Legacies of light

His legacy comes at me with its enormous chomping mouth. Using my speed, I meet it halfway and dodge, and then head for the man using it. As I am about to create ice on the ground to freeze him, I hear that the ball has turned and is coming back. Instead, I create ice on the floor, making a small pillar which I jump off of to dodge the attack.

What the hell? I watched that man the whole time, and at no point did he make a motion to indicate it was going to attack. The first time it went for me, that man made a motion was all that just some kind of trick? Maybe his ball seeks its target. That must be it; otherwise, it would never have found me in the mine.

As the ball attempts to attack me, I create a large wave of ice to try and freeze the ball, but it just chomps through it. As it comes for me with its large mouth, I use my legacy on my hands and feet to keep its mouth open. As it charges forward, my right arm is in excruciating pain, but I continue. I then create a large amount of ice in its mouth.

I jump on the ball head, then, using all the strength in my legs, lunge off it. I freeze the long chain as I move, but after I finish, I hear chomping sounds coming from my right. Taking a moment to look over, I see that small mouths with fanged teeth have appeared on the chain and are eating my ice away.

After taking in the sight to my right, I look forward to seeing the large man in front of me. There is no way a man this big got here so fast. In my shock, the man gives me an uppercut knocking my body into the air. That strength and speed, he must be using spirit arts.

Hearing a noise, I manoeuvre my body in the air into a particular position so I can face what I am hearing. In mere moments the large ball crashes into me. I use my hands and feet like before to stop it from chomping down as it pushes me into one of the buildings.

While I try not to pass out from the pain, I feel the mouth starts to close. His legacy just got stronger out of nowhere. He must have sent spirit energy into it. As the jaws of his legacy begin to close in on me, I push away from it, allowing the mouth to close, but then the sear force of the ball hits me.

As the ball pushes me through the building, we return to the platform I was fighting on. His legacy then tried to crash me into the platform, but I was able to create snow in front and behind me to soften the blow.

Shit, that hurt. Without a doubt, I have broken some bones. I see his legacy move back, open his mouth, and then smash down again, but I move back in time. Then, as it came for me almost instantaneously, I decided to freeze the snow where I landed, and which bought me a few extra seconds to dodge.

I might have an idea, but I need to play some mental games first. “HEY, YOU BIG PIECE OF SHIT, I WONDER HOW YOUR GUESTS WOULD FEEL TO BE FROZEN SOILD,” I say as I run into the bridges. With these words, he shouldn’t go off and attack Willow and the rest of the escapees.

Basileia is a city surrounded by walls, with large buildings all connected by a series of bridges, with a sizeable platform in the middle. Using my legacy, I am just going from building to building, from bridge to bridge. I create Ice on my hand and feet to walk and hang in places I wouldn’t usually be able to.

I do all this while his legacy chases me. As I move from position to position, I leave little snow traps from place to place. My movements are done in ways that would intentionally tangle the chain. And after I see his legacy has reached max length, I move towards it and freeze all the snow I have planted. This won’t keep it locked up for a long while, but it will give me enough time to freeze his main body.

So, after I return to the platform, I head back to fight his main body. Just like his size would tell you he is strong. I cannot seem to get any deadly hits on him. I am not using spirit arts, yet it seems he can sense where I am going. Maybe his legacy has enhanced some of his senses, like mine.

While going back and forth, I look for an opening to freeze his arms or legs since I am too tired to release another big wave of ice. I can’t even refuse the ice I already made because his legacy eats it. So, I guess all I have left is mental warfare.

“Why are you so loyal to such a horrible woman? She makes slaves do horrible labour till they die, and she kidnaps people’s families and uses that as a threat for them to do whatever she wants.”

“SHUT UP. YOU KNOW NOTHING ABOUT HER!”

Good, he is getting angry. The info Atalanta got is really beneficial, “The only reason you think such thing is because she has messed with your mind. Your thoughts are not your own.” As I land a few blows on him in his enraged state, I say, “Think about all the lives that she has ruined and all the people she has irreversibly broken, she did all that for money.

Not only to people but her family; her husband died one month after they were married under mysterious circumstances. Is that the type of woman you trust?”

“What of it,” I hear a voice say. Looking at the source, I see an old woman in a rather fancy dress.

Surprised, the man in front of me says, “Morgan, get out of here.”

So, she is the woman I was talking about, the old queen of Basileia, mother Morgan. While the man is shocked, I run up and try to freeze a vital spot, but to my dismay, the chomping of the ball gets louder. I dodge his legacy as he repositions himself into a more defensive stance trying to protect that woman. If I attacked her, I could get an opening.

So, as I ready myself, I say, “Why serve such a woman with no heart at all.”

“YOU KNOW NOTHING, YOU BRAT,” He says as he is about to swing his legacy.

Morgan suddenly chimes in and says, “What an idiotic kid you are.”

Bothered by her words, I say, “So what I have said isn’t true. Is that what you’re getting at?”

Morgan sighs, saying, “Basileia crystals are one of the most valuable resources. They are the words more significant energy sources. Just a small about of it grinding into dust can be used to bring life to the most barren of soil, and it can be used to enhance countless medicines. Though there is a problem with it; the two places where it is found have issues.

The first place hoards their supply for themselves, and the second place, Basileia mines, have potent toxins, killing all miners over time. So, since you will never get someone to work at Basileia, you have to force them.”

“But your husband didn’t use slaves to get the work done. He mined just what was possible and moved on.”

“That same lie. My former husband used the same methods as me but on a smaller scale, to create false scarcity and raise the price for the rich to whom he sold it. The people he sold it to did not need them, unlike peasants, to whom a little bit of it could have revolutionised their agriculture.

