Chapter Text
Asta had lived the entirety of his life plagued by disappointment. He never had any mana, never used any magic other than the occasional blinks he does. He trained and trained and trained but other than outrunning horses, his magic never came. Neither did his mana.
Not that it made much of a difference anyway.
Asta never had parents, but the church was as good a home as any he had ever seen, and he did his best to help out as much as he could. They didn’t really have expectations for Asta but that didn’t mean he didn’t have expectations for himself. And he will still surpass them all and become the greatest magic kni-
“Asta, have you collected the water yet ?”
“SISTER LILY” Asta shouted as he made a beeline for the black silhouette just out of reach. He crouched on one knee, proposed the buckets he had been filling with water like some sort of present, and yelled “MARRY ME.”
The nun looked unimpressed as she took the buckets from Asta calmly and placed them behind her as a fist of water slammed down on Asta. With a shriek as if not realizing how hard her magic could hit, Sister bent down and cast a minor healing spell on Asta before picking up the buckets and starting to walk away with a pointed hmph.
Asta had never felt better.
He got up and was about to head to his usual spot inside the demon’s skull when he noticed the slight ruffling of black hair and kids cheering in the distance as Yuno started folding and hanging up washed clothes with his wind. He saw Sister Lily pass by him with a smile as she complimented his skill and told him to keep up the hard work.
That Handsome Bastard. Only I will marry Sister.
And in a familiar gesture that Asta had long grown accustomed to, his vision blackened as he took off in a run and then suddenly appeared behind Yuno. Hardly startled from years of living together, Yuno looked up as Asta started shouting at him with a tired expression.
“You know if you want to impress Sister then maybe you should stop nagging her like you do all the time,” Yuno said with a hint of a smile that hardly ever appeared unless he was talking to Asta.
Asta flared up and was about to spout a response when Nash said “You know he can’t really do that. Especially if he doesn’t have any magic’”.
Rebecca elbowed him slightly, murmuring something about not being mean. Well, not that he was anyway he just said the truth.
Didn’t make Asta feel any less defeated though.
Asta looked up in his rival’s eyes, starting a moment too long at those long, curled eyelashes before he took off with his special mana enhancement brew to train. On his run there -which was an ESSENTIAL part of his daily training- Asta started thinking about his big day tomorrow. Blinking in and out, vision turning black as he ran, Asta wondered how he didn’t have any mana even if it was just a little bit. He would get it all tomorrow it’s sure ! Grimoire Acceptance day was supposed to be a miraculous day and surely he would get a strong grimoire of his own, maybe even a 4-leaf !
"YESSSA, LET’S GET ON WITH TRAINING. ONE…..TWO...THREE…”
And before he knew it the day had ended and he was back in the church, readying himself for his and Yuno’s grand day tomorrow.
As he and Yuno approached the tower on the high hill just outside their village, Asta was buzzing with excitement. What kind of magic would he get today ? How much mana would he obtain ? It was coursing through him making him blink ahead of Yuno multiple times, unable to contain himself. A few people shot him curious glances as he shifted in and out of existence, but Yuno was as infuriatingly calm as ever, basically buzzing with power, as Asta’s sixth sense told him, unlike himself.
Inside the building the Tower Master stood at the end of the tower,higher than all of them and speaking into his green orb as he made his usual speech about Grimores, their importance, power, history, and all that.
Get on with it !
“As you all know, grimoires are what allow us to manipulate our magic into useful forms as we want,” boomed the tower master, standing high above them all, “ and therefore are necessary to make full use of our attributes and mana flow. Everyone, prepare yourselves, as each grimoire will choose its owner”
As excited chatter filled the building, Asta found his own ears dumbfounded with anticipation. He eyed all the grimoires flying off the shelves and remained waiting for his own.
Seconds passed. Then they turned into minutes as almost every person in the crowd got their grimoires, some already showing off ice and fire magic. Around 30 minutes after the speech had ended, almost everyone Had already gotten their grimoires and were chattering excitedly. People shot him mocking looks, seeing as he is one of the only people who have still not gotten their grimoire.
Someone screamed behind him and Asta’s head whipped around, somehow feeling the presence of a grimoire behind him, but instead saw Yuno standing in the middle of a crowd, a golden and green grimoire glowing brightly and hovering towards him. As he accepted his grimoire, people started gasping at the sight of the 4-leaf on its cover.
Asta was confused, yet expectant. Maybe the reason his grimoire was late was because he had a really powerful one like Yuno ! Maybe his grimoire was just as strong if not stronger ! Maybe he would become stronger than Yuno than anyone ! Maybe….Maybe…
Minutes passed as Asta’s thoughts trailed as a feeling expanded in his chest, eating him alive, consuming him, ever hungry and growing. People were jeering at him, at his laughable state of patheticness. He called to the tower master, but that only resulted in a look of unwavering pity from him and more jeering from those around.
