The Claire Bible… supposedly the remaining knowledge of the Water Dragon King after he exhausted all his strength in his battle with the Dark Lord a thousand years ago.  A revelation about the netherworld. Those who were touched by this knowledge wrote it down in various forms, and those writings are known as Claire Bible manuscripts.

So who are you, Fujita-san?  What is your connection to the Claire Bible?  And do you have anything to do with that figure that was watching us from the tower during our fight with the magic beasts?

Sorcerers are an eccentric breed, and in nothing does this show more than in their towers.  Atlas City was known as much for fantastic edifices as for its wizards themselves, from Amagi’s white-walled garden of earthly delights to Jinnai’s metallic spire, topped by a round house that revolved by clockwork.  But in the center of the city, the tallest tower stood like the stalk of some sinister plant, menacing and beautiful, built of black-veined green stone that seemed to grow even darker when the light shone on it.

The tower’s master bent over a crystal sarcophagus.  “Just a little longer and I’ll have you back,” he murmured to the red-haired youth whose body lay enshrined within.  “We’ve come this far.  Just wait a little longer… my Zoisite…”

And in the prison…

“I really don’t know anything about those magic beasts!” Amagi sobbed.  “It’s all Jinnai’s doing!”

“I don’t know anything either!” screamed Jinnai.  “It’s Amagi!”

“Are you still saying that after you summoned those magic beasts?” the old sorcerer demanded.

“How dare you accuse me, you doddering old fool!” the clockwork-master retorted.

A royal pass – secured through Misao’s diplomatic connections – had gotten Kaoru and her friends in to see the prisoners, but so far they were no closer to finding the answers to their questions.  All the two old wizards did was squabble.

“I thought we could find out what really caused the incident with the magic beasts,” sighed Kaoru, “but it doesn’t look like they know anything.”  The argument was degenerating into a food fight.

“At least we know those two didn’t summon them,” murmured Aoshi.

“It takes pretty high level magic to do summoning,” Misao pointed out.  “Even though those two are masters…”

“You two really have no idea who could have summoned those magic beasts?” Kaoru addressed the two again, and pointed her bokken at Jinnai.

“I don’t even know how to summon magic beasts!” wailed Jinnai.

“Me either,” echoed Amagi.  “All my work has been in the perfection of mechanism, not in summoning!”

“The only sorcerer I ever knew with the power to summon magical beasts was… yes!  We do know someone who can do summonings – and he hates us to boot!”

“You mean…” asked Amagi.

“Yes!  The former Guild director!”

“Kunzite!” they exclaimed together.

Amagi stroked his long mustache.  “This must be a plot to set the two of us up.”

Elsewhere, Kunzite stalked along a corridor of polished green-and-black stone.  A shadow appeared before him, glowing kanji where its eyes should have been.  “And just where are you going, Kunzite?” it asked.

Kunzite didn’t need to turn around.  “Just out,” he replied.  “To perform an unpleasant errand.  Besides, I still need to get one more thing.”

The shadowy figure said nothing.  The only response was that the kanji briefly glowed brighter, showing the characters for “mind” and “eye.”

“Oro?” Kenshin asked.  “The former director of the Sorcerers Guild de gozaru ka?”

“He was banished from the Guild and the city!” exclaimed Amagi.  “And he’s powerful, he’d have no trouble at all casting a summoning.”

“He was a true seeker after knowledge when he began,” Jinnai put in.  “But as he gained power, he became an arrogant tyrant – and not only arrogant!  We found out he was involved in some very unsavory research!”

“Unsavory research?” repeated Misao.

“He was researching immortality,” Amagi snorted.

“He was tryin’ to find out how not to die?” marveled Yahiko.  “Sorcerers can do that?”

“It’s been a forbidden subject for a long time,” Kaoru explained.  “Once, long ago, a king offered a huge reward for it, and ended up destroying his kingdom.  Others tried to find the secret, and left only piles of dead bodies behind.”

