Amazonia

In the afterlife it is thought that everyone rests peacefully wherever they belong; this thought is wrong. Some think that in the afterlife you imagine your life continuing as it would on Earth; that is wrong. In the afterlife you are separated from your families going to two different realms based on your gender; Amazonia for the females and Mount Ryu for men. In Amazonia many people have either slain demons to take their powers or have begun to study magic to use it to help their masters take over these unearthly realms. The story Amazonia focuses on the adventures of the murdered maid who died at the age of sixteen, Luna, and her adventures through this Wonderland of War. She misadventures through multiple different factions and has to fend for herself. Follow her chronicle below.

The Opening for the First two Arcs is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0dKBZ-JHJPA

The Opening for the Third Arc is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-usbNcDD9g

Chapter One: Shattered Memories
The desolate road of blood red brick had gone through a field of rolling hills, and in this a large pedestal-stage. This large pedestal-stage was the Altar of Transfer; how female humans made it through the afterlife to their next life in the world of war and the realm of females, Amazonia. The air smelt of iron and vanilla, something that clashed very oddly and the sky was pure black, dotted with millions of stars and an immensely large moon; this realm was in the phase of eternal night.

The pedestal had shone a brilliant scarlet as it puddled towards the center, forming a glowing silhouette of a young woman in a maid's outfit. This pedestal equipped her with the weapons she would need to fend for herself whilst here; the knowledge of increasing her speed and a single scarlet knife and the knowledge of skills on how to use this knife.

She had then began to form and gain her humanly features yet again, hair as pale blue nearly the shade of ice, choppily cut down to her shoulders, some bits braided. She continued to wear her maid's uniform but it had a very odd armor-like appearance now; her smock no longer maid of silk but instead a breast plate with a metal skirt of plates. She continued to wear her ribbon slippers but now their were ankle and knee bracers with the shapes of a crescent moon attached to the bolt, making it look like they were all attached by these moons.

The young woman opened her pale blue eyes to glance around this world without a memory of it.

"W-where... Am I...?" she asked in complete awe, trying to step off the pedestal. She was quickly knocked back into the center of the pedestal-stage, and a voice began to boom from the heavens.

"Young Luna, you have died. You now live in the world of females who have met their untimely ends just like you. I have blessed you with the Scarlet Knife the knife of flames; I ask you to seek the other knives and bring them back to this place. When you do I will let you see your family again; but until then you are alone. In this world there are many other women trying to kill each other yet again to try and get these knives so they can get what you are aiming to get; they will try and get in your way. Are you ready to fight them?" the goddess-like female voice boomed.

"Yes." the girl replied.

"Now, follow this path to the Topaz Manor. They are concealing one of the knives. They aren't the humans like you knew on Earth; most of them have infused themselves with the essence of a demon so they have lost all desire to find these knives; they home the Amber Knife, the knife of sound." she explained. "Now, I must leave you to start your journey."

"Thank you." the girl replied again then smirking as she unsheathed the knife from a black leather garter under her metallic skirt. "Now let's see if she was lying."

She slashed the scarlet knife across the air unleashing a small wave of flames in a crescent, much like how she swung the blade. She looked in utter surprise. There was nothing like this on Earth and so she had known that she was dead. She was happier to be dead. Now that she was dead she could do so many things that she had wanted to do; like travel! But she then frowned. The travelling here would be nothing like on Earth.

"I guess I should follow what she said... I do want to find my family again." she sighed, then stepping down from this stage. She faced the path and begun to walk down it, out of the concealment of the valley into a large open field. In this field she saw the remains of many young women lain out in front of three large beasts; she had then learned you could die in the after life.

She had thought that maybe this astral voice had tricked her and had only aimed to get her to face these large beasts.

Chapter Two: The Maid Cleans Up
The large beasts all looked very savage and all very hungry. Although very hungry their bodies were larger than many buildings and their muscles were masses of thick vines, all having very human-like arms, although having large talons at the bottom of each hand which had stuck into the ground like spikes as they walked. They had large heads, very much like gigantic spear-heads, which did penetrate through the ground even more than their ivory talons.

Each beast was a different color, one red, one blue and one deep forest green. The red one had charged first and as it breathed it unleashed a flame like mixture of gas from it's mouth. She knew that if she had breathed that in she would die and be devoured just like the rest of these women.

She began to panic; she had never been good in a fight. At their school they were about to learn fighting and self-defense in their next term, but now she would never know how to fight like that. On complete instinct as the beast charged forward she jumped with amazing agility and spun in the air, kicking it in the side of the head with immense force.

The blue beast charged next. Now that she had known she could counteract their charges she knew she would be capable of destroying these large beasts with ease eventually. It had breathed immense gushes of water as it moved, making large puddles of it everywhere. It began to seep into the ground and that was when she realized; the puddles were acidic. They burned the ground and left giant imprints.

She clutched the knife in her hand, now unmoving. She allowed the knowledge she was blessed with to fill her mind as the knife began to glow, emitting blood red flames into the open air. She breathed slowly as it continued to approach. In a fluid moment it tore off her metallic skirt leaving her with her plain apron yet again.

Something was different though; she noticed that on the top of her apron there was a roman numeral for one. She left this for now and refocused on the battle as the large behemoth tried to slash again. Utilizing her power and speed she roundhouse kicked the hand and caused it to bury the talons into it's other arm, in turn letting it fall to the ground burying it's spearhead-shaped face into the ground. Quickly with a slash of her knife she lit this beast aflame as it breathed the acid puddles all over itself, burning to nothing but dust.

The final beast was just as unmoving as Luna, and the red beast had managed to get to it's feet again, both standing, facing towards Luna. They both charged at the same time, both spewing gasses from their mouths. Luna had lost a lot of energy from fighting already but she knew she had to continue fighting to see her family again.

Luna remained standing completely still as the beasts both charged, but with a speed near equal to her new speed they both struck their heads downwards at Luna. It had appeared that everything was over for both Luna and her adventure, and that she had died again.

At the last second both beasts set to flame and the gas that was in their mouths erupted, causing them both to explode. With this Luna landed on her feet, back upon the path and continued to move forward.

Meanwhile the astral voice, or rather the imitation astral voice had sat hidden in a shroud of shadows. "The blasted brat... She has successfully made it through the first trial! Her soul is too strong... With this she might actually get the Amber Knife..."

Chapter Three: The Second Trial
Luna continued to walk down the path towards a large manor which was still very far off of this pathway. It appeared as a speck as she walked, until she realized, the entire manor wasn't on this path. That was the staircase to get to the floating manor which stood on a metropolis of floating islands chained to the ground. In front of the staircase stood two gigantic guards whom appeared to have male figures but on the inside were truly hollow.

She tried to pass onto the staircase when both of the golden pieces of armor swung their golden axes down, her using her speed to dodge this and face the guards again. They again appeared hollow and she attempted to get onto the stairs again with the same outcome.

She attempted a final time and they both dropped their axes down again. She was so infuriated instead of dodging them with speed she kicked both axes up the staircase in which both hollow guard suits turned to face her.

They threw out their fists and she quickly buckled below them, spinning her leg to trip bot of the armors, to find them after standing again they had both fallen and collapsed to spare armor parts.

"And that is why you don't get a maid angry." she smirked then taking a step towards the staircase. She took another only to feel something tap on her right shoulder.

She turned to find a golden behemoth made of the armor, floating at the joints. The two heads sat upon a combined chest with four arms and two legs, holding to large swords and using the two other leg pieces as maces.

"Uh oh..." she whispered, then clutching her scarlet knife in her hand. She was about to have to face another fight and then if unsuccessful in sneaking into the manor she would have to fight some of the manors occupants.

It loosed all four arms in a point towards her, spinning the swords and clubs around, as she gracefully darted around them, kicking the swords and clubs to try and find an opening, but then again with magical armor where was the opening?

This continued until eventually Luna was left with sore ankles from repelling such strong blows. She then drew her knife and used her skills of both speed and fire to begin to land some scratches on the armor.

The armor unleashed the four weapons at a point to wards her heart, which she then used her speed to stab directly at this point, causing flames to spout directly up the shafts of each weapon. The flames coated the armor until a magical circle had been brought to the surface after melting away multiple layers of this metal.

Luna stabbed her knife through it and it shattered to dissipate into the air after she pulled the knife back out. The armor then turned completely to gold dust along with the flames and had blown away, out of existence.

Although not living, or rather dying, in this world long Luna hadn't encountered anything like that; it was obviously there for a reason. Now that the guards were destroyed her enemies were sure to know of her arrival; things looked very grim. For all that Luna knew she could mount the stairs only to see two elderly women who are kind enough to hand over the knife.

No; knowing all that she has encountered so far there was no way that they would so willingly hand over an object. There, sadly, had to be more violence for her to gain this knife. She then remembered what she was doing this for, and that it was so she could see her family again.

She then bolted for the stairs and charged up them, only for a pet bird to come and attack.

Chapter Four: To Slay the Phoenix


This bird was unlike any earthly bird; she had heard about it in mythology and legends. It was the Greater Phoenix, the bird of flames. Whoever got to see this bird was blessed with powers of pyromancy, but sadly she already had gained this power through her Scarlet Knife.

The bird looked like a very large falcon made of blood red flames, the only true pieces of it being golden talons and a golden beak. There was no way that she could have come across something so large in her misadventure to this Manor already; the opponents were completely aware that she was here.

"What an ironically warm welcome." Luna sighed grasping her knife. The bird opened it's golden maw and unleashed a hellish scream. She now knew what it felt like to be in a living hell.

Continuing to grasp the knife Luna faced this large bird with no fear; if anything she would rest in piece and not fighting in this balance between life and death. She lunged herself at this bird which had swung it's fiery gold talons at her, in which she replied with a quick swing of the scarlet knife.

"Well if you are watching, I'm going to make this a show." she smiled as she then used her speed to knock herself from the bird's talons onto a ledge and flip back towards the bird.

She clocked the knife around her and with the flames it had no effect upon this blood red demon bird. The bird then lashed out with it's golden beak as she flipped to kick it away from her, knocking it away.

The bird then flipped itself in midair flying at the staircase with immense speed. It hadn't cared if it died in this process; it was created to kill her and prevent her from moving any further forward. Luna stood completely still, this time not focusing the flames onto her blade at all, but to gather the magical energy from the air around her to the blade.

She had known that the phoenix was obviously a flame creature so if she captured this apparition within her blade she would be able to increase the power of her flames for whatever was to come. The bird then flew directly into the edge of her knife, becoming scarlet instead of blood red.

Now, on perfect instinct, she began to speak, as if the astral voice had commanded her to say so, "Apparition that haunted the fiery skies, I now beckon you to my Scarlet Knife. Stay locked within and summon your flames at my beck and call."

And with that, she charged the stairs to the gate. She now had to be immensely careful if there would be anyone on the other side of this gate...

She had successfully reached the Topaz Manor.

Chapter Five: The Garden of Wonders
She crept upon large gates made of topaz which faced a very large garden of golden flowers, scarlet roses and emerald trees. The entire garden appeared bare, leaving Luna some breathing room before having to fight for this Amber Knife. She clenched onto the Scarlet Knife and used it to melt the inside of the lock to then get inside the garden. She kicked the gate open after melting the lock and walked into this garden. She then had taken only two steps into the garden before the gates closed behind her and relocked without issue.

She turned behind her and by the time she turned back she noticed several small monsters, looking as if materialized shadows, stood around her in a large circle, the entire army being savage and blood hungry.

"You're ugly little things." Luna giggled as she reached for her knife. "It won't be hard for me to think about winking you little guys out of existence." she continued to snicker.

The monsters appeared angry, their golden eyes now glaring, tinged with red. The things then lunged with shadowy claws and teeth baring. Luna held her knife and with a simple lunge forward activated the Phoenix's flames, making the flames more blood crimson then any scarlet.

She spun around, a whip of flame emerging as she twirled enveloping the creatures setting them to magical flame as they all then erupted to nothing with each shot. She then lunged forward at a line of the creatures, the crimson flame shooting through each of their hearts in a spear of flame.

She was running out of energy; would she make it out alive or would she be stuck here for all of this dark eternity stuck in paralyzing agony.

She then knew she shouldn't use up anymore magic so she put away the knife to begin kicking and stomping on these enemies, preventing them from landing a hit on her. She punched them as she had began to reach her limit and continued to fight as for a brief moment she had shone an pure indigo.

She then regained all of this energy and continued to fend off the remaining enemies, using her knife to deal out wounds but not for any magical purpose; she couldn't bother to feel anymore pain like she did as the magical energy surged out of her body and into the knife.

