Mahō and Light

Mahō and Light Chapter 7

Start of Chapter 7
In Junk City, Arthur smirked as he turned off his computer, "Did we have access to Bianca's computer?" Asked Arthur. "Yep, but they may try tracking us down by the time I can copy all the data to this computer." Said Ava. "That's perfect. We can test if our test egg works. Come with me, Ava." Arthur said as he walked out of the house they were in and into the sewers. Ava and Arthur walked around the sewers for a long while until they turned the corner and saw Eva standing next to the flesh egg, which had roots growing from it. "Now leave the computer here when you have all the data needed and you transfer it to the main base," Arthur says. Ava follows his orders and once finished, she places the Laptop next to the egg. "What now boss?" Ava asks. "Now it's time for the egg to hatch," Arthur says. "Just place your hand on the egg and say any word," Eva says. Arthur places his hand on the egg and a wide smile grows on his face and black liquid starts pouring from his mouth. "Death," Arthur says as the egg is consumed by this black aura that pushes everyone back. Suddenly the aura disappeared and the egg cracked open. Suddenly, a child who looked to be about 5 appeared. The child was wearing a dark hooded cloak, pitch black eyes, messy black hair, black pants, and pale white skin, his hands lacked skin and were just bone. He also wore black shoes. "Who the hell are you?" The child asked. "Your father technically." Arthur said. "Oh cool. Why am I here?" The kid asked. "You're here to join my group and help me make this world a better place for us and us alone." Arthur said. "Oh ok…" The child said. The child placed his hand on his hand and suddenly he altered his body to that of an adult. "So old man…What's there to do?" He asked. "First let's think of a name… hmmm how does Grim sound to you?" Arthur asked. "Sounds fine." He said while looking around the sewers out of curiosity. "Great, now stick your hand out!" Arthur said happily as he drew on Grim's hand. "There are likely going to be some guardians down here soon. I want to test and see if your powers are worth investing in. If not we'll just abandon you. It's as simple as that" Arthur said. "Sounds fine with me," Grim said while touching the sewer water in confusion. "Good. I'll be back tomorrow." Arthur says as Eva and Ava follow him. Grim looked at the world around him in awe. Meanwhile, Mark was sitting on a building and resting on a door to the bottom floors. "You enjoying yourself darling?" Eve said as she sat next to him. "Yeah. I'm a bit bored. Hey, how do we find the rest of the sword pisces?" Mark asked. "They are likely being held in other portals somewhere on Earth. And I think there may be some in the monster dimension…But we'll cross that bridge when we get there" Eve said. "Great!" Mark said as he sit up and looked around. "I've gotten pretty strong…you think I could jump from the US to the UK?" Mark asked, "Probably, but that's probably not legal." Eve said. "True," Mark said.The two sat there in silence and Eve tried laying on Mark's shoulder, but phases right through him. Meanwhile, Andre and Bianca were talking in his office about a potential info breach. "I have a lot of valuable data saved in that computer. Im guessing they used Lucian to hack in to my stuff." Bianca said. "Well we have pinpointed their location. I sent S-rank Zachory, an A-rank named Aster, and a B rank named Yoru. I think those three are more than enough to find these hackers." Andre said. "But are they strong enough to beat Aurthr if he is there?" Bianca asked. "Hmm. maybe not. But most S classes are using their day off or are traumatized still. They are solid options" Andre said. "Whatever you say," Bianca said sounding annoyed. Bianca walks into her office and sits on her chair. "Hey computer what's today's date?" Bianca asked. "1999, August 1st, 7:21AM."The computer responded. "Set a reminder to send a group of guardians to China!" Bianca yelled. "Reminder set" the computer responded. Bianca yawned then placed an open book over her face and fell asleep. Meanwhile, Zachary was walking in the sewers with an 18-year-old man named Yoru and Aster. Yoru was a black male wearing a beanie, a black sweater, black pants, white gloves, and white shoes. Aster was white and wore a wide-brimmed hat, an ordinary shirt worn beneath a cowboy vest and waistcoat, the cotton or wool trousers, covered halfway with leather chaps, the distinct tall boots with spurs, and a bandana around his neck. "Hey partner, what are we looking for again?" asked Aster. "We are looking for a guardian named Andre. I doubt he'd be this careless enough to let us track him down. He probably left. Still… be careful. This could be a trap "Zach said. "Well, whoever this guy is he can't be too much trouble for you boss!" Said Yoru. The trio walked around the sewer system until they abruptly stopped and saw a splitting path. "You two should go left and I go right. That way we can cover