“You see, the fastest way to tell whether your research subject is immortal or not is to kill him,” Aoshi went on.  “If he doesn’t die, then you’ve succeeded.”

“Of course, there’s no record that anybody has ever succeeded,” Kaoru put in.

“Of course not!” snapped Amagi.  “Any fool knows that flesh can’t remain undying and remain flesh!  Only mechanism holds any hope for immortality!”

“But rumors started to spread that Director Kunzite was using human test subjects in his research,” Jinnai continued.

“Human subjects?” Misao gasped.

“That’s right.  Twenty or thirty people disappeared – only beggars and vagrants, but enough that people noticed.”

“That was why we convinced the Guild to revoke his directorship and banish him before things got out of hand!” Amagi went on.  “I’m afraid he didn’t take it very well…”

“It all fits together,” muttered Yahiko.

“That despicable man is guilty of countless misdeeds!” Misao exclaimed.

“Immortality research…” Aoshi said to himself.

“And if he is still using human subjects de gozaru yo…” Kenshin added.

“Don’t forget, he’s powerful enough to summon magic beasts,” Kaoru reminded them.  “Don’t let your guard down for a second!”

After Kaoru and her friends had gone, the prison returned to its usual silence.  Jinnai looked up as footsteps echoed down the corridor.  “Are they giving us our dinner?” he wondered.

Amagi wheeled his chair closer to the bars.  “Doesn’t sound like the regular guy.”  Then he cried out in terror.

A moment later Jinnai echoed his scream.  Then there really was silence.

The veins in the stone of Kunzite’s tower twisted and swirled along the walls in mind-wrenching patterns.

“Gloomy kind of place, ain’t it?” asked Yahiko.

“It’s Kunzite’s tower, so it’s probably a good place to start.” Kaoru explained

“And look,” Misao pointed out.  “Even though all the buildings around it got slimed by those magic beasts, there isn’t a mark on this one!”

“As though someone made sure it wouldn’t be touched,” Kenshin added.

“Don’t hide in there!” Misao yelled.“Come on out!”  Kaoru pointed her bokken at the door and blasted it open.

The entrance hall had been rich and elegant in its day, but now the signs of neglect were everywhere.  Dust lay thick on every surface; their feet left clear prints in the gray fuzz.  The light from their door showed their reflections in a cracked, tarnished mirror.  Ceiling and wall sconces were festooned with cobwebs.

A sphere of blue-white energy flew at them from the direction of the stairwell!

Fireball!

Kaoru and Aoshi retaliated simultaneously.  Their fireballs splattered on an invisible barrier, coming closer to them.

“Well done,” a masculine voice echoed from the stone walls.  “I can see that the ones who would interfere with me have great skill.”  Coming down the stairs was a handsome man dressed in gray tunic and trews.  A white cloak hung from ornamental buttons on his shoulders, visible under straight, silver-white hair.

“You must be Kunzite,” Kaoru greeted him.

“How do you do?” the newcomer greeted them.  “I know very well the faces of you who interfered with my plans.”

“Hold it right there!” cried Misao.  “Kaoru-san, this man may be an impostor!”

“Oro?” Kenshin blinked.

“Everybody knows that villains who defy heaven and disturb the world’s order… cannot be bishounen!”

Everybody, including Kunzite, facefaulted.

“Actually, I have nothing more to say,” Kunzite went on.  “I assume you’re going to continue opposing me?”

“Sou de gozaru yo,” Kenshin replied.

“In that case, I should make you disappear,” the silver-haired sorcerer continued.  “However, your energy would be useful to me, so I will make you the subjects in an experiment.  I shall extract the energy from your bodies – you are all young and strong, and your powers should make your life force useful for my purposes.  Now, please be good enough to die quietly.  I am very busy and have no time to waste.”  He extended his hands.

Fireball!

Kaoru dove out of the way and fired off a Flare Arrow in retaliation.  The fiery missile splattered harmlessly against Kunzite’s gray tunic.  Misao and Aoshi immediately attacked with their own techniques.

Elmekia Lance!

Amakusa Flare!

