Chapter 04: Unsettled Ice

                        It’s been five days since Seshiro was attacked by the monster, he was still giving it thought and wasn’t sure what exactly he fought and killed, after this he was still unsure of everything around him. The present day, morning, Seshiro leaves for school and encounters Lloyd, Yumi and Kyoshi, they are all on their way to school and on their way they pass a huge building with a big screen and the news are on about people being killed on the outskirts of town to the south.

            “Gail Evans is at it again.” Yumi says sighting.

            “Yeah, but she is kinda hot for a reporter, hehe.” Lloyd says staring at the reporter with perverted eyes.

            “Many people who have been reported missing as of just a few days ago were found dead, slaughtered in a very inhuman way, among these people there have been others who seemed like travelers as well as other kinds of people that have all turned up dead.” Gail Evans professionally says standing in front of the outskirts of the city.

            “What the hell?” Seshiro says standing closer, paying close attention to the screen.

            “Seshiro, hurry up.” Kyoshi says with an annoyed face and a heavy voice.

            “Yeah man, come on.” Yumi says unmotivated.

            “Yumi, tell the teachers I won’t be at school today.” Lloyd says.

            “Huh? What’d you mean Lloyd?” Yumi asks suspiciously.

                        Lloyd’s facial expression turns dead serious; he looks straight ahead towards Seshiro as Seshiro does the same.

            “Seshiro, your hand is shaking; you think those things on the news might have something to do with what attacked you?” Lloyd asks looking at Seshiro curiously.

            “…Too obvious to be a lie, Lloyd.” Seshiro says staring back at Lloyd.

            “Well, what are you waiting for?! Let’s go do something about this; I made a promise to myself.” Lloyd says motivated.

            “…Heh. Ok, I’ll go back and get my sword, you do the same.” Seshiro says starting to walk away.

            “Right.” Lloyd says also walking away.

                        After the conversation they were no longer there, Kyoshi and Yumi were left behind.

            “I think we got ditched.” Yumi guesses glancing at Kyoshi for a second.

            “Nah, they just like to pretend to be super heroes.” Kyoshi says smirking widening his arms to the sides with the palms of his hands opened.

                        Lloyd and Seshiro arrive at the city limits of the south and end up in a field of tall grass.

            “Heh, just a few days ago I trained on the grass fields of the north.” Lloyd says observing the area.

            “This is the south area, Lloyd. Things might change here.” Seshiro says landing on the field.

            “I smell blood.” Lloyd says glaring at Seshiro.

            “…Huh?” Seshiro makes a confused expression.

                        Lloyd then points a few feet away straight ahead. Seshiro’s eyes widen in shock to what he sees. There are many dead corpses of men, women, children, cops and some travelers.

            “This is just… too cruel. I have to figure what exactly is going on! And if what I think is true… no, it can’t be! He’s dead! I made sure he…” Seshiro says in disbelief thinking it was the work of the same monster that attacked him weeks ago.

                        Lloyd doesn’t seem too shocked to see this gruesome sight. Seshiro is now sure this is not the work of someone with the least bit ounce of humanity. Then suddenly three monsters appear out of the tall grass, they look like very dark monkeys, but slightly disfigured with small spikes coming out of their backs. The first is distraction which has a unique small horn in the center of its head, the second is speed which has a small hole in its stomach and the third monster has nothing unique, only that he throws up from his mouth strange explosives. They come out and quickly attack, Lloyd is now surprised, Seshiro jumps and attacks monster#2 with a vertical slash, but the monster evades, Lloyd tries to attack monster#3, but as soon as he gets close the monster drops an explosive to escape sending Lloyd flying, the explosion leaves some kind of smoke screen. All three monsters take advantage of the smoke screen and go hiding into the grass. Monster#1 comes out and starts closing in on Seshiro, Seshiro then side-slashes, but monster#1 is more flexible with his body than his legs and can dodge the sword slashes. Lloyd sees this and moves in to help out, but monster#2 comes out from the ground and throws a bomb near him, but Lloyd sees the bomb on time and is able to suppress the impact of the explosion with his wind powers. Lloyd then looks around for the monster, but because of his speed he was already with monster#3 gathering more bombs. Seshiro can’t lay a hit on monster#1, so instead of following the monster he stops, raising his sword and plunges it into the ground, making a path of ice following the monster at a great speed. The path catches up to the monster freezing him, Seshiro charges towards the monster at a great speed while jumping making a horizontal slash, but as soon as he was going to kill the monster, the monster breaks out of the ice and tries to evade, but Seshiro successfully manages to cut off his arms. The monster still has his legs so; he escapes into the tall grass once more.

