Chapter 1196: Book 18-7.2: Magi of Bellemer

“Well, time to cut things short,” Yuriko sighed. The partitioning within her mind began, and once again, she was three distinct bodies. Her true self remained in her seated meditation pose inside the master suite of a hotel in Shangria Station’s Section 626, with Gwendith nuzzled against her thigh, fast asleep. Her 1st-incarnation body shook off her lethargy as she pulled her aura back around her skin. Desire stood guard a few paces away, hidden from sight. The hour was close to noon, and she had pulled back from a skirmish against the Irvallans seeking to push closer to Neo Prism City. Her reach had returned to a tenth of her true self’s reach, though the density had lowered to two and a half per xan, a cubic inch, of Anima. Her strands of consciousness were at five. Only a single strand had regrown over the Season. However, that was still a positive in the grand scheme of things, and she knew that eventually, her incarnations would contain ten strands each. Her true body had a hundred and two strands, and it was much harder and took longer to create another compared to her incarnation body’s recovery. If it didn’t hurt so much, and if it didn’t leave her so vulnerable, tearing her Anima, her Willpower, and her strands apart to create a manifestation seed was a shortcut to growing stronger…

Well, the results were too random, come to think of it. If the tower spirit didn’t banish her manifestation seed, it probably would’ve withered at the vine. 

Circumstances had changed in Astoria, and she had considered merging her celebrity identity with her cape identity. Then again, once a secret was revealed, there was no way to hide it again. Hmmm, unless she killed everyone who knew it, anyway, but she wasn’t about to commit genocide for it. 

Her Astorian and her true body weren’t truly separate, but the Irisvaile incarnation slowly closed the connection. Before it was sealed, Yuriko’s greater self sent a couple of droplets of Ambrosia. 

“Ah, to rebuild my core, huh?” Yuriko mused. She’d laboured nearly five days to forge four layers of Sword Seals, and she would have to tear them down and create sword satellites instead. Hmmm, without forming a Radiant core, too. She didn’t think focusing on Radiance here was wise anyway, considering she was the only source of it. What would it take to ignite Radiance anyway? 

She guessed…maybe all of what her current physique produced for a year? Maybe. But if she completed the conversion first, it should be much faster. Anyway, she needed the Radiance for too many things to devote it all to something that wouldn’t help her until much later. The droplets of Ambrosia could forge five or six satellites, though she shouldn’t call them that without anything to orbit. Or… perhaps she could keep her current Sword Seals and use that as the centre? She felt a pulse of approval from the closing seal, and she hummed in appreciation as her greater self added another droplet. 

Keeping the Seals would skew the development of her Truth, she supposed, but she hadn’t trained with the Unyielding Guardian Sword long enough anyway. Well, pondering her progression could wait until later. Her Lucian detector told her that he was just a couple of buildings away. Should she head down to meet him? Or should she leave? 

No. While she hadn’t been sure, she thought that he had been behind the sensor last night. He was the only one to approach, after all. It meant that she couldn’t really hide away from him, and Amalia’s resentment pushed her to meet with him. At least to find out what he had planned. 

She wasn’t sure about her greater self’s assertion to kill the bloodsuckers either. They were certainly a power bloc in the city, and if she created a vacuum, who knew what riffraff would come to fill it?

It was a moot point anyway. She wasn’t strong enough to hold a city of this size by herself, and that wasn’t what her goal was when she entered this plane. If she could help, she would. But not to the point of sacrificing her original goals. 

She should probably wait for Lucian and whoever he brought with him to come up to either her apartment or, better, on the roof deck. This wasn’t hers, after all. She gathered her things and contemplated whether she should forge the first satellite blade while waiting. The Lucian tracker was deteriorating already since he was so close, but from what she could feel, he’d take about ten minutes to reach her. She wasn’t sure how long it would take to forge a blade, and she didn’t know what complications would happen when it interacted with her Sword Seals instead of the Radiant core. Yeah, better to hold things off until she has uninterrupted time. 

Once she packed everything up, she exited the apartment and climbed up to the roof deck. She actually should have meditated here while synchronising, but it was only helpful to face the sun if it was actually the Radiant Sun rather than this pale, offensive imitation. 

She spread out her Anima perception as soon as she settled on the roof deck. Her seated meditation pose on top of the stairway access hut bathed her in warm sunlight. As the day progressed, the soothing warmth would progress to a sweltering heat. District 4 was several dozen longstrides from the coastline, but the presence of the Tetra River meant it was humid at times. That actually made the heat feel worse, she supposed, though that was based on Amalia’s memories rather than her actual experience. Radiant Physique allowed her to weather extremes in the environment, even if she didn’t use her Anima aura to protect herself. 

When they came within her perception range, she saw Lucian’s companions stiffen. They noticed her perception aura, of course. She didn’t know why she’d think otherwise, but then again, over the past half-decade, the number of people who noticed was limited to other Ancients. Perhaps it was also because of the planar laws that her normally diffused perception aura was noticeable. Well, not much she could do about it now, but it was another point in favour of her aura being the way that bloodsucker woman tracked her. 

