Edmund frantically looks around but can't see much due to the smoke. "Guys! Are you there!" He tries to call out but there's this dull ringing sound drowning him out. 'Gah, I can't think straight! Where did all of this come from?!' Edmund continued to look around befuddled when two silhouettes appeared within the smoke.
Edmund studied the silhouettes to see if he recognized them when one of them drew what looked to be a sword. "Joana? Is that-" The figure leaped through the smoke holding the blade overhead and swinging down forcefully
Edmund jumped back, avoiding the blade and coming to the conclusion that this person was not Joana. Meaning the other was probably not Narie. The second silhouette waved while twisting her wrist forming a mini cyclone for a second. The burst of wind cleared the smoke just enough for Edmund to that his current attackers were two of the people that had attacked him earlier in the day.
He smirked. "Well, looks like our sister elf and the blood licker are back for a second round!" Eric stood from the ground pulling his sword from the planks while Alisa walked to stand next to him.
"I'm glad that you're happy to see us...uh...umm..." Eric grabbed his chin as he struggled to think of something.
"What is it?" Alisa asked in a hushed voice.
"I can't remember his name. What is it?"
"What?! How do you not remember it?!" Alisa exclaimed causing Eric to flinch slightly and pull her into a huddle while pressing his finger to his lips as a sign for her to talk more quietly.
"Well, I'm not hearing you give me the answer! If you know it just tell me!" Eric demanded.
"I don't know it!"
"Then why are you chastising me?!"
"You two really made this too easy!" Eric and Alisa looked up to see a wave a dark mana rushing toward them. They both immediately fell into panic and backed away with Alisa forming a wind barrier at the very last moment, just barely protecting them from the attack.
"Phew! That was close." Eric said in reprieve earning a dirty look from Alisa.
"That wouldn't have happened if you had just stopped distracting me with all of that stupid 'what's his name?' TALK!" Eric wanted to deny the girl's accusation she was right. It was his fault so he instead just took a step forward with his blade readied.
"Yeah, that one's my bad." Eric held the hilt of his blade tightly and rushed at Edmund again. He swung at the gloomy-looking elf wildly. Edmund avoided each swing with ease and it would continue to be easy for as long as he could focus on this one person. So, Alisa threw off Edmund's focus by throwing a chair at him with her telekinesis.
Edmund's eyes went wide and he flew to the side to avoid the chair. He was still shocked by the sudden attack from the girl when Eric came swing at him again, this time aiming for the man's neck.
Edmund frantically ducked under the blade as Eric tripped slightly from the force of his swing. He had only been practicing with the sword for about a week so he was still, how does one say, bad. His form was all off and his swings were too wide meaning all of his attacks were far too obvious.
Alone, Eric could never hope to beat any member of the Djinns. Just like Alisa, as she had no practice using her savantry in any sort of battle. All of her moves were more for flashiness and trickery meaning her main form of attack would need to be her telekinesis and that alone just wasn't enough.
Which is why Kent came up with the brilliant plan of letting these two fight side by side. Of course, they argue over even the slightest things in the most inconvenient moments but what could he say. They weren't battle hardened like he was and this was still better than one of them getting hurt or worse.
Edmund shuffled away from Eric as the boy regained his balance. Edmund's hair flicked back revealing his one, sharp red eye as Mund was allowed loose. Mund quickly drew a knife from his satchel and charged at Eric.
Eric had only just steadied himself so the sudden blitz caught him off guard as he barely blocked the attack. Mund then went to start a relentless rain of strikes at Eric when Alisa once again interfered, this time grabbing Eric's shirt and pulling him away from danger quickly.
Eric flopped onto his back as Alisa released him. She stood breathing heavily. " You're so heavy, Holiday!" She shouted while steading her breathing. "You need to get into less trouble!"
"We, don't have time for this, Alice!" Eric shouted back as he leapt up from the ground and ran back at Edmund. "Just help me get this guy!" Alisa groaned in grief as she waved her hands in the air again and grabbed something from out of sight.
"Take this you half and half nightmare!" Eric insulted while once again beginning a wild onslaught of attacks aimed to defeat Edmund. This time, however, Mund was in control and he wasn't going to waste his time avoiding someone this unskilled!
With one well timed swing, Mund parried Eric's blade in an attempt to knock it out of his hand. Eric felt his forearms begin to ache as the blade shook and fell from his hands. Edmund then moved to capitalize on his parry when Alisa launched a pair of kitchen knives at him, preventing him from finishing the boy.
Eric, seeing a moment of safety, quickly grabbed his sword again and jumped off of the ground. He and Alisa were both breathing heavily. Everything that they tried failed to work on this guy.
"How did Tyrant fight this guy while he was blind?! We can't even beat him and we can see!?" Eric exclaimed. Alisa's eyes then began to glow with inspiration as she had an idea.
"Right, we can't win when we can see him but, what if he can't see us?" Eric turned to the girl with a perplexed look on his face but had no time to question her as she suddenly yanked him into the smoke. Alisa then reached into her own pouch and threw down a smoke bomb thickening the already obscured battlefield.
Mund covered his face when the bomb went off so, when his arms came down it was like the two had just disappeared. But he knew better than that!
'Ed takeover! Use that eye of yours to find them through the smoke!' Ed did as instructed and took over for Mund, His hair naturally flopping back down as he did so. He then opened his dull eye as wide as he could allowing two silver stars to appear within it.
The smoke lessened in Ed's eyes as he scanned the surroundings for any sign of Alisa and Eric. 'That girl's a wind savant so if I just find some wind spirits or mana...' Ed looked for a bit when he found it. Just on his left side was a group of wind spirits seemingly getting ready to perform some sort of big attack. Ed smirked.