She then had lain out in peace to rest and regain strength concealed behind a line of emerald cypress trees, making a blanket of leaves with a needle and thread she had kept in her apron. She lay concealed for a good while, managing to gain quick sleep before then preparing to strike.

Minutes past and spanned to hours until she woke up, still to find the continuing endless night to still stand above the area. She grasped the knife at the side of her leg to find it burning as if trying to alert her in anticipation. She jumped up, still concealed behind these bushes to look through to find a young woman sitting there with a very blank expression, awaiting her to come out.

She had worn a very odd outfit, consisting of a camouflage bustier with a dark green vest and long green sweater over it. On her legs she wore a high wasted pine skirt and she stood facing the bush, as if she knew Luna was there. Her long brown hair cascaded over her shoulders and she smirked as her jade green eyes flickered.

"Well it appears the help is awake." she giggled evilly as she held her arms into the bush as it was enveloped in smoke. She then stuck her fist through this smoke and yanked Luna from behind the smoke cloud and gave her an uppercut with such immense power it knocked her into the air.

From this Luna then fell back down landing on her feet, clutching the knife.

"Who are you?" she asked.

"I am Commander Vivian X. I was a leader in one of the most underground wars of the entire Earth and now I reside here at the Topaz Manor to serve as one of the mistresses generals. Now my strength is multiplied more and I have the force of 100 of my troopsmen ever did. The real question is, why aren't you working?" she asked.

"What do you mean?" Luna asked.

"You are the maid around here. You should be cl- wait... You only have the one!" she gestured at my roman numeral. "You aren't our knock off then... Which means I can kill you!"

"I am lost; but honestly I couldn't care less. You are the one who is going to lose today." Luna chuckled reaching for the Scarlet Knife.

It was time for the battle to begin; General versus Maid!

Chapter Six: General Versus Maid
The knife had shone the brilliant scarlet it had normally in use and the young woman had equipped large silver gauntlets for battle, contrasting immensely with her petite figure. She shifted slowly so Luna saw this to be an opening; her sluggishness.

Luna lunged forward with her knife moving at an immense speed as the young woman threw down her gauntlet and shielded herself from this attack which had then proven itself quite useless, only for Luna to tire herself. Luna had bounced off the gauntlet with a kick which barely made a dent in the large gauntlet. Vivian then replied by throwing her arm forward which knocked Luna back into a cypress tree.

Luna coughed as she impacted onto the trees as they turned to smoke dropping her onto the ground. The young gardener loomed over the maid and held her large fist directly above her face.

"I'll make it as painful as possible." she smirked as she then raised her fist into the air and began to drop it. With immense precision Luna rolled backwards and kicked the fist, causing a large air wave to radiate on the impact. Luna then pushed herself forward and wrapped her body around the large gauntlet and separated Vivian from it by kicking her in the jaw.

As it was separated from her a memory flooded Luna's mind. It was one of the Commander's. She had been fighting, leading her troops to victory in a war under the city of Paris, France inside of the sewers.

She had led the troops and guaranteed everything was fine only to drown in the sewers as she noticed the wave coming. She made a signal for her troops to evacuate but she couldn't make it in time, and in turn for saving all of those lives she drowned in the sewers below her favorite city.

Luna had felt everything that she had felt that day, and she felt very bad for this young woman. Suddenly as she placed the gauntlet on she had gotten the next memory of her summoned into this world only to find herself starving and weaponless outside the manor.

She was taken in as one of the workers and was meant to be the guardian and gardener for this large manor. She had trained her skills and with her new immense strength developed a technique with the gauntlets.

Luna then took the gauntlet off. She didn't want to see any more sad memories for one day, especially since they weren't hers to look at. She gave the gauntlet back to her opponent who was slightly stunned and got back into battle stance.

"You have gone through a lot to get here; I am not going to be the one to kill you. Not today." Luna smiled kindly. "But I will be defeating you and your friends; I have something I need to achieve."

"Understandable; now let's fight." Vivian smiled back, holding out both gauntlets. From up the arms two hammers flipped then allowing her use of a weapon, not only the use of her deadly abilities. She launched herself forward and threw out her fist at Luna, which she counteracted by replying with a roundhouse kick to the wrist of the young commander, then sending her flying, gauntlet trapped beneath a rose bush.

Vivian then attempted to pull the gauntlet out, but it was too late. Luna winded her with a knee to the stomach and knocked her out in an instant with a quick tap on the head. She would be fine and suffer nothing but a mere 10 minutes of unconsciousness, allowing Luna's plans to prevail and for her to be able to explore this manor with ease.

Chapter Seven: Mirror of Truths in a Battle of Lies
The young maid had then kicked through the doors of this golden-topaz manor to find an isolated foyer with only a single door on the other side. The entire room was themed in blue; the walls the shade of midnight and the floor of icy blue. The floor only played a minor part to the room; in the middle was a large pond with a mirror hovering over it of crystal.

Luna looked around this room to see nothing else making it look very desolate and she decided to look into this mirror. She walked up to this mirror and tapped on it to see no effective change. She looked at her face, fixed her hair and smiled into the mirror, feeling utterly shallow. Although she felt this she continued to supply herself with vanity until she noticed that the eyes of the one in the mirror were pink; not blue.

Suddenly as she touched the mirror the entire reflection was coated in a pink glow until all blue features which was the majority of Luna's uniform and facial features turned pink, which she then had the instinct to jump through the mirror to destroy it, but she ended up on the other side to find her reflection did precisely that and materialized in the world opposite Luna.

They turned to face each other, and not only was Luna completely horrified, but she had also seen that the number on the copy's dress was three in roman numerals. This must have been some sort of strength count, meaning this copy had obviously gained more powers then Luna had known about currently.

"Well then, welcome to the foyer of Truth, imitation." the pink Luna scoffed at the real one.

"Who are you calling an imitation?" the real Luna replied angrily.

"You. I have been down here for such a very long time, letting my powers strengthen, unlike you. You are only a one whilst I have advanced my powers to a higher grade then yours." she smirked wildly, grasping a silver knife from her garter.

"So you use knives as well..." the real Luna analyzed, grasping hers as well.

"Yes, but that is not all I use." the imitation grinned as she then appeared directly next to Luna. "Those speed powers you have aren't speed. You will understand as soon as I begin to achieve my goal; kill you."

"We'll see. I have the Scarlet Knife with the powers of that Phoenix you used as a guardian infused with it. Your power cannot beat mine." the real Luna encouraged herself seeing a glint of fear in the copy's eyes.

The copy flung herself at the real Luna with her knife, then causing Luna to stop in her tracks some how. By counteracting with the fake Luna's powers Luna had thrown out a cut with her knife to prevent any injury by the other knife.

The imitation then threw her knife into the air which then formed seven knives in each of the two rings that formed below it. She then manipulates all of the knives to cause them to be a lot like a knife gauntlet as it moved following her fist.

"Knife Uppercut!" she said as she threw her fist upwards, narrowly grazing the face of the true Luna. This Luna had managed to deflect the gauntlet of knives with a simple cut of her fiery knife which had bent the course of the tip away from her face. The true Luna replied by delivering a kick to her counterpart's side. The counterpart flew into the wall she had been kicked towards, only for her to throw her knife at the real Luna.

Suddenly with it multiple different knives began to fly towards her.

"This is my ability; Time. I am able to summon knives that follow any path they possibly could have had in alternate time periods. The ability you possess now is to accelerate the time of yourself but nothing else. I possess the ability to accelerate and slow down anything I desire." she said as she demonstrated the knives flying towards the real Luna at both slow and immensely fast paces. She ultimately dodged them all, using her flames to aid her in battle.

"Well obviously since you are only number three you couldn't be good at this ability." Luna giggled. She threw her knife forward, the embodiment of a scarlet Phoenix upon the blade which then struck the fake Luna in the leg, causing her to topple back into the pond.

"Shoot..." she splashed as she then levitated herself out of the water, reversing to the time where she stood upon the ground, perfectly still. The wound still in her leg, but so was the knife. She clutched the knife and went very power mad.

Her eyes became the same scarlet as the blade and she distortedly moved, creeping to leave flames behind in her wake. Luna began to panic; she had nothing she could do anymore. She watched in horror as she was about to be executed by herself.

The young copy pulled the knife from her leg and rose it to slit her true self's neck as suddenly on complete instinct, Luna yelled. She uttered the words "Teishi!" before she had completely stopped time -- Or at least the time of the copy. She pulled the knife from her opponent's hand and unpaused time, as the copy returned to pink.

Another instinct had kicked in as the roman numeral for two had formed upon Luna's apron. She held her hand against the opponents chest and she had stopped her time, then using her knife to drain her opponent's life into it.

Once her copy was gone she continued on the knowledge she had been fed by the astral voice and she cut the palm of her hand and the spirit of the copy transcended into her, giving Luna all the abilities that the copy had known. She had now known she had the power to stop the mistress of the manor and gain the second knife. The Amber Knife.

Chapter Eight: The Maiden of Amber
I had opened the next door to find a young girl looking outside the window to a world of dismay. This girl wasn't human, and that was obvious. She had been one of the people who slayed a demon to fuse herself with it. She had the same features of a human but large black bat wings protruding from her back and instead of teeth she had large fangs, giving her the appearance as a vampire stuck in between both the bat form and human form. Although she looked so she still appeared to be a very beautiful young girl, one Luna would babysit when she was not carrying out her maid duties.

The girl had turned her face to reveal piercing green eyes and short brown hair in a bob. She had worn a pink sleeping cap and frilly nightgown with red silk ribbons securing it.

"Will there ever be a way to return my heart to white..." she sighed as she glanced out the window, seeing the maid's reflection now upon it. "Are you here to clean my room?"

"No, I am here to get the Amber Knife." Luna replied, gesturing to a knife tied to a string like a necklace around the young demon's neck, the blade being made of pure amber storing ancient cherry blossom petals on the inside. "And are you willing to give it to me?"

"That depends... I have forgotten how to see with my heart which has now succumb to the darkness. I have forgotten who I am and what my goals are... Can you tell me?" she asked, then turning to face Luna.

"I am afraid I cannot." Luna replied.

"Then you are of no use to me. But I am kind of hungry, maybe you can be my dinner." the demon smiled. She then grasped the knife from her neck and charged at the maid unleashing a sonic wave from it which knocked Luna back into the pink door of this plush yet desolate chamber.

Luna kicked off this door to go forward, using her new skill and the knife she had taken from her fake self, launching towards the young girl as the number three finally appeared upon her apron. She then was able to stop time and accelerate time and by putting a spin on what her previous opponent had done on making herself float by manipulating the time periods so she could fly at her opponent, then throwing the knife a large swarm of knives flew at the girl.

"Demon Hands." she stated simply as she raised her hands which unleashed black hands at the knives, each preventing one from attacking the little girl. Luna then reversed the time period to when it was in her hands.

"Why are you so bent on killing me?!" Luna demanded as she then dodged these hands flying at her in knuckle form. She grasped the Scarlet Knife and twirled it, severing many of the dark hands turning them to nothing but black smoke.

"You desire my knife. That and the fact that she sent you..." the girl said then flying at Luna with the large bat wings, twirling in mid-flight, coating her fists in darkness as she flew directly into Luna, punching her with both of her hands, knocking Luna into the wall leaving a very large crater.

"I am going to get that knife..." Luna mumbled as she fell onto the ground only to grasp the knife in her hand and set it aflame. She could no longer stand and the little girl had loomed down upon her.

The girl bore her fangs and just as she was about to seep her teeth into Luna's neck, Luna stopped time, ripped the Amber knife off of the little girl and kicked her into the bed, knocking her unconscious.

Luna then ran throughout the manor again to find the young Commander awake, congratulating her.

"Well, this is it then." Luna said.

"Ir doesn't have to be." Vivian replied.

"How so?" Luna asked.

"I could become a travelling companion to you." Vivian smiled.

"No... This house needs you. I promise, one day I shall return and when I do I will be here to talk to you and I will also apologize to your young master about the knife. Just promise me you will stay here and keep fighting." Luna replied teary-eyed.

The two then parted ways with an embrace, and all was fine until Luna had gotten to the bottom of the stairs.

Chapter Nine: The Arrest
"Ms. Luna." a young woman said. She had short lavender hair styled in a waterfall braid with emerald green eyes. She wore a frilly blue dress with peach accents, making a smaller skirt over the skirt of the blue dress. Over her sleeves there were two beach ribbons which curled down her arms to a float over them, in one hand holding a grimoire and the other holding a sword. She also wore a peach-colored puffy cap which had a golden emblem upon the center, the number 7 etched onto it by dots, surrounded by a coat of arms featuring a raven and a young woman holding her arm out as if to cast a spell.

