A/N: Well guys, I updated this particular snippet solo even though I already added it to the previous chapter cos some people may not be able to see it, and also because (when you see the length of this chapter) I decided to be nice and not kill your eyes and brains by making you read so much text in one shot, so make sure you return the favour and REVIEW!

Once I deem chapter 21 complete, I'm going to remove all individual acts and compile them under 'Chapter 21', you can read everything there in case you miss it.

Chapter 21, Act 2: The Blood Link

"What?!"

"You heard me Phoenix. We're mounting an offensive on Orbis two days from now. It's time we made the push."

The ranger stared at the Dark Lord incredulously, both in disbelief but simultaneously, relief.

Relief because it was about time that they made the push to Ossyria - but disbelief because they were ridiculously low on manpower. Several hundred of their soldiers were already hospitalized, with a few thousand more already dead. Zeraion didn't know how the Wise Men intended to make a successful offensive with a grossly under-sized army, but as far as he could see this was an attempt that bordered on suicidal. Apparently, all five of his assembled squadmates, Ryden included, shared that sentiment. All of them were staring at the two Wise Men before them with expressions that bordered on incredulous.

"Dark Lord, with respect sir, I think our army is in hardly any condition to be making an offensive." Zeraion tried to protest. "We're already hopelessly outnumbered by the Necropolis garrison on Orbis - not to mention the fleet they most probably have defending that town. Our own fleets are barely ready to fight them, I don't see how-"

"We've already covered that part, Phoenix," The ninja lord reassured him confidently. "You didn't think we were foolish enough to attempt an assault on an enemy fortress with a crippled army, do you?"

Zeraion didn't like the look that the ninja lord was giving him, but Tora, who was standing next to him and apparently felt the same way, expressed his sentiments before the ranger could.

"Don't tell me... you're throwing all of us into the fight." The chief bandit said.

Dances with Balrog nodded an affirmative, but Tora simply scoffed in response.

"There's no way even the six of us all together can make up for the losses that our army has taken." Ascion protested. "Sir, I respect the confidence that you have in us, but this is simply too much!"

"Not to mention that we're leaving our own garrisons vulnerable with all of us away from Victoria Island at the same time," Ark added. "Necropolis might take the chance to stab us in the back if we concentrate too much of our strength in one assault."

"We got that covered as well," Dances with Balrog stated with a confident grin. "Personally."

Zeraion's jaw nearly dropped open, and Ryden smirked. "So I guess we don't have to worry about anything back in Vic then?"

The Dark Lord shook his head, but Ascion was not convinced. "That still doesn't answer my question! How do you intend to make up for our army's losses with just the six of us?"

Dances with Balrog sighed, and looked at the priest with an expression that plainly said Are you dumb or are you dumb?

"Major Blade, you're forgetting about the Necropolis Separatists that we took in. While not really making up completely for our lost numbers, their aid in itself will be considerable. And did you really think the six of you are the only trump cards we have?"

"So... you want me to take part in this assault as well?" Rathias asked Athena slowly.

"Not just you, Rathias - all four of you. Delta Squad will be participating as well. We'll hold the fort here while you, Seles, Raizen and Stalrigarde are away." The bowmistress told him, her expression serious.

Rathias pursed his lips, but he only managed to hold it in for a few seconds - a loud chuckled escaped from his mouth a moment later.

"You've got to be kidding me, Athena. I just got hospitalized, and as much as I want to get back out there as well, it defies common sense to discharge me two days after having surgery on my eye!" The bowmaster said incredulously.

"You do realize what we did, right?" Athena said cautiously.

Gardner sighed, and pressed his hand against the eye patch covering his left eye. "I guess there's nothing I can do about it. Either way, I'd still have been blind in my left eye if you hadn't done anything. As much as I resent you making this decision without my consent... I realise that if I were in your position, I'd have done the same. Better to take a gamble than simply surrender to fate."

"Then I'm glad we understand each other." Athena replied, with a trace of relief in her voice.

"So... what was the result? Am I still blinded in that eye? Why is it covered?" The bowmaster asked.

"It was a narrow save," Athena confessed. "The operation had a 10 percent chance of your body completely accepting the eye, a 30 percent chance of it only partially accepting it... and a 60 percent chance of rejecting it. I'm not surprised that your body failed to completely accept the eye, but I'm thankful that it wasn't a complete waste."

