Chapter 33 - Diagnosis

Upon returning to the village, the group was greeted by the fellow villagers who had stayed behind during the battle, all waiting with baited breath.

Takumi's rousing of the group's spirits was just found out to have only helped the individual fighters, but in terms of telling the villagers who were in high spirits anticipating a victory, the sorrow of losing came once more and bore it's brunt.

"Guess it's up to me again to raise the spirits," Takumi thought as he looked at the group behind him, wearing a saddened expression.

Walking out towards the villagers, with a bright smile plastered over his face, he readied his words of motivation, but for some reason, before he was even able to utter a single word, the villagers let out a booming cheer.

"Huhh?!" Ichika couldn't hold back her astonishment as she blurted out.

It seems as if just the bright smile Takumi wore was enough to inform the villagers of the outcome and they seemed to be pretty content with it, so much so that they didn't even pay attention to the two dead bodies the nereids were carrying.

"They either have some crazy-ass faith in their king, or they're the dumbest set of beings in the galaxy," Misao thought as she carefully observed the villagers' fanatics.

The group stood there dumbfounded for a while until the cheers died down and the villagers all went back to their lives.

"Is it just me or…was that very strange?" Luna broke the silence with a question to Lancelot.

"OHOHOHO! They're always like that!" he replied with a echoing burst of laughter, " But enough of that now, let us begin the examination and burial of these bodies,"

The confused look on the faces of the group was soon removed as Lancelot mentioned the bodies, they nodded in agreement and were soon led across the village to a medium sized building.

"Miss Reiki?" Lancelot asked as he knocked on the white door, soon after the lock was heard and a tall woman emerged looking exhausted, she had large bags under her eyes but it didn't take one bit away from her beauty, with pitch black eyes, smooth skin and long, black hair she was still gorgeous even if she seemed as if she hadn't slept in years.

But that may not be her greatest eye catcher, on her back were a pair of magnificent, colourful wings, similar to that of a butterfly releasing a wave of silver dust as they slightly flapped.

"*haaahm* What is it?" Reiki questioned she yawned and flapped her wings faster in an attempt to get the exhausted feeling out of her, releasing a gentle breeze.

"I need you to examine a body and determine the cause of death," Lancelot firmly responded as he beckoned the nereid holding the demon's body forward.

Reiki's expression changed for a moment to that of shock when she saw the destroyed state of the body, "I'm sure I can tell without examining, but I'll do it anyway, so what about the other one?" she asked as she nodded at Taku's body.

Lancelot then proceeded to tell her of his plans to bury Taku after he explained how he died.

"Oh, okay" She responded, "I'll stay here and wait until you're done. You, come here" pointing to the carrier of the demons body they both entered the building.

***

The remainder of the group found themselves in a flat area, Taku's body was laid gently on the ground while the group had their heads bowed in silence, paying respect.

The sister of Taku, stood silently with a face full of pain as she tried her best to hold back the tears, she bit her lower lip so hard it left a severe bite mark. As she shut her eyes to try and drown out the pain, she felt a soft hand land on both her shoulders.

"It's alright to cry…" Ichika, who was standing in front of her, staring, assured.

Hearing this, the devastated dryad could no longer contain her emotions, she buried her face in Ichika's bosom as she released all the pent up frustration in the form of tears and howls. Ichika just allowed her to vent as she rubbed the dryad's head, just like a loving mother.

About half an hour of this silent funeral passed when the burial of the body commenced, Lancelot asked for Takumi's help in which he gladly obliged, they both stood at either side of the body and prepared to bury him when they were stopped by a shout.

"Meril? what is it?" Lancelot questioned Taku's sister as she walked towards the body.

"My…brother always liked flowers…" Meril responded in tears as stopped, she then spread her arms out and used her power as a dryad to create a beautiful blanket of colourful flowers over the body.