Noticing the cagey look on the other two’s faces, she politely withdrew her perception away from them. She did it in stages, but perhaps because they already knew about it, even when the aura didn’t touch them, they still tracked the boundary. She couldn’t tell if they cast any spells or if it was innate protections, but her curiosity was piqued. She wondered if they also created Arcana Circles within their hearts like the Bresian magi did. 

Only when her perception was completely withdrawn did the tracker for Lucian indicate that they continued moving. It felt like they used the stairs rather than the lift, considering his speed, but then again, the building’s lift wasn’t in the best of shape. 

Soon enough, they exited the stairway hut, and she had a glimpse of their features. 

Lucian looked like an older, male version of their mum. Um, a healthier, not addicted to strange drugs, version anyway. Brown hair and eyes, and notably shorter than she was. Actually, he would be taller than Amalia by a couple of inches, so she couldn’t really hold that against him. 

The other two were protected by enchanted gear. They were camouflaged to blend in with the mortals, but this close, and with her eyes tuned to see esoteric energies, the slight glow of active runescript enchantment was unmistakable. She designated a couple of strands of consciousness to decipher the enchantments’ effects, but at a guess, they would be for physical protection. Possibly against directed energy, too, but if so, the protections were layered so she couldn’t distinguish it from the rest. She was also sure they didn’t have physical enhancements active. 

Lucian’s companions were a man and a woman, with the latter leading based on how the other’s body language deferred to her. She had lightly tanned skin and dark hair. The man was taller than Lucian by an inch, had skin the same shade as Heron's, but was built like a boulder rather than her lover’s more svelte figure. Well, Heron’s shoulders were proportionally just as broad, but then again, he was taller than she was by half a dozen inches, and the other man would be lucky if the top of his head would reach Heron’s shoulders. 

Lucian quickly turned around and looked up, meeting her gaze in the process. His expression twisted into a frown for a moment, then, “A…Amie?”

Yuriko arched an eyebrow, which he reacted to by stepping back. “You…you are Amalia, right?” His tone turned frigid. The other two bounced gazes between Yuriko and Lucian, but didn’t say anything. 

“From a certain point of view,” Yuriko replied after too long a pause. 

That was apparently the wrong answer because Lucian’s frown turned into a full-blown scowl. “Then who are you?! Why…”

“Why does the scrying spell based on bloodline connection show you?” the woman asked, in a far more friendly tone than Amalia’s brother. “Ah, do you mind coming down from there?” 

“No,” Yuriko answered easily as she got up and hopped over to land behind them. The other man spun on his heels quickly, while Lucian gave the impression of rolling his eyes. The woman just chuckled. 

“So, who are you, really?” Lucian demanded, but he bit back a growl when the woman held his arm. 

“The short answer is that I was Amalia,” Yuriko said, “But no longer.” She didn’t really want the same song and dance she did in Astoria, and she didn’t care to preserve the body’s original identity. Also, Lilibeth’s features were close enough to her true body’s that it wasn’t inconceivable that there were other mundane means to the change. Amalia was too short, had too dark a hair colour, and even her build was different from Yuriko’s. In fact, she wondered why her manifestation seed was attracted to it. Or was it just a coincidence? A girl died, and a body was available? 

The words struck her brother dumb, but he quickly rallied. “But you remember? You went to my place, and to Mum’s? Didn’t you?” 

Yuriko frowned, “How did you know about that?” 

Lucian’s eyes darted to the woman, who didn’t deign to explain. 

“You remember?” 

“I do,” Yuriko admitted. “Bits and pieces.” 

“Oh.” He sagged in relief, but clearly, he was still troubled. “What…what happened?” 

Yuriko sniffed as she shifted to look at the other two. “You seem to know me, but who are you two?”

“Ah, apologies,” the woman said, her voice and tone quite congenial. “Elaine Nimdahl,” she paused, then added in a confident, yet softer tone, “Magi of Bellemer.” 

“Nemeo Arganni. An apprentice,” he grunted. 

“Nice to meet you,” Yuriko said easily. 

“Amie…what happened to you?” Lucian pressed. 

“Can’t you guess?” Yuriko poked back. “Why do you think the cops are after me?” 

“You…really killed someone?”

“Why so surprised?” She chuckled. “Those are the accusations.” 

“Night kindred. You killed two of them? Impressive,” Elaine murmured. Then she did something Yuriko didn’t expect, considering that it wasn’t something that had been done in Bresia. She held up her hand, made sure that the only angle it was visible from was in front of her, then cast a simple illusion spell to show a flat image of an open clamshell with a prominent pearl within. “Bellemer Academy’s coat of arms,” Elaine said when she saw Yuriko’s confusion. 

“You’ve awakened as a magi, haven’t you? I detected the residue of Arcana weaving around you.” 

It was true since Yuriko had to lock the door behind her when she left, since the deadbolt could only be manually turned from the inside; otherwise, a key was needed. “I suppose,” she admitted. 

“Perfect!” Elaine grinned widely, “Then let me invite you under the protection of Bellemer Academy! We’ll get you out of this barbaric city, and you and your brother could become magi and help restore balance to Irisvaile!” 

Well…she certainly didn’t expect that.