more ground. And I can handle myself fine on my own." Zach said. "Can I please go with you boss!" Yoru said. "As the highest rank here I say what we do. If you two need help just scream or call me." Zach said as he walked down the tunnel. "Aw man," Yoru said sadly. "Hey cheer up. How about this? If we make it out alive, I'll recommend you for A class." Aster said. "Really? Well then say less!" Yoru said as he dashed down the other tunnel with Aster chuckling behind him. Zach kept walking down and suddenly the smell of sewer water was replaced by the smell of something dead. Zach assumes it may be a dead animal until he gets to the end and saw disfigures corpses lying across the floor at the end of the tunnel. Zach walks over to the body and examines the bodies. Zach takes a picture and sends it to Bianca as suddenly he hears footsteps approaching his direction and what sounds like a sharp weapon being dragged across the floor. Zach looks in the direction of the noise to see Grim dragging a scythe along the floor. "Hello there. You're a guardian right?" Grim asked. "And you a monster I assume?" Zach asked. "Well of course. Hey, I have a question. You're an S-rank, right? So If I kill you then Dad will probably be impressed." Grim said with a wide-open smile. Black liquids started pouring from his mouth and eyes as he charged at Zach. Grim swings his scythe in an attempt to cut Zachary's head off his body, but Zachary ducks under the attack and uppercuts Grim then snaps his finger leaving Grim in the air while time stops. Zachary kicks Grim in the stomach as time plays again and Grim gets sent flying back. Grim suddenly starts inflating then suddenly returns to normal size and spits out a black acidic liquid at Zach but Zach jumps on the ceiling to dodge then dashes at Grim to land a headbutt then punches Grim in the face and follows it up with a backhand, covers his hand in MahÅ, and pushes him through the tunnel and into a large room. Grim gets up with no damage sustained and dusts himself off. "Strange, I'm not doing any damage." Zach said. Zachary snaps his fingers to stop time and lands a flurry of punches on Grim and ends it with a MahÅ infused punch to send Grim into the wall as time plays. "Oh, you must be Zachary, the famous S Rank guardian who can stop time. What an interesting opponent. The workers here weren't fun to play with." Grim said as he got up and he smiled widely and the black liquid started pouring out more. "Accelerate," Grim said as his speed increased suddenly and zoomed into Zach and placed his hand on him. "Death's grip," Grim says as Grim touches Zachary's very soul. Zachary felt a sharp pain all over his body and in an area he couldn't explain. Zach jumps back sitting and feeling exhausted. Zach breathed heavily while looking at Grim. "Aww man. I haven't mastered it yet. Oh well. I was pretty close to complete destruction of the soul this time." Grim said with a smile and looking at his hand. Zach tried snapping his finger but he felt a sharp pain in his fingers as a spark of MahÅ shoots out his hand. "My MahÅ output is completely messed up. I can probably use Time Stop one more time…what the hell is that thing?" Zach thought to himself. "Hey, I got a question. If you could stop time then why don't you ever use weapons? I feel like that would be a pretty broken combo." Grim said. "I made a contract with myself that I can stop time but only if I can snap and I'm not allowed to pick up a weapon while time is stopped.Breaking the contract can result in me being frozen in time for eternity." Zachary thought to himself. "I can't let this thing live. If I allow it to keep growing then it could eventually become an S-rank monster. Maybe even the first documented Z-rank monster. "But I don't think I'm ready to take this on." Zach said as he grabbed a random pipe and threw it. The pip got logged into Grim's head. As Grim pulled it out with no reaction Zach ran up and punched Grim in the face, sending it flying through the wall, and snapped his fingers. Causing him immense pain but he was luckily able to stop time and run away. Meanwhile, Yoru and Aster were still walking down the tunnel in silence until they saw a group of 7-foot rats. "Oh shoot a monster" Aster yelled. "No wait! Those are just normal rats. Rats have been hiding in these sewers for years and the constant waste and other potions being dropped in here mutated them." Yoru said. "Well, I think we should kill them because if I wake up one day with a 7-foot rat in my kitchen I'm going to genuinely start tweaking." Aster says. "Sure, why not? We would probably be doing this city a favor. And this gives me a chance to show off my skills." Yoru says as he snaps his finger and a large black blade appears in his hand.Yoru jumps in the air and slices one of the rats in half. "Cool right?" Yoru asked. "Yeah, pretty cool," Aster says, "What can you do?" Yoru asked as a rat started running at him. Aster pulls out a revolver, pulls the trigger, and shoots the rat. Yoru looks