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NO U :V
This excerpt marks the start of some grimdark - if that's not your thing, you may want to just leave off and read something else. I will remind you, though, that this isn't just Sakuya - this is Hunter, the person she was BEFORE she became Remilia's head maid.Have some
thematic music for this scene.
Crags, bluffs, cliffs, and then on top of that, the plateaus, tunnels, and woods within the range itself? Plenty of hostile places that Alice wouldn?t
be in, but then there?s still a massive area she could be. And there?s no guarantee she knows anything about the Dossiers.Though she were a single person in the dead of the night, wearing dark, mottled clothing designed to break up her silhouette, Sakuya knew she wasn?t going to just slip right in. The wolf tengu patrols would be able to spot her, clear as day, coming in against a clear night-sky backdrop, and on top of that, if the wind blew just right, their sensitive sense of smell would tip them off that someone was where they weren?t supposed to be.
Sakuya felt a moment of envy towards the wolf youkai ? their heightened senses would be a godsend for someone doing her line of work. Though trained and sharpened as far as she could push her senses, she would still be floundering in the dark compared to the elite lupine guardians, and her hearing was nowhere near as reliable in silence ? especially since she was susceptible to tinnitus in near-silence.
Let?s see if we can?t start this with diplomacy instead of violence. Sakuya angled down, cruising at a lazy arc towards a gentle slope atop one of the small plateaus that surrounded the base of the largest mountain. If anyone saw her ? and she wasn?t willing to bet odds that she?d escaped noticed for so long ? they?d know exactly where she was going to land, and would see that she was landing on flat, open ground with no cover to hide behind.
Her feet had no sooner touched soil than she heard a piercing whistle. A single, sharp tone, barely a measure long, and it came from further up the incline. Sure enough, she?d been spotted.
If the wolf tengu had been carrying torches, they would have of course stood out like literal beacons against the darkness of the night, but then they?d also have ended up ruining Sakuya?s night-sight ? and their own, though the wolves were reputed to being able to shift from color to motion sight at-will. As it were, the pack of eight tengu that abruptly appeared around her seemed to melt out of the darkness, save for the one that had attracted Sakuya?s attention by whistling.
She opened her mouth to identify herself, but before she could speak, one of the tengu bristled. ?The Scarlet Devil?s right-hand!?
In almost perfect unity, each of the tengu snapped into a battle stance, brandishing the bucklers they had strapped to their forearms while drawing out blades.
So much for diplomacy. Sakuya dipped her fingers past her own sheaths, and drew out a pair of daggers.
The wolf that had whistled earlier, however, didn?t draw a blade, but rather a small curved tube of some kind. The three tengu nearest the unarmed wolf settled into a forward guard formation in front of her, blocking Sakuya from directly getting to her.
Their tactic confused Sakuya for the barest of moments, during which she cast about wildly for what that tube could?ve been, and why the wolf would?ve gone for that instead of her sword.
The bitch tilted her head up slightly and inhaled, and with that breath, it clicked.
A bugle! Sakuya launched into the air, scrambling for clearance over the three defending wolves.
The element of surprise was the only thing that kept the bulwark wolves from rising up to block her attack; even though Sakuya was holding the dagger incorrectly for a proper throw, her familiarity with the short blades and many hours of practice sent the hurled knife precisely where she wanted it ? through the ivory horn that the female wolf was bringing to her lips.
As soon as the horn shattered, the three wolves had each assumed a phalanx formation and were bringing their blades up to meet Sakuya in the air. Rather than doing the polite thing and letting them impale her, Sakuya instead seized hold of her flight magic and used it to pull herself back to the ground.
With one hand now empty, Sakuya was more than capable of vaulting forward, drawing her remaining dagger around and across the back of the leg of the middle wolf, and snapping her legs out into a vicious kick to the two tengu on either side of the victim of her hamstring.
Her somersault ended up carrying her directly into the middle youkai, but because of her wild kick, Sakuya ended up straddling him as they went down in a tumble. In the brief moment that she was looking behind herself, she spotted the other four wolves much closer than she?d anticipated.
They?re quick. Gotta be quicker.Sakuya didn?t linger ? a single kick, better described as a wild flailing, from a human to a pair of youkai, wouldn?t be nearly enough to deal any lasting damage, or better yet, knock either one of them out. All she had was momentary disorientation to work with, and she had to make the most of that moment.