For the first time in his life, Asta felt disappointed, discouraged. A feeling that was more unfamiliar to him bloomed in his chest. But through the crowd was one face that was maybe as disappointed as him, as if let down, and Asta searched through the taunting onlookers until he found Yuno’s face, showing maybe the most emotion he had ever seen on it.
Devastated, Asta exited the building, warping to the branch of a nearby tree, drowning in emptiness as all the dreams he had before were starting to flee, escaping him. A step away from the darkness, Asta’s sense called to him, a sense that he had only felt once before, long ago when they were kids, and he blindly followed that feeling reminded of a glowing blue necklace stolen by some bandit as he found Yuno being beaten by a thug he had never seen before.
Without a second thought Asta charged towards the man, yelling out Yuno’s name as the latter looked at him with a terrified glance. The thug was trying to take Yuno’s grimoire, and as lacking in intelligence as Asta was, he still understood how much value that Grimoire held, even as just a collectible.
The man hit the ground with a grunt, surprised by Asta’s attack and then he barked a laugh.
“This is who’s going to save you ?” He looked at Yuno, mocking him, but Yuno was still looking at Asta as if he should never have come. “ A pitiful kid with no mana whatsoever. He will suffer the same fate as that guy over there”, he said pointing at one of the people who were leading the people mocking Asta.
The man approached Asta, taking confident steps forward as chains jiggled playfully behind him. He was having fun wasn’t he ? Asta charged again, determined to get rid of this thug and save Yuno, but his world went black, and suddenly his back hit a stone wall, his vision clouded with pain, the wind knocked out of him.
“Sorry little thing aren’t you ?”, the man said approaching Asta, the chains he hit him with stained in blood, “I thought when I saw you at first that you were….something else. But you disappoint me”
Asta knew he couldn't’ do anything blood was seeping into his vision, the feeling in his chest expanding ever more, not even recognized yet.
“Today was your Acceptance day wasn’t it ?” said the thief, holding Yuno’s grimoire in hand and stepping close enough for Asta to feel his breath on his face, “ such a sorry sight”.
Asta’s head moved on its own, slamming into the man’s nose, and ignoring the nausea and copper clouding his vision. He heard the man curse loudly, momentarily dropping the grimoire before chains slammed into Asta's chest again.
“You know, I am tempted to just end you right here”, said the man, though lacking the malice that his voice should have, as if he couldn’t really do it even if he wanted to, “but I feel bad for you. Did you dream of becoming a magic knight ? Braving into situations to save others ? Well, too bad you can’t now. Do you not feel it ? That despair at not being able to do what you want ?”
The man’s voice, as much as Asta hated him, rang in his ears, as he finally recognised the feeling blooming inside of him. He was right. It was over for Asta. There is nothing more that he could do, and he started closing his eyes, giving in to that ever expanding feeling.
“Well, now you can comfort your friend as well, seeing as he will be staying with you, not even managing to keep his own grimoire.”
Something snapped inside Asta at this, not even conscious of it. He can do whatever he wants to Asta, but Yuno...Yuno is sacred, he is something out of bounds for either this man or any other.
With a gut wrenching feeling, Asta stood up, barely aware of the throbbing in his head and chest, the headache from standing up, and the stone of the tower crashing as a book flew outwards towards him. He felt the familiar tug of space around him as he extracted a long, heavy, rusty black sword from the grimoire and appeared suddenly in front of the man. Holding him up with one hand and the sword with the other Asta saw the look of dawning horror on the man as he tried to frantically defend himself.
Chains shot towards Asta from either side and he deflected the one on the left with his sword while the other suddenly ran into a black hole and appeared beside its own caster, hitting him in the gut while he let out a heart-wrenching cry.
“Oiy”, Asta said, barely recognising his voice as something distant, otherworldly, “Don’t ever touch him again”
The man shielded himself with his arms frantically before Asta knocked him out with the flat of his sword. Picking up his grimoire and putting the sword back in it, Asta Picked up Yuno’s 4-leaf as well as the criminals’ 3-leaf and went to his best friend. He handed him the grimoire, and got a smile in return as he rose up and towered over Asta.
And for the first time in a long while, Asta didn’t feel the tug of jealousy as he looked up at those long eyelashes.
“Thank you”, Yuno said, sounding relieved but more for Asta than his own grimoire. “I guess we can both race to the same objective now.”
“Yeah.”, said Asta, turning to look with Yuno at the landscape unfolding beneath the hill. He never felt more satisfied in such a long time it hurt Asta to remember. “but I won’t promise it will be a fair race.”
Yuno’s quiet chuckle filled the space as he turned to Asta and held out his fist, a smile that only Asta saw curling at the edges of his lips “we’ll see then, whoever can first…”
“...become the wizard king”, Asta answered as bumped Yuno’s fist with his own. He thought of the dark feeling that bloomed in his chest as he was slowly falling into despair and he knew that he could never fall like that. He can’t neither for himself nor for others.
Never again.