To A Thief - Chapter 22: Ancient Flames Beckon

An ancient power has once again been awakened..

Author's Note: I've made an important update! I have removed Chapter 19 and the character 'Sandira' entirely from the story. In turn, I had to debunk the current chapters down by one to number them properly. Other than that, nothing much has changed. Sorry about that!

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The battle against the hordes of orcish beastmen raged on as more of their reinforcements arrived. It seemed as though the orcs were intent on taking over Ronfaure and perhaps, San d'Oria itself. 

"I don't think this is a mere training regimen anymore.." Flint said as he sat up against what was left of the outpost; his wounds now patched up and his rifle in hand. 

"I agrrree.." Nanaa nodded, standing up and placing a hand on her hip. "The orcs seem to have changed theirrr motive.. it's all orrr nothing, now." 

"Worst comes to worst, King Destin may declare Martial Law.." Avondale muttered as he dragged a wounded Temple Knight over to the outpost. "There are far too many orcs.. even with the rest of the Temple Knights here, we still fall a little short." 

Lady Curilla looked towards the south as she saw a sight that settled her worries if only a little bit. "That may not be necessary.. we may have a shortage of Temple Knights and Brigadiers, but there is plenty an adventurer joining the fight." 

"Where the hell did all these people come from?" Veronaut rose a brow as many adventurers ran towards the battle with readied arms. He caught an incoming orcish axe in his hand and threw it right back to the target orc, sticking it clean through its forehead and watching it fall back motionless. "B*****d thought he could get the jump on me.." 

"King Destin must have sent distress calls to any and all available Linkshells.." Claire looked about as she healed the wounded. 

"Heh, they're just looking for action.. that's all." Bear grinned as he stuck an orc through the gut with his lance and held it up like some trophy with his galkan strength, then swinging it to the side and sending it flying towards another one of the armored enemies. 

Draven reached for one of his throwing needles and flicked it towards Warlord Jagodek, sending it zipping towards the massive orc's side. Watching it bounce clean off the orc's faltering shield, he rolled his shoulder back in annoyance. "Even though it's failing, its shield is still up. We can only perform so many Weapon Skills before we lose all of our energy.. if we don't break off his shield soon, we won't be able to stop him.." 

"Just leave it to me!" Okina called back to Draven, giving him a little wink as she confronted the orc. "I'm going to shatter his shield like glass!" 

"How..?" Draven furrowed his brows. "You don't even have a weapon.. what are you planning? You're only going to get hurt." He muttered, jumping to the side as the Warlord attempted to slam the end of its razor-sharp greatsword at the young thief but feeling it stick into the ground instead. 

"Just stay back, Dravy.." Okina replied, holding up her index fingers and middle fingers from both hands and placing the tips of her right ones over the left to form somewhat of a spearhead arch. "Here I go!"

Draven grunted in defeat and jumped back, unable to keep avoiding Jagodek's quick blows due to his body's tiredness from all the Weapon Skills. "Watch yourself.." 

"Play time.. Over..!" Jagodek growled out loud as he suddenly chucked his sword in the distance, the spinning edge cutting down both his own orcish warriors and any unlucky knights or adventurers who couldn't avoid it in time. Right after, dark streams of unknown matter began to seep out from the crevices in his armor and enveloped his body. 

Okina blinked in surprise as she witnessed what was going on. "Huuuuh? What's he doing, doing?" 

"Carrreful!!" Mel ran towards the clueless monkey girl, shoving her own staff upward and causing a sudden wall of ice arching over herself and Okina to shoot out of the ground. 

The moment she did, Jagodek's large enclosed fists slammed down against it. They had already been on their way down towards Okina, but were thankfully avoided by the icy barrier. 

"Melly..?" Okina gasped, flinching under the trembling waves sent by the warlord's ridiculously heavy impacting fists. It continued to pound its fists into the ice, shattering it and cracking it more and more with each blow. It was as if its strength had suddenly quadrupled. 