The bowmaster released the breath he had been unconsciously holding. "That's good, then," At least he still had sight in his left eye, though it still didn't answer why it was covered. Apparently Athena wasn't going to answer any more questions about the surgery, so Rathias decided to turn his attention back to the briefing.

"What we transplanted into you should have increased your powers as well, Rathias. You feel it already, don't you?" Grendel finally said. "That's why we're throwing you out into the field so soon after this surgery - we know you've recovered quickly enough."

Taking in what the wizened archmage had said, the bowmaster realized he was right - even for something as simple as moving his arm, his movements already felt stronger, surer. Even his eyesight in his undamaged eye seemed sharper, and if he focused enough, he could make out the exact pattern of the intricate grooves on Grendel's staff - something he knew he wasn't capable of before.

"You will be at full strength in time for the assault, Rathias. Don't worry about the details." Athena reassured him. "Now, we have the battle plan to go over..."

"Necropolis will undoubtedly lead the defense of their fortress with their battle fleet first, so we will have to deal with that aerial battle first before we can make landfall," Dances with Balrog stated. "General Gardner and General Raizen will lead the fleet's main battleships, while Commander Phoenix and Major Tales lead the snub fighter squadrons. The rest of you will be waiting on the assault barges. Once the Necropolis fleet has been dealt with, our forces will make landfall. You'll find that the procedure will differ little from your old mission at Ellinia."

"3rd Company, our Infiltration Corps, led by Lieutenant Drakeson, will target the power plants first to knock out their defense grid as quickly as possible." The Dark Lord continued for him. "Once that is accomplished, 5th Company, our Heavy Assault Force, led by Captain Wolfen will lead a rush to take out their communications so they can't call for support before the emergency backup generators kick in."

"Simultaneous with 5th Company's assault, 7th, 8th, 4th and 6th Company, our Ranged Support and Spellcaster forces, led by Lieutenants Arklanser and Arundale, as well as Major Blade and Lieutenant Leinharte respectively will target the barracks and the armories to take out as many of their forces before they can fully mobilize. Captain Igzarion will be placed in charge of 9th Company, which will be held in reserve should 7th and 8th Company run into any trouble. Members of 10th Company, our medical corps, while be placed under the command of Captain Iris Shizune, and will be dispersed amongst the other nine companies to keep them in fighting condition."

"Once the barracks and armories have been destroyed," Dances with Balrog said once Dark Lord had finished his lengthy explanation, "1st and 2nd Company, our main and secondary assault force, led by Generals Seles and Stalrigarde, and Colonel Dracon, will lay siege to their Command Centre. Once the Command Centre's outer perimeter has been breached, all Company Leaders are to take a quarter of their men and converge upon the Command Centre. Commander Phoenix and Major Tales are also to take part in the assault. While they are away, General Raizen will have overall command of the aerial fleet."

"One question, sir," Roxi quickly raised a hand. "Do we have any intel on how strong the enemy defense fleet is?"

"Unfortunately, no," The Dark Lord said darkly. "In the wort case scenario, given the strength of the raiding fleets that have been attacking lately, and our own fleet's current strength, they will outnumber us at least five to one."

"That's insane!" Rathias burst out. "How do you expect us to win with a fleet five times smaller than their own!?"

"Calm down, Gardner," Grendel said forcefully. "The Necropolis Separatists brought along some ships of their own. And they're not just frigates or destroyers - they've managed to bring us ships from the top of their lines. I'm sure a dozen Necropolis cruisers will surely be enough to even the odds for us."

"You also forget, Gardner, that Necropolis grows complacent in their technology and hacks," Athena reminded the bowmaster. "They have become content to let their hacks do the work for them that they rarely get up and do it themselves; basically they've lost grasp of tactics and strategy and have become simple-minded in their battle methods. The only reason we have prevailed so far is that though our equipment is inferior, we let our heads and our minds compensate for that weakness. Tactics, Gardner. If a GDI frigate with smart tactics can stand up to a Necropolis frigate that's not using tactics at all, imagine how devastating a Necropolis cruiser could be with those same tactics applied."

"That's... completely one-sided," Ryden said with a smirk, leaning against the doorway behind the rest of his squadmates. "Hardly seems fair."

"Don't forget Ryden, Necropolis still has the advantage of numbers," Dances with Balrog said seriously. "The Separatists' help only gives us a chance at evening out the odds, but we'll still have to keep on our toes if we're going to win."

