Cannons Blazing

"You and your whores have besmirched my honor, and pay for that with the destruction of your den of sin," Taren shouted. Wanting the whole crowded street to hear. 

A lot of people have gathered there, at least a thousand and more are gathering every second.

I could see many familiar people, including Norman Lucas, who was looking at it all with pure joy on his face.

"It is just a building. I will build a new one," I replied with a shrug, making the smile on his face freeze for a moment.

There is not a hint of respect in my tone; I even stopped using honorifics. This bastard does not deserve it.

"Then, I will singe the land so bad, that nothing could be built here," he declared and turned to his rhinos.

…

"We have closed the gates," said Della as she stepped onto the roof with Barb. 

"Good," I said and turned back to the establishment.

Nearly every girl is present on the roof, looking at the establishment, with many having tears streaming down their cheeks.

"Are they really going to destroy it, Sister Margaux?" asked Gloria, with tears in her eyes. 

The girl, first time in months, showed her real emotions in front of all the girls.

"Likely yes, but you girls don't need to be worried about it," I replied with a reassuring smile on my face.

"It is just a building. Even if it is destroyed, a new one could be built," I added, which stopped the tears of many girls, but brought them to mine.

It is not just a building for me. It is the first place I called home and now it is going to get destroyed.

I felt pain, but there was nothing I could do other than bear it.

…

Boom Boom Boom

"Fire!" 

Taren gave the command and a yellow fire burst out of the mouths of twenty-four cannons with deafening booms and behind it came black cannonballs, covered in fiery sparks.

I watched the cannonballs roaring out of cannons and tearing through the air toward the establishment.

I wanted to cry and roar; run and cut through these cannonballs, but I could do none other than watch in frozen horror as these cannonballs destroy everything I had built.

They will not be destroying the building, but the representation of my dreams and will.

It is the thing that saved me when I was betrayed by my family and sent here. I bet my everything on it and found a success for me and the girls.

Now, a spoiled brat riding on his father's power is going to destroy it, while I watch helplessly.

Hun!

The cannonballs were fast and reached the walls in a second, and about to crash it when suddenly, I felt something from the establishment.

The twelve-pointed star appeared in front of my eyes. It shone brightly and covered the establishment in its light.

Bang Bang Bang

The cannonballs struck the establishment, with everybody expecting the building to blow to the smithereens.

Mages cast shields, including Zela, to save me from the rubble that came flying in, but nothing of that sort happened.

The cannon balls exploded, but instead of blasting establishment into the pieces. They only made faint cracks appear on its walls.

"Impossible!" shouted Taren, with shock all over his face. It is not just him; everyone is shocked, including me.

I controlled my shock and turned to Caena. I had felt the connection between her and the twelve-pointed star. 

She seemed to be expecting the question and faintly nodded with a look, saying, 'We will talk later,'.

I had my doubts since the dream incident, but now, I am sure. She had done something to the establishment. Something that just saved it from blasting into the pieces.

She herself had acknowledged that, with the nod.

She might also be the reason why Mage York stopped earlier, and fear appeared in Taren's eyes.

Seeing these things connecting; hope rose in my heart. There is a chance that the establishment might survive.

"It seemed like, someone is trying to protect you and this den of sin," said Taren and a smile appeared on his face. 

The smile didn't give me a good feeling at all.

"Load the berin rounds," he ordered, and I shook. All the hope, that appeared in my heart vanished in an instant. I looked at Caena and found all the color drained from her face.

Berin rounds, made from berin crystal. A crystal with immense destructive power, it becomes even more destructive when it is used to forge the cannonball.

A round berin crystal contains the power to equal to Grade 3 wide-range offensive spell. It is the power of a single round, and he is planning to attack with multiple at the same time.

"My lord; your lord had stated, those are for emergencies only," said a middle-aged man.

Taren turned and looked at the man with all the fury.

"This is an emergency; the man disrespected me. He deserved to be punished!" he replied, nearly shouting. 

The middle-aged man seemed like he wanted to say something, but once again, he just sighed and took a step back, while Taren turned back to me.

"There is nothing that can save your den of sin; not even the bastard, protecting you from the shadows," he said, and there was confidence burning his eyes.

This time, I didn't reply, and instead just looked back into his eyes.

I have felt the power of the star and the spell it had used earlier. It was barely a Grade 2 spell and the cannon balls that were used were common ones; they didn't even put skills behind them.

Each berin round is compared to a Grade 3 offensive spell. That defensive spell would tear apart like paper. 

There is no chance it would stand against the rounds.

Still, I am grateful. Like the girls, the establishment could also stand in defiance. It might get crushed today, but I will build it anew and make it powerful enough, that one day, it will crush this bastard.

This is my promise.

"Fire!" 

He ordered, and the sparks lit up across the cannons. The bastard isn't holding back and launching the berin rounds from all twenty-four cannons.

Those rounds are not cheap, even for him, but he is in no mood to care about the cost or consequence; the only thing he cares about is avenging his perceived disrespect.

