Chapter 5: Lady Sif (I)

Like a liquid simmering at the bottom of a cauldron, tension lingered in the air even as the Annual Meeting had concluded. 

The revelations that had cast a dark aura over Fjellborg Castle had dissipated to a slight extent, yet a subtle residue remained, swirling between the whispered conversations and uneasy glances exchanged between the new groups that had formed. 

Lawrence was standing beside Blake, talking with a crinkled nose and a huge, visible frown on his face. Meanwhile, Hiroshi and Rafeal were already heading toward their helicopter. 

Arthur stood outside, alone, his hands inside his pockets as he looked at everyone. 

'They really did come together after all.' Arthur thought, his pale grey eyes tracing along the beeline of the cliff against which the waves clobbered with a subdued ardour and then at the helipads where Yuki and Maria waited for their fathers to board their ride. 

Maria suddenly looked back, sensing a penetrating stare which caused her to glance back with a quick jerk of her head. 

However, upon catching sight of Arthur, her demeanour shifted subtly. 

Only a moment… a fleeting moment of softness crossed her face, reflected in the gentle wave of her hand. 

The sight of her slightly illuminated skin under the murky dark sky of Oslo carried a hint of rosy red tint before she boarded the helicopter. 

Lawrence had already left with Blake and Kwame Olaniyan—Dotun Olaniyan's father—moments ago. 

Arthur's chest flared upwards as he heaved in a deep breath before reciprocating, waving back at Maria in a subtle, weak fashion. 

Maria's lips flowered into a soft, warm smile, her fingers delicately grabbing the railing affixed to the door for a moment's stability against the winds that made her clothes flutter like a battle flag. 

With an unconscious grace, she found herself rising onto her tiptoes, a subtle indication of something fluttering inside her ribcage.

Her gaze lingered on him, his face, eyes, his sharp nose and thin lips and back into his eyes, a silent and desperate attempt– or rather a hope for one last conversation before she departed. 

She stayed for a while, probing to get anything other than that small wave from him, however, amidst the whirl of rotor blades and distant dark horizons, his blank stare was the only static thing. 

Like a heavy rock at the bottom of a shallow river. Unchanging. Unmoving. 

The smile all but disappeared as she faced back the man extending his hand to help her mount her carry. 

As Arthur saw her leave, he interlocked his fingers and stretched his arms to the back. The joints let out a creaking pop as he moaned, blinking his eyes a few times.

The meeting had concluded with the decision that delegations would be made with the United Nations at first to retrieve Adam's Battle Armour. 

However, if the delegations do not go as planned —since the families are not willing to explain the exact origins of it or the reason why they don't want it to go into public knowledge—it was decided that the heirs will be dispatched. 

Normally the other siblings are dispatched if a situation like this arises, however the paramount importance of the current situation made them decide to do it. 

Amongst the Seven Syndicates, it was customary for the heirs to not engage in such matters. The heirs were USUALLY socially disconnected people until the age of 15. 

Homeschooled from the very start, the knowledge of the normal world is given to them using the best hired teachers and they are trained in magic either by the family acquaintances who have a long lineage of Arcane Arts as well.

Just not at the same level as the Seven Syndicates. 

However, homeschool doesn't mean they are not allowed to interact. They are allowed to join sports clubs and leagues if they want to.

Once a person manifests the family inherent 「Arcane Arts」they are then trained by the parents.

Arthur, however, wasn't always the heir.

"Arthur." 

Lost in thought, Arthur looked to the side as he saw his father—Aksel Olvasen—walk towards him. His father was an inch shorter than Arthur, standing at around 178 cm.

Trailing a few steps away from him was Astrid, her head hung low. 

Her eyes trailed along the long grass, her left hand holding her right wrist with a slight, supple force.

Arthur's eyes flicked from Aksel to Astrid, before looking over his shoulder to spot Albert who was smiling gently at him from a long distance away. 

"You are not going back to Hammerfest." Aksel spoke without stopping as he almost ran towards his car. Without looking back, he continued. "Your mother—Sif—has called for you."

The words felt like a blow to the back of Arthur's head. He could almost feel his features crack under an incomprehensible emotion. As Aksel opened the door, he looked back. 

'He called her by her name. So, it means she wants to talk about whatever happened today. But why me?'

"Are you listening? Bring the girl, and get inside." He urged, sounding extremely impatient. 

'Why now? After all these years…well, only 2, but still…'

The question lingered into the back of his mind, like an itch he couldn't quite scratch. 

"Arthur…" Astrid's mellow voice brought him back into the real world. Looking back, he saw her smiling at him. "... we should hurry along." She prompted. 

"Something's wrong."

"Eh…? What?"

"Something's wrong. With you." Arthur repeated, holding her eyes.

If she could, she wanted to look away. To not pile up the already huge mountain of thoughts and things that weighed down on Arthur's shoulders like a wet blanket. However…

…it seemed futile.

Ever since the day she was saved—by him—she just could not muster up the strength to lie or hide from Arthur. Not when he was fixated on it. 