"As I said earlier, the assault is two days from now, so within 48 hours, Operation: Overlord will commence. Take the time to prepare yourselves for the coming battle - it will undoubtedly be one of the hardest GDI has ever gone through so far. Dismissed!" The Dark Lord stated. One by one, the Dead Six filed out of the briefing room, until Ryden was the last one remaining, as though he still had a question.

"You have something to ask us, son of Dracon?" The Dark Lord questioned the crusader, who stood stock still from his position against the doorway.

"You mentioned that I'm in command of 2nd company... but you have two generals in command of 1st company. Why is that so? Is my presence really necessary in this battle?" Ryden asked curiously.

"Of course it is, Ryden," Dances with Balrog stated. "You're the single most powerful individual in this army. Without you, 2nd company's strength will be more than halved, even if General Stalrigarde takes over in your place."

"I'm sure that hermit can handle things," Ryden remarked offhandedly. "I... may have prior commitments."

"Prior commitments?" The Dark Lord asked incredulously. "What commitment could possibly come before this war??"

Ryden's eyes locked with those of the ninja lord, and even the king of thieves, who was allegedly the most hard-hearted of the Four Wise Men, nearly flinched at the crusader's own orbs - dark brown orbs that had once sparkled with life and hope were now all but empty and black, save for the burning fires of the desire for revenge.

"It's a personal matter, Dark Lord. Let's just leave it at that."

Before either of the two wise men could say anything, Ryden turned on his heel and swiftly left the room, leaving the duo standing in shocked silence, and it was several moments before the Dark Lord could get his mouth working.

"He's too much like his father now, Dances. Gods forbid, he may end up exactly like him..."

Twelve Hours later...

Deep within the confines of the caverns, a robed figure sat in the center of a pentagram, legs crossed and hand clasped as if in deep meditation. A sheathed katana lay across the figure's crossed legs, and trembled slightly as the figure murmured words of arcane power over and over again, triggering tiny tremors in the chamber they were in.

Far at the back of the cavernous chamber, yet another robed figure, this one taller than the other, watched the other in complete silence. His stoic poise was a complete contrast to his mental state - he was practically bursting with anticipation. The ceremony was nearing completion - soon, the entire world of Bera would tremble at their feet as they unleashed the power of a thousand demons upon them.

Meanwhile, the one seated in front of him, her robes draped about her svelte figure, intensified her murmurings of the incantations, focusing and channeling all the mana she could spare into the sapphire blue amulet that hung across her neck. Her thoughts were greatly different from her accomplice's; it had been a narrow save, retrieving that amulet - it had been by a stroke of pure, dumb luck that while searching for it, she stumbled upon it as it was worn by one of the POWs that Necropolis had kept as trophy victims from the raid on Last Hope's headquarters oh so long ago. Astella had completely forgotten the name of the POW that she had found it on, but the poor sod had been tortured beyond sanity by her guild superiors that even she felt the need to put the poor bastard out of his misery. What they did to him was so horrible that it made her stomach turn to even think about it, so she instead concentrated on the task at hand whenever she began to think of how she had managed to get the amulet.

As the pentagram she sat within began to glow an infernal red, she quickly changed her set of incantations and began performing hand seals rapidly as well. Abruptly the colour of the pentagram changed from an infernal red to a deep lavender purple, as the mana stored inside the amulet worn across her neck began to flow into the summoning pentagram and merge with the already-existing energy inside the arte.

And as the summoning reached completion, far beneath them, thousands of feet buried beneath the earth, an ancient structure of ungodly proportions began to shift from inside the prison of earth and rock that had confined it for decades. The last time it had been summoned was in a great war that had nearly changed the world, but as fortune would have it, the world produced an unlikely hero that put it down before it could unleash the horrors that it kept confined within, and before that, it had remained untouched for a millenia. Astella didn't need to be a history genius to know that the aforementioned "unlikely hero" was Ryden's father, Dracon, but this time...

This time, there would be no "unlikely hero" to put the tower down. Astella was expecting Ryden to turn up, and when he did... she would take his half of the amulet, complete it, and claim the power of Dracon's sword.

Ryden didn't go anywhere without the Force Edge, even if he hardly used it. Astella knew her former lover well enough that she had everything planned out in a manner that she knew everything would proceed smoothly once the first steps were taken. Once the tower was raised, nothing would stop her.

Absolutely nothing.

