A/N: This is probably one of the chapters that received a heck ton of changes!! Please read through again in case you may not understand the things that might happen in the future!
Tetsu carried a tray of drinks to the table, where everyone was gathered around. He went around, putting down the drinks to each person. He looked around at each person, and noticed that Kyoko was not present, "Where's Big Sister Kyoko?" "She's sleeping in, her eyes looked all puffy and stuff..", Merlin sat down next to Lawless. Lawless snickered and nudged Licht, only to get a punch in his gut again.
"Okay, let Kyoko rest, we just.. gotta talk about Nyx.", said Mahiru, standing up, "what does she really want? Why would she keep targeting Kyoko, if she wanted Merlin?" "Maybe Nyx just wants to hurt Kyoko for revenge? Like since she knows that hurting Merlin physically won't work, then.. hurting someone he cares about?", suggested Misono, who was still having a small problem with the vending machine.
"No... that's not it... if she wanted revenge on me, she wouldn't have kidnapped Mahiru either.", Merlin pointed out. "Maybe we could find the pattern here, so far, who has been the ones getting hurt?", asks Misono. They all looked at each other. "Mahiru and Kyo-" "No! I mean yeah they are the ones who got hurt but do you see the pattern here?! They're both eves!", Misono exclaimed, annoyed at how slow this was getting. "Hmm, That's true.. Plus it did seem like she had something against the servamps when we met her...", Mahiru looked down, deep in thought.
"We've never even met her before though! I mean, who is she?!", Hyde threw his hands back. "Well you don't know her, but she knows you.., and honestly that's all that matters.", said Misono. "Yeah. And she's hurting us. We just have to find her and stop her!", said Mahiru, optimistically. "Yeah but how?", asked Hugh, crossing his arms.
"I could help!", said an unfamiliar voice by the door. The group turned around, to see a young man wearing a brown vest and goggles on his head. "Who are you?", Merlin and the rest stood up, preparing to fight. "A-Ah, Um, please don't be alarmed. I just wanna help. I'm one of Nyx's subclass-" He was cut off by Merlin holding a sword to his throat. "A subclass eh?" "W-wait wait wait waittt!!", Mahiru exclaimed before attempting to push Merlin away, "You said you wanted to help?" The young man nodded as he slowly pushed the blade away, "Yeah.. I ran away from Nyx... I don't want to work under her anymore..."
"And how are we supposed to trust you?", Merlin gave out a low growl. "I'm.. not asking you to trust me... I know very well that i'm in no place to be trusted at all! But please.. I cant bare hurting anyone anymore.." The young man pleaded, "Nyx has saved so many of us... But then she'd kill us if we were too weak. She has already killed so many of my friends.."
Mahiru's eyes softened, "Don't worry.. sir, I'm sure we could definitely use your help.", he said as his eyed Merlin, who slowly put the sword down. As everyone sat down, the young man decided to introduce himself. "My name, is Kyle Maxwell Obediah. But please, call me Kyle." He bowed. As he sat next to Misono, Tetsu also offered him a drink.
"So.. What do you know about Nyx?", asked Misono. "I know her location, the amount of subclasses she has and their abilities.", Kyle replied. "Abilities? Like magic??", Misono leaned forward. "You mean like Tsubaki's subclasses??", asked Mahiru as he recalled the time when they fought. "Yeah. Nyx herself is weak, but for some reason the subclasses she produces are strong. And I mean.. Really strong.", Kyle's face darkened.
"Nyx... was one of the failed test subjects of your father, the creator of Servamps.", Kyle started, "as she was being tested on, she died and failed to come back to life. So, she was cast aside. However, after she awakened, the first servamp had been created. You, sleepy ash of sloth.", he pointed to him. "So... She's like our big sister?", Hyde asked as he glanced at Kuro, who was clearly shaken by the news.
Lily sighed, "another one again..." "Well, she's different though... due to her being a failed subject, she is unable to form contracts. She is physically weaker than Servamps, but she has immense regenerative abilities... and the kind of subclasses she makes are... broken. They look like monsters. Only the stronger ones were able to stay... normal. Like me.", Kyle finished, looking back down. "Monsters.... Come to think of it... The ones that attacked us on the day Mahiru was taken. They looked... strange. Disfigured and weak.", Misono muttered, deep in thought.