            “Seshiro be careful of the bombs!!!” Lloyd shouts from afar.

                        This time seven bombs appear out of nowhere flying towards them, they try to evade the bombs, but get caught in the explosion anyways. They were injured, but not enough to stop fighting.

            “Lloyd…! The fastest one...!” Seshiro yells.

                        Monster#2 is now the primary target since he is leaving and throwing all those explosives from monster#3 around. Both Seshiro and Lloyd could hear monster#1 and monster #2 running around, but weren’t sure from where they would attack, Lloyd lifts his sword up and began to rotate it as a huge tornado begins to take form around him. The tornado begins to pull in everything around them. Two of the monsters manage to withstand the wind, but one goes flying towards the tornado. Seshiro takes advantage of this opportunity and jumps towards the monster doing a double kick and hitting him with such a force that sends him flying. While Lloyd is still doing the tornado one of the monsters laughs and let loose a lot of bombs, they are pulled by the tornado and go straight at Lloyd and Seshiro. Seshiro and Lloyd notices many bomb rotating around them; they look at each other and say. “Shiiiiiiiiiiit!”

                        Suddenly all the bombs set off doing a very big explosion and only a big flash could be seen. Meanwhile Kirisu is lying on the bed of the hospital asleep, but he is dreaming. In his dream people are dead and a small child around the age of five standing in front with a blank stare. The child then wanders the streets alone, when suddenly he meets a puppy, the boy and the dog become friends. Suddenly the dog lays motionless in a pool of blood.

            “Pochi!!” The small boy yells in despair.

                        Many corpses lay dead near the dog as the child is holding the dead dog with tears in his eyes. Then, in a wrecked apartment alone, the child is once again with a blank stare, a woman appears with an offering to the little boy.

            “I would like to help you, please come with me.” The young woman says extending her hand towards the boy.

                        The boy then extends his hand towards the woman. All of a sudden a bloody war rages and even more people are being killed. The child is now a young man.

            “You should leave and find the good humanity has to offer.” The same woman says hugging tightly the young man.

                        A man that is hardly visible could be seen standing in front of the young man, only the man’s mouth is seen; he has small fangs and is dressed in a soldier uniform, a blonde young woman with short hair and a young man with spiky red hair also appears both dressed in military uniform.

            “Take care Kirisu.” Both the young man and girl say in unison.

            “Take this as a memento big brother.” The young man with red hair says handing Kirisu hand pistol, Kirisu suddenly wakes up.

            “Why that dream.” Kirisu says wiping out the sweat coming out of his forehead.

                        Kazumi walks into the hospital room where Kirisu is.

            “Miss Kazumi, hello.” Kirisu says with a smile.

            “You can just call me Kazumi if you like Kirisu.” She says with a very nervous expression.

            “You look worried, is something wrong?” Kirisu asks getting up from his bed slowly.

            “Oh no, it’s just that I’m not too comfortable around hospitals.” Kazumi says.

            “Why is that?” Kirisu asks walking towards her.

            “I dunno, a lot of people die in places like this, I guess.” Kazumi says bowing her head.

            “Let’s go for a walk, ok?” Kirisu asks opening the door from his room.

            “Are you sure? You were pretty beat up the other day.” Kazumi says worried.

            “I’m sure, don’t worry I’m a fast healer trust me.” Kirisu says walking out to the hallway with Kazumi.

                        As they walked they pass by the maternity area, he stops and shows her the room, where the babies are and says. “People do die, but also new life it brought to this world.”

                        Kazumi is now more at ease all of a sudden and wasn’t nervous anymore, but by that time he notices he is already holding her hand.

            “Oh crap, I’m sorry!” Kirisu says panicking.

            “No, it’s ok.” Kazumi says smiling at Kirisu.

            “Oh um…alright. Also if this place makes you nervous why did you come?” Kirisu asks curiously.

            “Well, my friend Yumi told me I shouldn’t pass the opportunity of getting to know you.” Kazumi says blushing slightly.

            “Hmm....I see, well, I feel better I think, its time I get out of this hospital, hahaha!” Kirisu says.

            “Hehe, you sure are interesting Kirisu.” Kazumi says still smiling.

