adversary of fate

『  ⚚  』Mir sharply turned to face his still surprised master, directing towards him an extremely pointed look. “Master, you what?”

       ‘Busted.’ A nervous bit of laughter escaped from his lips as the mage took a few steps backwards, rubbing the nape of his neck sheepishly as he scrambled to recompose himself. Evidently, word had escaped–likely due to the second-generation hero’s own negligence. Those who had already known had no reason to reveal this; they wouldn’t do so, anyway, unless they trusted the person they were revealing it too. (Phantom was a completely different story, but he was an enigma of his own.)

       Clearing his throat as he halted his movements, Evan carefully averted his gaze away from both parties. He had overcome his surprise upon seeing that the sender was not the Luminous that he knew, having been aware of the existence of other universes. But, the fact that this was Luminous suddenly made the conversation rather…awkward…

       “….I won’t deny it,” he finally spoke, his words accompanied by a resigned sigh. There was no reason to lie to the practitioner of light and dark, even if she wasn’t the one with whom he was familiar. Having already been driven into a corner by her directness, Evan saw no other choice but to be firm and speak the truth. “But what do you want from me exactly? A justification for my actions? Where shall I begin?”

Eyeing Evan down with her heterochromatic eyes, she breathed in deeply. She hadn’t intended to argue with him, only to warn and prevent any... irreversible issues that could have occurred. Attempting to loosen her scowl, she averted her gaze, which landed on Mir. The Onyx Dragon showed an alarming amount of emotion on his face: astonishment, distraught; as well as a faint but evident expression of being betrayed. 

Freud couldn’t help but let out a laugh 

“Do you fail to recognize your own comrade, Luminous?”

Freud kicked the bookshelf Luminous was hiding behind, it falling over and revealing where she was hiding.

 “I am Freud, nothing more, nothing less” 

Freud chuckled lowly, Moving at an agonizing slow pace as he approached the light mage.

With every step Freud took, a deep sense of dread grew inside her. He truly was the suspect behind Aran and Mercedes’ deaths - despite the evidence, she was incredulous that he would be able to commit such an act. He was blocking the only escape route she had; there was no other choice but to fight. Or...

“You’re being controlled, aren’t you?”  She grasped her Shining Rod once again. “It isn’t too late to turn back, Freud. There’s no reason to keep doing this.”

Luminous bit her lip. She knew it already was too late. Seeing Freud’s figure stiffen for a moment, she muttered under her breath, pointing her weapon at the Dragon Master.

After all, it won’t be that easy for a lowly devil to deserve a date with me.

-

Eclipse takeover: 2/5

-

『  ⚚  』Lithe fingers trembled as they gripped the unrolled sheet of parchment, the crisp penmanship of its contents beginning to quiver along with his shaking. Beads of sweat began to coalesce at his fringe, and he creased down the message weigh it down against the wind to wipe away the perspiration with his other arm. Inhale, exhale; there was no need to be so up-in arms over this message. Things will be fine; things will be alright.

       Having somewhat succeeded in chasing away his mild anxiety, Evan began to fold up the message against the force of the wind, safely tucking it away in the pouch attached to his hip. The suddenness of the message was not what made Evan uneasy, no; rather, it was who the message was written by. The last time he checked, Eclipse was still active. So when did…?

       Noticing Mir beginning to land at the intended meeting spot, the strawberry blonde snapped out of his preoccupations. There was no point in questioning things right now, he reasoned as he slid down the onyx dragon’s back. Hesitation written in his entire posture, Evan tentatively stepped forward.

“I’ll get straight to the point.” She narrowed her eyes as she spoke. “Recently I’ve heard things about you and... Eclipse spending some time with each other.”

She wasn’t sure what answer she expected. Was Eclipse somehow able to emerge without her knowing? Whatever the reason was, Eclipse was a dangerous entity, and Evan’s inexperience definitely made him a vulnerable target. She grit her teeth. 