She obviously seemed to assume some sort of Governmental position, probably one of the law enforcers of Amazonia or a leader in their mystic ranks.

"We will need you to come with us." she sighed, holding up the sword.

"And who are you?" Luna asked.

"I am the Magical Legion's First Legionnaire, Lyrica. You are being charged with the theft of the Amber Knife. We have been given a call by an anonymous source telling us that you have stolen the knife. We will need you to come to trial and see if you are guilty or not." the young woman stated as Luna glanced at her with a deadly glare.

"And how can I do that? I am just a measly maid." Luna giggled. "As silly as I must be I probably ended up moving it when I was cleaning. Would you like me to go check for it?"

"That would be great, thank you!" Lyrica believed.

Luna turned and ran up the stairs as they saw the knives through the bottom of her dress along with the Scarlet Knife. Luna thought nothing that she should say aloud and charged up the stairs, using her time manipulation to accelerate herself to speed up these steps into the garden.

"Knights, full charge!" Lyrica demanded as the young women behind her ran up the stairs after her.

Luna clutched the two knives as the astral voice spoke out to her. "I shall grant you the knowledge of how to utilize the Amber Knife. Get Vivian to accompany you to some of the more Earthly-looking coasts of Amazonia; there you should be safe."

She rushed into the garden as she held the knives. She threw down some seeds in front of her and used her time manipulation to accelerate the seeds to the point of full growth making a full wall of trees.

"Vivian!" Luna called as she saw the young army girl run out in full battle clothing.

"I saw them coming. I will help you exit through the back exit and guarantee that they cannot follow us." she explained, then throwing down her gauntlets as she made a large pitfall directly to the ground below.

Suddenly the large trees cracked open with a large flare of energy, the women standing right at the stairway, preparing to capture Luna. At the last moment Luna threw out her knife and unleashed a blast of sound which caused them all to topple down the stairs.

Vivian and Luna then took off to a bolt. They ran into the Foyer of Truths and used the Amber Knife to blast open a hole in the wall which accessed a large passageway. They charged through and with time manipulation it sealed behind them. They followed the intricate tunnels until they reached a large empty room. It was directly open to one of the chains which led to the ground which they could slide down to get to the ground.

"I think there is a secret passage back here!" they heard one of the soldier's voices call.

"Uh oh!" the two girls worried in unison. They then jumped down this chain and in a spin Vivian threw out a punch at the chain and Luna loosed a blast of sound, causing it to snap with the punch, guaranteeing the opponents couldn't follow them down.

Luna grasped onto Vivian's hand and fast forwarded them close to the ground until she then slowed right before impact, causing them to land on their feet as this chain fell. They ran to avoid being squashed by the chain and managed to dodge any contact, leaving them to run freely into the forest surrounding. Suddenly in front of them appeared Lyrica and they were both knocked in the stomach by her blade and caused them to fall to the ground in writing pain. Lyrica then opened a vortex of blue light behind her and threw the to young girls in, going in after them.

Chapter Ten: The Shinigami Boat Ride
The two girls had woken again to find themselves in a canoe boat with a young maiden heading up the bow. She sat stood with one foot on the bow of the boat which was shaped like the head of a violet dragon. They sat upon the boat over a pristine ice blue expanse of water. It was so clear they could see far beneath and luckily saw no creatures.

Luna thought something was very odd, she lifted her leg to see she still had the two knives strapped to her garter and looked at her companion who still had the gauntlets upon her arms which had transformed into a much lighter version making them easier for her to move.

"So you wake finally." the young woman said, a large scythe over her shoulder.

"Where are we?" Luna asked.

"And who are you?" Vivian asked as well.

"Well, at least those questions were one at a time. My name is Shi Aijen. I am a Shinigami, otherwise known as Death God assigned to the both of you. I saved your butts from that one Lyrica character. Sadly, I am the one who has to take the both of you to the court. You are on the Xyst Expanse; the everlasting ocean of souls." she explained, swinging her silver knife which had a slightly wisp-like bending at the end into the water, raising it to expose a blue flame which appeared to be made out of life, as she then threw it back into the water.

"Why are you taking us there?" Vivian asked.

"A Shinigami is a God of Death. Not only am I your God of Death, but I am also the carrier of souls across the Xyst Expanse, otherwise known as the Charon." the girl replied. She swung the ax in the water as if it were a paddle and caused the boat to move forward at a faster speed.

"So, you are going to cart us across the expanse of souls to get arrested and die eternally?" Luna asked. "Sounds like you're a bad Shinigami."

"How sweet. You think I care about your opinion." Shi replied.

She appeared like an average woman, but the scythe looming over her shoulder made her look quite scary and gave all intentions she might of had malevolent. She had long orange hair which was wavy and went down a very revealing robe. She wore a tight black robe which left her breasts exposed at the top, being covered by a white lace bustier with green lining, much like that on her large sleeves which had the green lining with a black pattern across it, leading down to her large black sleeves.

"Now let me explain my position." Shi began. "Shinigami is no real term. The Death God came about as a trial of seven women of Amazonia which are strong enough to crossover to Mount Ryu whenever they please. I am one of these women. These women can all bend life sources, stealing it from some things and replacing some with another. Not only that but we also have other powers. I refer to mine as Extreme; I can use my scythe to repel anything I desire. I am one of the most valuable Shinigami because I cart souls here at a much quicker pace. I am basically the Soul Cleaner of Amazonia."

"So you aren't going to kill us?" Luna asked.

"No. I am leaving that up to the savages in prison." Shi chuckled. "But honestly, I am joking. Also as a Shinigami we can read into the minds and truths of whomever we are the Death God of, so for instance I know you both are innocent for the crimes they are going to try and pin against you."

"At least someone knows." Vivian cheerfully smiled.

"And that is why my goal is to break the Shinigami line by using my powers to save you." Shi smiled as she turned to us. Suddenly her sharp features that she had bore changed immensely. She wore the same clothes but now had straight blonde hair tied very much to what Luna knew as a Samurai Cut, which basically involved taking to large strands from the sides and tying them into a ponytail at the back, leaving the rest of your hair down. She had hair down to her shoulders, somewhat like a bob and had soft hazel eyes with a soft and delicate looking chin and jawline making her look very feminine and elude beauty.

"So everything that just happened was basically a facade?" Luna asked.

"Basically, yes. I have planned this for a long time, having my fates read by someone very dear to me back on Earth whom read a prophecy of me proving the innocence of two young women, a maid and war commander. I then also got that checked here in which she confirmed that you two would be the two that would help me change the name of Shinigami." Shi replied. "With this I have also been told that I need to accompany you upon your adventures in gathering the knives."

"Well that was definitely an odd turn of events." Luna giggled.

"But prepare. The worst you have seen so far is upon us." Shi grimaced.

Chapter Eleven: Immortal Imprisonment
The boat continued and we continued to share information with one another of how we thought the day was going and how are adventures were. Although there were some questions which remained unanswered, I grasped the knives from my garter and hid them at my sides, beneath the gown. They were still easy enough to access if I needed them and we began to discuss tactics.

"Alright, so if you guys enter and are found guilty, most likely you will both be taken to Level Seven, the level of highest Magical Imprisonment. You will be trapped in jail cells like on an earthly prison which will be very easy to destroy utilizing your magic. Each level has a different Guardian and a different theme, and yours has the theme of Great Puppetry, controlled by Alice the Malice. She gets that name from the malice she drives onto her opponents through control of puppets. These puppets range in size and also range from human to beast, each human puppet wielding a weapon." Shi explained.

"Alright." Luna smiled. "Thank you."

"There is no need to be thanking me. I am only trying to make a place for the broken in the light; something I know you both questioned your entire lives." Shi replied quite arrogantly.

"Understandable." Vivian replied, then looking at the waters of the lake. She looked teary-eyed whilst looking at them, and Luna thought that it was because she thought of the night she died. Vivian had drowned in the sewers of Paris after saving all of her comrades. She had a pure heart and now that she feared water Luna felt pity for the first time in her adventures throughout this living Hell.

"Shi, I would like to know something." Luna asked.

"Yes?" Shi replied.

"How did you die?" Luna asked again.

"Well..." Shi's eyes darted away, filling with tears. "My father worked in Chernobyl during the 1980's, and with the horrible luck I had in my life I had the horrible honor of visiting him there on the day the Chernobyl incident occurred. His office was destroyed in the rubble and our bodies were never found due to an odd amount of radiation, causing our bodies to turn to nothing. My mother hadn't come with me, but I know for a fact she must have been devastated to know what happened, although we were probably reported as missing. I don't even know if we had a proper funeral."

"That is devastating..." I replied to the young girl, caressing her arm in sympathy. We sat in silence for a minor few seconds until the young woman spoke.

"You are both good fighters, but these women are on the same level as I am. I shall meet you at level six in there and will, if I am waiting for more than half an hour, storm down into the seventh level. If you do not see me on level six, fight your way up to five. I have allies that will be storming five so you shall be fine. Plus, you have two of the Spectral Specter Knives, meaning that you know how to use them."

"How do you know that?" Luna asked.

"Well obviously since you drained that Phoenix into the knife you know the Scarlet Knife is the knife of Draining." Shi replied.

"In fact, I didn't..." Luna sighed, rubbing her head.

"Well you have been taught how to drain magical energy from the air and cause it to combust, but you can also cause things to freeze and also drain magical essence into the blade." Shi explained. "The Amber Knife although is the knife of Sound, capable of unleashing sound waves but also capable of moving objects through what is known as a 'sound push'."

"Alright. That shall come in handy for when I fight this Alice person." Luna replied.

"And your gauntlets aren't just power manifesting. They are known as the Seismic Gauntlets, they can also control Earth. You shall be able to make fists of rock to unleash at your opponents and now some walls of rock and earth. Use your power to defend mainly whilst Luna lands many quick dashes and uses her sound waves to maneuver the stones into positions where you will all have an advantage. Now that you know what to do, I will let you get to your trial." she said, as we reached the shore.

She stood onto the bow and in a flash upwards, disappeared. Suddenly Lyrica emerged from the building and chained the duo, taking them into the large golden castle building. In passing they realized that this was nothing like a human court.

This was nothing like anything earthly.

Chapter Twelve: Punishable of Eternal Life
The large marble doors opened to which the two young girls were thrown in, having council in front of a large marble podium, in which stood a young woman. She had short pale blue hair with blue eyes which sparkled from the high pedestal. She wore a green and white dress with gold embellishments on the shoulders, much like epaulets, which had the words, 'judgement' writ upon them. She wore tall black boots which compared greatly to the purity her dress represented. She held a rod in her hands which had a gavel-like end, with a skull on one side and a halo on the other, representing both good, or innocence and evil, or death.

She grimaced at the two of us, as the light gauntlet's that were worn by Vivian before became mere bracelets beneath the shackles, which meant they had gone unseen alongside the two other knives that Luna concealed on her sides beneath the dress.

"Now," she began. "You two are trouble."

"How so?" Luna asked ever so innocently.

"Don't play stupid with me, maid." she replied angrily.

"What did we do?" Vivian asked, teary eyed, pretending to not understand a thing that had been going on. Luckily the duo were both very formidable actresses, and had been able of tricking others in the past.

"Alright, well to name a few," the judge began, floating down slowly towards us. "Assault of poor Imirela Topaz at her manor, destruction of property, evading arrest. Shall I go on?"

"No ma'am." Vivian replied grimly, her attempt failing.

"With that you both realize you are sentenced with eternal life to prison. Specifically this prison; the one no one escapes." she scolded.

"Yes..." the two girls replied.

"Well then, if you know this I can," she began as the skull on her gavel-rod had begun to glow. She then reached the ground and threw the hammer down onto it, causing a rift to open beneath the two other girls. "Punish you to Level Seven!" and with the final words they fell.

Although they got the feeling of falling they materialized near instantly into two cells on the ground below, both facing each other. From what they heard there was no one else around. The ground was black and white and on one side there was a large stage, which both of the girls knew there was a door behind.

"So what now?" Vivian asked her partner.

"We try to bust out." Luna replied, breaking the shackles on herself through time manipulation, using this also to draw her knives back into her garter.

Meanwhile on level one their companion had finally made it into the room to challenge her opponent.

"Misty!" she yelled as she stood on the dock at sea, which was covered in a sea fret. She knew with Misty's magic this was only an illusion; nothing real. She swung her scythe into the mist, causing the souls formed to make this illusion to disperse, leaving her opponent.

It was a young woman with long blond hair who was wearing a long midnight blue gown which had patterns that represented stars. These stars traversed across her dress as she moved.

