Chapter Text
“Is this really where we’ll be able to find the last Origin shard?”
Lanz’s question came after half of hour of stomping about in the old ruins with nothing to show for. Their damp clothes from the misty wildwood rain earlier with their moldy surroundings created the perfect maelstrom for an inevitable dreaded stench that clung to their clothes. Taion’s displeasure was particularly ostensibly with how he had pulled his scarf over his nose in a measly attempt to shield his senses.
“Well, maybe if you actually looked for it instead of complainin’, we’d have found it by now,” Eunie quipped, with a kind of impassive acerbity only she could manage.
Lanz, of course, took the bait. “Oi! I am looking, you muppet. Maybe if you—”
“Guys—” Noah and Mio cut in at the same time; Noah’s tone warning while Mio had aimed to hearten. Their eyes met for a brief, warm second in that congruous exchange before Sena’s excited whoop snatched their attention.
In the abandoned, dark depths of Middle Maktha Wildwood, Sena had located what looked like the top of a door hidden behind fallen debris. She motioned to Lanz excitedly, and they both lifted up the chunk of broken wall aside to clear to reveal the new pathway. Tapping her Iris, she pointed ahead through the doors. “Look! According to the map, I think it’s just beyond this door!”
“Quite a well-hidden shard, for something that broke off of Origin. We should be careful of any traps,” Taion said, his left Iris glowing yellow as he confirmed the location. Sena pumped her fist in the air in victory.
“You’re relieved though, don’t lie,” Eunie teased, nudging him, to which Taion spluttered.
“Taion’s right. Last time, Crys was waiting for us. It’s likely that there’s another Moebius in wait as well. Be prepared for anything,” Noah advised to the group.
“Oh, don’t worry, I’ll make sure those Moebius snuffers get what’s coming to them,” Lanz promised as he summoned his Blade. “Now let’s bust this thing open and get the shard to Mr. Samon.”
Now, standing in front of the closed door to what was surely the last stretch of the road in front of them, deep in Middle Maktha Wildwood with its dilapidated structure and confusing rooms and pathways, they were ready to take on the next threat that would stand in their way.
Sena took the lead. With her Blade in hand, she smashed down the old door, and it nearly disintegrated at the force. When nothing came rushing out to greet them, she sheepishly scratched the back of her head. “I guess that was kind of an overkill?”
“It’s too quiet,” Taion commented with a push of his glasses up. “The sound should have at least drawn some monsters, but it’s almost like this place has been completely forgotten. I don’t like this.”
“Juniper did tell us that Middle Maktha Wildwood was…uncanny,” Mio commented. If not for the location of the shard, they would have never trodden the path inside the unstable structures that choked the wildwood.
“Friends better decide if they want to linger around or get shard for Samon,” Riku said in a not-so-subtle push to get them moving.
“Alright, alright.” Eunie agreed. “I think I see something in there, anyway,” Eunie said with her Gunrod in hand. “Come on, let’s get in and out, quick. Then maybe we can skip out on any of those Moebius guys waiting for us if we’re fast.”
With a nod between Noah and Mio, they walked cautiously into the room that was lit only barely by the grey sunlight from outside and glow of their Blades. It was still, quiet, and musty, but like Eunie said, at the very end of the room there was blue glow through an open doorway. With a quick check of his Iris, Noah could see that the shard was past the doorway and in that blue room.
He could instantly tell that there was something off about this. Lucky Seven wasn’t singing like it did to indicate the presence of Moebius, and yet Noah could feel something buzzing under his skin the closer they got. He turned to Taion. “Does it feel strange to you too?” he asked.
“Yes… But regardless, we need the shard. I say we best prepare for a fight.”
It was expected that after Crys, their final Origin shard wasn’t going to be any easier either, but none of their expectations could have matched the sheer awe when they were finally close enough to see what was through that doorway in the blue room.
Unlike the rest of Middle Maktha Wildwood with its crumbling walls and dangerously unstable walkways, this room was in pristine condition. Stretching out as far as they could see, the room was bathed in blue light from machines where holographic information flitted across the screen, and the ceiling rose almost impossibly far above them.