Miles away, at the very same moment, deep within the confines of Necropolis' Citadel, hidden away inside the blasted, Tiberium-devastated wasteland that used to be Omega Sector, a figure seated inside a vast chamber exactly mirrored Astella's movements. As the distant priestess set a delicate hand on the hilt of the katana that rested on her crossed legs, the figure did exactly the same to the hilt of the sleek, silver longsword that lay across his own lap. As the priestess rose to her feet, the figure did exactly the same, mirroring her movements perfectly. And as they both straightened simultaneously, the figure opened his eyes, while Astella's remained closed.

Yes... This is perfect.

What little light in the chamber only illuminated his silhouette, and the familiar bald head of Necropolis' Guildmaster was immediately apparent. Hidden by the darkness, his lips peeled back in a savage grin - the anticipatory grin of a predator that had succeeded in cornering a prey that was completely unaware of its presence.

The priestess played her part out perfectly... If I'd known it was going to be this easy, I wouldn't have bothered with all the subtleties. And now, all that is left is the son of Dracon...

Slowly raising his curved longsword to his face, Kain softly caressed the blade with his fingers, grinning sinisterly in anticipation. Smoothly sheathing the blade into the scabbard that rested on his waist, his hand stopped covering the hilt just long enough for the name Tsurugi no Kusanagi to be seen carved onto it, in smooth cursive letters.

Then, as abruptly as the carving was revealed, Kain disappeared from the chamber.

And within the bustling streets of Kerning city, nestled comfortable in his office chair, Ryden sat at the desk of his agency's office, the Dragon's Redgrave, staring up at the ceiling blankly. A half-eaten pizza lay within its open box on his desk, right next to his propped-up, booted feet, and his twin pistols, Ebony & Ivory, lay across his lap, on the smooth, black leather of the pants that he was wearing. His upper body's powerful physique, ripped and lean, lay exposed to the chilly, air-conditioned office air, and from his neck dangled his mother's amulet, the ruby glittering under the office's dim flourescent lights, the metal of the chain cool against his skin.

Ebony & Ivory had come a long way from the claws that they were once originally forged as - constantly tinkered with and upgraded until they both resembled and rivalled Omega Sector's infamous Desert Eagle Handguns, Ryden knew that they were the only guns of their kind in Bera (at least, for the moment). They had even progressed from using regular stars to an entirely different ammunition type, not even the bullets that Omega Sector's firearms used. Omega Sector's Desert Eagle handguns had two variants - one that used a calibre coded as .45 ACP, and was used widely as a standard sidearm by Omega's Peacekeeper forces, their standard soldiers, and a larger, more powerful calibre that usually wet the pants of whoever went up against Omega's Enforcers squadron, their elite regiment, whenever they heard its code: .357 MAGNUM. Of course, both of those calibres, and the Desert Eagle variants that used them, had long since been destroyed ever since the Tiberium nukes had landed. Omega Sector had been long declared a Red Zone, and all of Omega Sector's weapons were probably either destroyed or raided and laid claim to by Necropolis by now.

Still, that didn't stop Ryden from innovating. With a few hundred rounds he had managed to scavenge from odds and ends that GDI expeditionary trips had managed to recover from trips to Yellow Zones, the very same tinkering that he did to Ebony & Ivory and transformed them into the pistols they were now resulted in producing their very own ammunition type as well - in homage to the .357 MAGNUM calibre, that Ryden had heard had enough kick to stop even a Lycanthrope in its tracks, he had named the new calibre he had created .50 AE, or as he always referred to lovingly as "Fifty Cal Action Express".

Nobody ever bothered to remember their full names, but they had become damn near legendary in GDI's army for their stopping power. Eight golden cartridges, each chocked full of six of those rounds, lay stacked on Ryden's desk next to the open pizza box, and just one cartridge's worth of bullets would be enough to literally drop three Crimson Balrogs. He was the only one on the planet who knew how to make this calibre of rounds, and as such he was the only wielder of it.

The rest of Ryden's arsenal had not changed much, though some of the weapons he had originally forged during his initial training as an Agent had phased out into obsoleteness. The Kalina Ann and Spiral had been lying in his agency's storeroom, unused and collecting dust for months already, but Ryden had no intention of breaking them out of storage. Ifrit lay smouldering on his desk to his right while Shiva sat at the foot of the table, still frigid and frosted over. Alastor, sealed into its katana form, lay against the table to his left where he could grab it at a moment's notice, but despite all the weapons that were stacked around him, Ryden didn't make any moves to take hold of any of them.