Just then, Kyoko walked into the room, rubbing her eyes. "Ah- Kyoko! You're finally awake. Sheesh.", Merlin got up, "Hey... you don't look too good.", he walked over to her, placing a hand on her forehead, "Oi. You're burning up kid. What the hell were you doing last night? I know you left the room. Don't tell me you went out that late..." Well, it was somewhat true. Kyoko's eyes shifted over to Licht, who looked away when Merlin made the statement.
"I'm fine...", Kyoko pushed Merlin away lightly, "Hey... It's you." She looked at Kyle, recalling him from the mall. "Pleased to meet you again, Miss Ikeda." He nodded. "What are you doing here...?", she asked as she went and sat next to Kyle. "He decided to leave Nyx and help us!", Mahiru smiled. "Y-yeah... something like that heheh." Kyle chuckled softly. Kyoko squinted, letting out a tired sigh, "Alright...but I will warn you... Try anything funny with my friends and I will not hesitate to kill you."
Mahiru tensed up a bit, he knew Kyoko was just really protective over her friends but at the same time, he never expected her to be this... brutal. "Kyoko-san... we don't have to kill anyone okay? If he does betray us, I'm sure we can figure things out without hurting anyone." "Mahiru... I will not let anymore of my friends get hurt... or worse. I have to protect everyone...", Kyoko coughed loudly. "Alright back to your room. That's enough Kyoko.", Merlin grabbed her arm before dragging her back to their room.
Mahiru watched as they went off, worried about her.
Back in the room, Merlin struggled to keep her down on the mattress. "Lie down." "No- I wanna help!" "Not right now okay? You're sick." "Like that's ever stopped me before..." "Uhuh, yeah well remember the last time you had a really bad cold and yet you continued training in the rain? You literally fainted outside after 30 minutes."
As they both struggles, the door slid open. "Hey." They both turned to the door where Licht was standing. "Ah- Hi, Tenshi-chan.", Kyoko smiled before getting pushed down again. "Stay! Ugh seriously kid... And yeah what do ya want?", Merlin turned to Licht. The raven-haired boy knelt next to Kyoko who had sat back up again. "I came to check on her. You go help with the others find that demon. I'll stay here."
Merlin's eye twitched, "Oi oi, no! I'm not letting you stay here!" "Tch, and I should listen to a demon like you.", Licht scoffed. "She clearly needs an angel's presence." Kyoko chuckled lightly, "Alright that's enough you two... Merlin... I really want to help find Nyx. Please...?" "No. Look, Kyle knows where Nyx is, all I'm asking of you, is to rest and recover so when we get to her, you have enough strength to fight.", Merlin sighed.
Kyoko looked down, "I... I guess you're right... But you should really be out there hearing out the plan." Merlin nodded, "Ah. I know. But what about him?", he looked over to Licht. "I'm staying here.", Licht sat down next to Kyoko. "Let him stay. Don't worry about it.", She smiled. Merlin left the room, leaving Licht and Kyoko alone together.
It was silent, but in a cozy way. "Ahh... this is kind of embarrassing... ", Kyoko laughed, "I'm usually not this dysfunctional when I'm sick." "I can heal you.", said Licht, suddenly. Kyoko froze, speechless, "Uh- what?" "I can heal you of your sickness. After all, I'm an angel," He struck a pose with his arms. Kyoko giggled softly, "Really? Wow... I've never been healed by an angel before.", she played along.
Licht put his hands down and leaned in slowly, closing the gap between their faces, his cheeks slowly turning a little pink as he closed his eyes. Kyoko was a little caught off guard but stayed still. Wasn't this moving a little too fast? However, Licht's course changed and gave her a little peck on her forehead, to which she was still surprised, but relieved. She blushed lightly, touching the spot where he kissed her.
"Tenshi-chan.... I... haha... you know what? That actually made me feel so much better.", She smiled, looking at him," Thank you." He looked pleased, with his eyes clearly sparkling with satisfaction.
A few minutes later, Merlin returned. "Hey, Kyle gave us the coordinates and.... You're not gonna like this." He looked at them, realising that their faces were a little too close to each other. "O-oi... What were you doing?"
