[center][h2]Damian Gerard and Penny Hoft|Returning to Magnolia[/h2][/center] [center][@MarshiestMallow][/center] As the town of Magnolia came into view as Damian and Penny approached in the revolutionary vehicle, a small smile crept onto the face of the Blade of Phoenix Wing. Over the last two years, Damian had been in the guild hall exactly twice and both times was to both make sure that the more rambunctious members hadn’t burned down the building and to see if anything exciting had happened while he and Penny were away. When he was gone, he trained, working on both his magical power and skill while keeping his martial skill in tip top shape. Penny was with him a lot of the time, and the two only grew closer as time went on, both as friends and lovers. In fact, just a few days before returning to the guild hall, Damian had proposed to Penny, who had accepted amongst tears and screams of joy. As the pair approached the town, Damian absentmindedly petting Jaëger, their home, after two long years, Damian was reflecting on the first few months after he'd first set out, a long time personal grudge on his mind. [hr] [quote]Damian had caught the last train to Crocus for the last hour just in time, his face grim as he looked out the window towards the ever shrinking town of Magnolia as the train got further away. Penny had wanted to come, to find out why he was so dead set on this, the two had become quite the team and she was concerned for her boyfriend and teammate, but he'd told her that this was something that he had to handle alone and that he didn’t want her getting caught in the crossfire. When she made him promise to come back from whatever it was alive, he couldn't help but smile and kiss her in front of the guild. The whooping that came from the aware guild members had caused the Phoenix Slayer to blush while the looks of surprise from the unaware caused Damian a hearty laugh. The veteran soldier smiled as he thought back on the memory, but then frowned again as he returned to his thoughts on the matter at hand. He'd promised Penny to contact her through a communication lacrima the moment the issue was handled, and he intended to keep that promise, one way or another. [color=FireBrick][i]Corporal Jason Landricks, now a Lieutenant in the Royal Family's Special Magic Suppression Unit, code name Cerberus Platoon. Wonder if they even know the kind of lying snake their commanding officer is.[/i][/color] [url=https://img.roleplayerguild.com/prod/users/af7f820c-0377-42d3-bc1d-b3d103fd1891.jpg] Jason Landricks[/url] had been a promising corporal who served under Damian's father in the Royal Army's Fifth Infantry Division and then continued his service when it was combined with another unit and renamed the 42nd Border Control Unit, the same Unit that had received heavy casualties in what was now known as the Battle of North Forest. It wasn't until a few weeks prior that Damian had even known of Jason's involvement in the ambush that had killed his parents. The man had fallen ill the day before it had happened, but he wasn’t alone, so no one had thought anything of it. Then, without warning and about three months before this fateful train ride, he got a letter from one of the men who served under Jason as a books keeper of sorts that had also served under Damian's father. The letter said that the man had found evidence that Jason had helped arrange the ambush in exchange for enough gold that he could bribe the right people to turn a blind eye to the circumstances and still live almost as good as the King of Fiore himself from the Mistrallian military. Damian had been too distraught at the time to really pay attention to the finer details, but after thinking about it, he realized that the whole thing had been off. The Scouts went silent just moments before the ambush, but their bodies had never been recovered because there hadn't been bodies to recover. He'd bribed them to abandon their posts at just the right time. Of course, since none of them had since come forward with any word of this themselves, either they were all now dead or had been paid enough to keep silent as well. Clenching his fists, Damian took a deep breath to calm himself. The bastard sat where he did because he'd kept all the people who might sell him out quiet, whether it was with money or brute force didn't matter. He'd been the reason Damian's parents were dead, and now, he would pay for it. The rest of the train ride was Damian resting and planning and preparing his reasons for wanting into the Cerberus Platoon headquarters. It was the truth that he'd tell; He was an old friend paying a visit to a brave young man who’d once been an idol of respect for the now older Damian when he was a kid. Of course, he needed to remember that the Cerberus Platoon was armed with real anti-magic weapons, unlike the Magic Management Council, who had merely needed to maintain appearances over the last century or so. Thankfully, due to his father’s and mother’s extensive training and his own training regimen since their passing, Damian was fortunate that he hadn't always relied on his magic, he hadn't even known about it until the day his parents died. There was also