Varietas

Chapter I: Black Winter Night

He heard the roaring flames long before he saw them. The great light they produced illuminated the mountains as the small village they encompassed slowly burned. Screams emanated from the village. Many were cut short. Deep rumblings and inhuman shouts followed the shrieks, further despoiling the serenity of the mountains in which the village was nestled. A flash of lightning brought the face of a confused boy into the eye of the world for but a few brief seconds, but it was quickly lost in the darkness.

He'd only been gone for half an hour. He just wanted to explore the land surrounding his home after being away at school for so long. He missed these mountains. His eyes roamed over the great storm of fire as rain began to pelt downward, doing nothing to impede the flames' terrifying progress. His mind was whirling, 'How could this have happened? Is everyone all right? What are all these sounds?' Of all these, the thought that truly shook him to his core was, 'Is Nekane all right?'

She was the only family he had left. He couldn't bear to think of a world without her.

He looked to the ground, downcast, before he noticed something sticking out of his pocket. 'My wand...' It was a diminutive stick with a star-shaped block at its head. It was absolutely pathetic.

He withdrew his wand from his left pocket. It was little more than a twig in his hand, and with what meager training he possessed, it wasn't much more dangerous that one either. He looked first to his wand and then to the whirling maelstrom of fire that was his home. 'Who'll help them? The Thousand Master?' He scoffed in spite of himself. Maybe he wasn't experienced, maybe he wasn't a legendary wizard, maybe he really wouldn't be able to help, but maybe Nekane was dying. And despite his terror, he latched on to that thought. He wasn't the Thousand Master, but he did have a wand and a small repertoire of skills.

"If you were ever in any real danger, I'm sure you'd faint on the spot!" His friend's childish voice pierced his thoughts. Today he would prove her wrong.

Concentrating on the thought of Nekane and the others, he gritted his teeth, tightened his grip on his pathetic wand, and charged down into his village, fear and hope strengthening what resolve he could muster.

If he was going to die today, then he wanted to see his family one last time.

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Other than the roaring flames, the town was quiet and still. For a moment he entertained the thought that perhaps an elaborate trick was being played on him. That the flames and screams were simple charms to mess with him. Maybe it was just a prank even? A harmless spell that made the village look like it was burning.

And then he saw them.

The bodies of old friends and neighbors lay all through the streets. But they were not ripped to shreds or burned, he couldn't see their insides spilling out of their stomachs, none of what he had feared was what he saw.

They were frozen.

Frozen in frantic positions, with fear and pain etched onto their once cheerful faces. Most clutched weapons. If he had not known any better he would have thought that they were masterfully carved statues, but he did know better. 'Petrification? What the hell is going on?' He mentally flew through what he knew of this brand of magic: it was exceedingly difficult to perform, it could have ill effects on the user, it was irreversible.

It was permanent.

He had to find his sister.

He heard a loud thud behind him, and, silently praying it was simply the falling of rubble, turned around.

Staring back at him was the skull-like visage of a demon, a demon which bore two powerfully muscled wings on its back and a set of cruel horns atop its head.

He had only even read about these beings in his textbooks! They weren't supposed to be wandering around and pillaging small villages like his, they were supposed to be somewhere else, anywhere else! The demon turned its gaze upwards to him, and gazed into his soul with its glowing scarlet orbs before opening its mouth and emitting a great roar. His heart nearly stopped at the sound, and then some great deity decided that this one monstrous being simply wasn't enough.

He then heard answering roars all around him, in various pitches, each compounding his terror further. This was a full scale attack from a band of demons. Why?

Looking around, he saw that they were everywhere. Some of them were small, about the size of dogs, some almost the size of the buildings that burned beside them, and most were somewhere in the middle. And all could tear him to shreds. He regained his senses as quickly as he could and tore down the streets, his fearful mind hardly registering the statues that were once people and the rubble that used to be the "statues". He had to find his sister.

"Nekane! Where are you?" He shouted desperately. He scanned his surroundings as best he could, looking for any movement that didn't belong to a demonic carapace. He kept running, going to any place that had any significance between himself and his sister. Their favorite fountain, the swing Stan had built for the village, even his and Nekane's house. Everything was burning or crushed and Nekane wasn't there. "Nekane!" He shouted again.