"Nngh.." Mel struggled under the force of the blows, trying to keep her ice shield up but failing at it. She had one eye closed and twitching in hesitation as she held up the barrier. "Whatever it is you plan on doing, you can't just stand in frrront of it and expect it to wait forrr you to do so.. now get back and hurrrry! I'll hold him off!"

"Oh..! Right!" Okina nodded quickly, jumping back and readying her fingers properly once more as she continued to concentrate. "Sorry!" 

"I'm yourrr opponent now, Warlord Jagodek.." Mel bore her feline fangs as she allowed the icy shield to shatter, putting her hands together and shoving them upwards once more. This sent another icy spell shooting out of the ground; only this time it was more direct and like a pillar of ice that drove itself towards the large orc. 

"As I thought.." She muttered as Jagodek gripped the end of the icy pillar in its hands, barely skidding back on the grass despite the strong force she had sent it at him. "Forbidden Magic.." She thought aloud. "These orrrcs aren't worrrking on their own. They're being led by another parrrty.. now I wonderrr who they may be." She said somewhat sarcastically, knowing too well it must have something to do with the supposed underground group using magicite to do their bidding. 

Jagodek howled in rage at the persistent mithran mage in front of him, clutching the end of the icy pillar tightly and suddenly bringing it up in its arms. With a hard grunt, it spun its body around quickly and slammed the icy pillar against Mel; whom was about to raise her staff but failed. The blow connected and sent her tumbling a few dozen feet on the ground.  

"Mel!" Annie called out worriedly as she watched the blow connect, about to run to her aid but stopping short when she saw Mel push herself back up as quickly as she had been taken down. 

"I'm fine.." Mel muttered, moving away some strands of hair from her face to reveal a dry, distinctive crack on her cheek that looked kind of like dry earth. "He just caught me by surrrprise, is all." 

"Stoneskin.." Annie sighed in relief, referring to the protective incantation Mel had most likely cast over herself before jumping in against the Warlord. It was basically just an earth spell cast over the user and acted as a second layer of protective skin. "Reckless girl.. had me worried for a second." 

Mel smiled deviously. "Since when have I everrr been taken down that easily? I'm just getting warrrmed up.." 

******

"What are these things?" Stiff whispered to himself as he peeked over the side of the molded wall he was hiding behind. "Are they even real?" 

He pulled his head back as one of them turned around and began walking in his general direction. They seemed to be feeding on some of the dim lights that were floating about in small spheres around this darkness and idly walking around the area, completely aimless. It was as if they were just here because the emptiness was here.. roaming it for eternity without meaning. 

"S**t.." Stiff stumbled around the wall as the same one neared his location, walking quietly over to the other side as it walked past. "They're definitely not friendly.. if they see me, I'm doomed." He muttered. 

"Hey..! Come on, keep up!" A familiar child's voice rang through his ears. 

"Wait..! Wait for me!" Another voice called after it; this one unfamiliar. 

"What..? Who's there?" Stiff blinked as he looked around. He was shocked by what he saw. 

There in the distance ran a little boy across the monsters, somehow not getting their attention. But what surprised him most, was the identity of the little boy himself. 

"It's.. it's me!" Stiff gasped as he darted behind another wall and crouched, getting a closer look. "What's going on!?" 

"Don't run so fast..!" The other tiny voice called out as a little blonde girl about the same age as the child version of himself Stiff saw came out of nowhere and hurried behind his child self. "I'm scared!" 

"You're too slow!" The child version of Stiff laughed playfully as he turned and waved at the girl, beckoning her to hurry up before continuing his dart across this emptiness. "You won't be an adventurer if you can't even run fast enough!"

They ran in the direction of the glowing spire in the distance. 

'Ungh..!" Stiff suddenly clutched his forehead as his head began to throb in pain. Dropping to his knees, he shut his eyes tight and grunted. "Wha.. What's happening to me..? It hurts.." 

The childrens' laughter began to echo throughout the emptiness as they ran off. 

A pool of darkness once again began to form under Stiff's body, daring to consume him like it did before. But rather than sit there and allow it, Stiff quickly jumped out of the way and hesitantly ran behind one of the many horrific creatures idly standing by. 