She held up her hand to try and unleash a wave of spirits but by then it was too late. Shi held up her hand and caused a large spirit flame to be fired at the opponent, then knocking her aback.

The young girl twirled, unleashing knives from the bottom of her gown. Shi easily counteracted this by solidifying a spirit into a solid white ball with a wisp tail, then using it to fly on as the knives only struck the foot to ankle area. Once she made it close enough she spun on it, hitting the adversary in the head with it, knocking her into the door and causing her to collapse.

Shi then moved onto the elevator.

Would the girls escape? Could Shi make it down to Level Six in time? Would they ever get to survive to the next morning?

Chapter Thirteen: Fighting in Tune
Luna clasped the Scarlet Knife and summoned the Phoenix's flames onto the blade. She then slashed through the bars of her chamber, causing them to melt all the way up into the stonework. Meanwhile Vivian had summoned her gauntlets and struck every bar out of place due to the powers of her gauntlets. They then stood together on this floor, seeing that they were the only two cells, the stage sitting opposite to them. This dank room had been made of stone everywhere except for the floors where it bore a checkered pattern.

The two girls now needed their outfits to be more functional then for look. Luna took out her braids and used that string to form a hairband, then tying her hair back into a ponytail so it was out of her face. She then also used this string to tie together pieces of her made uniform which she had then destroyed so she could use some of it for armor.

Her dress was now a tight navy blue dress, ripping off layers of frills from the bottom of the skirt to leave it like so, now also coming up above her knees. She then pulled her garter down to be semi-exposed, to show that she was perfectly deadly. Over her arms she gathered the beak of the Phoenix she drained from the Scarlet Knife and split it in two to make shoulder guards, taking the talons and turning them into gauntlets.

Meanwhile Vivian had taken her normal look but had ripped some of the jacket so she could move more freely, turning it more into a vest. She had been ready for this battle much before Luna.

"Ready?" Vivian asked.

"Absolutely." Luna smirked.

Elsewhere their Shinigami had made it to the second floor. She had been in the process of her second fight as the girls had been preparing for their first. She held up her scythe and faced a young girl who was dressed in a scarlet kimono with her brown hair tied back by a red ribbon. She held a stick with two white strings attached to the top. She waved it around and unleashed flames from it at Shi, trying to land a hit.

Shi had now been experiencing a harder fight. Her spirits were warded off by the flames of the holy stick. She had tried to land multiple hits without success until she realized, she would have to use her base power.

Shi's base power was one of the most feared throughout the entire realm, allowing her to release spirits of deadly beasts, more so effective since they couldn't be warded off by these mere holy objects. Their spirits were ones she gathered with her Shinigami powers and kept them for herself instead of putting them to rest.

"Alright... Rouge, it is time for you to lose!" she beckoned, then unleashing a large suit of golden armor, with two heads, one torso, four arms, two holding axes the other two holding two large metallic boots as maces. This was a creature that Luna had vanquished earlier on in her adventures as her Shinigami followed her to try and see what she would do. She gathered very strong spirits like this.

The armor spun it's torso and it's arms to make a tornado spin of weaponry, then slashing and knocking the young girl out, causing the next elevator to be left for use.

Five floors below the curtains of the stage began to open and there were three small puppets dancing, all bearing the same features. They had short blonde hair in the style of a choppy bob, blue eyes and all wore frilly blue dresses with white ribbons.

Each bore a different weapon; one bore what appeared to be an old-fashioned razor which had been used for the same purpose as an ax, another used twin swords and the final used a grimoire to unleash blasts of fire.

The dolls all appeared to be having fun until hundreds more of them dropped down onto the stage. They all then moved forward and pulled away to expose a girl with her hands as if manipulating marionettes who looked exactly the same as her dolls.

"Welcome to Malice in Wonderland. I am going to be your downfall today." she smiled. "I am Alice, and I shall guarantee that all escapees are killed by my beautiful dollies!"

The dolls then flew at the two girls, some landing hits causing cuts in their clothes and bleeding whilst others missed completely.

Things looked grim already. Would they defeat this malice in time to make it to the next floor?

Chapter Fourteen: Malice in Wonderland
The girls squared up, now prepared to take down this guard woman and make it through. Vivian had her gauntlets in a new feature known as "Rise Feature", capable of letting her rise earth and solidify large pillars of it. Luna on the other hand used her Amber Knife to try and get the upper hand.

Pillars of rock formed in front of Luna as she knocked them forwards with blasts of sound, causing them to strike some of the dolls and take their weapons. She then used time manipulation to accelerate one of her sound blasts to the point of combustion, burning all molecules that went through it.

She now had begun to name her attacks whilst using them, shouting "Time and Sound Waltz!" as she released the combusting wave.

"Mirror Shield!" Alice cried in utter joy as her dolls formed their weapons in the exact position of a disc, all reflecting this wave. The wave still managed to burn all of these dolls to a crisp in the process and allowed Vivian to open for another move.

"Rock Doll Dance!" she smiled, then making stone doll replica's of herself, much smaller, a lot like Alice's magic and used them to fend off all of the dolls on the battlefield.

The three girls continued in this fight of strength to see who's fates would interlock and rise above the others whilst on the third floor Shi had managed to defeat the next guard.

Alice continued to launch puppets as did Vivian, making a mingling attack between the two, but Luna saw this as time to use her powers of draining to gain the upper hand. She unleashed a large Phoenix flame pulse, which with a sound wave caused a blistering torrent which absorbed the dolls indiscriminately.

Luna then lunged for Alice whom formed a large ax much like that of her doll counterpart into her own hands, blocking the two advancing knives, knocking Luna aback.

Vivian saw this as an opening and punched the ground, unleashing a large wave of stone which then trapped and knocked around the delicate Alice. Luna then using a sound wave knocked the young puppeteer off her feet, allowing her to then use her time manipulation to generate higher speed and attack with multiple melee strikes, sending her flying into the ceiling.

The girl landed on a bed of dolls as she peeled off and a life sized doll took her place. This doll bore the twin swords and lashed out with an inhuman speed, even making it difficult for Luna to keep up. Not only this but two more generated, attacking Vivian whom had no understanding of these spells. Vivian then formed knuckles of stone and used them to punch the dolls away which didn't react whatsoever, simply turning their necks back into place.

"These things won't give up!" Luna cried, slashing her knives at an intense speed.

"Keep fighting; we have to get out of this Hell!" Vivian replied roundhouse kicking the two dolls back into the cell she had just been minutes ago. She struck her gauntlet onto the ground and formed stone bars which locked the dolls into place.

Luna then dodged and tripped the other doll into her cell, then using time to reform the iron bars. Luna then used time to reform the shackles onto the doll and prevented it from cutting open the bars.

Whilst this had happened the real Alice had managed to heal near completely. She then had gotten the many remnants of tiny dolls from prior to form into life sized version making plenty of them.

They all used the weapons as well, now making things even more difficult for Luna and Vivian whilst Shi had just scraped by to make it through the fourth floor.

It was time for these girls to make it out of here; it was time for them to truly start their adventure!

Chapter Fifteen: The Malice Ends
The battle raged on between Luna, Vivian and Alice, and both sides had been unfaltering. Luna had been unsure if there were any faults in this young girl's battle strategy as she continued to fight a losing battle. She new her life relied on this, so she continued to move forward, striking each doll draining it into the Scarlet Blade to be destroyed by the Phoenix. Vivian had used her stones to segment herself from the dolls whilst also using the stones to unleash blades of stone to destroy them.

The grimoires of some all lit and merged to unleash a large flame blast upon the two girls, easily destroyed by draining it, only to fuel Luna's magic. The dolls advanced and all hell broke loose.

Luna and Vivian were starting to lose this fight; not all was going to be good. How would they ever survive fighting these dolls?

That is when Luna had a thought. She then stopped time and tied Alice's hands behind her back, securing each finger to one another, then striking each of the dolls with the Amber Knife. As soon as time had started again they all exploded in a pulse of sound, leaving Alice helpless.

Alice's hands were her main source of all of her magical abilities. Now that the hands were secure she wouldn't have the chance to try and defeat the two escapees. Vivian then knocked her on the head with a rock, causing her to fall unconscious and just when all appeared to be fine, the door opened.

From the door in walked the judge from before. She now had been wearing a black variant to her outfit from before and instead of her rod she held a paper fan. She had expected this to happen. She then smirked at the two young girls and began to speak.

"Welcome to your doom, young travelers. I am Helia; the judge who lies. None are innocent in my eyes and so I am going to make sure that all sins are washed from the Amazonia, by being the only person left." the judge maliciously grinned. She opened the fan and it unleashed a burst of wind, exposing that there was a yellow knife embedded into it.

"The Golden Knife; knife of release..." Vivian panicked in horror. This knife being the opposite of draining meant that Luna couldn't use the Scarlet Knife to fight and was left with the knife she was currently less experienced with which was the Amber Knife. With this if they won this fight she would steal this knife from the power hungry woman.

"I need to get that knife to see my family again..." Luna sighed, then reaching for the Amber Knife.

"Release the Hammers of Justice!" Helia cried unleashing a flow of black and white energy hammers. The white were of flame and the black exploded on contact, making a very wide range shot, dealing much damage. None had any effect because of the stone wall Vivian had managed to create at last minute.

Vivian and Luna were certainly tired and it was obvious they had little to no energy left. Luna had then used her Amber Knife to unleash sound upon Helia, sending her flying back in a shock wave. Luna then stabbed it into the ground as Vivian threw her palms into the ground, then unleashing sound and rock pillars at the young Judge.

Helia then used her release knife to unleash multiple shields which deflected these shots, then taken in by Luna's knife of draining, forming more power in this knife. Luna then unleashed it upon Helia and whilst she was focused upon the blast came up behind her and kicked her hand, knocking the knife in the fan away.

Helia replied by grabbing onto Luna's foot and tossed her into the wave of the blast, causing severe damage and for her to collapse. Everything was left up to Vivian.

Vivian formed a rock hand over the knife and tossed it to herself, now homing the skills of the Golden Knife of Release. With this she gained much knowledge and knew how to utilize this knife. She then used it to blast the young girl with a wave of wind, releasing speed behind her to then fly kick the girl into the wall.

"You..." Vivian began, crying tears of anger. "Do not... Hurt... My friends! Anyone that hurts my friends shall be executed for crimes against humanity! You are next on my list!"

"Big whoop..." Helia smirked as she stood back up.

Vivian then kicked the woman as she released wind into the woman to knock her back into the wall even harder, now causing her to collapse of damage. With her magic Vivian formed cages around the remnants of the dolls and the two young women and collapsed, putting the knife into the garter of her ally.

Chapter Sixteen: The Team Unites
The two limp bodies of both Vivian and Luna had then awoken to find the other women still trapped and unconscious within their cages, leaving Luna and Vivian able to escape. Luna had noticed the new knife in her garter and was very excited to have the reverse knife of her most advanced knife. With this she knew she would gain the knowledge she needed to become undefeated.

The astral voice telepathically communicated with her and told her that she should use the drain knife to absorb any injuries they had left, in which she did. This then permitted them to move like they could before the fight and head to the doors to the elevator to join their companion on the floor above.

"Thank god, you two are safe!" Shi smiled rushing over to the two girls as they exited the elevator. "What I mean to say is... Uh... Finally!"

"You were worried." Luna grinned. "Admit it."

"No I wasn't." the girl blushed. "D'you have the third knife?"

"Yes! We took it from that judge lady." Vivian giggled.

"Well then, congratulations." she smugly congratulated, returning to her normal personality.

"Look, you still need are help and obviously you would be a great partner, so what do you say to joining us on our quest?" Luna asked. "You want to find a place for the broken in the light, I got Vivian outlawed and so she can do nothing but come along and I am trying to get the last four knives to use them to see my family again. We all have quests which we can help each other finish."

"Well, I guess it couldn't hurt." she looked away whilst accepting arrogantly.

Luna and Vivian then charged at her, unleashing a tackle-hug as they all began to laugh. Smiling they all happily left this room, until an odd presence was felt in this room. Eerie black winds began to form in a sphere into the middle of the room, then closing in a small oval, to open like an eye shape.

From this the torso of a young woman popped out, shrouded in the darkness. "Well, it appears that she wasn't wrong. I better start causing some trouble." she giggled, as she then hopped out, the eye now bearing the resemblance of a curtain, two bows on it at either side. She sat upon it and suddenly, disappeared.

Who was this mysterious woman, and what was she going to do to these young travelers? Whatever she was going to do, it wouldn't be good.