“Wow, such a big room inside a smaller room!” Manana gaped.
“Is this…the inside of a Levnis?” Mio wondered aloud, looking around with her eyes wide. It certainly felt like something from the City, but at the same time, it was…different.
“Riku not think so,” Riku said. And even though he sounded the same as always, like a wise Nopon there to impart his knowledge, there was an undertone of wonder and surprise too. “Technology look different from City.”
Temporarily forgetting their goal and enraptured by the foreign sights in front of them, they marvelled at the room and the devices that were scattered about. “These have to be words,” Taion said while staring intently at one of the holographic screens. “But it’s unreadable. It’s strange – writing that can’t be read? Perhaps it’s some sort of code? And there’s so much of it. This must be a treasure trove of information.” He was half-talking to himself at that point, lost to the possibilities that this room contained. He reached out and touched the screen before flinching back and recoiling like it had burned him after it let out a low beep at his interference. Something started whirring and Taion stepped back.
“Hey, focus! We’re still looking for the Origin shard here,” Lanz reminded everyone to draw attention away from the agitated machine. “Lucky for us, it’s just up there on top of that device. Sena, let’s—”
A telltale shiver in the air. Violet mote-likes swirling together. “Too late.” A low voice, with an almost imperceptible quiver of madness and sorrow. Picking up the shining Origin shard and staring down at them from the top of one of the taller devices was the Golden Consul.
“N,” Noah said. At the sight of him, they all held their Blades at ready, except Noah. “You look unwell,” he said, reminded of the time in the prison. “Like me…when you had us locked up.” He could sense it, but he wondered if his eyes had been as lifeless as they looked on N even more now with his deep eyebags.
N was unmoved by the comparison. “Heh,” he scoffed. “Got my just deserts? Well don’t you look smug, with my woman on your arm, Noah…” His eyes flicked over to Mio, who was watching him staunchly, before he dissipated from the top of the device for a second before reappearing on ground level. His sunken stare bore into Noah. He looked like a brittle statue: like he would shatter at a touch and yet ready to slice Ouroboros into pieces at any second.
The comment had Noah almost indignant at this fallen version of himself – and he was beginning to understand after Joran at Captocorn Peak – who inflicted an insidious self-immolation that burned everyone around him. “Does this face really look smug to you?” he asked him.
“What else would you call it, huh?” N spoke, anger and madness crawling into his voice that was barely held at bay.
Mio involuntarily let out a soft, “N…”
“Poor clod,” Noah said, and he meant it. The anger and hatred he had once felt toward N so long ago was entirely gone and had been replaced by a hollow pity. “You don’t understand anything…”
But N was back to cold, smooth business. “You cannot continue your journey. Moebius is life itself, and I will not allow you to further tarnish it. You will forfeit your lives today.”
“You think we’re really gonna listen to that? We stopped you once before, and we’ll do it again,” Lanz shouted.
“Exactly!” Sena agreed. “And we’re going to be the ones to stop you in your tracks. Right…here!” With a dash and a leap forward, the two had interlinked into Sena’s Ouroboros form and charged forward with her hammer at ready to strike the first blow.
But what would have been a battle suddenly…wasn’t.
It was the buzzing again – the one Noah had felt under his skin earlier before – and it was only getting stronger, but this time, a flash of pain sparked through Noah’s body, and he buckled to his knees with a gasp of pain. Sena as well flinched at the sudden buzz like electricity jolting under her skin, and with a yelp, she crashed into the wall behind N when he easily dodged her uncoordinated movements.
“Sparks, what is that?!” Lanz’s voice was twisted in agony.
“Sena! Lanz!” Mio called out. Her grip tightened around her Dual Moonblades in an attempt to stave off the sensation of stinging needles piercing her body. “What power did Z grant—augh!”