She wheeled about, using the grounded wolf tengu she was astride as a base to push off of, redirecting her momentum back upwards in an altered roll, and launched up at the staggered wolf to her right.
Before the tengu could re-orient herself, Sakuya lunged in close and smashed her fist as hard as she could against the wolf?s ear. The tengu let out a dog-like yelp and spasmed, releasing her sword and car-wheeling her arms wildly.
Sakuya snatched her buckler and used it as leverage, heaving back against the wolf?s fall and pulling her over the fallen tengu. Dazed from the shot to the ear, the wolf stumbled over the male wolf, kicking him back to the ground and tripping into the third wolf that had moved to defend the bugler. All three wolves collapsed in a tangle of limbs and bristling tails.
As Sakuya turned back to settle into a proper stance after her tengu-hammer throw, she shot a glance at the bugler to make sure the bitch wasn?t closing in on her as well. Instead, it seemed she?d backed away from Sakuya and was huddling down behind her shield, staring intently at the fight. Sakuya mentally noted her position and turned back to face the other four tengu as they continued to smoothly close the distance.
Eight to one. Three down. One disabled or dissuaded. Alarm horn silenced. Four combatants showing caution, but also indignation. Find a flaw in their technique, exploit it, don?t stop moving.The two outermost tengu in the line slowed their pace half a step, allowing the pair in between them to come forward and brandish their swords in a dual strike, swinging downward.
Sakuya nearly turned sideways to slip in between them when she spotted the other two wolves turning, spinning outwards to bring their blades in to bisect the abnormally large blind spot left by the initial swing.
It was a beautiful technique, simple as it were ? getting even a single attack pattern to work for four swordsmen against a single target was tricky. The odds of striking your own ally went up for each additional swordsman present, and so precise teamwork was required.
Unfortunately for the wolves, it was a one-shot attack, and Sakuya was a veteran of danmaku duels ? she was conditioned to spot openings and check for fake safe-zones; it may as well have been a giant white X painted under a suspended rock, as obvious a trap it was to her trained eye.
The way the maneuver was coming together told Sakuya two things ? these tengu trusted each other, and didn?t expect to come up against anyone who could pick the flaws and weaknesses out of the attack while it was still in motion.
The center pair had dropped to one knee and was bowing their heads down, tucking their chins against their chests. Their blades had struck the ground as the outer pair?s swords were angling in ? from the trajectory they were turning, their blades would pass right by each other and turn in towards their allies, where they would be stopped by the upraised shields of the first two wolves, assuming they didn?t bury their blades in their targets.
The outer tengu were facing outwards in their spin ? the center tengu were kneeling as though they were genuflecting before Sakuya. Neither group had their eyes directly on her.
This is almost unfair how well they?ve set this up for me.At the speeds the blades were slicing through the air at, and how fast the thoughts shot through Sakuya?s mind, no one else would?ve been able to turn their attack against them. If their target had singled out all the little bits and pieces that made up the attack and could figure out how to exploit the weaknesses therein, they still wouldn?t have the reflexes necessary to engage a counter, and at that point the wolves would?ve split up and simply used their superior numbers and youkai strength to their advantage.
Then again, no one else had innate control over time and space.
To completely stop time, Sakuya would?ve needed her special fob watch as a focus. She didn?t need to stop time completely; simply slowing it down suited her purposes just fine.
As the coup-de-grace tengu?s turn slowed to a crawl, she leapt up and forward, launching herself directly into the attack. She?d be long gone by the time the blades got to where she was, though.
Once again using her flight magic to aid her combat prowess, she stopped herself in midair and paused for a moment, letting the ponderously slow blades arc into a better position before she made her move.
As undignified, as low-brow, as mind-bogglingly
simple as a move a stomp is, it?s also
very effective in the right circumstances.
Sakuya dashed forward and shoved herself downwards, driving the upraised shields of the decoy tengu back down, leaving them open to their own allies? attack. As they felt the shields drop from in front of them, each one looked up in surprised shock and disbelief as their partners? swords swung towards them.
Sakuya vaulted forwards, diving over the stunned and misfortunate, tucking into a flip as she came back down and released her stranglehold on time. She?d barely had time to hear the startled yelp before the graceful attack by the wolf tengu turned into a bloody mess.
