I was going to have to do the one thing I never wanted to do, much less never admit to doing.

  I needed a nap.

  x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

  "Wow, she's really out of it, isn't she?" Vert turned her head, observing Hinum, the side of her head buried deeply in the pillow in front of her. Hinum's leg was elevated, keeping the pressure off it as she dozed. Which was the real sign that Hinum was out like a light. She never slept on her side. Ever. The few times Vert had woken her up, Hinum was always on her back. Always. That, and Hinum was a notoriously light sleeper. It didn't take much to stir her unless she was really tired.

  Yes, things could have changed since then, but Vert doubted it. Hinum had been a creature of habit. She wakes up at a similar time, has the same breakfast, and deviates from lunch and dinner just as much as she was forced to. It was kinda cute, in a way. Then again, despite her somewhat temperamental nature, Hinum was extremely cute. If you knew what buttons to press, and pressed them with great care, that was.

  "Let her rest. Yesterday was a long day for her," and that was the truth. It had been a long day for all of their sisters. A completely unexpectedly long day for them, at that. The least they could do was let them sleep. Especially as Vert knew better enough than to think Hinum was getting rest outside of sleeping otherwise.

  As much as Hinum wanted to just throw the reins at her and be done with it, Vert could tell the girl had gotten far too wrapped up in her work to de-stress rapidly. Or even slowly. Hinum's work ethic was to be applauded, but she took it much too far. Getting her to relax was going to be an adventure of its own, Vert could already tell. If someone told her that she would have to pull out the big sister card and tell her little sister to do nothing but play video games all day.

  Okay, she'd do that under normal circumstances anyway. Vert knew herself well enough to not lie about such matters. But it wasn't like Hinum naturally deserved it by being her darling little sister anyway. She deserved nothing but the best, including cookies.

  Even if Hinum was effectively an adult stuck in the body of an immortal teenager that very much didn't take kindly to such babying. Still, she needed it, if only it would get Hinum to relax just a bit. If it weren't for that effective immortality, Vert would have been concerned about what the stress would do to her life expectancy, on top of the damage it was already doing.

  So letting Hinum get her rest in while she could was good. That being said, there was something important missing from the adorable picture before her.

  Which made it a good thing she managed to bring this along. She managed to hide it from Hinum in her bag, and it was absolutely worth the effort it took to do so.

  "What even is that thing?" Blanc asked, as Vert pulled the small brown, stuffed animal out of her bag. Hinum had called it a triceratops. She'd never seen anything like it, so it had to be from Hinum's home. Hinum had said it was extinct, whatever that meant. Vert had to wonder what it must be like to pet one of these creatures. Did it feel like the stuffed animal, or did its skin have some other texture to it?

  "Shhh! Be quiet and watch!" Vert shushed Blanc, the smaller Goddess biting back a squawk of indignation as Vert slowly lowered the plush down onto the bed, setting it gently in front of her. All she had to do was wait for a few moments. As the mattress shifted, Hinum's snuggle instincts went into full effect.

  Her hands lashed out, pulling the stuffed animal to her chest, her hug being a cute but effective trap. Vert fought the urge to squeal in delight as Hinum buried her face into the back of the plush, letting out a soft sigh of contentment as she did so.

  Pulling out her phone to take a few, okay, several pictures of her sleeping sister as she snuggled the stuffed animal like it was a lifeline. Hinum was just so, adorable! For all her prickliness, sometimes, she liked stuffed animals, being hugged (admittedly, circumstantially and only by people she actually liked), and a few other things most would consider feminine.

  Now all Vert had to do was convince her to wear a skirt. Hinum always preferred pants, but she would look so cute in them! It was a shame that didn't get to see Green Sister's first appearance in a dress live. Another thing that the ASIC took away from her. At least Hinum hadn't worn a dress yet. She was going to get to see that happen, one way or another.

  "You're weird," Blanc crossed her arms as Vert continued to take pictures.

  "I'm not weird, she's my sister!" Vert hissed back. "I have to immortalize these moments!"

  Hinum was cute. Naturally cute, even if she didn't like showing it off most of the time. Vert didn't get many moments like this. Already, so many had been stolen by Arfoire and the ASIC. She had to make up for lost time right now.

  As Vert raised her camera to take another picture, a hand lashed out, gripping it firmly.

  "Vert, I love you dearly, but I swear if you keep interrupting my nap the only thing that is going to be immortalized is how hard I throw this thing into the actual sun," Hinum's voice ground out, a single eye-opening-like a roused dragon. Her other arm wrapped around the plush protectively, covering its eyes as if to protect it from something unseemly.

  The message was very clearly, received.

  x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

  It was never fun when I was tired enough to nap. When the sun was up, my brain was active. If the sun was up, I shouldn't be sleeping. At all. The light was get up and go juice being injected straight into my eyeballs. Far more health and better for me than swigging an entire cup of coffee to wake up in the morning. Just as nature intended.