Neither spell even managed to muss Kunzite’s hair.  Nothing could hurt him, not even the raw power of the Demon Dragon King – though Aoshi’s attack had done plenty of damage to their surroundings.

“Hey, Aoshi!” snapped Yahiko.  “Ain’t it kinda extreme to toss Amakusa Flares around?”

“I’m so pleased by the power of your magic,” laughed Kunzite.

“Since you can summon magic beasts, we expected you to be powerful,” Aoshi replied.

“Haven’t you figured it out yet?” sneered Kunzite.  “I wasn’t the one who summoned the beasts.  Unfortunately, I lack the knowledge to cast summonings – my skills lie in other directions.  Allow me to introduce the one who summoned the beasts for me.”  He gestured.  A man in strange clothing decorated with eye designs stepped out of the shadows.  Eye-shaped earrings dangled from his ears.  His eyes were bandaged, and the characters for “mind” and “eye” glowed where his eyes should have been.  “Usui.  My partner in this project.”

“No fair calling in reinforcements!” cried Misao.  “I’ll show you the burning rage of Justice!”

Flare Lance!

Her attack had no more effect on Usui than her earlier one had on Kunzite. 

“It looks like my bad feeling was right,” Kaoru muttered.  “Besides skilled sorcerers, the only ones who can summon magic beasts are mazoku.”

“He’s a mazoku?” Misao gulped.  “Why didn’t you say so?”

“Oi, is this worth it?” Yahiko asked.  “I mean, a powerful sorcerer and a mazoku?  All we want is to get paid, right?”

“A powerful sorcerer researching immortality and a mazoku,” Aoshi cut in.

“Put them together and… oh no!” Kaoru gasped.  “Did he make the Pledge?”

“Oh, you know about the Pledge,” Kunzite approved.

“Then you did,” whispered Kaoru.

“Pledge?  What pledge?” Yahiko demanded.

“The Pledge of Immortality,” Kaoru explained.

“So you don’t all know about it.”  Kunzite extended his hands.  “Now be good and let me take your energy.  Soon you’ll feel no pain at all.”  He blasted them with a bolt of fire, and everybody scattered out of his way.

“Oro?” asked Kenshin.  “Kaoru-dono, what is this Pledge de gozaru ka?”

She sighed.  “Kunzite made a pledge with the mazoku to give him temporary immortality.  He won’t die even if we kill him.”

“We can’t just hide in here, Aoshi-sama,” Misao protested, crouching behind a desk next to the marble chimaera.  “We have to finish him off in one blow!”

“And just how are we supposed to fight him?” asked Aoshi.

“With courage and a love for Justice!”

Nothing less from Misao… “And how about in reality?”

“A heart that loves Justice shall burn like fire!” Misao gushed, oblivious to the chimaera’s sarcasm.  “The fire of Justice in your heart will burn all villains into ash!”

And that was exactly what she believed would happen…   Aoshi didn’t have time to reflect any further on Misao’s naïve assumptions, because at that instant Kenshin, Kaoru and Yahiko burst into the room, seconds ahead of a blast of fire from Kunzite. 

Mos Varim!

Misao hastily dispelled the fiery attack.

“Not bad at all,” the silver-haired mage murmured approvingly.  “The strength of your technique truly pleases me.  But I’m busy and don’t have time to play games.”

“So you expect us to cooperate and become your test subjects de gozaru ka?”  Kenshin drew the Sword of Light.

Elmekia Lance!

Misao blasted Kunzite with powerful spirit energy.

Flare Bit!

Kaoru’s bokken spat a shotgun-spray of small fireballs.

Damu Bras!

Kaoru’s fireballs were joined by balls of light, their vibrations powerful enough to shatter stone.  In the midst of the chaos, Kenshin struck.  “Hiten Mitsurugi Ryuu – Kuzu Ryuu Sen!”  The invincible technique of the Sword of the Soaring Heavens – a simultaneous strike to nine vital points to the body!  Kunzite fell to the floor in a pool of blood.