the matter of remembering to thank the backstabbing son of a bitch for helping him meet Penny; after all, he didn't want to seem ungrateful or anything. The last hour Damian slept, even though he'd slept several times before, he knew it was better than building nervous energy, though the rest was a fitful one. When the train stopped, Damian's eyes shot open and, with a small stretch, he stood up and exited the car, heading out of the station and towards the headquarters for the Special Magic Suppression Unit. Admittedly, as he moved through the streets of the city, the prospect of the experimental unit was still somewhat daunting. Armed with weapons forged from Magicite, these soldiers were able to cancel out a mage’s ability to use or cast magic for a short time if they broke skin. However, they could also fight to the death, as some mages were too powerful for a single cut to nullify, so he mulled over what it meant for him as he went. Over all, it was about a fifteen minute walk, one that he used to finalize what he would say as he approached the men guarding the front doors, the poor unaware souls that they were. "Stop," the one on the left says, a hand resting on his magicite sword, "who are you and what business do you have with the Cerberus Platoon?" Damian chuckled and held his hands up, trying to be disarming despite the [url=https://img.roleplayerguild.com/prod/users/da70eb2b-5ccb-48a0-ae37-0e9ddcd70931.png]sword hilt[/url] poking over his shoulder. [color=FireBrick]"Just here to visit an old friend, your Lieutenant Jason Landricks. He served under my father in the 42nd Border Control Unit before he was posted here."[/color] The man seemed to hesitate a moment, and Damian's hand subtly drifted closer to Andor's hilt as the look of distrust grew on the face of the guard. [i][color=FireBrick]If these guys try to stop me, Jason will know what’s going on before I can find him and ghost again. I’ll never find him if that happens though..[/color][/i] In the end though, his fears were unbidden as the man he was looking for came out himself, his magicite halberd stored on his back and a cape flaring underneath it.. [color=MediumVioletRed]"Dammy! It's good to see you again!"[/color] Damian faked a smile and took the man's hand shake in good grace, though inside he was infuriated. [color=MediumVioletRed]"Tell me, what brings you all the way to Crocus to see me? The Games won't happen again until next year."[/color] Damian gave a genuine smile, indicating the man in front of him. [color=FireBrick]”Heard you’d been given command of your own unit and had to see for myself. Dad had always hoped you’d eventually reach a commander position.”[/color] The honeyed words paid off as a stupid smile crossed his face and he beckoned Damian to follow him on a walk through the barracks. [color=MediumVioletRed]”Ah well, you caught us at a good time. Between your guild exposing the old Council and the overall activity of the legal guilds across the country, we’re still only called in on the most egregious of Dark Guilds.”[/color] The two of them stopped in the doorway to a training hall, showing the members of Cerberus Platoon not on guard duty sparring with and without weapons as well as practicing their spells. [color=MediumVioletRed]”We’re proud to be the first in what will hopefully be a long line of anti-magic platoons. I don’t know if you’ve heard, Damian, but other kingdoms out there are forming even their regular armies out of almost completely mages and if they aren’t full-fledged mages, they’re trained to funnel magic energy into artillery.”[/color] Damian frowned at the mention of this and remembered the feeling he’d gotten at the Games in the previous year, about the sense of War waiting on the horizon. [color=FireBrick]”Let’s just say I inherited dad’s instincts for conflict. Bloody hell…”[/color] Still, as they moved away from the training hall and back towards the entrance, Damian couldn’t shake the feeling that the world was a powderkeg just waiting for a reason to go off. The two made small talk on the way back to the entryway, Jason even walking back out to where Damian had been standing when he’d come out originally. [color=MediumVioletRed]”Well, it was good to see you again, Damian, but is there anything else you need? I’ve got responsibilities to tend to.”[/color] Damian’s face was covered once more in a grin as he rammed his fist into the other man’s gut, doubling him over from the pain. [color=FireBrick]"To see you get what you deserve for what happened to my parents you lying sack of Vulcan shit."[/color] The two door guards stepped forwards but Jason waved them off as he recovered, reaching over his shoulder and drawing the magicite weapon on his back. As he slid into a fighting stance, the weapon held diagonally with the blade aimed at the ground and the shaft held in both hands, his demeanor changed, becoming more psychotic than the mild-mannered man who’d been speaking a moment before. [color=MediumVioletRed]"So that blasted letter reached you anyways? I should have known none of the boys would hurt that old codger, though I’ll admit it took some courage for him to send it to you at all. Regardless, what hope do you have against me, Dammy? Even a legendary S-Class wizard can't defeat our anti-magic magicite weapons and without your magic, you're just a scared little boy."