  Which meant when I napped when the sun was up? I was exhausted. Probably even beyond exhausted, really. When was the last time I took a nap? Pretty sure it was well before this back in highschool where I spent two nights without a single bit of sleep.

  Not one of my brighter moments, I fully admit to that.

  I stretched as much as I could with my busted up leg. It wasn't a break, thankfully. Compa said it was a fracture though. Which was no matter how one looked at it, still an unpleasant injury.

  It was the first time I'd even injured a bone like this. I wasn't exactly the outdoors type. So I was technically on bedrest unless something came up as an emergency.

  So I was waiting for the emergency.

  What? With three of the four felons dead, Magik was going to have to respond somehow. I don't care how powerful she was. If she was the only one left, she was a major disadvantage.

  Between the evisceration of leadership and the damage done? The ASIC had to be panicking right now. Especially as I was never sure how much Magik was a part of the leadership in the first place. Judge was never really that active on that front, either. Administration was largely Brave and Trick's area. That, and the humans.

  But yeah, losing Trick and Brave, as well as all those monsters, all in a single night? It was going to be unpleasant. All I needed to do was rest up until Magik started to cause shit.

  Just side back, and relax.

  God I was going to go absolutely insane if I didn't have something to do right now.

  Yes, yes, rest was important, but there was work to be done! Sure, I didn't know what type of work, but there was still stuff needing to be done!

  Slowly, I opened my eyes, preparing to push off the bed to find something to do before I lost it out of shear, overwhelming boredom. Then I noticed that there was something in my arms.

  Fuzzy? My eyes flickered open, allowing me to see the stuffed plush, my arms wrapped around him, holding him against my chest.

  Huh. How did you get there? I'm pretty sure I'd let Fuzzy back at the Basilicom, even when traveling. Especially when traveling. I didn't want to risk losing him, one of the, no, last connection to my home. Only connection to what I had before.

  I couldn't afford to lose that. Couldn't take that risk. I continued to snuggle the stuffed plush, resting my head on his. I shift, burying my body back inside the covers as much as possible, closing my eyes again. I wouldn't get any sleep, but.

  Then the bed quaked. The entire tower quaked. Shockwaves roiled throughout the building, even making their way into my body was I did everything in my power to avoid being thrown out of bed. By the time the shaking stopped?

  Yeah, that's what I get for thinking I was going to get a break for more than five minutes, wasn't it?

  Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.

  x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

  "Are you sure you're up for this?" Nepgear asked as we flew.

  "Going to have to be," I frowned slightly. Yes, a leg fracture was, in fact, a bastard. But it wasn't like we could afford me sitting this out. This was kinda an all-hands-on-deck situation. Whatever Magik was doing, it was big. The earthquakes coming out of the Graveyard were growing more and more intense.

  It was not exactly impossible that Magik was trying to rouse Arforie from her slumber. To try and compensate for the loss of the remaining two felons. But there was a part of me that, doubted that.

  Magik did not seem like the one to panic. She did not seem to be the type to do things hastily. Frankly, from how she was killing to let Judge just bite it without doing a single damn thing, she didn't seem to care about her fellow felons in the slightest. And that worried me.

  There was something we were missing here. A piece of the puzzle that we just couldn't see.

  Whatever it damn well was, I really hope it didn't end up biting us in the ass.

  x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

  Having magic force fields in artillery duels should be classified as unfair, and banned in all legal competition.

  Or in other words, Magik was a cheating cheater that cheated.

  "It's adorable how you think you can defeat!"

  BOOM!

  I was already moving after I fired off the shot, magical lasers filling the space where I once was. About one in ten hits was making it to her. With nine of us, we were slowly wearing her down.

  If we could drive her to the ground, we'd be able to swarm her with a lot more people.

  But no, the dark magical girl wannabe had to do this in the air. Complete with a giant, shit!

  I rocketed backward, narrowly avoiding the massive scythe by the skin of my teeth, the wind whistling as it sailed by. The next thing I knew, she was able to pivot the momentum from the swing into a kick to my stomach. Pain flared up as I was sent flying backward, tumbling through the air. Magik readied another swing, only to have to raise her barrier again, giving me enough time to escape her range, joining in on the barrage.

  She was not making this easy on us, that was for damn sure. It seemed like we'd interrupted whatever it was she was doing, but we'd need to finish her off in this engagement.

  Vert managed to get in a few solid hits but was forced to break away as Magik brought her scythe around, laughing like a madwoman. Pulling backward I charged a shot that only managed to pierce halfway through Magik's barrier before exploding. Cracks began to form along it, as I grinned, only for the shield to quickly begin restoring itself.