“Mio!” Despite same agony squeezing like a vice around in his body, Noah reached out in an attempt to support Mio. He wrapped his arm around her to hold her steady as she struggled to control her pain.
“T-thank you,” she said while holding onto Noah’s arm in front of her.
“Is this really the strength of Ouroboros?” N said with a dark laugh they struggled to stay standing. “It must have been a fluke that day. A stroke of mere luck. There’s no way that I could lose to—”
“[INITIATING DATA TRANSFER PROCESS.]”
A calm voice echoed loudly through the room an inflection that was reminiscent of how Segiri talked.
“What tricks are you playing now?” Panic seeped into N’s voice as his amusement dissipated while he tried to uncover if he was the one who had fallen into another trap.
“[DATA TRANSFER COMPLETE. INITIATING TRANSFER IN THREE…]”
“Noah! If this is another one of your tricks—”
“[TWO…]”
“I swear I’ll extinguish your very existence until nothing remains—”
“[ONE.]”
Nothing.
And then Noah opened his eyes with a gasp, though he had never closed them. The pain was completely gone like it had never been there in the first place, and his arms were still wrapped safely around Mio, who was blinking in confusion. “W-what just happened?” she said, pulling away from Noah’s grip and looking at her hands after de-summoning her Blade. “Where’s N?”
The man in question with their remaining Origin shard was no where to be seen, but Sena, Lanz, Eunie, Taion, Riku, and Manana were present and struggling to their feet after what felt like a sudden blip into nonexistence.
“Room was not very nice! Manana was hurt a lot!” she complained and drew out the last word.
“Yeah, what just happened back there?” Eunie said. “’Cause it hurt like a bitch until it suddenly didn’t. And speaking on that, where the snuff are we? Did we just, uh, teleport out of there? Maybe it was that device Taion was messing with?”
It was then that the group finally took notice of their sudden shift in surroundings. Ecologically, it may have been somewhere in Ribbi Flats, but this was no place any of them recognized. And not to mention…
“A battlefield…” Taion said, noting the scorched and razed ground, whiffs of smoke still rising from the ground. “But this is small scale, and I don’t see a Flame Clock. And these burned structures… It looks like there was a permanent settlement here at some point. Strange.”
Even with Taion’s astute analysis, it was near impossible to get bearings on their location without checking their Irises. Noah tapped his Iris online; by his estimation, they were likely in some hidden part of Ribbi Flats that they had never come across before. A glimpse at the map would resolve all doubt, and then they’d have to hunt down N this time for that last shard…
“Huh?” Noah exclaimed, unable to hold back his noise of surprise. Hearing Noah’s surprise, Mio also turned on her Iris to check the location and her mouth opened in shock. “Our Iris – it’s not working anymore!”
To be precise, the map that they were attempting to pull up simply came up…blank. Like it had never been there in the first place.
“Just what the snuff is going on here?!” Lanz said, turning it Iris on and off over and over again like that was going to bring back his map.
And before any of them could put their heads together and lay out their next plans or figure out what exactly went wrong in what should have been a quick hunt for the final Origin metal, a clear voice rung out from behind them.
“You must be part of the group of bandits that looted and pillaged this place.”
The voice was steady, but there was a steely hint of resolve behind those words. They turned to face a red-haired woman stepping forward from the forested path with a masked silver-haired man silently by her side. Her eyes were narrowed in quiet anger at the injustice before her eyes. “While those you may have slaughtered may be gone, I won’t let you escape to harm any more people in your selfishness.” She readied a whip, and the man’s had reached for the sword on his back.
“Uh…wait! I think you have the wrong people!” Sena tried to explain, and the woman’s eyes narrowed.
“Try all you’d like, but you won’t fool us with your words,” she said. From beside her, the man had his sword unsheathed and was in a battle stance.
“Sena… I don’t think we can talk any sense into them while they have the wrong idea,” Mio said and summoned forth her Blade. “We’ll explain afterwards, but no hurting them, of course.”
“How noble of you,” the woman said flatly as she readied her Battle Braids. “But your days of hurting others are over.”