Instead, he lay stock still, leaning back in his chair, seemingly staring blankly at the ceiling. To the untrained eye it would have appeared that he was sleeping, albeit with his eyes open, but any mage would have recognised the state he was in - he was in a state that lay somewhere between meditation and a trance, something that beginner magicians used to aid themselves in sensing mana on a level not perceived by any of the other jobs classes, as well as making it easier for them to mould it, hence their ability to wield magic unlike anybody else on Bera. Still, as magicians progressed in skill, they used that trance-like state less and less often as it was deemed too slow to be practically applied to training - once mana perception and moulding became second nature to them, they completely abandoned the trance arte in favour of more "fast-and-easy" methods, like the typical grinding method that had been used by magicians long before the Guild War had erupted.

Not very many knew of the applications of using the trance arte once one was well-versed enough in the arcane arts of magic and spellcasting, and even fewer had actually used it. The result of using such an arte when one was skilled enough would be a massive expansion of the user's consciousness as well as their senses, allowing them to sense the mana signature and life force of every living thing within a radius around them that measured in the miles - the precise radius depended completely upon the individual's power level.

In short, the trance arte made its users all but omniscient, and Ryden was completely submerged in it.

His dark brown eyes, vacant and blank, were a direct contrast to the bustle of mental activity in his mind. All around him, he could feel the mana signatures and life forces of the denizens of Kerning City as they went about their daily, or in this case, nightly businesses, but as overwhelming as their numbers were to even the trained mind, Ryden had long since cast his senses past such mundane details.

Instead, he drove his focus towards the very centre of Victoria Island... and once there, dove straight down.

Kilometre after kilometre of solid rock and earth rushed past him as he surged downward, deeper and deeper, and eventually the familiar sensation of rock and earth was replaced by another feeling, this one completely alien and bursting with chaotic energy.

Tiberium... Ryden thought to himself. I must be getting close...

Pressing further on, he surged past layer after layer of bedrock, and eventually through layer after layer of massive Tiberium crystals, but still he did not sense what he was searching for. Just as he thought he had the wrong spot, he felt a familiar mana signature - an extremely familiar one. It was extremely distant and faint, fluctuating in and out of perception, but it was there.

There you are... Locking his focus onto the faint signature, Ryden pursued it like a bloodhound. As the signature grew stronger and stronger, Ryden felt the fluctuations increase in magnitude as well - it was as though the owner of the signature was casting a spell of epic proportions.

Ryden didn't need to be a rocket scientist to figure out what was going on.

It's happening... She's doing it.

Almost imperceptibly, despite his blank and nearly dead eyes, the corners of Ryden's mouth turned upwards in a feral grin.

I've been waiting for this.

I've been waiting for this. Kain thought to himself as he caressed the blade of his curved longsword again, eyeing the bright red neon sign in front of him; the neon sign that read Dragon's Redgrave. What a fitting name for the crusader's agency, taking the name of the legendary beast that the ferocity and tenacity of his father's power had once been likened to. Eventually the whelp would mature into a proverbial dragon himself, but Kain had things to do before that happened. Limiters to place, or in this case...

Augmenters.

Kain grinned to himself once more, and unclenched his left fist, revealing the pattern of three tomoes arranged inwards in a circular pattern on his palm, each identical to one another.

Raising his right hand, he formed it into a straight palm, and gestured casually at the building with the neon sign before him before he disappeared from sight once more.

A sudden fluctuation of sinister mana slammed into Ryden like a ton of bricks - reacting instinctively, he withdrew his mental probe all the way back to his own body, and immediately began scanning his surroundings.

The very first thing that registered with him was that the mana aura surrounding his office was a deep, hellish crimson, instead of the usual cool, azure blue that it typically was.

The very first thing that happened was an invisible force ramming straight into his desk, presumably to catch him off guard and off balance.

Unfortunately for whoever the caster was, the spell had been cast a tad too slow.

The crusader reacted. He always reacted. There was not even any think to begin with any longer. His body had been here before a thousand of a thousand times over, and it got the job done before his brain could decide if it had anything to say about getting ready for a fight.