One of the attacking wolves had barely managed to pull his attack, unable to stop completely but just enough to keep his sword from becoming lodged entirely in his ally. As he began to draw back, stifling a look of horror, Sakuya mercilessly flung her remaining dagger, and it struck him directly at the base of his skull. He noiselessly dropped, blade tumbling from his limp hand as his partners collapsed next to him.
Beyond the remaining attacker, Sakuya spotted the bugler. She was no longer settled into a battle stance, but kept her buckler held in front of her torso, and was watching Sakuya intently.
The final attacker, a bitch, was less fortunate in her attempts to liberate her blade ? while she was struggling to pull it free, Sakuya dashed up behind her, straightened her hands out into flat, open palms, and slapped as hard as she could over the bitch?s sensitive ears.
As it had the first time, the blow to the ears stunned and disoriented the wolf, who cringed and shuddered, nearly dropping to her knees. Sakuya plucked another knife from its sheath on her harness and effortlessly drew the blade across the bitch?s throat.
Eight on one. Four dead, four disabled, of which, one dissuaded. Eliminate three, interrogate one.Rather than further horrify the last standing bitch, and potentially break the air of lethal mastery by clumsily stabbing and slashing at the three helpless foes, Sakuya decided to use one fell swoop to clear them all. With the third dagger still in her hand, she pushed the bleeding bitch away from her, letting her lifeblood continue to pour out as she expired in the grass.
She already had enough lifeblood for what she needed.
Blood as a medium. It didn?t matter
whose blood it was, of course; the last time Sakuya had done this with her own blood, it left her weak and nearly dead. Luckily, Remilia had been there to secure her body and return her to the Scarlet Mansion.
Concluding magic. It wasn?t a spell of her creation; in fact, it was Mistress Remilia?s. She didn?t have the spellcard with her, though, but the technique was developed long before spellcards were. It would?ve been easier to conjure with the spellcard, but anyone who was even halfway familiar with danmaku would?ve sensed the spellcard aura in a half-mile radius. Doing it this way meant the spell was going to be lethal no matter where it hit, but then, she wasn?t intending to pull any punches to begin with.
Divine Lance ? Spear the Gungnir!The dagger in her hand exploded in a wash of red light, elongating to take the shape of a featureless, nondescript shaft of blood-red. If Remilia had conjured it, or she?d used a spellcard for it, it would?ve been decorated with scrollwork, canard wings, and a more pronounced point.
This?ll have to do.The divine spear had little mass ? less so than even the dagger it had consumed upon etherealization. It didn?t need to be thrown like a material lance, either; it was a spell component, you simply willed it to go where you wanted it.
In a flash, the Gungnir cleared the distance ? short as it was ? and speared all three of the tengu Sakuya had attacked first, pinning them to each other and the ground beneath them. The bugler flinched as the lance flew, and stiffened for a moment before realizing she wasn?t impaled.
Sakuya closed the hand she?d held the Gungnir in, and the lance shredded itself and the tengu it?d impaled into non-existence. As gruesome as it looked, Sakuya knew they?d died the instant the spear had pierced them. Armed with this fact, she was able to remain impassive, and successfully maintained her air of lethal efficiency before the bugler.
The bitch stared hard at her, before finally dropping her arms to her sides. As the buckler swung away from the rest of her body, Sakuya spotted a glint of metal and immediately dropped into a proper combat stance, pinning the wolf tengu in place with a hard glare.
?Relax. You just took out seven healthy, rested, and well-trained wolf tengu after flying in from Misty Lake. What hope could a runt like me hope to do to you, no less with one of your daggers in my hand??
The bugler held her and up for Sakuya to inspect. Sure enough, the glint of metal she?d seen was her own dagger, impaled completely up to the hilt through the palm of the bitch?s hand.
?Good. You understand that you can?t hope to defeat me, which means you also understand that I don?t
need to keep you alive, but rather that I want to.?
The wolf nodded, almost nonchalantly. ?And I can only imagine why. Tell me, after I answer your questions, are you going to kill me anyways??
Sakuya relaxed from her battle stance and shook her head. ?Nonsense. That would remove all incentive for you to answer me truthfully, and on top of that, why would I kill you? You didn?t attack me. Your compatriots did, and look what it got them.?
?Indeed.? In a simple, deliberate movement so as not to alarm Sakuya, the tengu grasped the handle of the dagger in her palm and yanked it out abruptly, barely failing to stifle a whimper. ?Will you be wanting this back, or shall I keep it as a souvenir of our little encounter??