A feminine scream answered him. It came from somewhere on the eastern side of the village. He looked behind him and saw the demons once again, although there were less, because some of them were probably too have followed him throughout the village. He took a right and ran towards the direction in which he'd heard his sister's scream, only to come practically face to face with a monstrosity. One that would haunt his dreams for years to come. It was roughly human sized, and flew in the air with powerful sinuous wings. On the crown of its skull-like head were a pair of horns which looked as if they belonged on a ram of some kind. Its body looked as if it wore a great suit of armor, though it was clearly its actual skin. Its face was menacing, a pair of luminescent yellow eyes amid great black pits directed at something laying before it.

'Sister!' She was sprawled out on the rubble, her flowing blonde hair spread around her. She seemed relatively unhurt... until he looked closer. Her lower body was an ashen gray. 'She's petrifying!' The demon lifted its gaze to him, before opening its mouth and letting out a deep laugh-like rumble.

Clenching his teeth and quickly wracking his brain for something to use, something to fight with, he raised his wand to the demon and began to chant as quickly as his brain and mouth would allow, "Rastel Maskil Magister," Great waves of light began emanating off of his arm as he recited his initiation phrase, "Sagita Magica Duodecim Sagittae Lucis!"

As he yelled the last words, light gathered around the tip of his wand, coalescing into twelve arrows of light that shot towards the demon at frightening speeds. The arrows pierced all over the great demon's body, flinging it back several meters.

Hoping, praying, that it was dealt with, he rushed to the fallen form of his sister. He kneeled next to her, dropping his wand at his side, "Nekane, are you all right?" He felt obliged to say this, and even though he dearly wished it to be true, he knew that it wasn't.

She turned towards him and smiled weakly, "Not really." She coughed, but instead of saliva or blood, dust flew from her mouth. He looked at the rest of her body, and his eyes widened. From her neck downwards, she, and her clothes, were completely gray. He picked her up and she weighed down upon his arms greatly. Far more than a human being should.

"You'll be a great mage, right Negi?" She questioned before coughing up more dust. "You'll be able to fix this won't you?"

He looked down to her, tears welling up in his eyes, as he held her in his arms, "Of course I will. You won't stay like this, I'll save you." He hugged her tightly

"Then don't cry Negi, we'll meet again." Nekane Springfield smiled up at him one last time.

Her formerly blue eyes were now gray. They were still locked with his own, but all life had fled them. She was petrified. A statue. She would never again to smile at anyone. Never again smile at him.

Negi Springfield, brother of Nekane Springfield, began to cry, the droplets stinging his eyes and wetting the stone figure he cradled in his arms. The rain began to pelt downwards even harder. He had just come home, after months and months of learning and practicing and training and not seeing her, and now he would never be able to talk to her again. "This isn't fair..." He choked to himself miserably, he was only ten years old, he needed her.

He gently laid his sister onto the ground as he wiped the tears from his eyes. Trying to steel himself, he grabbed for his wand, and shakily set it in his pocket.

"Life isn't fair kid," A deep voice ground out. He looked to where the noise came from, and saw a demon, the demon that he had hoped he had defeated. It looked into his eyes, before it began to laugh at him once again. "Don't worry kid, you'll be joining her soon enough!" It opened its mouth and light began gathering within it.

A wizened old voice croaked, "O Six-Pointed Star and Path of Shadows..."

He looked to the source of voice, and saw the robed form of an old, bearded man, a man who had been like a grandfather to him, 'Stan!' He clutched a bottle in his right hand, grim determination set on his face.

"Put a Seal upon this Spirit of Evil," He continued chanting his magic laced words, "Demon-Sealing Bottle!" With his last powerful words, he threw the bottle that he had been holding at the demon. A glowing hexagram burst into existence around the demonic being. The demon roared and its knees buckled, bringing it to the floor. The demon's body dissolved into a thick black gas that hung in the air and was sucked into the small bottle, in what felt like an instant. Its roars ceased abruptly and the bottle fell gently to the ground.

Negi looked to his "grandfather" and smiled.

And then he noticed that Stan's body was rapidly turning to stone. "Stan!" He cried helplessly.

Stan turned to him and smiled slightly, "It's too late for us Negi, you've got to get out of here," The pipe he had always held in his mouth wobbled as he talked, and was blown out of his mouth when he began to cough up the dust that had taken the place of his blood. "These demons were summoned here. They were too strong and too numerous for us. We couldn't defend ourselves. That ugly one was petrifying us one after another. Your uncle was one of the first." Stan frowned momentarily, but his expression quickly changed and he gripped Negi's shoulder tightly, "You can escape. You've got to leave here, you're the last of us left." he hacked up several specks of dust, before smiling and saying one last set of words, "Make us proud Negi!" The final vestiges of his consciousness left his gray eyes as he became one of the many statues standing watch throughout what used to be a village.

