The transition through the unusual fusuma had been instantaneous, a warping of space that left a lingering scent of ozone and old paper in the back of Lavinia's throat.
When the world solidified again, she found herself standing in the heart of the enemy's nest. The headquarters of the Utsusemi Agency was not the sterile, glass-and-steel skyscraper one might expect of a modern conspiracy.
Instead, it was a subterranean labyrinth that hummed with a mixture of high-frequency electronics and the stagnant resonance of ancient Shinto curses.
Lavinia Reni took a measured breath, her sapphire blue eyes scanning the perimeter. They were surrounded. And also both her and Tobio, their hands were then placed into handcuffs and restrained.
"Take a look at this!" Hanezu said. Expanding his hand.
Scores of fellow students, those who had been abducted and twisted into Utsusemi stood in the shadows of the massive hall. Their eyes were vacant, their bodies mere shells for the artificial Sacred Gears that pulsed within them.
Beyond the students stood the agency members themselves, men in sharp business suits who held talismans and tokens with the practiced ease of seasoned executioners.
The atmosphere was thick with bloodlust, a physical weight that pressed against her skin. Beside her, Tobio Ikuse looked like a man drowning on dry land.
His eyes darted from face to face, recognizing friends and acquaintances among the monsters.
Himejima Hanezu stood at the center of it all, standing next to the silent, hollowed-out form of Toujou Sae. He wore a smirk that made Lavinia's skin crawl, a expression of pure, clinical arrogance.
"Welcome to the Utsusemi Agency headquarters," Hanezu said, his voice echoing in the vast space. "Or perhaps, should i say hidden base."
Lavinia felt the cold iron of the handcuffs snap around her wrists. These were not mere restraints, she could feel the intricate magical sequences etched into the metal, designed to suppress the flow of mana and dampen the connection to one's soul.
Beside her, Tobio was similarly bound. She watched as Jin, the black puppy who carried the "Four Fiends" within him, was forced into a cage lined with the same suppressing seals.
The agency members began to lead them deeper into the facility. They passed through heavy blast doors and corridors guarded by biometric scanners. The deeper they went, the more the air changed. It became humid and smelled of chemicals and rot.
They eventually entered a vast chamber that looked like a perversion of a cathedral. Instead of pews, there were rows upon rows of cultivation tanks filled with a bubbling, neon-green liquid.
Lavinia's eyes narrowed as she inspected the contents of the tanks. Inside each one was a human being, suspended in a state of artificial stasis. There were men, women, and even children.
"Take a proper look," Hanezu urged, gesturing toward the nearest tank. "These are the families of the students you see upstairs. The parents, the siblings, the blood relatives of our experimental subjects."
Tobio let out a choked sound of horror. "Why? Why would you do this?"
"The Utsusemi are not perfect," Hanezu explained with the indifference of a scientist discussing a common uncertainties and errors. "Manifesting an artificial Sacred Gear causes immense strain on the host's mind and body. To prevent total collapse, we found that someone of close genetic relation can act as a stabilizer. We use the life force and biological data of the relatives to supplement the recovery of the students. Every few days, the student spends time in a capsule, drawing from their family to preserve their ability to fight. It is a necessary cycle of mutualism."
Lavinia felt a wave of profound disgust wash over her. 'It wasn't mutualism, it was parasitism of the soul.' she thought.
The Agency had turned family bonds into a literal power source, a biological weapon for their war against the Five Principal Clans. She looked around the room, seeing the dark intersection of Shinto ritual and modern science. It was a factory of misery built to fuel the "Four Fiends Project."
They were ushered into an elevator that descended even further into the earth.
The silence was deafening, broken only by the hum of the machinery. When the doors opened, they were 100 meters below ground.
The walls were reinforced concrete, and the floor was a seamless expanse of white.
The guards positioned them in the center of the room and released Jin from his cage. The black puppy immediately lunged to Tobio's side, his red eyes glowing with a feral intensity.
Hanezu stepped forward, producing a shakujou from his sleeve. The staff's rings jingled with a sound that felt like a funeral bell.
"This room is solid enough that your little dog can't collapse the ceiling," Hanezu said, his eyes locking onto Tobio. "Now, Ikuse Tobio. Amuse me. Set that Dog on me!"
The handcuffs on Tobio's wrists clicked open and fell to the floor. Lavinia remained bound, her eyes fixed on Hanezu. She knew what he was doing. He was testing the "Dog," and Tobio in general.
"I will assist you if I can, Toby," Lavinia whispered, her voice a calm anchor in the storm. "But for now, I must watch. If I intervene too early, he may use Sae against us."
The battle began with a roar. Tobio, desperate and driven by the need to save Sae, commanded Jin to charge. The puppy transformed into a blur of black shadows, a katana-like blade sprouting from its forehead.
