APOSTLE

BANG!

One side of the tower was vaporized in an instant. That's right, vaporized. Seconds beforehand there had been a beam of light that hit the tower. The light made a strange noise as it slammed into the stone wall. It wasn't the sound of a physical object slamming into rock, nor was it the distinctive hiss of heat melting stone. No, it sounded as if the light had simply dismantled the component parts of the wall. The top of the imposing tower blew away in the wind, its stone turned into particles finer than sand.

It was an interesting process for Ivan, who wanted nothing more than to learn the specifics of it. So without another moment of hesitation, he turned to the source, in the sky floated a silver-haired blue-eyed girl with a helmet on her head, gauntlets on her arms, and greaves over her legs. Over her torso, she wore nothing but a white sleeveless dress. If anything she matched the figure he had seen in Melusine's illusions. A pair of glimmering silver wings unfurled from her back.

"Aiya, if it ain't a true valkyrie… As beautiful as you may look, that ain't no excuse for ruining my introduction. Throw along whatever that magic was and I just might forgive you~!" If Ivan hadn't teleported a few meters away that disintegrating beam of light would have nailed him and Aiko. He stared at the figure with an expression that didn't match his words, his fingers curled as his left hand held Aiko from the nape of her uniform.

As of now, she dangled in the air like a misbehaving cat, and as much as she wanted to protest the situation didn't seem to allow for her to break Ivan's concentration. The only solace she had was that none of her students were here to witness her like this. Sweat poured down from her forehead as the floating angel-like figure made a pair of large, hiltless swords appear in her hands.

The two-meter longswords glimmered with the same silvery light as the rest of her. She swung them as if they were weightless, eyeing Ivan without a trace of emotion on her face. The same thing could be said for her voice.

"I am Noint. An Apostle of God. My duty is to remove unwanted game pieces from my lord's game board."

"Hm… So you just chose to ignore me huh… Unfortunately, I don't intend on being removed from this game yet. Considering the circumstances I believe it's correct to assume your 'god' is Ehit? If I was so unwanted then why hasn't he gotten off his ass and come after me himself? Actually, scratch that— Considering all he does is play games then I can't imagine he's capable of anything else~"

"There is no use in trying to taunt me. For I have no emotions." She lunged forward after saying such a sentence. Though to Ivan, he doubted her claim, as he could've sworn he saw her eyebrows flinch.

"I'm apologizing ahead of time, Aiko." Ivan turned to look at the figure he had hung up to his eye level. As she was she'd just be a disadvantage in this fight.

"Hm?" Not understanding what he was apologizing for, she only looked back at him.

"Shortly you'll be seeing a comrade of mine, stay alongside them and you'll be safe. With that being said, farewell!"

Ivan ignored the worry on her face before the hand he held her in was engulfed in light. A second later she vanished. Seeing the figure still rushing him, Ivan lifted his bracers to receive the dual greatswords.

CLANG!

"You've gotten rid of the distraction. Am I correct to assume that you intend on taking me seriously?" To Ivan's surprise, Noint was suddenly up for discussion. Fighting and talking wasn't a problem to Ivan, in fact, he rather enjoyed it. Something was satisfying about getting to know the person you were going to kill.

CLANG!

"Hm~ I wonder~! I still want to know how you did that light beam thing so I'd appreciate it if you could do it again. Of course, I'll reward you handsomely for your troubles~!"

"...."

CLANG!

"I thought about this before but are you sure you don't possess any emotions? I can't help but feel that the last strike was stronger than the other one."

CLANG! CLANG!

"That one too!"

"Enough of this farce…" She pulled back before shooting into the air, when positioned comfortably toward Ivan's direction she flapped her wings. Silver feathers poured from the sky like needles. Each feather seemingly carrying a penetrating power greater than that of a rifle.

In response to the flurry of feathers, Ivan held both his hands up. Each of his tattoos glowed with imbued mana before releasing an electric discharge into the air. Every feather the red wave hit was returned to sender, every feather the blue wave hit was immediately destroyed.

"I'm going to assume that you do have emotions, So what do you want? That bastard, Ehit, how much is he paying you? If you've done your homework you should know that I'm quite the lucrative businessman, I could triple it!"

"Hellfire Tsunami." Noint formed a magic circle made of her feathers in response. Seconds later the circle glowed white before a wave of fire appeared out of thin air. It's mass and span so wide it'd be impossible to dodge.

If it was in any other condition Ivan would've been happy to fight such an enemy. Unfortunately, his opponent seemed quite fond of air battles. Not that he could blame her, she had every right to use her advantages. But as a predominantly melee fighter, it was difficult to get a foothold on the air even with Air Dance.