@absolute-end liked for a starter

“Luminous” Freud said with a laugh as he kicked down a nearby bookcase. He was searching the Ellinia library for his dear “friend”, or at least whom he used to call his friend. Maybe that wouldn’t be so true now that Mercedes and Aran were dead. And Freud clearly had blood on his hands.

Defeating him wouldn’t be easy, but definitely not impossible... But that would only be the last resort; having a comrade die by her own hands was not something Luminous was prepared to experience. 

Aran is dead. So is Mercedes. The recollection of their unmoving corpses, blood trickling from their wounds as Freud knelt over them, a twisted smile contrasting his ordinarily gentle demeanour was enough to make Luminous’ stomach churn. With grief? Vengeance? Fear? She was still unsure of her own feelings, but only one thought dominated her mind: run away. 

Another rattle of the shelf brought her back to the present. Luminous heard Freud’s footsteps grow closer, and gulped. There was no escaping this. The clacking of boots suddenly stopped, and a heavy silence hung in the air. Breathing deeply, she slowly opened her mouth. 

▎♛  ▎

     Tнe Sαcred Mαιdeɴ ♥ ;;

     She was startled by the the mage’s shout. Was she the cause of it somehow?…Never the less she showed herself to the hero.Even though there was a chance she would not be seen or heard she replied.

«Alright, there’s no need to shout though.You might wake the Tinos..»

Slightly raising her head as her sentence trailed off, only to find that the empress’ feet were not present on the ground in front of her. When she spoke, her words seemed to be nothing more than a whisper in the wind. Luminous looked up at the woman’s face, her gentle face being more transparent than she’d last remembered.

“Empress, aren’t you…”

“That works to. I moreover just go with Alternative Luminous since Sunfire included in this ..!” Manners~ Letting out a sigh she continued on, “Since I was inflicted with a curse, I just go with Alternative Luminous.” Giving a surprise look at the girl she had to blink a few time to process that sentence. She wasn’t asked that question at lot to be honest. So when it appeared she was just slight shocked. “ Ah sure. Let me see where to start. Also thank you.”

Taking one of chairs not to far from, she sat in it, sweeping her hair out the way so not to sit on it. “I do it a lot. Dimension travelling. Though it does get tiring if I use at so much in one period of time.” crossing her legs and propping her arm up on it to cradle her chin as she talk she continued on looking at the girl.

“Well for one thing. The color palette is switched greatly from the one here. Most colors have been switched to black and red. Another one that I feel like i should clear up with that info is that the Hero’s are still good. Just because we dress in black and red doesn’t mean we’ve turned evil.” She couldn’t tell her how much that has been a big misunderstand for some people about her.

“Oh, I wasn’t going to question your moral alignment based on your palette.” Luminous raised an eyebrow. “Aran always preferred to wear darker colours, after all.”

How peculiar. Out of all the things Luminous had come across another one of him was very…strange in the least. Maybe strange was an understatement- It was completely bizarre.

“An imposter?” She echoed. “I could say the same to you.”

Flumi eyed the man with a rather disgusted look. “A male version of me? Distasteful, really. Although…” she paused for a moment, “I suppose it must be interdimensional matters.”

▎♛  ▎

     Tнe Sαcred Mαιdeɴ ♥ ;;

«Hm..»

That is, except for one particularly disgruntled mage. 

After arriving in Ereve a few hours earlier, Luminous was told that the meeting wasn't to be held for another week. It just so happened that neither she nor Phantom were notified about the postponement. Seeing him always brightened up her mood, obviously. As an apology, she was offered a room to spend the night. Although they were a bit too adamant on it for it to be an offer, she accepted nonetheless. Naturally, the rest of the day was spent trying not to throw Phantom off the edge of the floating island. It was tempting. 

Now that it was the middle of the night, she was finally able to get some peace and quiet.

Luminous kicked the ground in frustration. “Stupid thief.” she grumbled, recalling the nightmarish reunion with the thief hero. Immediately after the words left her mouth she heard a hushed voice behind her, and whipped her head around in response.