Lavinia watched with an analytical eye. Tobio's movements were sharp, his training with Vali showing in his footwork. He called out the name of his technique, "Night Haken," and a distorted, hooked blade erupted from the shadow at Hanezu's feet.
It was a brilliant move, a strike from a blind spot that should have ended the fight. But Hanezu was not an ordinary man. He moved with a fluidity that suggested years of combat experience. He parried the shadow blade with his shakujou, the rings on the staff emitting a pale light that shattered the darkness.
Hanezu was mocking him. Lavinia could see it in the way he dodged, the way he only exerted the exact amount of force needed to survive. He was a predator playing with his food.
"You lack resolution, Tobio," Hanezu said, effortlessly shattering another shadow blade.
"Your attacks are docile because you still fear the consequences of killing a human being. That hesitation is a poison that flows through your connection to the Sacred Gear." He continued.
Tobio's frustration was palpable. He didn't want to be a murderer. He wanted to be a savior. But in this world of supernatural beings, the two roles were often indistinguishable.
Hanezu swung his shakujou, firing a bullet of pale light. Tobio managed to manifest a shadow shield, but the impact blew him backward and his body skidding across the white floor.
He coughed, blood staining his lips, his hands trembling as he tried to push himself up.
Lavinia felt a cold fire beginning to stir in her chest. She had seen enough. She was about to begin the internal calculations to break her own seals when the heavy double doors at the far end of the room groaned open.
An elderly woman walked into the chamber. She wore violet robes that flowed around her like smoke, and her presence was like a heavy weight, an ancient authority that demanded attention. Behind her followed a young girl in purple gothic-lolita attire, smiling with a playful, disturbing innocence.
"Chief engineer-dono," the elderly woman said, her voice like dry parchment. "Haven't you had enough fun with the boy?"
Hanezu lowered his staff, sighing. "Witch-dono. For you to come here"
"Ah, i want to meet the 'Dog', after all."
Lavinia's gaze locked onto the woman. The air around her began to drop in temperature, a frost creeping across the floor.
This was the person she had been hunting. This was the target assigned to her by Mephisto Pheles.
"Purple Flame Augusta," Lavinia said, her voice dropping into a register that made the agency members shiver. " Or should i say, not so purple flame Augusta? "
The old woman turned, her eyes narrowing as she looked at Lavinia.That was an outright insult but she still able to control her emotions. Losing Incinerate Anthem to god knows who is still paining her, after all she didn't even knew a Sacred Gears could pull off something like that. But she, a woman of her stature won't let a little girl in front of her gets on her nerves.
"Oh my. That's a big talk from a little girl that runaway from Emerald City to the Grauzauberer. So you are the one Mephisto sent to kill me huh, Ice Princess Lavinia."
Lavinia stared at her, her expression one of cold, crystalline disdain.
"You've touch a new low, Augusta. And here I remember a woman who commanded the Purple Flame with a certain... dignity. A Great Magician who stood at the peak of her craft and the whole magician world in general. The Witch of the East. Now? You're a collaborator for a minor agency, hiding in a hole in the ground like a small-time criminal you are."
Lavinia really want to piss this old woman off. She had knew her since she was a child, after all she was an acquaintance of her 'mom'. How could she not.
Lavinia took a step forward, the shackles on her wrists groaning under the pressure of her rising mana.
Augusta just standing there in silence, but her killing intent could even be felt by both Tobio and Hanezu.
Augusta's eyes flashed with a violet light, her mouth tightening into a thin line. "It seems the child i've met years ago has learned how to bite. Now you become even more just like her."
The girl behind Augusta, the one called Walburga, giggled and clapped her hands. "Oshi-sama, who is she? She's so adorable! Can we keep her? Kyun kyun!"
"Quiet, child," Augusta snapped.
Lavinia ignored the girl. She focused on the flow of energy within the room.
Carefully observing as Lavinia released waves of cold air, the elderly woman, Augusta, turned to Himejima Hanezu.
"Chief Engineer-dono, I have only one question," she said quietly. "How many binding techniques did you use on that girl?"
"We applied spell equations passed down by each of the Five Principal Clans," Himejima Hanezu replied, offering no further explanation.
At that, Hanezu let out a low, understanding groan.
"So… it still wasn't enough?"
"Yes. It was insufficient. Unless you used ten times that amount, it would never have bound this young miss."
A dry, metallic sound echoed through the vast chamber. The handcuffs restraining Lavinia's wrists began to crack. One fracture became many, spreading rapidly across the surface.
"That is about what I expected."
The restraints shattered, fragments scattering across the floor. Lavinia's blue eyes had darkened, their color sinking into the deep, lightless hue of the ocean's depths.
She began to chant, the words a low, rhythmic hum that seemed to vibrate the very air.
"From eternal sleep, awaken. And thus, the fool will be made to sleep for eternity."
A massive vortex of frozen air swirled around her, gathering into a towering shape. From the ice and mist, a figure emerged.
