Chapter 60: DxD : A New Hero : Chapter 60
It was a brilliant maneuver, one that would have impressed even the most experienced of fighters. It should have been impossible to achieve during the chaos of live combat, yet he pulled it off seamlessly. It was something I had never seen before and may never see again.
It was a shame that I couldn't allow him to complete it.
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Just before the two swords clashed, I willed the first one out of his hands. And it complied immediately, eager to obey, disappearing from his grasp like it was never there. That should have ended him then and there but once again Kokabiel's inhuman reflexes came to play.
The slight widening of his eyes was the only sign he allowed to show of his surprise as he twisted his body out of the way, bending almost painfully to get out of the sword's path, and what should have been a mortal blow through his chest was turned into a deep gash in his side instead.
"Remarkable!" He laughed as if his blood did not spill out of his side and stained the ground far beneath him. "Truly remarkable! No one can use these swords but you, can they?" The curiosity and pure glee in his voice was unmistakable. It was if his death had no meaning to him.
"But," he turned his eyes towards me, just as he side-step a sword that came bearing down at him and used a newly summoned spear to knock away another, "this is not all of it. You found it, haven't you? The light Father spoke of?"
He was cut-off as he had to weave around another barrage of swords, but he soon carried on. "I want to see it. I want to understand what Father meant all those years ago. I want to know. Show it to me."
For the first time I saw a true sliver of fear flash onto his face, something that even his dead could not bring, just as his voice turned imploring, "… Please?"
I shut my eyes as I answered, "…Of course." It was the reason why I brought him here after all. Without opening my eyes I reached out to my side, towards the sword that I knew was there.
Unlike any other sword I hadn't called for it, didn't summoned it, I didn't need to, never did. It was always there, always waiting. It had never left my side ever since that day, even after its master no longer remained here with me, it stayed.
This was a sword that I always kept closest to my heart, thus it was always by my side.
As I wrapped my hand firmly around its hilt, I opened my eyes and smiled up to the Angels. "You didn't need to ask." I told him, "I promised to save you didn't I?" Then I pulled the Sword from the earth-
-And the world was bathed in all the colour of the morning dawn.
It shone in my hands like a second sun, as if it held a one within its very steel. It blazed to life the moment I freed it from the ground, shining like a sword forged from light itself.
It should have been painfully to look, lifting the sword up as I did and holding it by my face, it should have blinded me shining as brightly as it was but it was anything but painful.
I could stare right into its heart and all I felt was its warmth, it was as if my soul was bathed under the light of the warmest of summer days.
In the grass fields of my Reality Marble, motes of gold began to appear. Little sphere of golden fire, they moved like fireflies in the air, called forth by the sword.
They danced around in the fields of grass, weaving around and over stems like playful children as their numbers continued to steadily grow until they appeared to match every blade of grass with their number, forming an illusion that I was surrounded by a lake of rippling gold.
Slowly, so gently it felt they were carried by the wind, they began to drift into the air before they turned and began to gather towards the sword, swirling around its blade, drawn in by it.
From the skies above the rain of steel lessened before tapering to a halt, their strength no longer needed. The Fallen, the handful that remained, finally having a reprieve from the unending barrage of swords had their first opportunity to attack. Committed as I was to wielding this sword, they may have even succeeded.
However none of them took advantage of it. No, perhaps it simply never occurred to them to. All of them were staring widely at the sword I held in my hand. They couldn't look away, unwilling to look away, captivated as they were by its radiance.
"I… I know this," Kokabiel, taking a step forward from where he, along with the remaining Fallen, had drifted to the ground. He reached out a hand before him, looking at the light that was reflected in his palm as if it was physical thing.
He stared down into his hand with such frail look of hope on his face, his expression so fragile as if he dare not believe it was real, before looking back up into the sword. "I know this light."
"You should," I told him, raising the blade even higher as I did so, allowing all to see it, "it was what you were looking for after all."
Though it radiated a holy light, it did not harm any of the Devils around me. I could see the looks of disbelief and awe on their faces, the wonder reflected in their eyes as they stared at the Holy sword. Entranced by a blade too beautiful to be called beautiful, they looked on despite knowing they shouldn't.