[/color] This caused Damian to first chuckle, then laugh and then simply guffaw uncontrollably for a minute, and leaving Jason and his guards bewildered. [color=MediumVioletRed]"What's so funny to you, you arrogant son of a dead man?"[/color] Damian calmed down enough to reach over his shoulder and draw Andor, the dragon fang blade sinking into the concrete a couple of inches when the edge of the blade hit it. [color=FireBrick]"Are you really, truly so arrogant, or foolish, if not both, as to think that I’d let my martial skills wane simply because I gained the use of magic?"[/color] Jason’s face became one of indignance, but he didn’t get a chance to reply as Damian rushed forward, bringing Andor up towards Jason's chest at a speed that the man clearly hadn't expected. The attack forced Jason to leap back with a couple of flips before countering with a quick but powerful thrust for Damian's chest. This was countered by bringing Andor around and into the halberd, knocking it up and away from Damian's body before the two settled into comfortable guard positions. [color=FireBrick]”Allow me to educate you on how wrong you are.”[/color] And then, in the blink of an eye, the real fight began, the two men masters of their chosen weapon and neither giving ground or openings where they didn’t have to. Damian wielded a sword like his father, with speed, power and precision that belied both his age and the size of the weapon, and Jason Landricks the halberd of the Special Magic Suppression Unit, the weapon lancing in and out and making sweeping strikes to try and catch the swordsman off balance with little success. The two men exchanged blows faster than the untrained eye could follow, not because of magical enhancement or outside aid, but because of the increase in speed and strength adrenaline gave naturally, nevermind their existing level of skill normally. Damian struck from the right, Jason blocked with the bottom of the halberd and struck from above, which was deflected to the side as Damian thrust towards his opponent's chest, which Jason dodged by leaping to one side and slicing at Damian's stomach. It went on like this for several minutes, a deadly dance that neither side would lose in, neither side giving nor gaining ground without making their opponent earn it. That is, at least, until Jason made a very nearly fatal mistake. Seeing Damian leave an opening in his guard, he swung too far with the halberd in an effort to disarm the swordsman and Damian took advantage of it, catching the haft with his left hand and bringing Andor’s edge down on it's middle. The dragon fang blade sliced clean through it, more or less destroying the magicite weapon, and he delivered a sidekick to Jason's chest, knocking the man onto his back and knocking the wind out of him. Undeterred, Jason attempted to stand again, but found himself pinned to the ground by Damian’s foot as the city guard regiment with the royal army arrived, the man who'd sent the letter to Damian at their head. [color=FireBrick]"I hate you for what you did, taking my family from me, taking a future and maybe even knowing my father’s and mother’s families from me.”[/color] Damian leaned forwards, his gaze unwavering. [color=FireBrick]”But I also have to thank you for allowing me to find a new family, and my girlfriend, with Phoenix Wing. Enjoy your cell."[/color] Damian stepped aside as a pair of spearmen approached and officially arrested Jason Landricks, taking the former Corporal and Lieutenant into custody on counts of high treason and accepting bribery from the enemies of Fiore. Damian, his parents avenged as he knew they'd wished to be, sheathed Andor and, with a heavy but contented sigh, attempted to leave, but was stopped by a member of the guard garrison and asked to stay in Crocus until the conclusion of the trial, so that he could testify against Jason. Damian, knowing that his word might be the difference between Jason going free or going to prison, agreed eagerly to do his part to see the bastard thrown in jail. That process took an additional couple of months, but it was a process he would happily endure and he'd already called Penny and talked to her, suggesting to her to come to Crocus. They'd spent the time they weren't attending Jason Landrick's trial wandering around the city and enjoying the sights. This process repeated for two months, until the day they convicted the man who'd been responsible for the death of so many, Damian's parents included, as a murderer, traitor, and conspirator against the crown. Damian stood and watched Jason dragged away, kicking and screaming, never to be a free man again.