                        Meanwhile, a lot of smoke covers the area where Seshiro and Lloyd are, all of the monsters are laughing uncontrollably. Unexpectedly one of the monsters stops laughing like if he saw something, the other two are still laughing until this monster pokes them on the shoulder and then points to where the explosion had occurred. When they look they both stop laughing as well. When the smoke clears what can be seen is a barrier of ice; it seems like in the last second Seshiro was able to make the barrier to protect themselves from the explosion. The ice barrier suddenly cracks open, Seshiro and Lloyd can be seen laughing at them.

            “You didn’t saw that coming did ya!” Lloyd says laughing like crazy holding his stomach.

            “You didn’t exactly… saw that coming either, Lloyd.” Seshiro says looking at Lloyd with a eyebrow lifted.

            “Uh, yeah, but they don’t know that, so shut up and play along dude!” Lloyd says still laughing.

            “Whatever! Let’s end this! Lloyd, I have to borrow some of your power!” Seshiro says still staring at the monsters.

                        Lloyd and Seshiro stand diagonally side by side. Lloyd’s right arm starts to get surrounded by wind as Seshiro’s left arm is getting surrounded by a cold fog making his hand light blue. They suddenly clash their arms together forming an “x”, a powerful impact could be seen as soon as they clash arms. Lloyd and Seshiro ready their sword and swing them vertically among the wave.

            “Cold Impact!!!” Lloyd and Seshiro shouts at the same time.

                        From the impact of their arms crashing together comes out some kind of cold air wave towards the monsters freezing everything on its path. Two of the monsters are able to evade the attack, but one of the monsters is run over by the freezing air wave. While the monster is still caught up in the attack, his entire body freezes by the cold wind and then slams against a wall thus breaking into pieces. Only monster#2 and #3 remain. Monster#2 now speeds up and surrounds Lloyd and Seshiro in a circle leaving bombs all over the place.

            “Damn, I’m not going to take this any longer, Seshiro, do the coldest technique you can!!” Lloyd instructs.

                        Seshiro over freezes his sword and strikes it in the ground freezing the ground and the grass, monster#2 moves, but some frozen pieces of grass breaks near him and Lloyd notices the monsters location. He uses his wind to send him flying against a wall. Lloyd begins to run towards the monster, the monster gets angry and throws a bomb towards Lloyd, Lloyd then kicks the bomb high into the air and then throws his sword thrusting the monster into the wall. The monster is uneasy trying to take the sword out, but suddenly the bomb falls in front of him. He sees this and screams as the bomb detonates. After the explosion Lloyd’s sword comes flying from the impact vertically spinning thrusting the ground in front of Lloyd.

            “That’s what I call good aiming! One more to go.” Lloyd says picking up his sword.

                        Seshiro lands next to Lloyd and says;

            “The last one seems to be hiding… it’ll be hard to find.”

            “So what do you suggest?” Lloyd asks observing the tall grass fields.

            “Let’s try to plan a strategy.” Seshiro suggests keeping his guard up.

            “Crap, I’m no good at this.” Lloyd says still looking around.

            “I think its hiding somewhere in front of us.” Seshiro says also observing the field.

            “Hm...Hey I got an idea!” Lloyd says quickly punching the ground with his fist covered in wind and suddenly a giant wave of wind destroys the icy grass field and exposing the monster. Seshiro nods in amazement. Seshiro and Lloyd begins to run towards to monster, the monster freaks out and begins to throw many bombs. Lloyd and Seshiro still running while they evade the bombs doing zigzags, Lloyd then jumps diving through the air as Seshiro jumps on Lloyd back expelling himself high into the air. The monster is speechless to what Seshiro has done staring at him, Lloyd then lands with one hand quickly doing a front flip and landing while doing a baseball slide towards the monster. The monster keeps looking at Seshiro, but when the monster stops staring at Seshiro and looks at Lloyd it’s already too late and Lloyd still doing the baseball slide makes the monster trip and then kicks him into the air. The monster still in mid air looks up just to find Seshiro above him. Seshiro quickly makes four ice spears and then throws them to the monster, hitting him in the arms and legs heavily thrusting him into the ground. The monster is now unable to move, Lloyd and Seshiro then interrogate him.

            “How and WHY did you kill those people!? How could you?!” Seshiro asks angrily.

            “Proditor…you and the one sent by the great will shall die…hehe; that is if you ever meet him.” The monster says in a distorted voice making his eyes glow red all of a sudden.

                        Lloyd and Seshiro quickly back off, the monster explodes.

            “Proditor, the same as the last monster said to you.” Lloyd says staring at Seshiro.