Some stared at the little fireflies that had gathered around them, before running past them towards my sword. Some of them reached out a hand to catch one of them, only to find them slipping through their hands as it was never there.
As Devils, they should have died under its light. It should have blistered their skin, burned their flesh to the bone, bathed as they were under the light of this holiest of swords. It did no such thing, instead it welcomed them with its light. Greeting them like a long lost friend, filling them with a warmth that could only be found in a mother's embrace.
They had nothing to fear from this sword, it would never harm an innocent no matter what form it took. This wasn't a sword of God but of Man. And be it Devil or man, it rejected no one from its light, denied none the warmth of its embrace.
It was such a sword.
No matter how far they have fallen, so long as a splinter of good still shined in their soul, it would call out to it. I have seen it happen, reading the history etched in its blade.
How looking upon its light made even Caster of the previous Holy War remember the memories and glories of his past, before his descent to murder and occult, back when he served alongside Joan of Arc, evoking tears and even regret in his final moments.
It was a sword that, by merely existing, made the world a better place.
"Can you see it Kokabiel?" I asked him, as the sword radiated in my hands, illuminating one side of my face. "Can you see it engraved on its blade? Our hopes, our dreams, the desperate wishes of mankind that's reflected in its light?"
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This is the manifestation of mankind's great desire, it the crystallization of the prayer named "glory" and everything etched in the hearts of those who are scattered at the sword's radiance;
Xenovia watched as the sword of legend, the blade of the mightiest of kings was held in the hands of the red-haired boy before her. She could not look away as she listened to his words, captivated by the beauty of the sword's radiance.
Though the boy had not called its name, he did not need to, for she already knew it. She realized what it was the moment she was caught sight of its light. How can she not? After all-
All know its name.
It was E-
She felt a pair of arms warp around her, interrupting her thoughts and encasing her in a familiar warmth.
"You hold it like this," a nostalgic voice, one she hadn't heard for so, so long, told her as the hands that embraced her adjusted her grip of the wooden sword she held in her tiny hands, "That's how you do it."
She turned her head to look over her shoulders and a seven year old Xenovia found herself looking into the honey brown eyes of one she lost long ago. "Mom?"
The blue-haired women smiled down at her daughter she held in her arms. "Hello my little blue bird."
...
the nostalgic, sorrowful, and hallowed dreams of those who were placed on the bloody hell called a battlefield, of all warriors past, present, and future fully exposed to the fear of death and despair, and yet who still cling to a desire: 'to be exalted.'
"Stop it! It tickles."
A young girl with hair of purest white squealed with laughter as she pulled on the raven locks of an older girl who rubbed her face against her belly while she was held her in her arms.
She tilted her head from where it still remind on her stomach, revealing eyes gold that sparkled under the morning's light.
"Shirone, my little white sound, you are my treasure. You know that right?" She smiled up into the girl in her arms that looked down at her with eyes so similar to hers.
"My most precious treasure. For you, I pray that your life will be filled with the music of your laughter, my little white sound.
May the sound of your name be woven to that of eternal laughter." She looked so sincere, so happy at that moment as she stared into the eyes of her little sister before she buried her face back into the girl's stomach.
"Ahahaha, Nee-san that tickles" The little girl giggled in the older girl's arms as she rubbed her face on her tummy, half-heartedly trying to fight free from her embrace before she found herself gentle hauled up in to the air.
Held straight out before her sister's face, she had a clear look at her tender expression as she spoke. "I love you Shirone, more than you can ever know and I always will. Till the sun and the stars in the sky extinguish themselves and forever after, I will always love you. And I'll never stop."
"Hm!" The little girl nodded at her older sister's words, never doubting it for second. "Neh, Nee-san. You and me, we'll always be together right?"
"Right." She promised without hesitation, nodding back with a smile. Before a squeal of laughter erupted from the little girls as her sister began tickling her sides.
Tears drops glistered under the light of sword as they pooled under her eyes before spilling down the side of Koneko's listless face.
Her broken body was set down on its side on the grass filled ground, as her frame occasionally shook with entirely silent sobs. Her empty unseeing eyes, wet with her tears stared blankly ahead, lost in long gone memories of better days.
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Hey guys I really need you to throw some power Stones ;)
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