Chapter Seventeen: Change
Inside of a hotel in one of the more earthly villages the three girls sat in a circle around a pentagram. They each cut their hand and placed the blood from the blade into the center of the pentagram. They all looked to and fro from one to the other, all fearing what would happen in this journey.

Shi had gotten some clothes from the local shop and for what she couldn't find they would have to improvise with what they had at their disposal. Luna had gotten a black pleated skirt which she kept her knives under sheathed by a new leather garter. She had gotten an odd light black jacket which had only covered one half of her torso, the other half narrowed and the other sleeve attached by the back, was slotted and segmented to leave three slits throughout the length of the sleeve, whilst the other had the new team emblem upon it engraved into a steel plate, attached to ribbon onto her right sleeve. Underneath this she wore a revealing tube top made of bandages. The bandages were also tied onto her hands so she would have some sort of protection on her hands.

Meanwhile Vivian wore something much different and more outlandish outfit. She wore a black lace bustier-corset and had tight green sleeves with large cuffs at the end secured by black cuff links. She wore tight dark green shorts and a large, chunky, dark brown belt with her new katana holstered at the side, also wearing long chunky dark green boots, armored with black iron lining.

Shi had now taken off her shinigami robes to replace them with large, white samurai pants, secured by a pink and gold belt with white fur, leading up to her black and white striped tube top, ripped at the top making it appear as if she made it like so. Much like Luna she then also tied bandages around her wrists and hands, also tying them round each finger individually. She then held her scythe over her arm and faced the two girls.

The three women now all decided they should try to look different facially, so Luna took her hair out of the few braids she had, now leaving it to flow round her shoulders. She also cut it so it wasn't so choppy and it now had cascaded over her shoulders, length reaching to the top of her breasts.

Vivian had tied her long chestnut hair into a very long braid which hung over her left shoulder as she finished changing how she looked by having her gauntlets form as bracelets beneath her cuffs.

Shi had taken her hair out of this and did the same hairstyle, but now making it into pigtails instead of a single ponytail. Her fringe also appeared slightly longer, possibly throughout her shape shifting allowing her to grow it, it now framing her face perfectly.

Suddenly there was a knock at the door and Luna grasped her knives as Vivian reached for her bracelets. Shi on the other hand did nothing of the sort and she had walked to the door quite calmly without making any type of fuss. She opened the door with a smile as she let in a masked woman. She had a mask which was white with green lines on it, giving her a smile and appearing to have large closed eyes. Her jet black hair was long and somewhat at points when it ended around her shoulders, not appearing so at the top of her head leaving two points appearing like cat ears. She wore a green, sleeveless green, short kimono covering to her knees. She wore green sleeves of the same nature, and underneath she confided her hands. She wore pointy black boots and walked in to face the two young women. She let out a cry of victory and jumped at Luna as she saw the knife in her hand.

Luna was completely confused and bewildered by this experience as Shi snickered away from these two young women as they both got up. The woman in the mask then began to explain herself.

“My name is Cheshire. I am an associate with Shi, and an ally working against the “Divine Forces” of Amazonia.” she smiled. “You possess the first three knives of the Spectral Spectrum; that is why I was so happy to see you.”

“May I ask why that brings you joy?” Luna asked still in an utter stage of bewilderment.

“I possess the Emerald Knife; the knife of Binding. This means that we will finally be able to get the final four knives.” Cheshire began. “The final four knives are stored within Mount Ryu. Now that we have the first four which are stored here we can open a gate known as a Gatekeeper’s Way and final get the rest of the knives.”

“The knives aren’t all in this one world?” Vivian asked.

“No; they were all originally made when Mount Ryu and Amazonia were a single realm. A woman gathered them all and split the two worlds because she was doing what she saw as right; separating us from the men of our families. With this I was never to see my husband again.” Cheshire sighed.

“How long have you been here?” Luna asked.

“Since the worlds were separated.” Shi answered.

“1,782 BC. The Xia Dynasty.” Cheshire replied.

Chapter Eighteen: The Two Holders
Both Cheshire and Luna had rushed away from Shi and Vivian to then begin talking about the knives and what they could use them for. Eventually they both got around to different topics after placing each knife out on the table of one of the bedrooms in this large hotel room.

"So, these knives are required for a ritual known as Almevie?" Luna asked.

"Yes. Almevie is derived from the words 'all', 'me' or my' and 'vie' meaning 'life' in many different languages. This ritual will rebirth the person and was a prohibited ritual when the knives were united. Each knife represents a different thing that many people rely on; the draining of energy, knowledge through sound, a release and relaxation and a loving bond." Cheshire explained. "These were given to the Seven Nations which ruled across the lands when they were in unison. Over time those nations fell to opposing factions and were divided in the separating of the two realms, leaving these knives to new successors."

"So what you are saying is, is that whenever I unite them... I won't see my family again." Luna began.

"I apologize, but yes." Cheshire replied. Luna held her head in her hands and let out a soft sob. She had been aiming to see her family again all this time, but it appears that it would never happen.

Cheshire swooped her arm over Luna's back, taking her in a lot like a maternal figure, somewhat becoming a mother bird and taking her under her wing. Cheshire appeared to be fighting herself over a thought through the sighs she was making beneath the mask.

"Cheshire, what is it?" Luna asked.

"I can perform this ceremony with the knife. You will be given shackles on both your arms and legs and I will separate them with the Emerald Knife; and although the shackles will remain their forever you won't seek out your family and feel so horrible about this anymore." Cheshire explained.

Luna remained silent for a minute before breaking the silence she had caused by uttering a single phrase, "Do it."

Luna raised her arms and her legs as sudden shackles and chains formed join her ankles and wrists. The Emerald Knife was then drawn from the table.

It had a somewhat ax-like blade and at the vertical end of the blade curved a handle, which at the bottom had seven silver chains hanging from it. The chain at the end of the blade had begun to shine an aura of deep green, the shackles and chains on Luna beginning to do the same.

"The sacrificial lamb shall no longer long for these bonds," Cheshire chanted in an incantation. "Break the chains that hold her down; break the chains adjoining the living with the dead." and with a single swing, the smell of pine in the air, the chains were severed.

The shackles remained upon her wrists and ankles, but she could now move much easier, surprisingly enough. She noticed a pressure on her heart had been lifted. Now all she knew she wanted was to get past her sadness to destroy the person who tricked her like this.

She urged for revenge.

Chapter Nineteen: Cheshire Fades
After handing what appeared to be multiple scraps of paper to Shi, Cheshire began to prepare for her leave. As she attached these papers to the legs of her pants Vivian and Luna had begun to realize what these were. They had just needed to be certain.

"What are those?" Luna asked.

"Paper Charms." Shi replied, each of the talismans glowing as she held one in her hand. She threw it as it burn a lit and it was followed by another, this surrounded by water to then put out this fire. They were talismans all embroidered with symbols which all meant something different. Shi appeared to hold an infinite amount and was quite pleased to now have these.

"I apologize girls, but I will have to go for a while. I will not be joining you just yet... I have some business I need to attend to." Cheshire spoke from behind her smiling mask. "Luna, keep the Emerald Knife." she urged.

"Are you sure?" Luna replied.

"I am more sure of that than anything I have ever said before. The knowledge that is stored within it shall awaken your senses and allow you to use this just as masterfully as I could." Cheshire replied.

"And no gift for me?" Vivian mumbled.

"There is one for you; you just do not need it yet." Cheshire giggled from behind the mask.

"Well it was lovely to meet you." Luna smiled.

"Great seeing you, old friend." Shi smiled.

"Yeah, yeah... Just leave..." Vivian mumbled, to only be hit on the back of the head by Shi.

"I will see you sooner than you think..." Cheshire sighed, and with a throw of a charm, she disappeared. As soon as the charm was used the ink faded on the paper and it turned to ash, so no one could follow her nor copy this seal.

And with the visit of this mysterious woman they were all changed. Forever changed.

Chapter Twenty: Nothing Left?
"Well now that we've gotten four of the knives there is nothing left for us to do." Luna sighed.

"Nothing left?" Shi began. "Nothing left?!"

"Obviously. This was our goal, wasn't it?" Luna replied to Shi.

"Of course not! You do know that Mount Ryu is filled with deadly men with much stronger abilities then us women. Not only that but these men all have new abilities that none of us have ever encountered before; not to mention if we were to find a woman on Mount Ryu they would be more dangerous than the three of us united with all seven of the knives." Shi replied.

"Well then what are we supposed to do?" Luna asked.

"Obviously, train." Shi replied, then reaching for two of the paper charms, peeling them from her belt. Luna reached to her garter and grasped the Emerald Knife and the Golden Knife, then yanking them free to face her ally. Vivian threw her arms across her chest, making an 'x' with her forearms, her palms flat, parallel to her shoulders.

"Let the battle begin." Vivian giggled as she made a ring of rock fists upon the ground circling her. They all then raised with arms coming from them and moving with both properties of rock and sand, swung wildly whilst dealing immense damage if struck.

"Release: Gusts of the Seven Winged Fairy!" Luna chimed as she jumped back, unleashing a large torrent of wind from her knife, causing the fists to be taken in and tie round themselves. Shi had thrown two charms which unleashed a large energy blast destroying the fists.

"Spell Tag: Shadow Eyes." Shi said, throwing down three tags with different symbols, then causing large rays of shadows to raise from the ground and attempt to strike Shi's allies.

"Andromeda: Maiden's Shield!" Luna smiled as she unleashed chains from both the Golden Knife and the Emerald Knife. Suddenly the two shackles on Luna's wrists shone a brilliant green and extended to then spiral with the other chains which then all struck through the shadows to grasp both of the women's appendages.

Vivian used this to her advantage and caused many fist-shaped rocks to then be unleashed at her opponents, firing like artillery, raining down like a torrential down pour. The chains retreated just in time for Luna to grasp the Amber Knife and unleash a blast which was so loud it shattered the rocks to dust.

From behind Shi then swiped one of her paper charms five times, unleashing a pentagram made of fire. This threw Luna right into Vivian and gave Shi the advantage. She formed a blue flame into her right hand and threw it downwards unleashing the soul of a long extinct mammoth.

The mammoth then charged at the two young women but was no match as the Phoenix was unleashed from the Golden Knife to battle it, only to be absorbed back through the Scarlet Knife.

Directly in the center of the battlefield, before they were allowed to continue a large rift opened in the shape of an eye, and from this a little girl stepped out. She had short blonde hair in the style of a bob, tying a single piece into a pigtail at the top left of her head by a red ribbon which appeared to be very worn and torn. She had glistening obsidian eyes which sparkled with flecks of gold, appearing to mirror the midnight sky. She wore a black sweater vest over a white button down shirt, which was secured with a rounded collar and blood red bow, which like the ribbon in her hair was fairly tattered. She wore a black skirt and black school shoes, appearing to be no older than ten. Her white shirted appeared to be slightly brown like as if it had been exposed to fire and the gas had sopped it to become a light shade of brown. Although she seemed very innocent she appeared to also be grimacing at all of the three women. The eye closed behind her as she stepped forward.

What was this menacing girl going to do?

Chapter Twenty-one: Darkness and Shadows
The little girl looked ever so malicious and her intent appeared nothing but malicious. Her hands were strewn out at her sides, emitting a smoke of pure black. She solidified two spheres of shadows and had begun to speak.

“It appears that I have some new toys to play with,” the little girl giggled. “Just a warning but, I break all my new toys.”

“Who sent you?” Shi demanded, spheres of flame forming in her hands.

“Mi-kun, of course!” the little girl replied.

“Which would be who?” Vivian asked.

“I just told you.”

“But ‘Mi-kun’ is obviously not her name.” Luna scoffed.

“Whatever.” The little girl angrily replied. “My name is Eris Strife. I died in a school fire. You can call me 'Kurai Megami', meaning 'Dark Goddess'."

"You are... The Dark Goddess...?" Shi clammed up.

"Why of course!" the little girl cheered. She then hovered into the air and juggled the spheres of darkness, throwing them down into the ground. "Why don't we play a game."

"Why would we play a game with you?" Luna scoffed. She had never bee good with children, in fact as a part time job she babysat, and the younger kids agitated her, very much.

"Because," Eris giggled as the spheres erupted into shadows, blinding all of the girls before the area had flared into that of some sort of distortion world. It was a dark purple, appearing much like an odd version of the sky, many stars and galaxies visible with a large moon chained to three large pillars, hovering over a stadium which was a flat disk of gold and crystal, appearing to be more precious than any earthly object. Adjoined to it were twelve pillars, each marked with a roman numeral, much like that which was on the apron of the maid. "You are in my world now." she giggled darkly.