?I?d like it back. I lost one with the spear I just used to remind you just why fighting me would be a bad idea. I don?t feel like continuing this night down two daggers.? Sakuya held her hand out expectantly, and the tengu obligingly handed the knife over, handle-first.
?If you?re wondering why a wolf isn?t trying to avenge her pack, let?s just say that being the runt of a litter that got scattered to the winds feels no loyalty to the pack that doesn?t even spare her the scraps of the leftovers, who constantly neglects to inform her of her duties, embarrasses her in front of the Lord overseers. Ask your questions of me; though you are not a wolf, you are clearly every bit the dog of the Scarlet Devil. Rather than the lapdog of the rumors, however, you are the bloodhound. I can feel kinship and respect to a bloodhound, even if I can?t feel outright loyalty to you.?
Vengeful. That was lucky. Lucky, or Remilia had Fated things to go her way tonight.
?I am honored, then, to be held in such regard.? Sakuya tipped her head in a miniature bow.
?I?m impressed. You can say that with a straight face.?
?I mean it. No sarcasm. Now then, I
do have some questions for you, though. This pack recognized me ? I?ve never seen them before, and only passed by the mountain during the Flower Incident. That means that someone has posted a description and ordered the patrols to be on the lookout for me specifically. Why??
?I couldn?t tell you why, but I can tell you that?s true. The patrols were ordered to be on guard for anyone from the Misty Lake region. The Witch of Seven Days, the Small Devil, the Scarlet Devil, and the Devil?s Advocate were all posted with orders to repulse on sight, and sound an alarm. Looks like we failed both tasks.?
Sakuya frowned. ?Devil?s Advocate? Who?s that??
?The blond vampire with the seven-colored shards? We don?t know her proper position at the mansion.?
Small Devil? must be Koakuma. ?Very well then. Other newcomers to the mountains ? I?m looking for Alice Margatroid, the Witch of Seven Colors. She disappeared shortly before a file that belongs to the Scarlet Devil did, and she received a letter asking her to come here. Her presence, the guards being ordered to attack us, our missing file? that?s not a coincidence. If perhaps the regular patrols weren?t told what you?re guarding now, in addition to your normal duties, then maybe she knows. Where is she??
?She?s not on this mountain, though she
is here in the range.? The wolf pointed to the side, indicating one of the smaller sister mountains to the primary peak of Youkai Mountain. ?There is a network of tunnels throughout the Kappa?s mountain ? unnatural ones. The Wolf Tengu refused to patrol them, and of course the Crow Tengu don?t like being underground or indoors for more than they need to be. If you?re going to fly there, at least do me the favor of not lifting off from right here ? you?d attract the other wolf guards, who would come and find me as the lone survivor. Questions would be asked, questions I can?t safely answer.?
?The wound in your hand won?t close up for a little while, even for a youkai. I?ll knock you out before I go ? they?ll see that you didn?t get to draw your blade, and the wound in your hand as well as the broken horn will tell them all they need to know. But, before that, do you have any idea why the Puppeteer is even here? I came here grasping at straws, but what you've told me and the reaction from this patrol group tells me I'm going in the right direction.?
The wolf glanced down at her wounded hand. If she were apprehensive at all about the threat of impending unconsciousness, she didn't show it. ?She was brought in to both guard those tunnels and for her...
unique skills, from what I heard. Exactly what skills that means, I couldn't tell you.?
Sakuya looked over at the smaller mountain and nodded to herself. ?I see. Guess I'll just have to find out when I get there on my own, then. You've been a great help, and for that, as I promised, I leave your life in your hands.?
?But, of course, you'll be knocking me ou-?
The bitch didn't even grunt as Sakuya's shin smashed into her temple, knocking her out in one clean kick.
After only a moment to clean her daggers and sheath them, Sakuya lifted off the ground, prepared to flit over towards the Kappa's mountain. She paused for a moment and considered the helpful wolf tengu, debating on whether she should use one of the teleporting arrays on it to send her back to the Voile.
No. She said it herself, she doesn't feel explicit loyalty towards me for sparing her. Her place is here.Sakuya took off, then, pushing through the air as quickly as she could without looking back.
If I timed this right, hopefully the music ended right as you finished :D