"I gotta get outta here..! Someone.. anyone! Help me!" He thought to himself as he continued running in a panic. "I don't know what to do.." 

It seemed everywhere he looked there was either one of these empty creatures or a dead end.. and if he stopped moving, the darkness would begin to consume him once more. 

"Don't fall behind! Keep going!" His child self called out, laughing some more as he waved his hand. "They're gonna get ya!"

Stiff looked up to see his child self waving at what first appeared to be him, but shortly after he felt the presence of the little blonde girl run right past his body as if she was some sort of spirit. 

"Wait.." Stiff said to them. 

"Wait..!" The little blonde girl called out at the same time. 

"Come on! Follow me!" The child version of Stiff yelled, turning his back once more and running. 

I can't help but feel like he's talking to me.. like he wants me to follow him. 

...

Where else am I gonna go? If they're heading for the spire.. then that must mean something is there.. 

Stiff bit his lip in hesitation, not wanting to stop moving his feet for fear of the darkness. After a split second of thought, he ran after the two children, following close behind them even though they seemed oblivious to his presence. 

The empty creatures waited in every corner, causing Stiff to have to sneak behind them cautiously or wait for them to move. Even though they had no facial features, they seemed to respond to what they only saw in front of them. Still, this also caused him to lose track of the two kids many times, making him slightly panic before catching the sounds of their voices and seeing them appear once again. 

It was like his fate laid on the shoulders of these two children that ran before him, their little beings glowing through this darkness and therefore becoming his light in the dark. 

After about five minutes of running after them and avoiding the 'empty', Stiff found they were near what appeared to be the entrance of the spire. It wasn't too far now. 

As he turned another corner behind the children, he suddenly found his foot bound to the moldy ground. Looking down, he saw that a smaller pool of darkness had caused his foot to sink into it and wouldn't let him pull it back out. To add to the panic that begun to rise in his stomach, Stiff turned to the side to see one of the empty so close to him that he could nearly touch it if he stretched his arm far enough. 

At first, it took a few steps away from the thief as it did not see him. But as Stiff began to struggle to get his foot out of the darkness, it turned once more and prepared to make its round back down towards Stiff's direction. 

"S**t!" Stiff grunted as he tried to yank his foot out of there, beginning to panic even more. But it was too late.. the empty had seen him. 

It let out the most stomach-turning screech that caused a giant chill to rush down Stiff's body and caused the back of his neck to burn with anxiety. 

It began galloping towards him the moment countless other empty turned at its sound of alert. They, too, let out gut wrenching screams before moving in on the hume. 

"Oh, no!" Stiff panicked as he began desperately attempting to remove his foot from the puddle of darkness. It was bound in there and just wouldn't budge. "Come on!" 

At the last second, just as the empty that had first found him shot out a long tendril from the opening on its face was about to reach him, he felt the darkness binding his foot give out and release him. He tumbled back onto the moldy floor, just barely avoiding the tendril and jumping back onto his feet. 

"Over there! Hurry, slow poke!" His child self called out as he pointed towards the entrance to the spire. 

Without giving it a second thought, Stiff sprinted as fast as he could towards the spire entrance with damn right every empty on this floor chasing after him. He could feel the wind of the tendrils shooting out at him from behind just barely missing him. 

Even after he made it past the entrance, he didn't stop running. Unfortunately, the spire was practically another dead end. All there was inside was a long, molded bridge-like hallway and a giant web-like matter that blocked the path. 

"A dead end!?" Stiff bit his lip, turning around quickly and seeing to his surprise that the empty no longer chased him. "What..?" 

They weren't even in sight anymore. It was like they had stopped tailing him right after he ran through the entrance. Once again, everything went silent. All he could hear were the heavy sounds of his breath after such a sprint. His child self and the little blonde girl were nowhere to be seen. 

As Stiff caught his breath, he turned and faced the strange glowing web at the end of the spire. Approaching it, he was stopped by the voice of his child self calling out:

"Where are you? Where did you go!?" 

But looking around, Stiff couldn't see him anywhere. He just heard the echoes of his voice. 

