-Prelude(1)-

“You damn old man, what’s happening with Kenshin?” Joy asked, sitting beside Kenshin carefully. Giving the kid from Sylph race a hate-filled glare, he asked: “What are you going to do with him?”

“He will be in my custody from now on, don’t worry about that anymore.” The old man scratched his beard and turned around at the kid, giving him a glare he said “Cancel that summon. That tiger, send it back to from where you brought it.” He had completely forgotten about it until now. His fight with the kid and then Kenshin’s sudden transformation, all this made him forgot his second or more like most important objective.

“I will not, what can you do anyway? Bleak will kill everyone, it will not be stopped. I have already ordered it to go berserk. By now, it should have already killed that group of weak earthlings, hahaha!!” the kid laughed out loud, thinking the old man was funny, asking him to undid which he achieved after sacrificing a lot?

“Do you think I am asking you nicely? Do it, or else you will see what happens when my hammer slams against your head. I am pretty sure it will resemble a watermelon that went through a session of the watermelon-smashing game.” To emphasize his words, the old man created a blazing hammer and held it with his left hand. It was the same hammer that defeated the kid in the first place, so he had quite the impression of it.

The kid tried to back away, but since he was bound by something invisible, he couldn’t move even a step. All he could do was stare at the hammer, and the old man like kids look at a monster below their bed. The old man took a step forward and asked, “Which one it would be? What will you do, I wonder!”

“Hik! Stay away from me you psycho old man, I will do it. I will dispel the summon.” The kid blurted out before closing his eyes to do something. He glowed red for a second before returning to normal. The old man stared at the empty space for a second before nodding his head, he then dispelled his hammer and turned around. “Good. You have done it right…is what you thought I would say? Huh!!!” suddenly the old man turned around and slapped the kid hard while coating his palm in the same blazing energy from which the hammer from before was made.

Coating his head, he raised it and threw a kick at the kid’s head, fully intending to make it resemble a watermelon after the game of watermelon-smashing.

“Wait! Wait! I am doing it, I am doing it!!” kid from Sylph race shouted loudly and broke a tooth from his mouth with his tongue. After that, a shockwave generated from his body, which dissipated soon after. He looked at the old man with a sweaty face that creased into a fright-filled frown and said, “I have done it, I have now fully dispelled the tiger, you can check it. So, please take that leg away from my face.” the old man took it away, not before looking at the vacant sky for a few seconds.

Then he looked at the fallen Kenshin, who was clearly still sleeping and then turned to Joy, saying “Kid, what happened here, don’t make it public. No matter what happens, don’t go to the public. This matter is now handed to some serious lunatics, and those paranoid fools won’t want anything funny to happen under their watch. You better not make this public or problems might come your way, problems that you couldn’t handle.” The usual cheerful and mocking attitude of the old man was gone and now replaced with a grave tone of an experienced veteran.

Joy grounded his teeth in anger after hearing the old man say that he punched the ground beside him, making a huge dent on it as cracks spread around, and then he shouted “Are you serious? You fucking old man, are you fucking serious? An entire town was now gone in flames, thousands if not millions have died, including innocent children and old men. Now that we captured the culprit, you want to remain silent and proceed without noticing anyone?” Joy punched the ground once again as his voice increased a few octaves, spraying saliva everywhere he shouted “People have the right to know the danger that lurks amongst them. keeping silent is not a solution, keeping these people in the dark will only endanger them more-”

Boom!!

Before Joy could finish, he was kicked away by the old man. His body made an arc across space as he slid through the tiled floor of the hotel. In a flash, the old man appeared in front of him and aimed a small dagger of flaming energy, pointing it at his eyes. Seeing this, the remaining hairs on his body stood up as he broke into a cold sweat. His eyes began to jump. Killing intent far surpassing anything he had ever faced, Joy felt an immense pressure weighing down on them like a ton of bricks.

Grabbing his neck, the old man pointed his dagger at his eyes even closer and growled “Kid, don’t take my words as a request. It’s a statement, an order that you must follow, understood?” but Joy remained silent. He was just too occupied with his fear to make a coherent speech.

“What’s your answer, huh?”

“Yes!!!” shouting hastily, Joy closed his eyes in fright. Soon he felt the pressure lessening on him a lot, and the hand grabbing his neck also retreated. After that, only he took a breath of relief while thanking the gods that he survived that. Despite that, he had now developed a healthy trauma towards the old man. While he was busy recovering from his fear-induced paralysis, the old man stood up as he stared at the Kenshin’s body with a frown.

“Kid, it's not that I am cruel or not care about humans, but the situation is as such. The news might have already spread across the world, it will now attract the attention of everyone present. Adding any more will only result in a worldwide pandemonium. You want to create a pandemonium worldwide?

It's also for your own good if you spread it. The people in power will first silence you and then make the whole thing a hoax. This matter will be suppressed within a few months…you don’t know how huge the influence of the people who work behind the scenes and control this world.”

The old man’s words cooled down Joy’s anger and indignation, which he felt after seeing the slaughter of so many people. Adding to the fact that he or Kenshin couldn’t defeat the culprit despite having a bitter battle with their life on the line, he wanted to achieve some form of victory in the situation. In the end, he lost the coherent thinking process. After calming down, he understood how grave the situation was; if he had made everything happened here public, not to mention his life, which might have been extinguished even before the end of the day, he might have started something irreversible.

“I am sorry, old man, for losing my head back then. But!! Did you have to be this violent? I think I broke a bone somewhere behind my back…damn, it's painful!” complaining, he came back to sit beside Kenshin, waiting for him to wake up.

“Sorry, sorry!” scratching the back of his head, the old man laughed awkwardly. Then he looked at the kid of sylph race and said, “Kid, let's go. Your new home awaits…” after that, the old man pulled out a neatly folded handkerchief from his pocket and started to unfold it. The small handkerchief soon became big enough to hold a grown-up man.

“You old man, where are you taking me? What is this thing? Hey! Can you hear me? Hey-” but his voice was cut off as the cloth fell on him and covered him completely. After that, as if magic out of children’s storybook, the cloth started to fold back to the shape of the handkerchief, like before.

Pocketing it casually in his pants, the old man then looked at Joy and said, “Kid, I am going. My job here is done, I am returning. Remember what I said.” Then his eyes landed on Kenshin's sleeping form as he sighed, “There are many things I need to tell him…sigh, it can wait for another time. When he wakes up, tell him to inquiry about someone named Henry James at DCB office. With his authority, he might be able to meet that person, tell him to meet him no matter what. Okay, enough talk, I am going. See ya!!” with that old man vanished as if he teleported out.