            “Lloyd, he was looking at…you.” Seshiro says looking back at Lloyd dramatically.

            “He was looking at me and not Seshiro, Proditor, The great will? What the hell’s going on here? I wonder where we’re headed with all of this. We have to stay alert, but Seshiro and I can’t do this alone and Kyoshi doesn’t look like the fighting type even though he can perfectly control his fire elemental powers. Kirisu seems like a good swordsman, I might drop by to ask for his help once he’s healed up.” Lloyd thinks all this with a surprised expression.

                        Lloyd and Seshiro leaves the fields, they are proud that they have helped stop the mass murders, but they didn’t have a smile, many people died and more questions have been raised.

            “Lloyd, this is definitely no good… those monsters are actually after us.” Seshiro says covering his sword with the big mantle.

            “Tell me something I don’t know.” Lloyd says sheathing his sword.

            “We need to investigate more… but how are we going to get to them?” Seshiro asks glaring at Lloyd.

            “I do not know, wait for another attack? Nah, but I think we need more help.” Lloyd comments scratching his head with his left hand.

            “Kyoshi’s a good fighter, I mean, he IS a Satsume after all, stronger than humans in everything.” Seshiro says.

            “No offense, but he doesn’t look like the fighting type.” Lloyd says mockingly.

            “Trust me, you’ll be amazed. Give him a chance. He can help.” Seshiro says as he walks in front of Lloyd and walking backwards while facing him.

            “I see, well let’s give him a chance then, I met this guy a few days back that might help too.” Lloyd says looking up at the bright sky full of clouds.

            “Hey Lloyd, it’s not even one PM yet, we can still be back for the afternoon classes.” Seshiro says still facing Lloyd walking backwards.

            “Dude, look at me and look at YOU, we’re beat up and tired, I’m gonna go home.” Lloyd says slightly irradiated.

            “Dude, I don’t want to sound like a geek or anything, but if you don’t want to fail class then I suggest you get your a*s to school.” Seshiro says turning around facing ahead.

            “I don’t care; I need a shower and some fapping time right about now.” Lloyd says boldly with a grin.

            “Ugh, Lloyd, come on! Discretion, man…” Seshiro says looking back at Lloyd disgusted, but slightly smirking.

                        Seshiro decides to go home, Lloyd is too tired to walk to school so he goes home; he calls Yumi in her cell phone.

            “Yo Yumi, come to my house immediately, it’s an emergency!” Lloyd shouts radically.

            “Alright, I’ll be there as soon as I can!” Yumi replies quickly slightly worried.

                        Yumi gets out of class and heads directly to Lloyd’s house as fast as possible.

            “Lloyd, I came as fast as I could, what the hell happened!?” Yumi asks concerned.

            “Ahhh nothing, just wanted some company!!” Lloyd says comically making a perverse expression.

            “You sick son of a b***h!” Yumi’s eye twitches as she leans her right arm back and punches Lloyd very hard in the face.

            “So that’s it? You skip class all day and then phone prank me?!” Yumi asks furiously leaning her arm back once again about to punch Lloyd.

                        Lloyd then lifts his shirt to reveal a small burn mark under his chest from the past battle. “I went to the area where all those people were killed; Seshiro was not lying when he said he fought a monster last time, I mean, I didn’t really doubt him because we’ve fought out share of monsters the first day of school.”

            “What happened? Why didn’t you call me? I’m more than capable of helping, you know that.” Yumi says grabbing him by his shirt with her left hand.

            “I just didn’t want to drag you in this.” Lloyd says looking away from her.

            “Nonsense, you better call me out next time when you’re going to check these kinds of things out. Promise.” Yumi says still holding his shirt.

            “Ok, ok, I promise.” Lloyd sighs.

            “Really?” Yumi says slightly pleased and letting go of his shirt.

            “Yup…I don’t know why, but I felt like I wanted to be with you for a while.” Lloyd says staring directly into Yumi’s eyes.

            “Oh come on, cut the lovey dovey crap, you know I’m not that kinda girl, and what makes you think I’d fall for you anyways? You perverted prick.” Yumi asks irritated.

            “Hehe, yeah, yeah, whatever.” Lloyd says sitting down on the couch.

                        An hour or so pass, when the bell of the front door abruptly rings. Lloyd is gonna get up to see who it is.

            “Ahh I’m too lazy to get up, come in!!!” Lloyd says, but doesn’t get up from the couch anyways.

                        The front door opens; its Kirisu and Kazumi, Kazumi walks up to Lloyd and Yumi with Kirisu right behind him.