Suddenly, the little blonde girl's voice called out in distress from within the other side of the web. 

"Help me!" It cried out in fear. "Stiffy..! Save me!" 

After that, everything became silent once again. 

Feeling his head throb once more with a sudden wave of pain, Stiff clutched his forehead and felt his knees tremble. "Gah..! This pain.. this feeling.." He grunted, confused as to why he was feeling these sudden surges of pain.

Once the pain subsided, Stiff stood back up straight and looked at the strange webbing in front of him. Walking up to it, he gently placed his hand against the wall of web but retracted it as the web moved under his touch and suddenly imploded into itself, disappearing into nothing and leaving a clear path to the other side.

Hesitating for a moment, Stiff took a deep breath and proceeded forward; hoping above all else that this was the way out. 

Upon walking in, the wall suddenly shut behind him forming a new web like the one he had just caused to implode.. only this one wouldn't do so by his touch. 

The throbbing in his head returned the closer he walked towards the center of the circular moldy room. This place was a lot dimmer than any other part of this emptiness, but he could make out many torn off and molded sections of what used to be some chamber. 

Upon reaching the center of the room, Stiff choked out a gasp as he felt an incredibly sharp pain on his back. Feeling the sharp point of whatever it was thrust right through him, his eyes went wide. An immense pain followed as a large tendril shot from his back right through his chest, ripping clean through. 

******

"How much longerrr, Okina?" Mel frowned as she slammed her staff heavily onto the earth, causing the ground to suddenly crumble towards Jagodek and shift around like waves. The movement of the earth disgruntled the warlord's movements, causing him to stumble and stagger against it. 

"Almost.. almost!" Okina concentrated hard. "Just a little more, more.." 

The darkness surrounding the warlord suddenly stretched away from its body; remaining attached but creating the shape of a large hand that shot forward and brought the warlord away from the crumbling ground. Jagodek looked up and growled at Mel as it reached its hand out in her direction, causing the larger hand made of darkness to shoot out towards her. 

"Hrrm.. so it can manipulate the darkness too." Mel narrowed her eyes as she brought her hands a few inches from each other and began to cast a holy spell near her. It glowed brightly around her, keeping the large hand of darkness at bay. Taking the chance, she brought her hand out towards Overlord Jagodek's direction and sent the holy spell after him. 

The large hand of darkness coming from Jagodek avoided the holy spell with ease, although allowed it to make contact with the warlord. It was almost acting on its own accord. Nonetheless, the hand shot once again towards Mel to her surprise, and was able to wrap its large, shadowy fingers around her. 

"Mrow!" She meowed aggressively, feeling the strong hold nearly crushing her body. It probably would have too, were it not for her Stoneskin ability. 

"Hurry it up!" Annie yelled at Okina. "Mel's in trouble!" 

The large hand shot down towards the ground at full force with Mel in its grasp, slamming her hard into the earth, attempting to finish her there and then. 

Mel yelped in pain as she was continuously thrust down into the ground, her Stoneskin wearing off in chunks upon each impact and causing her to lose her defenses entirely. 

"Okina!" Draven called out to the opo-opo girl, feeling Mel wasn't going to last long if that continued. 

Okina's blue and green eyes suddenly shot open with a strange hue glowing inside of them. "It's ready!" A strange shape began to glow on her mid-back, glowing so bright that one could see it clearly even over her Brigadier body piece. 

The light energy that the strange shape on her back suddenly gave out began to stream itself around her, much like the darkness that had surrounded the overlord. With a sudden pulse, the light energy around her formed an array of weapons that formed around her body. The weapons appeared to be made of the energy coming out of that strange shape on her mid back, but they also seemed to be solid enough to be as real ones. 

One could see nigh on every type of weapon around her, all for her taking. But instead, she leaped high up towards the shadowy hand that had a tight hold on Mel and spun her body once in the air, causing all of the glowing weapons around her to slice the shadowy matter clean off and forcing it to release the mithran mage. 

"Is that.. magicite on her back?" Moku stared in awe at the array of energy surrounding Okina. 