"What is this place..." Luna wondered, standing upon the pillar marked twelve.

"This is one of my many worlds created through my magic;" the girl began. "Gothica's Hand." she exemplified as a large copy of her was made on the disc, holding out her right hand. Her thumb was completely invisible, her index was made of shadows, her middle was a very terrifying demon, her ring was plated silver and her little finger was black smoke. She clenched her hand together and it returned to normal as she then vanished as black smoke, appearing on the six. Vivian had stood on the three and Shi stood on the nine, all obviously now having to make it onto this disc to fight the little girl eventually.

"We are only in the first stage... Gothica's Dollhouse. Eventually it will work right up to the point of Gothica's Witch Burning." Shi explained experiencing sheer terror. "The six she stands on is the symbol of evil power; the devil's number. With this her apparitions are much stronger than on any other pedestal."

"So she will be able to make illusions to deceive us?" Vivian called from the fourth pillar. "We have nothing to defend that..."

"That is why I am called a Goddess. I am on a much higher fighting stage than any of you," the girl cockily giggled. "With the exception of Shinigami girl, but she appears to be frozen in fear."

"We'll show you who is strong!" Luna called from across her adversary. She then threw forward the Emerald and Golden Knives, both unleashing chains to form a bridge to her opponent. Suddenly with a swoop of her hand the bridge was coated in tendrils of pure black shadows, engulfing it and eventually breaking it down to nothing.

She continued to hold out her hand. "Death's Succumbing Smoke." she uttered as a wave of black smoke poured from her open palm, out into the air around the girls, causing a massive black smog to fill the atmosphere. This gas then smothered the girls and attempted to suffocate them, but Luna had reached for the Scarlet Knife just in time to drain all the smoke and prevent them from losing their lives, or rather their afterlives.

"I am useless here... There is no Earth for me to bend and manipulate!" Vivian sobbed, as Shi still attempted to gather herself. The only person capable of fighting at this current stage was Luna herself, and she was fairly new at fighting here.

How would Luna ever survive fighting such a sweet girl with a soul of impurity?

Chapter Twenty-two: Immortal Dance
Luna had reached an entirely new peak of anger and rage, not now knowing how she would ever manage to land a hit. As Shi had mentioned earlier this was only the beginning of Gothica’s Hand, and what would this little girl be able to do if she managed to use the higher levels with such exceptional skill.

Luna stopped.

She took a deep breath in and focused all of her energy into a single one of her four knives; the Amber Knife. Suddenly an aura of celeste blue surrounded Luna and the amber knife as the colors of the amber began to shift. It flickered the same shade as Luna’s aura as she then closed her eyes to then quickly open them, her eyes being the same shade as the knife.

“I call upon the Heaven’s Quartet! Sound of the Maiden’s Call!” she called then unleashing a large blast behind her to knock her into the main platform. "Now little girl, if you are such a goddess, come and get me."

"Ooh, you just make me so angry!" the little girl angrily called then charging down to the main platform through flight. She formed many spheres of darkness, firing them down onto Luna much like rain, causing there to be very little movement for agilely escaping. Still in the movement of Heaven's Quartet which allowed her to fire large pulses of sound to then use not only her abilities of time to freeze the spheres of darkness in mid-fire, but then unleash a torrent of sound which absorbed all of the darkness to then fire it out in a large blast at the young girl.

"Little brat..." Luna puffed as she lost a lot of her energy.

"I will show you who the brat is!" the little girl scoffed, then raising her middle and index fingers of her right hand, which then transformed into a terrifying demon and a finger coated in darkness. She loosed three bullets which formed like bulbs on the ground. They grew and with them released tendrils of violet, which looked two dimensional as it crossed the atmosphere. Suddenly they all burst and released three shadow copies of the three young women.

Now Luna would be fighting shadows of herself and her friends, alone. How would she ever manage. Suddenly pillars of black rock lifted themselves in a direct line towards Luna as multiple black paper charms flew at her, unleashing black flames and also her own copy fired chains at her from a copy of the Emerald and Golden Knives.

Luna prepared for the worst. This would be the end.

In a flash a wall of rocks and paper charms formed deflecting each attack around her as Vivian and Shi rushed to her side. Vivian had noticed that if her clone could make stone pillars, so could she and of course Shi was a seasoned fighter, and seeing Luna of all people hold her own against this one young girl had reassured her. This girl was not as amazing as everyone said.

The three girls stood against these cheap copies and knew that together they would never be defeated.

"We shall stand together! We are a family!" the three girls called together holding hands.

"Family?" the little girl began. "Pathetic."

Chapter Twenty-Three: Mirror Shadows
The three girls stood against their three shadow copies, preparing to now engage in a long fight before fighting this little girl. The shadows all lunged at the three women and they all began to clash. Luna had already known the feeling of fighting a clone as she found herself fighting the Mirror of Truth and a copy of herself in the Topaz Manor.

"It is a shame that I have to waste all of my time fighting cheap copies and not actual villains." Luna scoffed, reaching for her Golden and Scarlet Knives. Her copy had lunged at her with the Amber and Emerald Knives, unleashing chains and blasts of sound which Luna redirected through draining them in the Scarlet Knife and releasing them from the Amber Knife.

"You have fought copies before?" Shi questioned.

"Yes; the Topaz Manor had the Mirror of Truth. She fought it to get to the Amber Knife." Vivian explained as she unleashed a torrent of rock at her copy, knocking it aback. Vivian then lunged forward with a fist of black as she collided with her copy.

Shi on the other hand had been using her Paper Charms instead of her main magic to take on her copy. Her main magic was like a homing device, when used the other Shinigami could locate her, and it was obvious they would kill her on sight now that she had helped two outlaws escape the Immortal Imprisonment.

She threw forward two pieces of paper and the suspended the copy in the air until pulsating a wave of blue energy, knocking the copy back into the air.

Using flames from the Scarlet Knife (due to draining magical particles and causing them to combust) she unleashed a whip of fire at the copy as the copy used the Golden Knife to unleash a spiral of wind which then also acted like a whip, causing these two to be interlocked in a dance of wind and fire.

Vivian had been fighting a losing battle as her copy had used the ground to make multiple spirals of rock, each hitting Vivian before settling in the ground causing there to be very limited movement for her. Vivian continued to attempt to move and try and get her allies attention but they were both slightly busy, and she couldn't find her voice to call out to them. From the ground large spirals of rock grasped and tightened around Vivian's body and arms securing her in place, leaving her neck, heart and face exposed.

The shadow had moved forward in flight and had held a knife of stone to her neck and another to her heart whilst beginning to form words. "With this... I shall animate myself and take your place... I shall be the true Vivian..."

Vivian still couldn't manage to speak. She felt the knives beginning to cut into her flesh and she knew that this was the end.

As she started to bleed a sudden pulse of energy formed around her in the shade of jade green and lines began to form in the air, becoming the pattern of a flower, the center being filled in green which then repelled the stone knives from her body just before she had reached her death. This pulsed and knocked the copy of herself back in a large wave, knocking the shadow unconscious, causing it to disappear.

She then used this new power to shatter the rocks around her and with this all of her energy had been used up in unlocking her new power. She had then left Luna and Shi to finish this fight and defeat the girl of shadows.

It was time for victory to prevail.

Chapter Twenty-four: The New Stage
The two girls had witnessed the full formation of Vivian's powers and knew that if they needed to do anything, it was protect her. She had slumped unconscious due to so much magical power use and they still had three opponents left to fight, now that the shadow Vivian had disappeared.

Shadow Luna and Shadow Shi were both very tempted to take the life of Vivian because of this new power and strength of will, making her appear to be one of the strongest of the three girls. Luna had then managed to lunge at her unfocused copy and destroy her by stabbing her and pulsing a large wave of sound through the Amber Knife into her body.

With this Shadow Shi had managed to land a scratch on Luna through her scythe before having her spirit separated from the shadow, then being unleashed to the Xyst Expanse. Shi had now been exposed to the other Shinigami and so she decided she would have to lay low, leaving the original opponent left to fight Luna. Now it would be a death match between Luna and Eris.

Eris then appeared in the center of this large area as the two allies of Luna had managed to make it to a pillar leaving this large disc to the two adversaries. Eris stood in the middle and two large clock hands which were in the same position as Eris's arms. She then spun which caused them to move with such an immense speed Luna couldn't dodge them, being knocked repeatedly until finally she managed to freeze time.

She then used her time manipulation to speed herself up and kick the little girl until suddenly the stage became enveloped in complete shadows leaving Luna in sheer darkness to fight off this little girl.

"Gothica's Second Stage: Black Abyss." the little girl giggled as Luna looked around to try and find her. "You can't see anything in this stage, but I can. This is torture for you but just another round in the game for me. Now, back to the game. Shadow Spectrum!" she giggled as suddenly meteors of glistening violet and black then struck Luna causing her to be knocked aback, all coming from the same direction.

"Amber Knife, release light!" Luna called as she sent a burst of light directly into the center of where the shadows had radiated, causing the little girl to be knocked back and for her spell to be broken. Her hand was now not flaring the same darkness and just before sending the finishing blow a large dimensional portal formed behind her and sucked her in.

With the lack of all this energy from all of the fighting she had just done, Luna collapsed.

Chapter Twenty-five: Time to Leave
Vivian and Luna had both woken up in a cottage, lain out in the same room upon two separate beds. They still were in tact with all of their equipment but they weren't in tact with one thing; their ally Shi. They both looked around the room before getting up to find a note alongside two different backpacks of things lain out on the foot of each bed. The not had read their worst nightmare.

Dear friends,

I am sorry, but I am going to have to leave you for a while. What I did when we fought Eris attracted all of the Shinigami to my location. I couldn't put you in such a fatal position after all that you guys did for me, and although I hadn't wanted to admit it, you were a family and I loved you both like sisters.

I have entrusted you to the comfort and safety with ex-Shinigami, and one of my allies, Kaya Megumi. Kaya is a master of an art she has practiced and a very cheerful and optimistic young girl, whom I think you both would get to love more than me. She can also manipulate spirits in a very beautiful way; I am sure you would see it as a much cooler power than mine.

I will meet up with you all in the capital city Nirvana and Cheshire has arranged to meet with you somewhere along the way, and so make sure to tell her what happened.

Now my lovely saviors, I am sad to say that this is a farewell but not a farewell for very long. I will see you again in Nirvana and I wish you the best upon your journeys!

Love, your new sister, Shi.

Luna's hands clenched around this note and she then began to lightly sob. Her tears washed down her cheeks and drizzled onto the paper, changing many letters into unreadable glyphs. Vivian as well had cried, holding her face in her hands whilst sitting back down upon the bed.

After their sorrow they realized they had a new member for their team and so they decided that they needed to clean themselves up and bring them to see the new girl sooner or later.

Luna tied her hair into two braids down her jawline which reached her bosoms, then checking to make sure she had each of the four knives holstered into her garter. Vivian had neatened her long braid and had reached for the door first. As soon as she touched the knob there was a knock.

They opened the door to find a very beautiful young woman standing with a large tray of food for her new guests. This young woman was obviously Kaya. She had blonde hair which was long enough to reach her waist and it was wavy, a single strand tied over her shoulder by a silver clip which had an ice-blue crystal moon upon it, in the center. She wore a black sleeveless dress with a sweetheart neckline, the designs of a crescent moon at the cut off of the dress at the bottom, few shooting stars radiating from it. On her feet she wore black leather gladiator sandals lined with blue crystals, much like that of the one in her hair clip. On her upper arms she had silver bracers depicted with whorls and swirls.

The trays had obviously gourmet cuisine, holding two silver trays, both containing freshly cooked lobster on a bed of pasta. Next to it sat a juice of an odd indigo color which had tasted of a mixture of green apple and watermelon.

"Good morning, sleepyheads!" Kaya smiled walking in with the dray. She unfolded two pieces from below the tray and it became a small table, in which the two girls could eat off of.

"So, Kaya," Vivian began as she took a large bite of lobster. "Tell us about yourself."

"Well..." Kaya began. "I am a different species of human, somewhat a special human you could say. I am still currently living, but I am immortal so if I were to be on Earth it would be horrible for anyone to notice me not aging. I am a shrine maiden. A few thousand years ago I was the hundredth sacrifice to the maiden Kaya, Goddess of Death, and in turn she took me into her and we became one person. With this I gained control over spirits and death and became a Shinigami the second I came here. This is my home world, but I am unlike any demon because my body is holy, not evil. As a girl I had done many things so I assumed she saw me as a holy blessing and being the hundredth made me sacred. Now together we are one. I chose to live here instead of a world known as Angeleden where all magical females dwell. I hope one day to go there with a strong group of friends and see what it is like there. How did you both die?"