It was a princess of ice, three meters tall, wearing a dress of jagged crystals. It had no mouth or nose. The left side of its face was covered in six unblinking eyes, while the right side was a garden of frozen wild roses. It had four long, slender arms that ended in massive, clawed hands.
This was the Longinus-class Sacred Gear, Absolute Demise.
'This is...a Sacred Gear, isn't it?' Tobio was unable to judge, but he could at least say that rather than magic, it seemed likely that this was the embodiment of Lavinia's will.
Seeing that strange princess of ice figure, the elderly woman Augusta let of a sigh of admiration.
"...One of the thirteen, Absolute Demise, The Eternal Ice Princess. So that's the reason Mephisto sent you here,"
Augusta looked toward Hanezu. "Chief engineer, you should leave. This girl is here for me. I have no interest in involving your little project in our personal affairs. Besides, don't you have things to attend to upstairs?"
Hanezu glanced at Tobio, then at the roaring inferno and the creeping glacier filling the room. He realized this battle was beyond his control.
He nodded to his men, signaling them toward the exit. He grabbed Sae by the arm, dragging her toward the gate.
"I will leave this to you then," Hanezu said before disappearing through the door.
Tobio struggled to his feet, his eyes fixed on the door where Sae had been taken. He looked at Lavinia, his face filled with conflict.
"Go, Toby," Lavinia said, her voice echoing with the power of her Sacred Gear. "Save the girl. My duty is here. This is the witch I have been searching for."
"But, Lavinia!"
Lavinia turned her head slightly, offering him a sad smile. "You are too kind to kill a human being, Toby. That is your strength. But a day will come when you must wound another to protect what you love. Today, let me be the one who fights the monsters. Go. Rescuing her is something only you can do."
Tobio looked at her, then at the princess of ice that stood as her guardian. He knew he couldn't help here. He would only be a distraction.
"Thank you, Lavinia! Please... stay safe!"
Tobio and Jin dashed for the door, disappearing into the upper levels of the facility.
Augusta laughed, watching him go. Neither she nor Walburga made a move to stop him.
Walburga was too busy floating on a broom she had summoned from a magic square, watching the confrontation with wide, excited eyes.
"Well then, Ice Princess," Augusta said, as suddenly an earth golem appeared from beneath her leg, witht the size that almost as big as the ice princess.
" Even without Incinerate Anthem, i am still The Witch of The East! "
Lavinia didn't answer with words. She raised her hand, and a massive magic square appeared in the air before her, shimmering with a cold, blue light. Calculations flowed through her mind at the speed of thought, variables for atmospheric pressure, moisture content, and thermal energy being solved in milliseconds.
The Ice Princess swung her arms, and a forest of jagged ice pillars erupted from the floor, rushing toward Augusta like a wave of glass. But the golem parry it with its body, and before Lavinia could respond three massive magic activation circle rotating and sending three big fireballs to her.
As it Lavinia use the Doll.
BOOM
And with that the world turn into white.
***
Thirty minutes.
For Jay, it felt like an eternity.
After found nothing in the Toujou residence, he had been a blur of motion across Kyoto, his purple embers flickering in and out of existence as he jumped from coordinate to coordinate.
Every mark he had placed on the city's spiritual map was checked and discarded. His "Domain" was stretched to its absolute limit, a massive web of sensory input that searched for the specific familiar resonance of Lavinia's mana.
He had felt her vanish from the house, a sudden, violent displacement that had left him snarling in frustration. Azazel had delayed him just long enough for the Agency to make their move.
And as he teleporting in the outskirts of Kansai Region near Kyoto, he finally.
'Found it!'
On the edge of a remote mountain range, tucked away behind layers of Shinto magic veils and electronic jamming, there was a pinprick of cold.
It was faint, buried deep beneath the earth, but it was unmistakable. It was the Absolute Demise, Lavinia's magical imprint.
Jay materialized at the base of the mountain,
His body then dissolving into purple embers and reappearing hundreds of feet higher, moving toward the source of the anomaly.
When he reached the hidden entrance, hidden behind a waterfall of artificial mist, he didn't stop to look for a key. He focused his intent, his Domain expanding to perceive the structure of the mountain itself.
He felt it then. The hollowed-out center. The metallic corridors. And then the horror.
Jay stopped, his eyes scrounging as the feedback from his Domain hit him like a physical blow.
Hundreds of human signatures, their life force being siphoned away. He could feel the slow rhythmic drain of energy, like a thousand leeches feeding on thousands of body.
"This place is disgusting," Jay whispered, his voice vibrating with a dangerous, low-frequency anger.
But deeper still, at the very bottom of the facility, he felt a clash of titanic forces.
One was the familiar, sharp chill of Lavinia. The other person magical power was also enormous.
'They are in a battle' He thought.
In a flash of purple embers, he vanished.