In the face of a wave of fire the plan was simple: Go through it.

Ivan leaned forward before placing his feet on an arched air platform, another second passed and he leaped headfirst into the fire like a cannonball. He held his right hand in front of him like a spear, red lightning enwrapping it. Through the air streaked red lightning, a faint cry of a crow resonating the longer the streak went on.

FUOOM!

He passed through the wave almost instantaneously, the heat was crazy but he managed to pass through without a scratch. But he didn't stop there, keeping the momentum he charged at the unsuspecting Noint who had expected her attack to at least cause some damage to him.

Without hesitation, he aimed for neither her swords nor heart, as each of which was defended by her in those short seconds. Instead, he aimed his right hand at her wings. He latched onto her right wing and charged his mana output to the max. Contrary to her statements about being emotionless Ivan was one hundred percent sure her eyes shot open in surprise.

BANG!

The wing exploded in a single second, as a result of the explosion her body was sent flying into the tower. With her impact, it finally decimated what remained of the top floor.

"W-What the hell is happening?!" Claire and Eri ran from the base of the tower with anxiousness in their voices. They returned to Yue's side to hopefully gain a gauge on the situation. Yue, seeing that a barrier was pointless, turned to help Ivan.

"Ivan is up there… fighting something strong." She muttered.

'No shit sherlock!' The two kept their honest thoughts in their minds. They looked up into the air just in time to see the top half of the tower obliterated.

"...If we had left any later." Ari trembled at the possibility of having been squished by that silver-like meteor.

"As much as it pains me to say… I don't think Air and I would be any help in a battle against that figure. In fact, I'd say we would just end up putting Ivan at a disadvantage. Yue, please aid him in our place."

Claire finished her words with a bow, she had been the one to guide her and Ari to evacuate the tower. Moments prior she peered out a window to see what happened at the top of the tower from the first explosion, immediately she knew they were outclassed.

Instead, she saw it wiser to allocate her and Ari to aiding either Felis and Canis or Tio in destroying the chapel. Yue nodded to her words, glad she understood. Ari originally had protested but after some pondering, she accepted the fact.

If Ivan needed help however they were determined to throw themselves in.

"Mmm… take care, you two." Yue vanished from her place and appeared on the highest level of the tower that wasn't destroyed. She planned on jumping the apostle from behind when she let her guard down.

"Alright, let's go, Ari!"

"Yes!"

=====================================================================

"RAGHH!!!" Ivan refused to relent, he had taken out a core component of his opponent's fighting style and he wasn't going to let them adapt.

Of course, he wasn't naive enough to believe that taking out one of her wings removed her capability of flight. In fact, Ivan inferred that the wings existed for two reasons, one that they served as a great defensive mechanism, and two they were capable of being used offensively and in offensive magic.

Her flight was likely a by-product of her being, she clearly wasn't a human so he amounted it to that. He did however hope that knocking out a wing severely reduced her attack output.

RUMBLE!

The debris from the tower shook as she reemerged her head. Faint scratches marred her body, slight burns from the explosion as well. Each of which vanished almost instantaneously. She stared up at him without another word, floating into the air as Ivan had expected.

"I underestimated you, Irregular…" She attempted to keep her poise. Though one could infer from the strong grasp she had on her swords that she was anything but calm.

"Yeah and I appreciate it too, it would've been way more difficult to incapacitate you if you didn't instinctively defend yourself with your wings." Ivan grinned beneath his mask, for some reason he derived a powerful sensation of enjoyment from breaking that 'emotionlessness' she proclaimed in the beginning.

"...I'll kill you." Noint's words were followed by an expulsion of mana. The air shook and Ivan smiled as an oppressive force weighed down on him.

And then— she started glowing like a star.

================================================================

If you want to support me please follow this link! There's a couple new links added~: https://linktr.ee/ardoaleister

Noint's pretty cute~! I would've loved to make a work where she was a potential love interest. Other than that I don't got more to say. I began writing a little later than usual so I gotta hurry up and right another to stay on schedule After that I'll reward myself with an air fried lunch! I can't wait, my grandmother even got me some freezer food from walmart yesterday!

So hey thanks for reading, if you wanna support my air frying endeavors please click any of these links. Have a great evening, and I'll see you all soon~!

If you want to support me and read ahead 10-15 chapters, you can check out my p.a.t.r.e.o.n right here: https://bit.ly/ardoaleister

Discord: https://discord.gg/tQ5TWbYd9t