The worst of it was when a pandemic broke out decades ago. The crystals here were the only way to make medicine, and it only took a small amount, but my bastard husband sold all his crystals to the wealthy to increase prices to make a fortune. People were losing their lives back and forth. The only way they could survive was by giving their money and bodies away to afford enough money to buy them or find a way to persuade someone more prosperous than them to give them just a little bit.

During that time, people lost parents, siblings, friends and lovers. Even I couldn’t escape this, I had to give away my body to make enough money to help my siblings, but it was to no avail. They still died in the end.

So, I chose to do all in my power to seduce that man, to become his wife until the day I could end his life and take over. When I changed this place, I bought more slaves for mine. I sell mainly to the poor for minuscule prices; I only ever sell to the rich to appease them. What I might do is unsightly, but I make sure every worker’s death translates to ten thousand lives helped and saved.”

“That can’t be true.”

“Since I don’t sell as much to the wealthy, they have gone out of their way to slander me or keep all my achievements off of any paper, so unless you have seen what I have done with your own eyes, you wouldn’t know about it.

Little boy, let me tell you something right now, good people will and always have been supported by bad things. That’s how the world works, and I choose to save the many by killing the few.

I decide to dirty my hands since no one else wants to. For that reason, most guards are loyal to me even after I break them because they see why I am doing this and choose to harden their hearts to help me. So, if you continue with your foolish actions, you will only hurt more people in the long run.”

Looking at the woman in front of me with eyes full of determination, I falter and shake uncontrollably. Is what I am doing right? If I mess up here and lives are lost, that wouldn’t be a mistake. That would be a sin. Capti told me to be a good person. Is it reasonable to allow people to die for my reasons? Aren’t all lives equal? If so, I shouldn’t let my friends die here. But if I saw a million corpses versus one corpse, I wouldn’t say they’re equal. What the hell am I supposed to do.

As I continue to freak out, I remember Atalanta’s words which calm me down. Right now in my heart the most important thing is to, “All of that is none of my business. I will rescue the people I care about. It is that simple.”

Φ The brat’s hair turned a purple so light that it blended into the sliver in his hair, but more strangely, all the bluish-red crystal around Basileia pillars turned the same colour.

“So right now, you have chosen to be a murderer. I guess ignoring reality is part of being a kid, but I can’t see you as one right now. Porto, kill him.” And with those few words, they start fighting again as I walk away.

-Break-

Φ As we all run towards the wall of Basileia as fast as we can, a couple of guards find us and stop us. While we prepare to fight, I see four white arrows pierce the guards in our way, making them vulnerable for us to knock out.

“What was that,” Buloke says.

Perplexed by what had happened, I tried to find the arrows, but they disappeared. I have never heard of anything like that. Though I have no time to waste, “All those who can fight, come with me. We are going to get the hostages. The rest of you should take these crystals and blow a hole in the wall. We have no time to waste, so everyone gets their asses moving.”

But as we start to move, all the crystals around Basileia glow a light purple. It is just one strange thing after another today, but all this confusion will help us if we are proactive. “Let’s GO, EVERYONE, WHERE ALMOST THEIR!”

“YEAH!” They all shout in unison.

Φ Willow looks so good in his new clothes. Maple, stop, you need to focus everyone is in a very make it or break it situation. I have helped Willow so I look to Orb’s fight against that giant man.

I fire multiple around the man while his ball chases Orb, but he dodges them. Since I am using spirit arts, he could sense them as they come close. This is bad, but I have to keep trying, so I constantly keep shooting arrows, but it is to no avail. Eventually, I started to feel exhausted, followed by extreme pain. I noticed they my nose was bleeding rapidly. Atalanta told me there is a side effect of overuse of spirit energy. As the bow starts to get heavier, I look at Orb, who has been hit again by the giant ball.

No, this isn’t good. At this rate, Orb will be killed. Looking from here, I can see how batter and bruise he looked. But I take a second to stare at his face, and I can see he hasn’t given, so neither can I. If he is staking his life, I will do the same so will all my strength.

I pick up the bow and ready myself to fire ten arrows simultaneously. Atalanta said this bow could be used to fire multiple at once, but the max I ever did was four, but I must push myself; As I am about to fire the arrows, I see the bow change, and I feel a burning under my right eye.

Φ The boy is finished after that last blow. His body is undoubtedly done, for even if he gets up, he won't have enough strength to fight against me. It would have been nice to talk to a legacy like me, but my loyalty lies with Morgan. Back when I was an ornament her husband collected, I suffered abuse every day, but she saved me and gave me this home and family for her. I would do anything.

As I am about to ask the man in front of me to reconsider, the look he gives me shows me his determination won’t change. So, I say “Don’t hold this against me”, as I send my ball towards him.

Suddenly I sense ten of those spirit arrows, but as I am about to dodge them, I notice they swerve around me and then suddenly stop in motion. Looking at the arrows, I notice they’re golden and see they didn’t stop but as just moving so slowly that it seems like they stopped.

Using my enhanced sense of smell, I smell the boy approaching me. But even if he dodged my ball’s first strike, it would always come back around, so as my ball was about to bite him front the back, he jumped toward one of the arrows and landed on it. Then immediately kicks off to another one.

He moves between all of them at insane speeds, using the arrows as platforms. He is moving so fast that my Orthrus automatic tracking is confused. So, I manually sent it where I predicted he would be next, but I was too slow and missed him.

I lose track of the boy until I smell him behind me on the right side. Before I can attack, he freezes and shatters my right arm. This is bad, now that my physical connection to the vessel I was using is broken my legacy turned off. I try to use my gift on my left arm, but before I can get that off, the boy punches me in my mask, freezing and shattering it which knocks me to the ground.

While on my back on the ground, I see the boy let out a victory cry right before I fall unconscious.