Like gravity, the pressure of so many otherwordly beings weighed down on the humans present at the secret meeting, though none as much as Souta.  Until recent times far more comfortable at his forge than in the field, Souta found himself growing more accustomed to the presence of angels and demons at a frustratingly slow pace.  He remained still, with nothing more to contribute to the gathering than his visible existence as an agent of the Charred Council, until the gentleman 'in charge' adjourned the conference.  Before he could even steady his breath, Souta hurried to find a secluded spot.

Once out of the towering doors and out of sight of their exquisite decoration, the smith reigned in his pace.  He rounded the circumference of the building, running a hand along the silver railing.  Before him lay a piece of the sparkling ocean from which Aquapolis rose, an island of glimmering metal and elegant craftsmanship.  It was hard to believe, standing here bathed in brilliant reflections and awash with the gentle sounds of crashing waves and waterfalls, that this beautiful place could harbor any ill at all, but not all was well in Brightwater Isle.  

[i]Vega.[/i]  The revelation still gnawed at him, cycling his mind through worry, doubt, and dark humor.  That was the name of the entity who wished to destroy the seals and bring the apocalypse, bringing annihilation to all of reality.  It would all be a smoldering wreck, if not dust itself: his magical place, every city and wilderness in the world, his home, his family...everything he loved, and everything he didn't.  More than once, Souta considered how such a thing might occur.  He'd thought, long before armageddon was even the remotest reality, that the end of the world meant Hell emptying its legions across the world, laying waste to the planet in a war to end all wars.  Yet, Hell was as much a player in the affairs of the world as Heaven, and no instrument of the existential accord that the seals represented.  Would the oceans dry up and the mountains crumble?  Would all the world become nothing more than a heap of ash?  Or would, after the seventh seal's destruction, things simply cease to exist?  Souta remembered a movie he'd seen not so long ago, and shuddered.  Never did he spare any effort wondering why this Vega would want the apocalypse to come—that, he could not fathom.  “To think.  All this, because of a Spanish guy from Street Fighter,” he said aloud, joking to himself.

Of course, it was no joking matter.  Though he commanded no forces and carried precious little strength of his own, Souta would fight to protect the world.  To him, the odds seemed good; now, Heaven and Hell would be cooperating, at least for the time being, against the rogue responsible for two seals' breaking.  Plus, he still retained his Council allies: Fenn the hellhound, as brutal as he was cunning, the somewhat dubious but nevertheless powerful Nephilim Wrath, the crotchety old sorcerer, the Watchers -though mostly the unusually helpful one he called Magpie- and...Lily.  Souta wanted to say that she still had him spellbound, that he could not make any decisions until this chaos was over, but he knew how he felt about her.

Taking a deep breath, Souta clapped his hands on the silvery railing and pushed off.  He could not waste much more time idle, and needed to practice for the coming fight.  The remarkable weight on his back, troubling him now more than before, belonged to the Mountain Buster, not so long ago 'borrowed' from Regalia Arms.  Right now, the incredible but unwieldy new weapon was nothing more than a weight on his hands, and though he would likely never be strong enough to wield it freely, he needed to get more comfortable with it to have any chance of using it in battle.  

A long, curved bridge extended across the water not far away.  Souta headed in its direction.