Boom Boom Boom

A loud boom rang out, and yellow fire burst out from the mouths of cannons, and, through it, came blue cannonballs. 

A quarter of them were more than enough to turn the whole establishment into the dust, but he had launched twenty-four.

There are skills attached to them, making them even more dangerous than they already are.

I was watching the cannonballs when the twelve-pointed star appeared in front of me, and it shone more brightly than earlier.

It is taking the power from the sun.

Still, despite that, I don't think it is enough to defend against the berin round. If it had been one or two rounds; the establishment might have survived with some damage, but against twenty-four, only complete destructions waited for it.

"Hun!,"

Even with the sound of cannons still ringing in my ears; I could hear, Caena crying. Tears have begun to drip down from my eyes too.

I didn't want to show weakness in front of the bastard, but tears came out.

This is a place, I had built with my blood and sweat, took risks, that would have ruined me, and made the enemies, that hate to the bones.

I am proud of what I have achieved with it, and what it helped achieve. 

It is filth of society, but it had made my girls earn their self-respect, that they value enough to discard the thousands of imperials, that common people would kill each other for.

So, when I saw the cannonballs roaring toward it. It felt like, they were coming for me. 

They reached the establishment, and the impact caused the reaction, bringing out the massive power that could tear apart any wall.

Hun!

I was watching it with horror when suddenly something shocking happened. The twelve-pointed star, which was shining brightly, burned with ten times greater brightness.

At the same time, I felt a change in me. I found myself connected to the star at a much deeper level and thus sensed something that my mortal mind couldn't make any sense of.

Though whatever it was; it shook me to my core.

When I came to myself; I found the world had become colorful.

I could see all types of colors around me. They are of every type and everywhere, and people are the source of them. 

Constantly emitting them out, like a breath.

"Emotions," I said. 

They are not energies, but emotions that people radiate, and I am seeing them. 

Every person radiates them in different quantity and quality depending on their mood. Like right now, Taren, Caena, Stena, Lucas, and a few others are radiating them intensely.

I was watching the colorful world when I saw these emotions moving, and they were moving toward the sun.

I had seen it happen once, during that incident, but the scale of it was like comparing the drop of water to the plate. During that incident, emotions from the plot were pulled, but now emotions from the whole city and beyond are getting pulled.

They are coming like a tide and coming from every direction and getting sucked into the sun.

There were so many emotions coming that the whole area of the establishment got covered in dense emotions, but strangely, I could see it all clearly and what it was doing to the sun.

The sun begins to swallow the massive amount of emotions from everywhere, becoming denser and bigger, every second.

It is also releasing the energies into the shining points.

The energy it is giving into them is also massive, tens of times greater than what the twelve-pointed star had sucked from the sun.

Every shining point is blazing and getting bigger and strangely, the strings connecting them to the sun fade rapidly, till it completely disappears.

Seconds passed and shining points got as big as pearls and got bigger. My connection with them seemed to be strengthening rapidly, I could feel what they could do.

Though, not all; there are many which seemed too complex for me to understand. 

Gasp!

I was thinking about her when I heard her take a huge gasp of shock. It seemed like she finally realized what was happening.

The sun becoming bigger and bigger, as it absorbs more and more energy. It had already become as big as a soccer ball and getting bigger.

The surrounding things take the massive energy from the sun and grow bigger. It is not the only change that is happening to them.

I focused on one charm. From a shining point, it had turned blue marble, with a hint of green and purple.

As I focused, I began to feel gentle, relaxing hands moving across my body, relieving me of the stress.

The message charms.

I looked at others, feeling what they do, but when I looked at some, all I got was a vague feeling. All these charms, which gave me a vague feeling, are part of clusters, with each having four to seventy-two charms in them.

Not all charm clusters are vague like them; there are some clusters that give a definite feeling like the first message charm. 

It was also part of the cluster.

Once this is finished, Caena will have a lot of questions to answer. Especially about the number of charms. They are far greater than the number I have in my mind.

There are two thousand and sixty-one charms, when there should be only seven hundred and fifty-one.

Hun!

Time passed, and the tide of emotions kept coming when suddenly, I saw something appearing in the sky.

A meteor, filled with such dense emotions, nothing my core absorbed had compared to it.

It is not big, just the size of a volleyball, but packs a massive amount of emotions and they are extremely dense and powerful.

It appeared beside the sun before getting swallowed by it. Immediately, the sun begins to grow fast.

As it is happening, another meteor of appeared, and then another, and then another. One by one, they appeared in the sky and came at the sun, before getting swallowed by the sun.

Hun!

Their appearance confused me, and I thought about their origin, till I saw the ninth meteor and felt the familiar feeling. 

Immediately, I understood where these extremely dense balls of emotions were coming from.

I also remember a thing I read in the book years ago and now seeing the meteors, I know it is true.

{Conditions Met: L…}

I was thinking that when the notification appeared in front of me. Making it official.