Tears flowed freely from Negi's eyes as he fell to the floor, the last of his mismatched family gone. 'Why?' He questioned within the safety of his head. Negi rubbed at his eyes, trying to rid himself of his weakness before looking up. Demons encroached upon him from all sides. They lumbered to him slowly, as he was no threat to them. He could do nothing but question his fate 'Why me? Why is everyone gone?'

A crack of thunder was his answer, as lightning tore through the black night sky to the demons. They were instantly obliterated, nothing but stray patches of dust remaining where they once towered. Negi's gaze tore upwards, and he witnessed a man floating down from the heavens with an aged staff at his back.

The man wore a robe of a light shade of brown and was turned away from him, facing the demons that were now rapidly advancing. His hair was much like Negi's own, nearly shoulder length, with the upper layers being red, with the lower layers being much darker. Negi's eyes widened as he realized who this man had to be.

"Negi. Stand back," Said the man calmly.

Negi obliged, and watched what proceeded. The robed man pointed his right arm towards an oncoming group of demons and, without a single chant, let loose a bolt of lightning, spearing a group of demons through their chest, and causing some of the weaker ones to simply disintegrate. He then raised the gnarled staff that he now held in his left hand towards the sky, and a great shaft of lightning tore downwards, a crowd of monsters vaporizing within seconds. Several more bolts descended following the first. Scores of the fiends met their ends to the terrifying might of the man known as the Thousand Master. Each successive lightning bolt shook the earth and kicked up an explosion of dirt, dust, and debris.

As the dust cleared, Negi saw the man holding a winged demon by its throat. The demon croaked out a few words, "At this level of power... It's hard to tell which of us is the monster," It didn't have the chance to speak more, for the hand that was holding it up twisted, snapping the beast's neck. The man once again raised his staff, casting down several more lightning bolts from the heavens.

What few demons survived were of no threat.

The man turned to Negi.

"I'm sorry," he stated solemnly, his eyes downcast, "My coming was too late,"

Negi turned towards the man, his voice soft, "The hero always arrives in the nick of time," he said, remembering stories his sister had told him as a child. His eyes became angry, and his voice rose "But what about Nekane's nick of time?"

The man recoiled, clearly not expecting such a response.

He should have been grateful, he knew it. But he wasn't. He was angry. His father had been gone his whole life. He was the most powerful wizard of the age, and yet, he couldn't even get here in time to save his own family?

"Or uncle's? Or Stan's? Or anyone in this whole village? Where were you when they needed you?" Negi stood up, his shoulders quivering in both rage and sadness, "Everyone who isn't dead is petrified! All because you were too busy making yourself even more famous!" He reigned his anger in to a controllable level, "Father," He ended, spitting as much scorn and grief and longing and fear into it as he could.

"It couldn't be helped Negi..." He replied, a tone of pleading in his voice.

"Nekane and Stan are petrified! There isn't a cure for that!" He yelled, tears stinging his now bright red and burning eyes once again, as his anger quickly returned "Or did you forget? Has the fame gone to your head? The only family who ever cared about me is all but dead!" He knew that wasn't who is father was. Nekane, uncle, and even Stan had all told him as much. His father was a great man with a lot of love in his heart, and Negi had longed to know him for as long as he could remember. But at that moment, when he finally met his father face to face, all he could do was lash out.

"I'm sorry," He said, "I'm sorry, that I've been unavailable to raise you." His father bowed his head, "I know that I have no true right to say this…" His voice became softer still, "But, grow up well, my son," He finished sadly. The man looked to his staff, and then back to his son before closing his brown eyes. He began ascending towards the sky, appearing much like an angel.

An angel that came too late.

"I will grow up father!" Negi shouted up at him, his anger the only thing keeping the loneliness at bay. "I'll be someone who can be there in a time of need!" Tears threatened to spring forth once more, and he gripped his wand so tightly it almost snapped. "I will succeed you Nagi Springfield!" He screamed towards his father and the heavens.

Negi thought he saw a smile on his face as the robed form of his father disappeared in a flash of lightning and a roar of thunder.

And then Negi Springfield was alone.

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AN: As stated in the summary, this will be a Dark! Negi fanfiction, and will contain a NegiHarem pairing.

As of 9-12-09 (and later 12-26-16) I have slightly revised this chapter. I fixed a few parts I didn't like, and overall attempted to make it a bit better.

I shall be giving the same treatment to the other chapters so stay tuned!

Any questions, criticisms, and/or suggestions? Feel free to ask, criticise, and/or suggest!