together at record speed. He stumbled to his feet, then ran into the wall to his side as though he'd been lurched to the side, "Ugh! A Child of Balance. How fortunate!"

"Fortunate?" Yusa asked.

"Yes… Fortunate. The power of balance does not support creation or destruction… only balance… which means your ability is not inherently capable of destruction," Alaric smirked amidst the pain.

"And so what?" Yusa scowled. The sound of steel singing through the air announced him drawing his sword, "You're immobilised. A lumbering drunk with no sense of direction."

"I invoke the powers of the four Constellations of the Elements: Aero, Liquidium, Incendio and Tecton, the Pioneers of Balance, Pillars of the World Before and the World After," Alaric declared in front of the soldiers. The Old Tongue was not that well-known, but invocations were commonplace enough for those who paid attention, and it was also commonplace knowledge for those who sought it that using the power of multiple Constellations at once required mountains of aether and even worse, laser-like focus.

Anything less and a disaster was the outcome.

"That boy's insane," Roan yelled out, putting his hands out to summon a protective barrier.

No sooner had the man done this than the ground quaked, the heavens thundered, and a powerful tempest descended on the pair of fighters, filled with water droplets and icicles.

Yusa stabbed his sword into the ground and looked forward, only to find the boy wasn't there anymore. He looked around, holding a hand over his eyes and squinting through the chaotic tempest, only for him to feel the cold edge of a blade on his neck.

"So your ability only works if you can directly see your target. Quite the limitation, don't you think? Have you thought of a way around it yet?" a playful yet chilling voice whispered in his ear.

Yusa's hand travelled to Alistair's blade and yanked it away from his neck before the other pulled his sword out of the ground for a counterattack. The grey-haired soldier moved fast and with enough prowess to make Alaric grin, but when his sword struck at his enemy, there was nothing.

Alaric appeared above him a second later, his sword coming down on the man's back. Yusa was faster, though, turning easily to block the attack.

CLANG, the two swords met, and the ground shook from the force.

A grin bloomed on Alaric's face as he welcomed the thrill of battle.

Yusa pushed his blade away and closed the distance, with a calm expression on his wet face. His blade was sailing for the boy only for Alaric's body to vanish yet again, reappearing in a spin that brought his sword in a dangerous arc, going straight for Yusa's neck.

Again, the soldier blocked the attack easily. This time, however, the edge of Alistair's blade was burning a furious red that exploded on contact, throwing Alistair away from the battle, instead of Yusa.

'Tch!' Alistair clicked his tongue.

He teleported again and appeared high above, unperturbed by Yusa's impeccable defence. The sky thundered, and a bolt of lightning came down on the grey-haired soldier. Yusa lurched to the side as Alistair came down, dodging the lightning-wreathed blade by a hair. The ground split, and rocks flew everywhere.

"Heh! You're quite nimble." Alistair said while he staggered, caught in Yusa's ability once again. He could feel gravity twist along with his perception of it. It was a nasty ability, and yet, it made him grin even wider.

'Too bad, Yusa. If you had the power to read thoughts, you would have found out that I'm not the real Alaric,' the clone's thoughts rumbled in his mind, 'Now, this is how you play decoy.'

…………………………

Alaric's plan wasn't too complicated, and it wasn't entirely his either. Alia and the rest of his friends had helped him fill in some of the gaps during the five days he spent training.

There were simply too many options to consider, and out of those, picking out something that could work against a Steel Rank became a major task. The whole mission itself was hard for the group to even fathom. It was like looking up at a mountain and going, 'How do we dig this up again?'

That said, they did have quite an arsenal of tools. There were the abilities Alaric had gathered. Alia filled them in on what she'd found out about the clone's abilities. Alaric's white copy was physically weaker than his, but also not easily destroyed as it had been with Darth's clones. The only difference had been that Darth's clones were at least Glass Rank, which wasn't the case for Alaric.

Back when they'd fought Darth, cornering the annoying bastards was just a way of reducing their numbers but increasing their individual strength. The power of one they destroyed was just distributed to the others. It was after they killed all of them that the remaining body, which they assumed to be the real one, rose to the Stone Rank and made a frightening attempt to kill Alaric.

Alaric was still unaware of how to transfer power to the clone like Darth did. Even if it would make him a mere Glass Rank, that boost to the clone's power would have been better than sending him out with nothing.

Alaric had landed silently, not far from the Sisters of Fragrance and released his clone from his shadow. He willed the power of the spell Shroud to roll off the clone so he would be visible while Alaric remained invisible.

His clone's job was to capture the full attention of the Dark Mage and the Emperor's Men while Alaric weaved through them and made his way into the building. He wore the Face Mask to deal with his white appearance and assumed the persona of Alistair, even going as far as to borrow Alaric's Storage Bracelet.

While Alistair fought the Red Cloaks, Alaric ghosted up to the top floor, where he knocked lightly on Lucy's door. The door slowly swung open, admitting him to a scene he didn't expect.

Inside, a woman dressed in all black stared back at him. Her beauty was impossible to miss, and the black lipstick seemed to enhance it even more. She looked like the kind of person with the power to ensnare him with a single look and only let him keep his life because it amused her.

He was still invisible, and yet, the woman stared at the threshold. She remained still, almost sure she was staring at someone before turning to Lucy with an angry scowl, "Where is he?"

"I don't know," the girl whispered, her voice weaker than Alaric remembered.

"Don't be smart with me, girl," the woman yelled at Lucy.

Alaric walked in so he wouldn't be locked out, but stopped once inside, holding back a gasp. Lucy's white hair had lost its lustre, deteriorating to a dull grey. Her full lips had grown thin and cracked, and she looked like she'd forgotten how to smile. Alaric could see the lines of her face that suggested she'd been crying, and the bags under her eyes from the lack of sleep.

A chain rattled on her arm, connecting her shackled hands to the Matriarch's hand. Alaric felt his chest tighten. Who had done that to her? Was it the Matriarch? Why would anyone put her 'daughter' through that kind of pain…?

But Alaric knew why the situation had escalated to this state. Deep down, he knew Lucy was less of a human to the Matriarch and more of a commodity. Lucy was the Matriarch's golden goose. Powerful Holy Mages were rare and valuable, bearing the power to turn the tide in the war against the demons and purify powerful demon cores to create even more powerful Aether Crystals.

It was an inhuman conclusion he'd come up with, but it was the closest thing he had to the truth.

Before Alaric could open his mouth to speak, however, his guardian's voice echoed through his mind, [ What are you doing? Are you dense? ]

[ What? ]

[ You just confirmed that this woman sees Lucy as her most prized possession. What could you possibly offer her that won't get your ratted out to the men out there? Look into that woman's eyes and tell me what mercy you can find in there. ] the guardian's voice rumbled.

[ She's a merchant… so I must offer her something equally valuable. ]

[ Storm Orbs won't cut it for this one. ] the guardian sighed. Alaric's mind was churning. He'd spied on the Matriarch for a while, so he knew a few things about her. He knew for a fact that Lucy wasn't her daughter and that the cheery girl he'd met in the Sisters of Fragrance all that long ago was putting on a facade to attract her 'mother's' attention.

[ What's the one thing you know the Matriarch wants more than anything else? More than even Lucy. ] the guardian asked again.

Her voice hinted at more than just a baseless question. This was something Alaric knew. He'd spied on the Matriarch for far too long. He knew what she wanted so badly, but now that he needed that answer, it eluded him. Then he remembered a conversation she'd heard with a peculiar Fortune Teller.

The boy furrowed his brows for a few seconds before his heart sank, [ A Domain. ]