Chapter Text
CHAPTER-3: STUDENTS OF DIVINATION.
After a while of altercation, the trio moved to a more secluded area to converse, opting to be in peaceful terms for the time being so as to find the stolen insignia.
They situated themselves near a clear water fountain the sparkled from the sunlight.
Emilia was seated on the fountain’s rim in a noble way, ontop her lap was puck with his folded arms.
And standing before them was Natsuki Subaru, who was forced to stand despite wanting to sit next the beauty in front of him. Puck was still too wary of Subaru to let him be too near his beloved daughter.
At the moment, Subaru was asked by the Father-Daughter duo to explain things to him with a brief summary of everything they needed to know.
Subaru, already knowing that the task of finding the insignia was a good first mission, was also aware that the failure of such a thing could lead to dire consequences via divination. Therefore, he didn’t wish to waste time.
He was relatively new in terms of mysticism in general, he might have some experience in trying to summon ghosts with fake tactics before but the tactics, being fake as they had been, were quite useless.
He was only able to use mysticism regarding the topaz pendulum, using his cane as a dowsing rod, a little control over his spirituality and dream divination, he was only able to do so due to the extensive teachings of mysticism for two whole days by Ms.Hermit and Mr.Star, Who asked in a favor each that they could use in the future.
What he learned wasn’t much, from what he could tell at least, but they still needed him to get used to it, and so the two days of mind-wrenching mysticism classes. He could only Praise Mr. Fool for making him his blessed and bestowing him some talent.
Essentially, he took a certain spot and divined for the most important happening at the moment of his being in Lugunica through dream divination and saw an illusory image of a silver haired lady shouting ‘Stop! you thief!’ and after waking up he used his cane as a dowsing rod to start at a direction.
But the problem currently is that the two people he was in front of were completely foreign to the aspect of divination, let alone mysticism. Making him seem like a stalker who was working with the thief to sabotage them.
Sighing to himself at such a predicament, Subaru took up a teacher like dameanor and spoke.
“First and foremost, there Is the Spirit world.” He decided to start off with basics, he didn’t need to say too much about it for the moment and could still use it as a clear foundation to explain divination and mysticism.
But as if scripted, his plans were foiled instantly.
“I’m a Great spirit who had lived for over 400 years old and I never heard of something like the spirit world.” Puck spoke Condescendingly.
Subaru immediately face-palmed before speaking agitatedly
“It doesn’t have anything to do with your kind…it is actually a higher realm, that, coexists with ours.”
‘Higher realm?’ Emilia pondered to herself over his words.
She had never heard of such information before, as a king candidate she was obligated to adherence of Study, yet she never came across such intriguing things before. She knew that there will be much that she wouldn’t know about the world, but she thought something as important as a ‘higher ream’ wouldn’t be neglected in any kind off study, especially so with regards to magic.
In the end she couldn’t help but wish to listen more.
Subaru, after taking a second or two, continued.
“in fact… it is a realm where past, present and future also exist in a…weird way.” His voice became uncertain at the end.
He was also new to mysticism and so wasn’t able to clearly comprehend the aspects of the spirit realm, and so he decided to continue to the next aspect of the spirit realm to avoid being called out on his unprofessionalism.
“And! This is even more crazy, but a single point in there could be anywhere and everywhere at the same time!”
“You’re crazy, stop saying those crazy things.” Puck responded with malice, he wasn’t planning on listening to ramblings of a mad man.
Having enough of the annoying cat’s interruptions, Subaru quickly pulled out a metal sheet inscribed with words of an unknown language from a pocket inside his shirt and spoke threateningly.
“Can you shut up for a moment! If you don’t I’m gonna have to put you to sleep!”
Hearing his warning, puck scoffed.
“How are you going to do that? With that thing in your…hand.”
Puck narrowed his eyes.
The metal sheet that Subaru pulled out indeed had a certain aura to it, he couldn’t quite place his finger on it but he could tell that it was a kind of energy that was different from mana.
Seeing the gradual decrement of volume in puck’s voice and his falling face, Subaru grinned and said.