  Yeah, I hated her already. A few more arrows went into the barrier, having less impact as she began to move, before being cut off by the tandem of Neptune and Nepgear, swords flashing in a brutal assault. Magik was able to ward them off, though she took a hit from Noire from behind in the process.

  Before Magik could retaliate, Uni, Rom, Ram, and I launched a coordinated attack, managing to break through the barrier for a fraction of a second, drawing her attention away as fire and ice roared around her. A blade of darkness erupted, cutting through the air and forcing us to scatter. But Blanc took the opportunity to get a strong hit in, her axe connecting with Magik's jaw, this time enough to send Magik skidding backwards.

  It was becoming increasingly apparent how Magik managed to defeat our sisters. If she was taking this sort of beating from all nine of us, then five weren't going to win, no question about it. The fact there were nine of us, and we were struggling more than that time we fought Judge was, not a good sign. We were winning, I think, but.

  Was the Graveyard powering her up or something? Was she just getting some type of home field advantage here? It sounded almost ridiculous on paper, and yet.

  It could just be because Magick was really just built different compared to all the others. I mean, she was the only she among the four felons. She. Was.

  Was she supposed to be a dark mirror of a CPU? God, just when I thought Arfoire didn't have enough originality as is.

  I flew closer to Uni, only for a beam of shadow to fill the air between us. That was, interesting. An idea began to form in my head. I just needed a way to let Uni know what it is without physically being closer to her. If Magik was willing to go out her way like that to stop us, then something had her spooked.

  Rom and Ram may add magical power, but Uni and I were good at punching through defenses. If we coordinated a concentrated assault, we might be able to do some major damage. I followed her shots, lining up my own arrows to hit at the same place of Magik's field. Not hard enough for the woman to notice the attacks, but enough to send a message.

  One two. One two.

  Uni looked at me, before nodding. The message was received.

  I notched two arrows at once, one modified to be slightly shorter than the other, as Unit's gun morphed slightly. The intent was clear. We needed to work together to break the barrier. One to break, the other to hopefully give Magik a bad time. Charging up both attacks, we released them within nanoseconds of one another.

  Both land right on top of the other, cracking the barrier, leaving a hole large enough for the two follow-ups to slip through before it could recover. The sudden blast erupted inside the barrier was impressive, but I'm pretty sure I'd seen Uni's shot go right into Magik's shoulder before the fireworks went off.

  We were already moving by the time Magik retaliated, a mass of dark slashes and cuts filling the air.

  "You hurt me!" She shrieked, her rage distracting her as Vert and Blanc managed to land two solid slashes along her back, forcing her to give up on trying to swat Uni and I out of the sky. That looked like it managed to chunk her quite a bit. She looked far more ragged, part of her hair being burned, skin partially covered in soot. I watched as she swung her scythe again, warding off Neptune, but she was slower, and her barrier was flickering.

  Was that?

  "Damn, that was a good shot," I gave Uni a thumbs up, before launching a few more arrows, these making it through with far less effort, exploding around Magik as she continued to cackle, attacking in almost a blind rage.

  Nepgear quickly came flying in under the cover of Magik's attacks, bringing her sword across Magik's chest. For a moment, the swings ceased, Magik looking down at the wound. Then began to laugh.

  It wasn't the laugh of someone who just lost though. It was mad, yes, but it wasn't the laugh of someone who's plan just went up in smoke.

  "You've done it! You've finally done it!" Magik howled in laughter, looking at us with glee, arms wide. "You've broken the seal! Arfoire is free!"

  Magik continued to cackle madly before her body fell into the Graveyard. Something in the air shifted. Something was wrong.

  Something was coming.

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  "We could try the cursed sword."

  That got my attention pretty freaking quickly. Arfoire awakening, was, not good news. As if turned out, the four felons acted as a sort of, seal, for Arfoire. And in killing all four felons, we had freed the Dark Goddess.

  Thankfully, the crippling of the ASIC had done something to diminish her strength, but we still had no idea what to do. Fighting her then in there after Magik put us through the ringer was a bad idea. But now we were brainstorming ideas and, yeah. We didn't have any good ideas, but fuck if that was the worst one yet.

  "Nepgear, that is a terrible idea," I pinched my brow. I even knew which one she was talking about, too. But cursed sword was enough of a red flag as is.

  "It might be our only chance to," I think my glare was enough to get her jaw to click shut. I respected Nepgear a lot. She was the heart of our friendgroup, but she needed to realize how bad of an idea that was.

  "Gear, every time I've heard anyone use a cursed sword, even if they go into it with the best of intentions, they always, and I do mean always, come out of it turning against everything they started out fighting for."

  Yuri in the Total War Warhammer 3 prologue. Any game involving Soul Edge. Cursed swords were a dim a dozen, and almost all of them ended poorly. But there was one story above all others that I knew well.

  "If you really think this is a good idea, then let me tell you the story of a Prince named Arthas. And a sword known as Frostmorne."