Chapter 20: Patriarch
Elone watched as the jagged trails zigzagged their way around another corridor until it was covered in cracks of glowing energy. Then, with a simple click of her fingers, Yokai Kitsune caused it all to erupt in fire. Another corridor incinerated, another incision into Godhand’s heart. The two girls fled as the hallway collapsed in on itself, a cloud of black soot chasing after them. Elone had never felt such a rush!
They reached a quiet section of the manor and Yokai closed her eyes, as she always seemed to do after creating an explosion, taking in deep breaths that reminded Elone of meditation lessons. She still had no idea how the strange girl managed to cause so much destruction with just a gesture, but she put it down to some kind of advanced technology from the big city. Glancing outside the window, she noticed the chaos their aggressive behaviour was having: people were running around the courtyard in a panic, either fleeing from the devastation or trying to contain it. If only they realised it was the fault of a couple of teenage red-heads! As she watched the drama with a delighted grin on her face, Elone’s attention was caught by the sight of the towering structure jutting out the back of the manor, like some kind of sick phallic representation of power.
“We should totally destroy that thing,” she said, jabbing her finger against the window. Yokai looked at it with wide eyes and cooed her approval.
“Torsten Tower,” she said, “That’s what they call it. Say it’s gonna be the biggest tower in the who—ole town. Said they’re gonna put a weapon in it to shoot down attackers,”
Elone looked bemused. “Why’d they want to do that? Why’d anyone want to attack Torsten?”
Yokai wasn’t paying any attention, though. In the instant Elone had taken her eyes off her, the shorter girl had gone from looking like an absent-minded teenage girl with a cruel smile that betrayed her psychotic tendencies to a defensive figure with narrowed eyes and a serious frown. She reminded Elone less of herself now, and more of those boring girls who studied all day and night to get the best grades. The girls Elone hated.
“It’s him, isn’t it?” she asked thin air. Moments later, a hazy image shimmered to life in front of her. Elone tried her best not to scream at the sight of the ghostly feathered spider, its mandibles twitching as it spoke with the voice of – Elone couldn’t believe it – what sounded like a prepubescent boy.
“Indeed, he has arrived on schedule,”
Yokai sighed and shook her head, her multitude of ponytails whipping the air. “Guess this means the fun is over?”
“Affirmative.” said the spider/boy.
Elone had seen too much. First crazy nanobot controlled explosions and now holographic spider-children? This was way over her head. “What the hell is going on?!” she asked.
The spider/boy looked in her direction, and she could swear its multiple eyes narrowed in contempt. “That girl would be safer away from here, if you even care,”
“I like her,” said Yokai, “She has potential. She can live for the time being,”