"I was murdered. I knocked on the door and entered to clean and the next thing I know a serial killer is the tenant and he severely injures me fore tying me to the bed and fatally injured me, whilst I screamed for help. Luckily they caught him and just before we had gotten my body to the hospital, I died of blood loss." Luna began to sob, remembering every single horror she had felt as she died. She had dreamed of a peaceful death, but that would be nowhere near what she got.

"I was fighting an underground war in the sewers of Paris and just as I saved my legion I was drowned in a large flush of water. Luckily all my men managed to get up to the surface before I died. They called me the Modern Day Joan of Arc, which was ironic because she was burned at the stake and I was drowned..." Vivian tried to joke as she then drowned her sorrows in the food quickly finishing it all. Luna attempted to finish hers but her appetite was tarnished and so Vivian finished it for her.

She then got up to bring the tray back into the kitchen but as she moved she tumbled onto her face, dropping the plates. The plates shattered but Kaya appeared to be fine and so she got back up, but was too afraid to move because she didn't want to get broken dishes into her sandals.

"Shifting Flight!" Kaya smiled as ice-blue butterflies made of energy rose from the ground and gathered the fragments and the tray to move them into the kitchen and garbage respectively.

Kaya's new power definitely was awesome, and it would be amazing to see in action. Little did they know how little time they had before they would truly see it.

Chapter Twenty-Six: Kaya in Action
Kaya had then stepped out into the kitchen to leave Luna and Vivian to talk among themselves, them directly moving on to conversation about their new partner. Personally both of them had been overcome with joy, expressing smiles and very happy. Luna smiled at Vivian and Vivian replied with a light giggle as they began to converse.

"She is quite the amazing girl." Luna applauded from behind the closed door. "Optimistic, a good cook and also has amazing magic?! I am all for her as an addition to our team if you are."

"I completely agree." Vivian smiled. "She also has this air about her that I really like. I find that she has a strong aura which means she also has a very powerful magic, not only being as delicate as we saw it."

"I wouldn't mind seeing how she can battle."

"Neither would I." Vivian said as she pulled the door open. Suddenly before they could see anything Kaya screamed very loudly in absolute horror. They both rushed into the kitchen to find their friend standing in front of a sink oozing blood. This was definitely not something that was supposed to happen.

The two rushed over to the sink and turned it off.

"I am sorry girls..." Kaya apologized. "I didn't mean to frighten you..."

"You had reason! Blood doesn't ooze from a sink." Luna replied.

"You have a point there." Kaya giggled as she then turned to the window to see something most horrifying.

The demon maiden of Topaz Manor. She had been very enraged and had obviously been following the young duo, with an obvious motive to take back both her gardener and her Amber Knife. Luna was now in sheer fear as she reached down to her leg to grapple the knife in her garter. Vivian held her hand out preparing to attempt her new magic. Blue spirits swirled Kaya's arms and she was obviously ready to destroy this little girl.

"I am here to get what's mine!" the little girl said from the window, her large bat wings flapping.

"Well too bad you can't have it." Luna replied shortly. She held out the Golden Knife and blast a large pulse of water through the window, the little girl dodging it. This little girl then formed red energy upon her hands and unleashed them into this window which destroyed the kitchen, knocking the girls in different directions.

"Time to show you true power." Kaya said as she then rose into the air and flew out of the window. She had kicked the girl with immense speed and strength knocking her downwards before then beginning an incantation. "I am the Maiden of spirits, and I summon forth the power of my heart! Necrofantasia!" she called as she then grasped two fans from beneath her dress. She grasped them and ice blue butterflies materialized on the both of them. She spun in midair and unleashed these butterflies. They both erupted and unleashed multiple pink, yellow and green versions each striking the little girl. On contact they shattered, exemplifying how delicate they truly were.

The girl had now slumped unconscious as Kaya had flown back in threw the window. Apparently her power was so overwhelming she could destroy a demon-girl in such an amazing and awe-inspiring fashion.

The girls had now needed to know about her magic.

Chapter Twenty-Seven: About Necrofantasia
"How does your magic work?" Luna asked.

"Is it really the use of spirits?" Vivian followed up.

"Do you have the powers to separate the soul from the body?" Luna continued.

"Well I guess I should tell you about Necrofantasia." Kaya chuckled as she began to sweep the remnants of her kitchen. "Well, I had made Necrofantasia long ago whilst I still lived in the shrine. By manipulating 'spirit', I basically manipulate Life Energy and also Energy Flow, being able to manipulate it into whichever way, shape and form that I desire. Personally I love the use of butterflies, because they are very graceful and I feel that if I change the flow of their energy at an acute enough frequency I can cause them to imitate life. I use it mainly to generate these butterflies but also use 'qi' for a main purpose of spell craft and attacking."

"That sounds quite amazing..." Luna applauded.

"Is that all it can do?" Vivian asked.

"No it certainly isn't. Necrofantasia also allows me to separate souls from their bodies and also take souls from whatever I desire. It also let's me take souls from the Xyst Expanse and use them to fight and form the butterflies. Necrofantasia also let's me control the dead and the living. It let's me resurrect the dead."

"So that means..." Vivian began.

"You could resurrect us!" Luna finished.

"Yes, but in that I would have to die myself and throw my entire being into the both of you, in turn killing me. If I were to resurrect you both, you would both be brain dead." Kaya replied, for once with a sad expression. "Well, I guess we should leave these people's cabin."

"So wait..." Vivian began.

"This isn't your cabin?!" Vivian and Luna exclaimed in unison.

"Obviously!" Kaya giggled. "I am a goddess, I have no need to reside anywhere!"

"You cannot just steal someone's cabin!" Luna scolded.

"It is wrong!" Vivian added.

"Oh well." Kaya shrugged. "Now, how about we start heading out."

Chapter Twenty-eight: The Gate's Maiden
On the horizon of Yurimomo Coast four beautifully tearifying beings flew with the amber sunrise. As an earthly coast Yurimomo had mainly always had time changes as illusions to keep inhabitants from going insane through the eternal night. This coast was guarded by high walls and an odd structure so the buildings hid away in trees whilst the streets were far into the ground, many platform-plazas standing tall from these streets.

The guard had a gate's keeper. Her name was Youkai Byakuya, her name meaning Supernatural Monster's Hundredth Night, loosely. She had pine green hair, fringe artfully disheveled over her forehead and messily tied by a single white ribbon at the base of her neck, leaving a strand going down between her bosoms. She had a large ribbon tied around her chest, covering her breasts instead of a shirt, the bow large and stored below her black hat, symbolizing that of a typical witch hat. She had a white ribbon tied loosely up her right wrist, up until just above her forearm, in a large bow securing it. Youkai had a white skirt over black leggings which went down to cuffed brown boots. Holding her hands out she prepared for this arrival. Where the brim met the top were three ribbons, each of the six ends rushing out like snakes to survey the area.

"The Archons..." she whispered.

Meanwhile, Shi had been attempting to trek around many large obstacles and forests to get to the coast and try and meet with her allies there. She held her scythe out in front of her as she spun and unleashed a burst of fire as a large demon attempted to make her an early snack.

She looked up at the sky just in time to see the four people attempting to touch down in this village.

Karasu the Raven of Tempests. She had black hair tied into a ponytail, her fringe crossing one eye looking very shaggy. She wore a black strapless dress with tight white and black sleeves with frilly, chunky, white cuffs and on her legs black tights and white boots. Although she hadn't appear so she was a natural inhabitant known as a tengu, whom was known for bringing tempests wherever she went and she was one of the Archons, a small group of natural inhabitants of Amazonia who wanted to rebel and banish the entire non-natural population. Although she had no wings she soared faster than anything else in the sky.

The next was Nazo. She was an original inhabitant of the two worlds, being a user of black magic, then punishing to eternity here, instead of in the world of the Gods and magical beings. Nazo had long wavy blonde hair, eyes of the deepest red and wore a black french maid's uniform with a large stereotypical which hat. She had flown in on her original black magic broom stick.

The third was known as simply Kuro. She was a mysterious girl who had hidden her eyes behind a black cloth. Her clothes were made of the same cloth and had flown about in many layers, torn at ends. Her hair was long and jet black, hidden beneath a black hood. She had flown with ease, much like her clothes, and she held a scythe over her right shoulder as she flew.

The final was someone very familiar.

Meanwhile back on a deserted pathway shrouded back into the eternal night stood the three members of the protagonist travelling company. Their goal was to reach the same coast and this path would lead them right onto the gates, all in view over the cliff they stood on.

Would all of these forces clash?

Chapter Twenty-Nine: The Annoyance
The newly assembled team had now been attempting to get down this cliff-face and into the forest to eventually reach the Yurimomo Coast. They had no clue how in the world they would manage to make it down this cliff-face without jumping and probably fatally wounding or killing themselves. None of their magic would work at this point to help them with this single problem; this single annoyance. And so they decided that they would attempt to set up camp and try again the next morning.

The artificial sun had begun to set over the coast and the omnipresent night had returned, looming over the group as they began to set up the tent.

Vivian had found it in her bag and she had begun to use the stakes and was on her final one. She had begun to hammer it in, when suddenly cracks began to become apparent.

"Uh oh..." Vivian smiled awfully embarrassed.

"Everyone inside the tent." Luna demanded. They followed her orders and she suddenly had used a large life raft with self automated pump to have protection over all of them for the fall. With the final preparations made as Vivian forced a shield over the top as they all lain down in the raft, the edge of the cliff cracked completely and in a matter of seconds they were falling to the ground.

"Ow!" Vivian cried. "Who's foot is in my butt?!"

"More importantly," Kaya began. "Who's butt is on my foot?"

"That would be Vivian's." Luna giggled huddled off in the middle of the raft.

Soon enough they had landed at the bottom of the cliff, the large tent now completely destroyed; a hole made in their life raft as well. They were now completely exposed to the night air in front of a large and wondrous building.

"What is this?" Kaya began to question herself. "A shrine in the middle of the netherworld?"

"A shrine? I thought those were meant to be on Earth." Luna pointed out.

"They are; more or less." Kaya replied. "Each shrine acts as a portal to the world of magical beings as long as they aren't visited by regular humans. What I find odd is that someone has such strength as to move an entire portal."

"So..." Vivian began. "Whoever did this has to be a powerful Goddess! I think we have a new person to recruit into our ranks."

"If she is at all an ally." Luna reminded.

The shrine was upon a large pedestal, reaching the same height as the tallest of trees. The pedestal was made of cobbles as were the stairs leading up to the top. Next to the stairs on either sides were railings with Japanese-styled lantern boxes. Each had shone with a different shade, mostly glowing the shades yellow, pale green and dark blue. At the top of the stairs was the entrance to a shrine painted blue with many Japanese-style screens. The roof had large overhangs like to behind it, and the roof was made of a very sleek blue tile.

The three girls stood at the bottom and were very angry as it would take a very long time to make it up these countless stairs, and so they began their treacherous trek up the large staircase.

As they passed the first lanterns, a set of blue, a tidal wave began to fall downwards, attempting to wash the girls right off the staircase. In a quick flash Vivian stretched out her arm and made a barrier to shield the tidal wave.

The lantern went out.

"These lanterns... Pass the next ones!" Kaya demanded. The two girls did as told and passed the pale green lanterns as suddenly a large rock formed at the top of the stairs and began to tumble downwards. Luna lashed out at it and fired a large release of wind, knocking it off the staircase onto the ground below.

"Want us to encounter near death again?" Vivian angrily snapped.

"No." Kaya smiled. "I have gathered the evidence I need. These are defense lanterns. A basic first level Shrine Protection; the next would be a shrine maiden, but I doubt a shrine here in the underworld would have one of those; all that would be left is the Goddess or a pet if she had one."

"So how do we get up the stairs?"

"Like this." Kaya replied as suddenly butterflies formed over every lantern. "These lanterns utilize souls all killed in natural disasters; my souls are strong enough to break these. Calamity Souls, or souls killed tragically, are fairly weak souls if not in the afterlife stage so I can displace them with the ones I can gather." The butterflies then went into the lanterns and the other souls came out and dispersed.

The girls then continued up the stairs, the lanterns now all glowing a dim pink, before going out as they reached the top. Once they did the door to the shrine opened to give them a view of the lost Goddess.