Kenshin turned, breathing hard.  “Sessha…” he whispered – then gasped.  Incredibly, Kunzite pulled himself to his feet!  Kenshin flew back across the room to take up a defensive stance in front of the others.

“Man, this guy really won’t die even if you kill him,” Yahiko marveled.  “So what do we do now?”

“It’s really hard to cancel a Pledge of Immortality…” Kaoru began.

Kunzite extended his hands.  A single word fell into the silence.

Fireball!

Everybody hastily dove for cover.

Kaoru noticed several shards of glass at her feet.  Glass.  It might work.  What have I got to lose?  She stepped forward.   “Kunzite, I accept the honor of being your victim.”

“Kaoru-dono!”

“Kaoru!”

“Kaoru-san!”

Aoshi held out a restraining hand.  “See what she does.”

“Made up your mind, have you?” sneered Kunzite.

Kaoru clutched her bokken and concentrated, whispering the spell.

Holy wind,
Wind which gently flows across the land…

Like a heart of fire encased in crystal, a sphere of energy grew in Kunzite’s hand.  But he never got a chance to use it.  Kaoru drove the point of her bokken against the stone floor and shouted the last line of her invocation.

Let all things be filled with your pure breath!
Van Rail!

Thick tentacles of ice snaked from the bokken’s point toward Kunzite, smashed into him, and wrapped themselves around him.  Vainly he tried to beat off the attack, but it was too late.  Kunzite, former director of the Atlas City Sorcerers Guild, rogue wizard, stood encased in a block of crystalline ice.

“It really worked, Kaoru-san!” cried Misao.

“But he isn’t defeated yet,” Kaoru pointed out.  “We’ve just bought ourselves a chance.”

“To run?” asked Yahiko.

“No, that won’t work now.  He’d break out of that ice before we got out of town, and come after us.”

“The girl makes sense.”  Gorou Fujita stood in the doorway, his brass buttons gleaming.

Aoshi grabbed the front of the policeman’s immaculate tunic.  “You dare show your face in front of me again?”

“Oi, where’d you disappear to before?” demanded Yahiko.  “And why’d you come back?”

“I see I’m unwanted, like an insect,” sighed Fujita.

Kaoru noticed a slight movement out of the corner of her eye, and turned around.  The mazoku Usui was unobtrusively fading into the wall.  Why did he do that as soon as Fujita-san showed up…?

“In any case,” he went on cheerfully, “I thought I’d come over and tell you something interesting.”

“Such as?” asked Kaoru.

“Oh, how to break the Pledge of Immortality that a human has made with a mazoku…”

“You have to destroy the Pledge Talisman,” Kaoru sighed.  “I know, I know.  One way is to kill the mazoku the pledge was made with.  Another would be to call on the power of a higher-level mazoku.  For instance, if I drew on the power of Shabranigdo and used the Dragon Slave, it might kill Kunzite.  Or it might not, depending on how much weaker Usui is.  But it would level the city, and I’d be paying reparations the rest of my life.”

“Hn.  I should have guessed you’d know already.”

“Oh, I know a lot of things,” replied Kaoru with an airy wave of her hand.  “But not why you want to find the Claire Bible – or why Usui is afraid of you.”

“That’s not important,” Fujita growled.  “Kunzite’s ice is starting to melt.  Don’t you think you should find the Pledge Talisman first?”

“Don’t run away until this is over,” snarled Aoshi.

The Pledge Talisman… it has to be somewhere in this tower.  And we have to find it, no matter what!

NOTES, EXPLANATIONS ETC.

I took one look at evil-bishie Halciforme, with his white hair and his dead love, and the first thing that popped into my head was Kunzite!  (And of course, his tower is made of malachite…)  And there’s a reason his mazoku partner is the blind swordsman Usui, but you won’t see it until much later in the series. 

Another thing you won’t see until later in the series is the reason for changing Gaav Flare to Amakusa Flare – probably the only change in Slayers magic I’ve made in the entire series.  It has to do with a later casting decision…