at the rat and sees a hole burned through its body with smoke coming out of the hole. "I call this burning trigger. Any gun I hold can shoot out miniature stars that can burn through pretty much anything on Earth." Aster said. "Holy shi- how are you, not S-rank?" Asked Yoru. "Physically I will admit, I am lacking in that department." Aster said as suddenly he heard footsteps approaching behind him. It was Zach. Zach was sweating and was dragging himself against the wall. "We need to retreat. This was a trap. There is another monster. Luckily I got a photo of it while time was stopped." Zach said. "You ok boss?" asked Yoru. "Yeah yeah, I'm fine. Let's go." Zach said as he walked towards the exit with Aster and Yoru following behind. Thirty minutes later, Zach walked into Bianca's office and leaned against the wall. "Hello, Ma'am I'm back. We weren't able to find Arthur unfortunately. But I have this." Zach says as he shows Bianca a picture of Grim. "And?" Bianca asked. "Look at his hand. He has the same symbol that Lucian had when controlled. See? Look at his hand" Zach said. "Hmm, i'll send this info to Andre. We could be dealing with an entire organization. Also are you ok? You're a sweaty mess" Bianca said. " Yeah…that thing touched me and suddenly my MahÅ output was completely screwed and my body felt off… he said something about destroying my soul," Zach said. "Your soul? A Monster that can interact with the soul is incredibly dangerous. MahÅ needs the soul to power and replenish it, And it needs the mind to keep it contained in stable. Taking damage to the brain can result in either a sudden increase in MahÅ out allowing you to do things you couldn't normally do or lowering you MahÅ supply rapidly. But for the soul, not only could it ruin your MahÅ output but It can disfigure you in terrible ways. We need to get Jack and every other S-rank off their ass. Their breaks are over." Bianca says as she gets up and intends to go to Andres's office. "Zack, you should chill out for a bit. You won't fully recover for a while." Bianca says as she walks out. Zack slumps on the wall and sits down out of exhaustion. Meanwhile, Mark was sitting by himself in the woods talking to Eve." So Eve...why do some monsters look human?" Mark asked. "Well, humans and monsters did live with each other over 500,000 years ago. Back then there was little difference seen between us and some humans had monster wives and husbands and kids. I descend from a human-monster hybrid." Eve said. "Eww. now I have the thought of some random dude dating a dragon in my mind…yuck" Mark said while eating an apple. "Oh I love apples can I have it?" Eve asked. "But you can't eat. Your real body is a sword and the body you are using is intangible." Mark said. "Just put it on the sword," Eve said. Mark placed the apple on the sword and suddenly chunks of the apple started disappearing quickly until it disappeared. "You ate the stem? Weirdo" Mark said jokingly. Eve giggled until Mark heard footsteps behind him. Mark turned around to see Jaden. "Hey Mark. who are you talking to?" Asked Jaden. "Myself…I uhhh…like daydreaming." Mark says. "Ah…anyways I heard you heading back to the UK tonight." Jaden says. "Yep. You came to say bye?" Mark asked. "Well, kind of. I wanted to help with your training. But somehow you grew even stronger than I have in such a short time. Anyway, I wanted to teach you how to use one of my favorite moves. The critical hit!" Jaden says. "What's that?" Mark asked while getting up, Eve teleported to the top of the tree and watched from above with a smile still on her face. "Well, it's not my move… it's a move that every MahÅ user can perform. It's an attack that has a low chance of working but in return, it gives you a huge amplifier to your power. The critical hit is an attack that at first multiples your power by 1.5x. But the more you land it the higher the multiplier. At first, it's 1.5, then 2, then 2.5, then 3, and it keeps going up. Trying to use it concisely has a 0.0625% chance of working, and it's an even lower chance that you will land it when not trying to." Jaden says. "Well then if its luck based then there is a point of training for it?" Mark asked. "There is a way to increase its chances to 15%. Jaden said. "And how is that?" Mark asked. "There is a state called instinctual flow. It's when you insert MahÅ into your brain and close your mind to anything else. Your body will fight on its own instinctually. Somehow this state not only allows people to fight nearly perfectly but it also allows you to land crits more often. Are you willing to learn under me, Mark?" Jaden asked. "Meh sure why not." Mark said. Meanwhile, Akira and Nyx were given separate rooms to get settled in and once they were finished the two walked outside to see Maverick waiting with his arms crossed."It's time for your first test Akira and Nyx!" Maverick yelled. "Wait I thought I wasn't being trained." Nyx said as she looked up and saw 2 swords man fall from the sky.
End of chapter 7.