"It's… nothing, really. Nothing to worry about."

Not taking his eyes away from her, Arthur's fingers trailed along the sleeve of her long puffer jacket. Despite not being against her bare skin, he felt a jolt creep up his spine.

Trailing down, he placed his hand over the sleeve, removing it from her right wrist, avoiding any direct skin contact. 

She almost let out a relieved sigh as the weight of his gaze finally lessened.

Looking down, Arthur saw a small, deep crack like a fissure running across the lower end of the wrist. Turning it in his hands, he saw a small spherical insertion.

Like a fang had dug deep into it and then roughly taken out from the other part. 

"Albert?"

"No—I mean, yes, but you know—" she paused, collecting her thoughts. "You don't have to think much about it… they had to disrupt the flow of my Arcanum somehow, so it was this big device." Astrid spoke, a childlike glint in her eyes as she explained the size of the device used to render her incapable of using Arcanum.

"And then Albert closed the maw like thingy on my wrist and it made a huge hole!" She explained, widening her eyes. "Although it didn't hurt at all!"

She's suppressing her pain. 

Hesitatingly, Arthur's thumb drew circles over the mark.

"So, a magical insulant was inserted into one of the paths leading to your magic circuits. Quite old school. I was expecting they'd make something more…" he paused, smacking his lips, trying to make her believe he was buying her act of not feeling pain, "...innovative."

He spoke as an intangible tremor permeated from Arthur's thumb into her arm. A small intangible pulse.

"It has a foreign isotope as well. You might need some treatment once we are back."

Astrid shook her head, making the loose hair at the end of her bun flail here and there. "No, no. They—Albert gave me this!" She exclaimed, taking a small glass bottle out. "He said any kind of abnormality will be mitigated if I drink this."

Taking the bottle from her hands, he looked down at it.

The same intangible pulse that had permeated from Arthur a while ago flared to life once again and the metal cap on top of the bottle twisted at a blinding speed before shattering the bottle into shining, unseeable portions. 

"No need to rely on that bloodsucker's medicine." Arthur spoke as Astrid looked down at the broken shards that were too difficult to see by the naked eye. 

Raising her hand, she slapped his shoulder. "You should be appreciative of others. Also, why won't you trust him just because he isn't human!?"

"Arthur Olvasen! Take another damned second and I swear on Goddess Hestia's name I will tell your mother you are unwilling to cooperate." Aksel bellowed, taking his head out of the car window. "Skynd Deg!"

"It's not because he's not human," Arthur murmured, his grip on Astrid's arm tightening almost imperceptibly as he pulled her closer, totally disregarding his father's words.

"I just won't trust your well being with anyone. No one."

As he pulled her beside him, a content sigh escaped Astrid's lips.

"Are you flirting with me?"

"Maybe."

The violent winds tousled her platinum locks in his direction, mingling with light brown hair of his own as they were blown back by the raging tempest, mingling together and obscuring their vision of the world around them. 

"Are you trying to act cool or something?" She snickered in a low tone, disregarding the subtle rise in her pulse. 

"Probably."

Arthur Olvasen POV

Injustice, Justice—Justice, Injustice. 

Quaint little notions. 

A common social construct, a mere figment of the human imagination, spun into existence to appease the feeble minds of simpletons seeking succour in a world that is seemingly in a specific "order." 

However, it's a myth. 

A fairy tale for people of all ages. Whispered into the ears of the gullible masses from the day they are born to keep them in line, to maintain the illusion of control.

To the common folk, they represent gallant pillars of righteousness, guiding principles upon which society stands. 

But in reality, they are nothing but hollow concepts, devoid of any coherent or cohesive substance.

As it should to anyone with a little bit of critical thinking.

Even the world that these Foulborns, and us—Arcane Arts users—live in, it's a stage built on piles upon piles of lies and treachery. 

Those who wield power, who claim to be the arbiters of righteousness—The Seven Syndicates—us—they're nothing but frightened little creatures hiding behind a facade of superiority. 

Prancing around, adorned in their self-righteousness, but deep down, they're trembling with fear. Fear of losing the very power they so desperately cling to.

「Arcanum.」 

Funny how they cling to it like a drowning man clutching at straws. 

They parade their abilities like prized possessions, boasting of their superiority over the common folk, calling them Foulborns. 

But it's all a sham. A charade to mask the insecurities that gnaw at their insides like a demon crawling its way up from the pits of hell, slowly nibbling away at the false ego they have built. 

They fear what would happen if the truth were to be unveiled, if the masses were to realise that they too possess the potential to wield such power.

And so, they hoard their abilities, locking them away behind a fortress of lies and deceit. 

For centuries. Multiple millennia even. 

All the talks about the "betterment" of mankind, of progress and enlightenment, but it's all just empty rhetoric. They—we… I care only for myself. For our own selfish desires and ambitions.

Injustice is not some abstract concept floating in the ether—our world. 

And justice... Well, it's just a fairy tale told to children, a comforting lie to shield them from the harsh realities of the world.

"—thur. Arthur? Arthur!"