Re:War (Discontinued)

Chapter 4: First Step

In the scroll, we sat down to begin our planning. There were things we had to be sure of first before we could do anything.

"So, Kurono- okay screw that. You're name is way too long. I'm just gonna call you Kuro."

"You really are brave. Giving the spirit of time a nickname?"

"Your name is long as hell, and I'm not particularly the guy who cares about formalities."

"Fine by me, then I should call you.... Raibo."

"Did you literally come up with that for the sake of it or was my name really that hard to pronounce?"

"Enough with that, Raibo. Let's start discussions. Firstly, in order to end the war, you first need to know why it started. That's were we need to begin from."

"And why did it begin? Before we met, I know that all early records of the war were destroyed. No one knows why it really happened and everyone is just pointing fingers."

"That's where I can't help you. As much as I am the spirit of time, I only became a spirit after the war began. And I have no prior memories," was what she said, but something in her tone was suggesting something different.

"Well, you're kinda useless in that sense. It would be a lot easier to get all the info I need from you, but it looks like that's not gonna happen."

"You are a very rude child, aren't you?"

"I have the mentality of a 47 year-old soldier traumatised by war, what did you think I would be like? Stars and sprinkles?"

"I'm at least 20 times your age and you sure don't see me badmouthing anyone."

"You called me an idiot when we met a few hours ago. How is that not badmouthing?"

"Anyways, Raibo. There's someone you should probably look for. As Amayasha told you, she told you to find a Puppet. There are quite a few in Tendo, so looking for one should be easy. We just need to find someone that was the right ability to help. It's not efficient to waste your mana on those with insufficient powers."

"Don't speak as if they're tools!" I voiced. "Puppets are just as human as any other person."

"Don't get me wrong on this, Raibo. I don't have anything against Puppets, but I don't see the point of calling them human when they clearly aren't. They may have been human while they were still in a womb, but the addition of spirits in their bodies have turned their human bodies into something that is not. No use denying that fact, Raibo."

"I know that... but everyone just treats them as if they are expendable. Ostracising them from society as if they're below humans.... It almost rare in Tendo, but Reveriens treats Puppets like dirt..."

"It is in human nature to fear the unknown, Raibo. And fear creates hate. And when fools band together with their hate, it is easy for them to act on that hate, resulting in the victimising of the Puppets. If you don't like it, I would suggest you try to do something about it. But it won't be easy, you don't have a lot of time to do it either. Don't forget that in a year's time, Sylphia launches an attack on Tendo. You need to find a way to stop that first. Kamisen, the centre of Tendo was attacked and basically destroyed."

"So the first step is to prevent that from happening."

"But the question is how? It's not like we have any infor- we do, don't we? That general you met earlier on... he had a message of some sort, didn't he? Kazeyama, was it?"

"He did. It was a letter from the Sylphian Sovereignty, that stamp on it was definitely from Sylphie Magis herself. No one else had that stamp...."