Chapter Thirty: The Lost Goddess
Inside of the shrine stood what appeared to be a little girl, but the three young women knew this was completely wrong. The young goddess had golden blonde hair of a medium length, going down to past her shoulders, golden fringe hanging in front of her face, two long strands at the sides tied by indigo strings. She wore a very simple dress of the same indigo color of the strings in her hair, and after the top half of her torso where the dress had a hem line she had a twisting rope circle shimenawa with seven shide hanging from it. The skirt of her dress went down to just below her knees and she wore indigo ribbon sandals which had tied until just below the hem of the dress. Upon her arms she had sewn white sleeves into the dress which had indigo ribbons at the end, tied into large bows. Upon her head she wore a wide-brimmed hat which had a large ribbon in the center where the top met the rim.

She smiled warmly at her guests and with a child-like euphoria stretched her arms out and tackled all of them into a hug.

"I am just so happy!" she cried, tears of joy welling in her eyes. "I haven't had visitors in years! And to see that it is two beautiful young women and a fellow Goddess just makes it all the better!"

The whole group got up and she danced around in excitement. She then rushed off through another screen whilst beginning to hum a lovely tune as the young women all sat at a table in this room. She seemed nearly too nice as she walked over with a tray of delectable foods, offering the most exotic and outlandish of meats, cheeses and other delicacies to her new guests.

"Now," Vivian began, talking with her mouth full, most words coming out as a mumble. "Why don't you tell us about yourself."

"Well," the Goddess began. "I am the Goddess of Disasters and Calamity, Saigai Tenkara. I may look young but I am one of the oldest Goddesses in existence, being a Goddess back into ancient times. Sadly I was forgotten with all I brought and thought of as evil so I wasn't worshiped any longer. My Shrine Maiden left with all of the visitors and eventually I was left to be on my own. One day I got very angry and it appeared that I created an earthquake that shook my shrine and ended me up here. I assume that everyone from that town is dead, so I am quite happy about that; they were all that woman's descendants. Other then that, I like to use my magic to try and help humanity and I also have been desperately looking for a new Shrine Maiden."

"I can see why you are so confused and sad that you are alone." Kaya sighed. "You accidentally moved your shrine in your fit of rage, unleashing all of your built up and unused magic in that spell causing the earthquake. With it you opened a rift and it moved you."

"I understand why no one visits me any longer..." Saigai looked into the distance. "I have spent a century alone, waiting for someone to visit, never ceasing the hope and faith I had, when really I only got in my own way... How ironic."

She sat and began to ask her visitors the same questions and what they were doing.

"Alright, well if you are currently on a journey, I would love to join you. I need to build up my magical strength so I can move my shrine back."

"Deal!" Luna smiled. They were looking for someone with as much power that she had and this was icing on the cake.

"Well, if that is done I am going to need to have a shrine maiden join me; none of you seem to match that criteria..."

"What about Kaya?" Vivian asked.

"I was previously a Shrine Maiden," she explained. "Now I'm a Goddess, remember?"

"That's right..." Vivian was reminded.

"What about me?" Luna asked.

"The only problem with that is that you are going to need to give up your current magical powers." Saigai replied. "Are you ready to do so?"

"Does that mean I would have to give up the four knives?"

"Yes."

Chapter Thirty-One: Rebirth!
Luna had in little to no time had made her decision. She placed her four knives out on the table in the direction so that each of the four handles faced her ally Vivian. She had recently been trying to develop her new power and now that she only had the abilities of it (since her gauntlets had severely malfunctioned due to the fall off of the cliff) leaving her only as a defender. In a fight she would have no chance if separated from the group and she indeed needed them most.

Luna began an incantation. "With these knives I pass to you, I sacrifice my knowledge of their use. Keep them safe under lock and key, and use them well with every memory." and with that, each knife had shone a brilliant celeste; the color of Luna's aura. With this it then began to change into the color of pale jade green, the aura of Vivian. Reaching gingerly at the knives, Vivian placed all of them into her brand new garter that Luna had donated to her companion. She placed each knife into it and with them knew everything that Luna knew about the knives.

"Without any warning..." Kaya sighed.

"Very moving. Very daring. A smart girl." Saigai smiled, holding her hand out to her soon to be shrine maiden.

"I prefer to call it rash and reckless." Kaya mumbled from behind her cup of tea.

"Now, it is time to relinquish all other powers you have gained since your descent into Amazonia." Saigai explained as the same celeste blue aura swarmed Luna, then all puddling at the hand that Saigai had held. With it, once Saigai pulled away all ability was drained, leaving nothing but Luna's soul and body without her aura to grant her the ability of living. Saigai ate this aura and grasped Luna's hand, as from the exact same point she had been coated in a beautiful indigo, the shade of Saigai's aura.

With this, once Luna opened her eyes they were no longer pale blue but were replaced by the same indigo as her aura. She stood to face her new master and began to speak. "What are my new abilities?"

"Due to me being the Goddess of Calamity and Disaster, I can grant you any power I desire to give you since I am not an assigned element and have power over all of them. I am more assigned to a group referred to as "spirit" which also contains your friend Kaya. You will have the ability to summon my Godly powers when needed if we ever get separated but also can manipulate aura's and wavelengths of light and sound along with manipulating any energy flow and 'life force' as referred to in Taoism which manifests energy into whatever way, shape or form you desire. This is very uncommon and can only be blessed onto shrine maiden's by high powered Goddesses." Saigai smiled, then floating onto the shoulders of her new Shrine Maiden. "You can also float and fly if you manipulate the energy to shift you upwards."

With this Luna then used her advice to maneuver a shift of energy upwards, letting her fly around the room. The indigo aura flared around the two of them and Saigai pressed her hand onto the forehead of her young companion.

"With this I shall awaken your knowledge on how to utilize the boundaries of manipulation of energy, auras and wavelengths... Blessed be." Saigai surprised as suddenly an enormous rush of knowledge flourished and blossomed into Luna's mind. She had gained the knowledge also of a secret that Saigai definitely wouldn't want Vivian to know. Shrine Maiden's selected from the dead are born again, gaining life and immortality none the less.

Chapter Thirty-Two: The Big Misunderstanding
The sun had already set on the new Shrine Maiden's day and so her and the rest of her unlikely brood had fallen asleep in the beautiful and blessed shrine of Tenkara to await their move towards Yurimomo Coast the next morning. A wonderful entire eve had passed as the girls slept in sheer excitement for the events of the next morning.

As they all awoke and prepared Saigai prepared all of her belongings into a little bag as she had begun to prepare for joining her new team and the new nomadic lifestyle she would have to get used to.

Saigai was very excited. In the past hundred years she had no adventure or excitement in her life, this would be one of the best expeditions she had ever been able to accompany. Her outfit appeared to be good enough as she tightened her shimenawa around her waist and fixed her hair.

She knew that if she got into the city with her new group she would be able to meet up with a Kitsune or an Oni if she could open a portal of some kind and get into contact with one of her old friends.

Saigai had walked through her bedroom door, her backpack upon her back to meet her new companions. They all looked exactly the same and that made the smirk across Saigai's face stretch even further. She hugged her companions and led the descent down her long stairway.

Luna and Saigai flew down together, Luna handing Saigai her Japanese-style Parasol of a white, made completely out of lace. The top of it was a golden pentagram, the top of it sharpened to a point, acting much like a spear if used as a weapon. She had gathered this parasol back when she had her first Shrine Maiden, which she received as an offering. It was embedded with the soul of Cassiopeia, the Queen Constellation, and so no matter the weather it will always protect her, also from magical spells.

Behind them Kaya and Vivian had walked down the stairs together, unable to fly. Eventually they all met up at the bottom of the stairs and Luna held the parasol for Saigai as they all then began to walk into the depths of the Yurimomo forest.

Eventually they had approached a gate, and in front of it sat a young woman. She had appeared to be in perfect health and also like the guardian of the Yurimomo Coast. Her garb was very ribbon themed and she looked somewhat like a witch.

She held out her hand. "The Archons are here..."

"Who?"

"Don't play dumb. A girl (Saigai), a flying young woman (Luna), a witch (Vivian) and a mysterious young woman (Kaya). Now prepare to die."

Chapter Thirty-Three: Misfortune and a Battle
Saigai and Kaya had faced this young woman, seeing themselves as the only ones necessary to fight someone of such a high level. From what they had known this young woman was named Youkai and was the highest level of guardian in the entirety of Amazonia. She had never let anyone who looked suspicious in to Yurimomo Coast and was also one of the toughest executioners of Amazonia.

"We aren't who you think we are." Saigai began.

"We are a young group of travelers trying to make it to the capital." Luna finished for her master.

"Do you think I care? You are The Archons, a group of malevolent beings. I have been told to kill you on sight and so that is what I am going to do."

"Well then, that is your funeral. We are not the Archon's and we will prove it to you." Saigai replied very angrily.

"Soul Aria." Youkai scoffed, then throwing her hand forward. She unleashed five ribbons and each struck a different member of the group. They all then retracted, each member feeling slightly more tired as she then began to fire lasers of energy onto these four women.

Vivian quickly used her powers to form a large barrier around the four, preventing any of the lasers from landing. Saigai then launched herself at the young woman.

"Calamity Storm Sign, Shocking Burst!" she smiled as she threw her hand, coated in lightning, unleashing a sphere onto the ribbon woman. It had then gathered the lightning onto her, but appeared to barely leave a scratch upon her.

"Soul Sign, Flight of the Spirits!" Kaya called, appearing behind her adversary unleashing multiple butterflies at her. The girl then formed to ribbons in the air and they both blew up, unleashing energy to destroy each butterfly. Streamers flew from these explosions and tied Vivian and Kaya up, leaving Saigai and Luna to fight this insane woman whilst protecting their friends.

"Let's try my new skills as a Shrine Maiden." Luna smirked. She lurched her hand forward and a large magic circle formed, a pentagram in the center. "Waning Star!" and with that unleashed a burst of indigo energy at her opponent, causing her to jump into the air. In this burst she passed the parasol to her master as Saigai picked it out.

Saigai then swung her parasol, unleashing a large wave of golden energy from the tip of the star onto the opponent from above, knocking her into the still firing beam causing a fair amount of energy.

"H-heart's... Melody... Ribbon's G-gentle Dance..." she panted. She then gathered energy yet again and spun around. She unleashed two ribbons, each grabbing Saigai and Luna respectively, by a simple arm thrust. She then spun yet again and once she finished followed by another arm thrust, pulling the ribbons back in as she kicked both of her opponents in the head.

"I am so sorry..." Kaya began to sob helplessly from behind her bind.

"Why can't we help!" Vivian sighed.

"I-it's alright..." Saigai smiled. "We need the bonding time as a team of Shrine Maiden and Goddess."

"That's right. We won't let a simple guardian of a gate bring our team down." Luna tried to smile.

"I beg to differ." Youkai snickered as she then swung her foot again, knocking the women back. As they fell back she used her ribbons to tie them and pull them in, to follow with a swing of her arm.

"We are a team now... We can't give up." Luna encouraged, grasping the hand of her master. It shone a brilliant blue as energy and a formation of blue mingled with it. They pushed it down into the ground as a burst of water and energy towered upon the young woman.

She still stood. It took nearly everything that Luna had and most of what Saigai had but it still wasn't enough. The opponent wasn't even nearly as injured as either of they were. The opponent just seemed even more enraged.

Saigai and Luna then rushed at the opponent. She hadn't even seen it coming. The two voices spoke in unison and suddenly she before she could tell, she had been struck with an overwhelming power that no villain could ever have. Saigai formed a lance of lightning and it rushed through Youkai, Luna then following up by coating her fist in energy and also her right elbow and left leg in energy. She then kicked the opponent, punching her downwards and striking her in the side with Luna's elbow, causing Youkai to be sent flying back into the gate.

She collapsed onto the ground, barely managing to speak as the moderately injured Goddess and her Shrine Maiden helped their two companions out of their binds.

"So you really a-aren't... T-the Arc-chon's..." the young guardian stated, horribly injured now upon the ground. "C-could I a-ask yo-ou... something?"

"Go ahead." Saigai smiled, helping the guardian up and proping her against the gate.

"If they cause trouble..." she began. "Could your protect the coast?"

"Certainly." Kaya and Saigai giggled warmly at their new friend.

Would this group of women live up to the guardian's expectations?

Chapter Thirty-Four: Arrival at Yurimomo Coast
The gates were opened by the guardian to let the four women into the large coast of Yurimomo. This coast was guarded by high walls and an odd structure so the buildings hid away in trees whilst the streets were far into the ground water rushing through them, many platform-plazas standing tall from these streets. The four women had passed through the gates and into this amazingly odd coast to try and find a place of refuge for the next night.

The group had decided they needed to do a little research and planning for the next day in case they faced The Archon's like they promised Youkai. Saigai and Kaya were obviously not going to leave this coast in peril to continue their adventures.