"Yes." Vincent nodded. "A very rare type of magicite that only Okina as the experiment can control.. the magicite is simply another part of her body." 

"So.. this is why they were all after her." Moku nodded in understanding. "She truly is a 'weapon'.." 

The energy coming from the magicite in Okina's back was so immense that it caused her to be able to leap higher into the air than before, with all the glowing weapons made of light orbiting around her body. 

Annie caught Mel just before she hit the ground after being cut free from the shadowy grasp of Jagodek's darkness and got her away from all the danger, setting her down gently on the ground near the broken outpost. "Mel.. are you okay?" She asked with genuine concern in her firm eyes which were otherwise like piercing daggers. 

"Ngh.. Never better.." Mel caught her breath, hardly able to stay conscious but forcing herself to do so. Her entire body felt as though it was throbbing with pain. 

Others ran to help her as well, keeping out of the way of Okina for now. 

"It is time.. to end this." Okina spoke in a loud and firm voice that hardly sounded like her own as she stood there in front of Overlord Jagodek, her eyes glowing with that strange hue. 

******

The large empty creature; standing on its four sharp and bladed legs held the young thief up by the tendril it had thrusted right through his chest. It had what first appeared to be two large eyes on its head, but upon closer inspection were in fact two large cores that were guarded by a strong webbing. The "mouth" opening where the tendril that had gone through Stiff's back had a similar webbing over it. Above its head were large spikes thrusting upward that resembled stalagmites. 

That was all Stiff could see before feeling himself lose consciousness altogether, his vision blurring and blacking out as the intense pain going through his chest began to subside. He could feel the warm stream of blood trailing out of his mouth as he succumbed to darkness. 

Once sure that the young thief was dead, the strange large Empty began to lower him, but soon after gurgled in surprise as it felt the strong grasp of a hand suddenly clutch its tendril-like tongue. 

Stiff was far from dead. However, he no longer seemed as he did just a few moments ago. He tightened his grasp around the tendril so tight that it caused the empty to shriek in pain, drawing its tendril back out of Stiff's chest and away from his grasp. 

Stiff fell to the soft, moldy floor and laid there for a moment, convulsing as he felt the darkness pouring out of the gaping hole in his chest. Suddenly stopping, he rose right up without even using his hands in a strange manner, now standing straight up and facing the large empty once again. 

The hole in his chest was pouring with even more darkness now, blanketed enough with it so that you couldn't see through the hole anymore to the other side. Stiff's eyes were a piercing black with only the iris's filled with the natural light brown color of his. 

Yes, once again, the darkness had taken over him.. only this time, he had absolutely no control over it. If anything, the young thief perhaps was dead and the only thing animating his body was the darkness itself. 

Nonetheless, Stiff stood there and crouched forward in an inhumane manner, a wide and twisted grin cutting across his face and his eyes- wide pools of black. He felt himself begin to laugh maliciously as he threw himself violently at the massive Empty.

******

 Vincent and Moku looked to the side as they saw Stiff; rather, Kyrie in the appearance of Stiff, emerge from the trees covered in wounds. 

"Stiff..? What happened to you!?" Moku called out in surprise at his bloodied up pupil. 

"Ungh.. Gazo and Daan.." He whispered rasply, clutching his bleeding shoulder and walking towards the two. 

"Gazo and Daan.. it must have been an ambush!" Moku clenched his fists. "Where are the others?" 

The fake Stiff bit his lip, nodding his head in defeat. "They're.." 

Vincent narrowed his eyes as Stiff walked towards them in tatters. 

"They got em'.. and they would have gotten me.. if Norick didn't hold them back and force me to run.." He wheezed, holding his hand out desperately towards them. "I'm sorry.. I couldn't save them..!" 

Vincent suddenly took the fake Stiff's hand and swung him over his head like light baggage, slamming him down against the floor and pressing his foot to his neck while keeping a hold of his wrist. 

"How sad for you. Now how about you tell me where the real Stiff is?" 

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Continued in Chapter 23: Reprisal

Author's Note

Do you enjoy this story? Don't hesitate to let me know what you think! Comments or Reviews much appreciated :)