Misono and Kyle were sitting at a laptop, with the others surrounding them. As Merlin entered the room with Kyoko and Licht, Misono turned the laptop to them, "Here." The three sat down and Kyoko leaned forward to see the screen.
"Wait... Isn't that...", her eyes widened. "Ah. Yeah. It's our home.", Merlin frowned and sighed, "She has been living in that old shed in the forest nearby all this time." "Well, it's not really a shed. There's a hatch underneath the floorboards. There's an entire tunnel down underground that leads out to a cave nearby." Kyle traced over the screen.
"Still... That's... She has been so close to us. Why hasn't she done anything? I mean, she's never attacked Merlin.", Kyoko pondered for a bit, she looked up at Kyle, who seemed to have saddened. "Kyle? What's wrong?"
Kyle sighed, placing a hand on her shoulder, "Well, she never directly attacked Merlin because she knew how strong he is. So... she found other ways to fuel her rage. She wanted to kill you, so she sent 4 broken subclasses to... go after you." Kyoko felt her stomach drop. 4 subclasses... "Though after the subclasses were sent up, only 2 returned, saying that they failed because Merlin had arrived to save you." He continued, "And then, about 2 years later, the 2 were sent back up to go after you, but strangely enough... none returned. And there had been some scouts keeping an eye on Merlin, so they knew that he didn't do anything to them.
Kyoko clenched her first. "Kyoko-san... are you alright?" Mahiru glanced at her, noticing how much she clammed up when Kyle mentioned how the subclasses didn't return. Kyle continued, "When the scouts found their bodies... They were even further away from the shed... Like they were running from something ... one was missing a leg with a knife in its eye, and the other had a large hole through its neck."
"Ewghhh, that's cruel." Hyde commented, smirking. Mahiru chuckled nervously, "Yeah... Wow... at least they didn't get to Kyoko-san...", He glanced at her again, realising that she was trembling. "H-hey, Kyoko-san... are you alright?" She seemed to have snapped out of it when she heard her name and shot back up, "Y-yeah I'm fine." Misono crossed his arms, "You don't happen to know what happened to those subclasses right?"
She slowly stood up, "I wouldn't know... I was just a kid." tensing up to Misono's question. Everyone looked at each other and then back at her, "Kyoko-san... Are you sure?", Mahiru stood up, slowly walking towards her, "I mean... If there's someone in the woods who did those terrible things to those subclasses, they could be a threat to us too, so if you know anything, you can tell us!"
Merlin grabbed Mahiru's shoulder, "Alright that's enough." "What are you hiding from us, Battle pair?", Misono stood up as well, arms crossed. He looked over to Kyoko, who remained silent. "Nothing okay?", Merlin's tone harshened. The purple haired boy lifted a brow, "I don't think so. Please, if there is anything we need to know, tell us now. It could be a threat. You said you wanted to protect us? Then tell us, no matter how scary it is."
Kyoko only turned away, clutching the sides of her yukata tightly, "I'm... Sorry... I can't." "Why not?", Misono pressed further, "Look even if-" "I said no.", the volume of her voice increased, startling everyone in the room. Misono frowned more, "Why don't you trust us?"
"It's not that I don't- "
"Then what is it?"
"I can't... I... I Don't want to..."
"Don't want to? Kyoko-san, if there is something or someone in those woods, they could hurt us all!"
"No, there's no one in the woods okay? So let's just drop it."
"If there was no one, what could've done it? There were weapons, and they were brutally murdered!"
"Misono-kun, it's alright, please calm down.", Mahiru stepped in, "Kyoko-san, we're your friends, you can tell us anything that is bothering you, okay?" He said with hope that she would calm down too.
"No... Not this... If I do... You'll...", She turned to look at everyone, her friends, her new found family... But... She can't possibly tell them... If she did... what will they think of her?
She quickly turned toward the door and slid it open, before leaping off into the snow, running toward town.
"K-kyoko-san!!", Mahiru called out. "Crap...", Merlin ran after her, and so did Licht with absolutely no hesitation. Mahiru and the other followed them out, "She couldn't have gotten far... Tetsu, stay here in case she comes back... come on guys... Let's get Kyoko back!"