            “Good morning.” Both Kazumi and Kirisu say in unison with a smile.

            “Well, well, you two were the least I expect here.” Lloyd says with a grin raising his right arm on the edge of the couch.

            “What brings you two here?” Yumi asks with a curious face.

            “We were walking around and I guess we passed through here, so I wanted to say hi.” Kazumi says cheerfully.

            “So you were together all this time?” Yumi asks suspiciously.

            “Ack! Not like that!” Kazumi says alarmed shaking her head.

            “You saved me a lot of time; I wanted to ask you something Kirisu.” Lloyd says standing up from the couch.

            “Heh, there was something I wanted to ask you too.” Kirisu says.

            “Well then, girls if you would excuse us.” Lloyd says placing his arm around Kirisu and walking outside the apartment.

                        Yumi and Kazumi both sit down the couch.

            “You two look pretty good together.” Yumi says casually.

            “He’s just a really nice guy.” Kazumi says smiling.

            “Haha, yeah right, b***h.” Yumi says staring at Kazumi with a strange look.

            “Don’t look at me like that!” Kazumi says blushing.

            “Hehehe, like what?” Yumi keeps looking at Kazumi with the same strange look.

            “Like that!” Kazumi blushes even more and looks away a little annoyed.

            “He looks alright for an average guy.” Yumi comments nodding.

            “He is, he said he wants to get into Nakahiro High, I noticed we were around Lloyd’s neighborhood so we came by so they could talk about it, also I think I’m going to start going to school again.” Kazumi says in a low voice finishing her sentence.

            “You little s**t, you do like him!” Yumi says starting to tickle Kazumi.

            “Hahaha, as a friend ok, nothing else, hahaha, stop that!” Kazumi stands up getting away from Yumi.

            “Sure.” Yumi says sarcastically.

            “Shut up!” Kazumi says mad.

                        Meanwhile Lloyd and Kirisu are standing outside at the front door of the fifth floor where Lloyd lives looking towards the city from the window of the hallway.

            “Kirisu, I wanna ask you a favor.” Lloyd says looking outside the window.

            “You put me in a hospital and now you’re asking me for a favor? You sure have some balls to do that.” Kirisu comments lying against the wall crossing his arms.

            “It’s not a joke; you seem like a good swordsman despite fighting me while you were sick.” Lloyd says without looking at Kirisu.

            “You noticed, huh?” Kirisu says closing his eyes.

            “You threw up and you couldn’t focus, it wasn’t difficult to notice, but despite that you held your own pretty well.” Lloyd says looking at Kirisu.

            “So what do you need of me?” Kirisu says opening his eyes and staring back at Lloyd.

            “First I need to ask you something, have you ever been in a fight where your life’s on the line?” Lloyd asks seriously staring at Kirisu’s eyes.

            “Hmm…in every fight I have always put my life on the line, no matter if the opponent was powerful or not.” Kirisu explains closing his eyes once again.

            “You could have just said yes.” Lloyd jests.

            “Hm…” Kirisu doesn’t say anything.

            “I want you to help me out; there have been some incidents in this city.” Lloyd says walking towards Kirisu.

            “The cops can’t handle it?” Kirisu says getting off from the wall.

            “You might laugh, but they involve monsters, not criminals.” Lloyd stares seriously at Kirisu once again.

            “……” Kirisu once again remains in silence.

            “You don’t believe, do you?” Lloyd asks with a smirk.

            “I believe you...” Kirisu calmly says walking towards the window.

            “So, will you’ll help me?” Lloyd asks also walking towards the window.

            “Yes, now on to my request, do you know where Nakahiro high is? I want to ingress into that school.” Kirisu says.

            “Know? I go there, I’ll be happy to help you.” Lloyd says with a smile.

                        A new member joins the party, sort of speak. A new shadowy figure appears in a mountain at a distance, almost the entire city of Lemuria can be seen from there.

            “This is the place where a lot of auras gather up.” The unknown man says to himself and as he grins his teeth he says. “Might as well check it out.”

Reviews

[DMoOn-Y]

Why does Yumi has to call b***h the other girl? I mean, is it necessary?

[Felipe]

hehe this is another awesome chapter, the professional formal is even ebtter liek always, very good job man!

[Shin]

This is yet another chapter edited to the better format, more work to go.

[Angie Diane♥&hea..]

Good chapter. Some of the parts in this mad me laugh. I think this book is still going to be amazing. Thanks for sharing. :)