Moving automatically in a motion that seemed to have been rehearsed countless times over, Ryden threw himself upwards in a backwards flip, as the spell sent the pizza box, Ebony & Ivory, Ifrit, and the bullet cartridges flying upwards. The desk continued flipping end over end backwards until it hit the very back of the office, and Ryden landed perfectly upon it, perched almost like a predatory cat, with hawk-like eyes immediately surveying the room beyond him. With inhuman speed, his right hand flicked outwards in an almost imperceptible motion, snapping like a snake's lunge, and suddenly he had Ivory locked in his grip, levelled straight in front of him.

But as impressive as his acrobatic display was, the most stark change of all was visible in his eyes - within moments, they had shifted from a blank, empty and dead gaze, to an utterly focused and hardened stare, one forged and tempered by battle, and a feral glint of anticipation was barely visible in the edges of his pupils.

Ifrit, Shiva, and Ebony and all its bullet cartridges clattered all over the floor all around him, but Ryden didn't move a muscle. The crusader spent several moments surveying the room in front of him, the slitted pupils and feral yellow irises of his eyes indicating that he had activated his Draconic Vision and was scanning the room in front of him for any potential threats. Several moments later when it was apparent that nothing else had made an incursion, he let out a breath of relief and stepped off the desk, his eyes returning to normal as he holstered Ivory and raised his left palm upwards, flawlessly catching the pizza box (and its contents) as it fell.

And as the windows and walls all around him in his office began to shatter and crash inwards, revealing all manner of Tiberium-mutated monsters, all slavering and baying for the crusader's blood, the son of the legendary Dracon allowed himself a small grin.

This was how he lived his life, and he wouldn't have it any other way.

The blades the monsters carried plunged themselves into his body over and over, and he offered no resistance.

Meanwhile, at the Philadelphia...

Rathias Gardner examined the katana that had been offered to him, giving it a quizzical look, as though he had no idea why he was expected to make a connection with such a weapon.

"You expect me to use this?" Were the only words the Bowmaster could conjure, his disbelief at the situation he was in nearly locking the words in his throat due to the sheer incredulity of it.

"Rathias," Athena began in a warning tone, "There are several reasons why I'm presenting this katana to you. First of which are diplomatic - if we're going to show the Necropolis Separatists that we trust them and are willing to acept their aid, we'll have to start using the weapons they have given to us out of goodwill. Second of which... You'll see what I mean when you've trained enough on this thing." The bowmistress gestured for him to follow him, and began walking through the winding corridors of GDI's main headquarters.

"'Trained enough'?" Rathias asked, his eyes nearly bugging out as he made to follow her. "Athena, you're giving me a frigging Deathbringer, and I know it takes Agents decades to master this thing to a point where its effectiveness is barely passable! How am I going to-"

Athena raised a hand to silence him, almost as though she knew what he was going to say next. "Rathias, I wouldn't give you this weapon if I didn't have a way of making you capable of using it effectively in time for Operation: Overlord. Now, even as we speak, Grendel has given one to Grace Raizen, Dances with Balrog has bestowed another upon Keiga Seles, and the Dark Lord has granted it to Joseph Stalrigarde as well. We all have a plan for this." Athena didn't even bother correcting the bowmaster on his previous statement - the weapon she was offering was in fact not a Deathbringer - in his disbelieving ignorance, Garnder had chosen to call the katana by the name he knew such a thing by best, rather than as the 'Soul Slayers' or Zanpakutos that the Separatists had so willingly provided them with.

"If you say so, Athena..." Rathias muttered hesitantly, following his mentor down the corridor. "Still, I don't see how I can master this thing on time to-"

The bowmaster's speech ground to a sudden halt as they turned around a corner, to a corridor that Rathias himself had never walked down before; now he knew why.

The sign that he was staring up at in disbelief read 'Hyperbolic Time Chamber'.

Despite his disbelief, Rathias' lips turned upwards in an excited grin. "Oh, you've got to be fucking kidding me."

"I'm not," Athena replied next to him. "This is the aforementioned plan I spoke of earlier. But before we begin your training, there's one last thing we need to do..."

"Oh really? And what's that?" Rathias turned to face his mentor to see what she meant, and the very last thing that he saw was Athena raising the blade in front of her, running it through the very centre of his being.

A/N: Ok, Act 2 ends here. I'll get around to producing Act 3 when the inspiration starts flowing again... Or maybe there won't be an Act 3, I'll just skip ahead to producing the next chapter. All depends on how my planning goes... I'm getting a bit lost as to what exactly is supposed to be happening here, I only have a rough idea. Geez, I haven't touched this story for too long...