“Yep, damn right I will.”
“…”
Puck remained silent afterwards, being scolded lightly by Emilia as he watched carefully.
Then Subaru coughed into his hand.
“Again…Uh…What were we talking about?”
Emilia replied instantly. “the Spirit realm…?”
“Oh yeah, that.”
Afterwards he went on to explain the way to do mysticism.
“We all have a level of spirituality in us, that can be controlled with a certain level of practice, I mean it’s still really hard to even activate it. Seriously, I can use it because of Mr. Fool choosing me as his blessed and giving me those wonderful chea— I-I mean, blessings. Yeah…”
He decided to cut off any questions that they could ask about the topic, choosing to quicken his pace.
“Either way, being a beyonder is more or less necessary to wield spirituality accurately, you could still do it, but it even way too much of a high difficulty.”
Saying so, he un-attached the coiling pendulum on his hand to make it hang down, the pendulum head was a purple colour.
“With that Spirituality, we have a way to interact with the spirit world in many ways, this is mainly used to gather information, by divining the future, past and present.”
He looked at them with a proud grin, he seemed very pleased at his own performance, but he suddenly became flustered at the question Puck asked Next.
“Why would you need to know about the present?” Puck had an idea of why but still asked to shake Subaru Up with some difficult Questions.
The Caught off guard Subaru stuttered out random words that didn’t make sense before regaining his composure.
He stood still and tried to remember his mysticism lessons, with sweat glistening on his forehead, and After a few seconds passed by, his eyes suddenly lit up. Coughing into his hand he spoke once more with a smile.
“The present… is probably the most important out of the three, while being set in stone by the past, it is also the sculptor of Future.in a way, all three tenses of time are actually a present.”
Hearing this, even Puck remained silent and became a bit eager to know. He didn’t expect such a profound answer to come from the boy.
“The past ‘was’ a present while the future ‘will’ be a present and the present ‘is’ a present.” The smile of his became solemn with a hint of longing.
“And since the past determines the now and the now determines the future, Doesn’t it make sense to know about the present most? It’s all three after all!”
“…”
“…”
“Um…Hello? You guys good?” Subaru asked cautiously at the silent duo.
He was growing embarrassed at their stares.
‘Damn it! I knew reciting Mr. Fool’s Words wouldn’t work! Why is it not cool when I say it?’ He mourned inside his head.
“Wow…”
Emilia worded wistfully.
She clasped her hands with a bright smile.
“That was Amazing Subaru! That was truly mind-Boggling and (insert ancient word)!”
Hearing her praise, Subaru couldn’t help but blush.
Especially so from hearing her calling him by name.
Taking his top hat off, he did a clumsy bow whilst muttering.
“Th-thanks! Fair lady, it was something Mr. Fool taught me…Also.” He quickly rose up and placed his hat back on. He had an amused face as he spoke.
“…Who says Mind-boggling and (Insert Ancient Word) in this day and age?”
Right after those words came out, he suddenly realized his mistake.
Emilia, who was praising him began pouting at the dunderhead in front of her.
‘What hell was that!?’ his thoughts scolded him.
He realized that he had been impolite in the previous sentence, he wouldn’t have thought much about it since he doesn’t really show a dignified manner to anyone. but the fact was that, in that moment, if there existed a politeness meter then it would certainly have drastically undulated up and down with large magnitudes.
‘She looks really cute like that though…’ He couldn’t help but swoon quietly in his mind at the sight of the Pouting Emilia.
While Subaru stood Embarrassed by his own actions, Puck immediately jumped up into the air and pointed an accusing finger at him.
His voice rose with a bit of mischief.
“I knew it! There wasn’t any way for you to ever say something like that!”
That broke Subaru off his Stupor.
He, hearing those accusing and condescending words, immediately retaliated.
“What does that mean!? What do you even know about me huh?” although he was sounding agitated, the smile on his face betrayed that sound.
Subaru wasn’t too keen on being offended by Puck’s words, after all, he wasn’t wrong.
“Seriously! Even if you are right…Shouldn’t you have some pity for poor me? You could at least pretend right?”