The entire group smiled at the sentiment as Meril regained her sweet nature after sending her brother off, Lancelot and Takumi then proceeded to activate their earth dragon force and after moving their hands in a pulling and pushing motion, created a coffin from earth which was then sunk into the ground.

"Goodbye…Taku…" Meril said the final goodbye as the mourning ended.

***

The group separated after the funeral and only six remained, consisting of Lancelot, Takumi, Misao, Luna, Ichika and Aiko who all went to see Reiki about the autopsy.

They soon arrived to the house and let themselves in where they met Reiki sleeping on a a chair using her wings as a blanket, the demon's body was laying on a table in the centre of the rather dark room, only being illuminated by a sole open window.

"Wakey wakey!" the energetic nereid who was left with Reiki yelled at the top of her voice as she opened all the other windows, flooding the room with light.

Reiki jolted awake and screeched like a vampire when hit by sunlight, "ugh!…what is that light?! Turn it off!"

"You mean the sun?" Ichika asked sarcastically, giggling from Reiki's dramatic reaction.

"Yes! Turn off the sun please!" Reiki begged.

The house was filled with laughter as Reiki finally came to reality, soon after she returned to her tired demeanour as she began to examine the body.

"I have to ask… what is she, I didn't see her species in the book," Takumi whispered to Aiko who was rubbing her foot which seemed to have collided with a risen piece of flooring.

"Oh! She's a fairy, they're known for their medicinal skills, they're the best doctors in all of Endolis," She answered after getting over the small injury.

The house became silent once more as Reiki brought the chair towards the table, "Let's get this over with so I can go back to sleep, shall we?"

The group moved closer to her as they noticed Reiki widen her eyes, the black colour soon changed to a transparent yellow as her wings lit up. She then placed both her hands on the body, runic markings began to appear from her elbow down and began moving across the body like an army of ants.

She released a breath as she flapped her wings, the dust that came from them began to surround her, she hadn't blinked since she started the examination and beads of sweat appeared on her face.

This went on for about ten minutes when Reiki stopped, her eyes returned to normal and her wings went still, the runic markings also disappeared but the sweat remained, Reiki was breathing heavily as she sluggishly rose from her seat.

"Are you alright, Miss?" Ichika asked with a look of concern.

Reiki nodded as she caught her breath, "This might be shocking to you but…the cause of death wasn't what I expected,"

The group all looked at each other in worry as they were all invited to take a seat while the explanation was given.

"To put it all in a nutshell," Reiki began with a saddened face, "she was turned into a demon, that caused a scarib to form in her body and from what I've studied about dragon force and jade energy, the two can't mix with this sort of combination.

The dragon force in her body was cut off from the dragons, who keep it in check and in result it began to destroy the scarib from the inside when the dragon force and jade energy were used at the same time, but instead of just killing her normally, the scarib somewhat…fought back…destroying her body itself, which resulted in what you see there," Reiki finished, pointing to the grotesque body.

"I'll have to perform more tests to come up with more answers, but all I can say is…Lancelot…Aegis may be in danger…more so than you thought"

The room was filled with an aura of silent despair upon hearing this heart rending diagnosis.

Meanwhile, across the seemingly endless galaxy, on earth in a hospital located in Hokkaido, some persons were holding the same feelings of sadness from hearing a diagnosis.

"Takumi…wake up," Takumi's body laid lifeless in a hospital bed, with tubes coming from his nose aiding in his breathing, the beeping of the machine monitoring his vitals gave his father, Hiroshi the faintest string of hope knowing that his son's heart was till beating.

***

In another room, the same feelings could be felt as Shi, Misao's martial arts master and adopted mother, sat next to her, who was also in a bed seemingly in worse condition that Takumi. She was laid in a capsule with many burns all over her body, she was still alive but unconscious.

"Come on Misao, don't leave me like the rest…wake up…" Shi's muscles clenched as she gritted her teeth, crying and…laughing?

As Shi laughed and cried out of sadness, an unknown being located in an unknown realm, was laughing out of joy, uttering one sentence,

"This is getting fun,"