'Dumb kids. They forgot that we are also a spirit savant. We have the vision too!' Ed then started to jerk his body violently in an almost ritualistic way. His movements were very unnerving to anyone unlucky enough to watch but they were for a purpose. He was moving the mana in the area to gather dark mana.
Luckily, Blaze's domain should be disappearing by now meaning Knalia's should be pumping out a fresh amount of dark mana! The darkness gathered at Edmund's beckoning and began to swirl before him. His body shot straight and he stood on one leg with both arms bent upward.
The mana reacted to this took a straightened form akin to that of a blade with no hilt. Edmund then slithered his hands in a zig-zag motion through the air ending with a sudden swipe. The dark mana blade moved as Edmund had, first in a slight side to side motion gaining momentum then in a sudden, quick slash at the spot where the wind spirits had gathered.
The swipe was fast enough to blow away some of the smoke revealing that there were only wind spirits in the area that he swung. He felt confused for a moment which was that was the last thing that he felt, as from behind him Eric came through the smoke and slammed the back of Edmund's head with a chair.
The chair broke apart from the force of the blow and Edmund crumpled to the ground.
Well, Ed was down.
As Mund awoke he went to jump up and attack his unsuspecting-
"CRASH!!" Mund flopped back down unconscious as Alisa used her telekinesis to slam the man with a second chair.
"I told you he'd get back up!" Alisa gloated.
"We knew that he could do that, we saw it earlier." Eric explained undercutting the girl's achievement.
"Why can't you just let me have this?!" Eric opened him mouth but took a second before speaking. He sighed and spoke with a smile on his face.
"You're right. That was a really good plan to use the smoke and his eyes against him like that." Alisa was shocked by Eric's sudden compliment. The boy would normally argue with her but for him to let it go this time...
Alisa looked down at Edmund then back to Eric with similar smile. "You did great too, Holiday!" Alisa lifted her hand and Eric high fived it.
They had somehow won their battle.
...
Alix awakens with a shiver. Her eyes slowly open as she realizes that the temperature had dropped a bit since she had last been awake. 'The Blaze must have went out for the day.' She reasoned while sitting herself back up.
She realized that her headache had lessened again allowing her to think much more clearly than before which was great as, she looked around and noticed that Francis wasn't around. She wanted to use this moment as a chance to escape but she didn't really know how she would do that.
Alix looked around the room for anything that could help her get out of the cage when her eyes landed on the monster cages opposite to her. Each of the monster lay helplessly in their cages, not even trying to get out. None of them were higher grade than beast either.
Just a bunch of poor monster's that were likely being subject to horrific experimentation. And one of those monsters...
Alix turned her head to Nuka's cage on the other side of the room. Nuka lay within it with her beak on the floor. The sight was hard for Alix to look at. Nuka was always so full of energy when they were younger. Yet, now she's so...listless.
'Nuka." Alix called through her connection. The bird looked up with only her eyes.
'Allie. You're awake." She sounded defeated even in Alix's mind making Alix feel more determined than before.
'Is there anyway for you to get to me?" Nuka shook her head.
'No. I've gotten out before but, as you can see..." Nuka gently gestured to her sealed cage. '...she's put me on lockdown this time." Alix's brows knitted at the sound of Nuka not even seeming willing to try to break free.
'Hey, you can not give up yet!"
'Why not? You're caught, I'm caught, even the talking food's caught! We're done for, Allie. There's nothing that we can do now." Alix clicked her teeth.
'So, you are just giving up? That easily?"
'No. You can't give up the will that you lost a long time ago." Nuka lamented making Alix feel even worse about the current situation. She wanted to cheer Nuka up but she couldn't do it from this cage.
'Is there anything that you could do if you weren't in that lockdown cell?"
'Sure there is, for example, if I were free that cage of yours would be easy for me to melt through but, that's impossible right now. You know why, Allie?" Alix's eye shone as a thought occurred to her.
'It's because I'm stuck in here and you're stuck in there with no way out!" Nuka was now shouting in Alix's mind., meanwhile Alix was focusing on her connection with the bird.
'I do not know if that ability is tied directly to Mo or not but, there is no better time to check than when I am quite literally trapped within a cage.' Alix focused on her connection with Nuka but something more specific than that. She focused on the flames that Nuka should be emitting.
The flames that burned brightly and that Nuka was confident could easily burn through this cage. The flame that was innate only to Nuka but through this connection should also be hers to use!
Alix felt it, the heat rising in her hands. She continued to pull from Nuka but felt something preventing her from pulling all the way. 'Nuka, do you trust me?" Nuka felt something pulling at her. She looked down and saw a strange silver string reaching out from her to Allie.
'What?" She asked sitting up as much as she could.
'Do you trust me?"
'O-Of course I trust you Allie! You're my best friend! My Sister in Sorcery!" Alix gritted her teeth as she kept mentally pulling at the string.
'Good, then let your faith in me out! Let me use those powerful flames of yours!" Nuka lay staring at Alix with no idea what was going on. All she knew was that Alix was asking to use her flames but that's impossible. She can't just impart her flames to a person.
Yet, as Alix was calling out to her she could swear that something was beckoning her to Allie's side. This string was pulling at her chest or was it her heart, either way she was being pulled. Nuka didn't know what this feeling was or if it had something to do with Alix but she somehow knew what she had to do...
'Okay." Nuka agreed. 'Use them well, Allie!" Like a dam being burst open Alix felt the block disappear and power surge through her body. Within an instant green flames shot out of Alix's hands and melted the chains that bound her hands.
Alix smirked as then did the same to the chains at her feet and then the bars of the cage. She pushed her way through the opening that she had just made and immediately dashed over to Nuka.
She was the next one that Alix needed to free!