“No, I won’t pretend…And who would ever actually pity you? Ah, actually you are very pitiful, but even pity has it’s limits.” Puck replied within a beat.
Although Puck still carried the same vigilance as he did before towards Subaru, the overall thought of him being a sin Archbishop lessened quite significantly.
Even without the ability to feel emotions and lies, he still lived a long life, and even held a cross proximity to people of such nature. No matter what they do, the hint of madness always remains like an ugly tumor.
And what he could see, that sort of madness didn’t exist in Subaru, if the boy actually is a Sin Archbishop who could hide his madness… Then it wouldn’t truly be possible to run away.
For from what Puck learned from his long life, the most dangerous are the ones who have perfect control over their madness, creating new types of madness as they wish and deleting them as they wish. This is Especially so for Authority wielders.
That is why, Puck hadn’t completely let his guard down around Subaru despite his conclusion of Subaru not being a threat.
“Wait! That actually hurt!” Subaru Spoke in outrage.
Hearing the two, Emilia giggled to herself, her Angelic Silver-Bell like voice enchanting the two men.
The Two frenemies seeing this sight looked at each other and nodded at the same time, saying with a respectful tone.
“Good doing Business with you.” Puck spoke.
“Nice going partner.” Said Subaru.
Although both wondered and agonized over the fact of misalignment between the two, they seemed calm and collected in the real world.
Laughing, Subaru showed the Pendulum in his hand to Emilia and Puck.
“See this? This Is called a Spirit pendulum, by entering a state known as Cogitation I can connect to the Spirit Realm and ask a question, the pendulum will rotate Clock-wise…”
Suddenly he thought that the time system here could be different and asked.
“Do you know what a clock is?”
After receiving a dis-affirmation he nodded saying “It’s alright” before explaining once more.
“As I was saying, you need to ask a question that can have a yes or no answer, it will rotate to the right if yes or true and left if false.”
Saying so he smiled at them and asked.
“Wanna check it out?”
Hearing his question Emilia immediately nodded excitedly while puck merely stayed put.
Acknowledging their acceptance, Subaru outstretched his right hand and muttered to himself a few times, trying to enter Cogitation for the first half of it and succeeding in the second half later, after that, his mutterings were made clear.
“It is dangerous to take Emilia’s Insignia Back.”
Hearing it, both Puck and Emilia were alarmed.
As they waited for an answer from the Charlatan-like boy, they saw movement from the pendulum.
It was rotating Clock-wise, meaning it was dangerous.
But then it quickened.
Subaru instantly flashed open his eyes with a bit of concern, nothing too grand however.
He had already expected a certain level of danger from the mission he took, it was thievery after all.
In the meanwhile, Emilia was looking in astonishment at the sight of the pendulum, whereas puck was in shock.
He didn’t feel any mana from the topaz, but just like the metal sheet from before, it had a strange energy around it, he wondered if that was spirituality.
As they looked on, the speed picked up in acceleration, it’s Amplitude also increased.
This brewed a sense of unease for Puck and Emilia, but that unease soon turned to worry as the speed picked up once more.
There was a level of air blowing now.
“Wh-What the!?” Subaru Shouted out as he grabbed his right wrist with his left.
The Amplitude and speed of rotation was too strong.
This instantly grabbed the attention of Emilia who stood up in a hurry to help, but was stopped by Puck.
“Hold on Lia.” His voice seemed fretful.
Emilia looked at him with shock and said angrily.
“Puck! Subaru might be in danger!”
Despite her words, Puck did not deter, forcing her to stay.
And in their gaze, the Pendulum slowly came to a stop, making Emilia leave a sigh of relief, although concern still remained in her heart.
Slowly, as sweat dripped down from his forehead, Subaru gazed up at the duo, his face pale with terror.
Then he spoke with a worried tone.
“Severe…No.”
His eyes were slightly blood shot as his right hand trembled.
“Extreme.”
With that word he gave a micro-pause and said.
“Extreme—there is Extremely, EXTREMELY severe danger.”