[/quote] [hr] Slowly, Damian's mind came back to the present and he smiled softly as the car entered Magnolia. Penny had always complained to him after he’d had Andor reforged that he’d spent too much time learning Kenjutsu and Iaijutsu, but would usually let it go after a bit and simply enjoy his company and he did the same with her. As the car came to a stop he looked to Penny as she climbed out and stood outside the doors apprehensively. [color=FireBrick]"Come on now,”[/color] he says as he climbs out and joins her at the doors, [color=FireBrick]”sure it's been two years, but we're still two of the Guild's strongest members and it's strongest team, despite what Lazarus thinks and his numerous losses in our duels. Let's show 'em we're still kickin'."[/color] Penny gave a nod, but she also knew that several things had changed, and that nothing would be the same as it once was. Two years was a long time for something to happen, and Penny wondered if the guild would be like it was. And there were still things that bothered her. ------ [i]Penny has never mentioned the night that Solias had come, wanting to talk to Damian. She had sensed the phoenix's presence, and had only reluctantly gone to speak with him, so that no one would have to know. Penny would have gladly told Damian, and in fact had wanted to, several times, But bound by an oath, she couldn't speak of it. She had approached Solias, her eyes narrowed, suspicious of anything he would say or do. It was safe to say that she no longer trusted the Phoenix. [color=fff200]"Penelope,"[/color] his voice was relieved, but Penny just stared at him, blinking and not saying anything. Solias gave a sigh, [color=fff200]"You're mad at me, you have every right to be."[/color] [color=f7976a]"Gee, thanks,"[/color] Penny said bitterly, [color=f7976a]"I believed in you. I believed you would help. I trusted you for years. And you just threw that all away. I didn't believe you wouldn't help me, wouldn't help your own blood. You probably never expected me to come into your life. Fate sucks, doesn't it? You hurt me, I thought I had a parent that actually cared. I was wrong. I don't want to talk to you."[/color] She didn't give Solias a chance to speak, instead, she turned and headed back. She didn't look back, although she knew that Solais could give her answers, she decided she didn't need them.[/i] ______________ Now that they were home, Penny wondered if she had been rash. She looked to the doors, and took a deep breath. She was sure there was a lot to catch up on. She looked back to Damian, nodded and smiled. [color=f7976a]"Right. Let's do this, with style of course."[/color] And with amusement, Penny slammed the doors open, flames licking up along the doors themselves, but not burning them, a harmless show entirely for effect. Grinning at his fiance, Damian followed the flames up with a series of spinning blades in the shape of snowflakes, or they roughly were as it was, blowing into the hall and up to the ceiling before bursting into thousands of smaller, harmless ones as the two dire wolves bounded in and howled their arrival. The spectacle brought everyone's attention to the door where the two S-Class wizards stood with smiles on their faces as Jaëger and Carmilla returned to Damian’s sides. [color=OrangeRed]"We're back, Phoenix Wing!"[/color] With their arms linked and their fingers interlaced with each other, the pair walked into the guild hall, their home, for the first time in two years. Damian immediately set about hugging and shaking hands with everyone who approached him, having missed his guild mates over the last two years, but knowing that growing stronger for the sake of the guild and for himself wouldn't happen if he only used the guild training grounds. On top of that, Damian had unlocked the inner secrets of his magic and learned that it went by another name; Arsenal Magic. He used the Wolven Blade Master, a type of arsenal magic that allowed him to use any form of sword while summoning a pack of wolves for his command, though currently it was only Jaëger and Carmilla. With that knowledge, he had worked hard to improve his strength, both magically and physically, ensuring that each of his blades managed to achieve it’s true form. Looking around, he spotted the guild's resident Paladin inspecting a revolver that the swordsman didn’t remember him having and waved at the man, who returned the wave with a smile on his face. Damian was glad that he hadn't left while he and Penny were away, he could recall a few instances where the man's ability to shield, heal and attack had saved his allies during difficult fights in the past. And nothing could change that he was key in winning those fights. Seeing Lazarus and Sasha sitting at a table, Damian nudged Penny. [color=FireBrick]"We’ll need to take some time at some point and see how they and their little girl are doing."[/color] Damian knew many in the guild probably had a hard time recognizing him after his two years away. He was taller and had added a touch more muscle to the visible spectrum, though how strong the man really was was still a mystery. Turning and giving Penny a quick peck on the cheek before looking over the guild members present. He’d heard that there was still some who had joined recently that hadn’t yet met the Blade of Phoenix Wing and he wanted to rectify that quickly. Being the famous S-Class mage he was, he also gained a reputation for being short and to the point when dealing with mages who thought he was inconveniencing them and...merciless to Dark Mages. Admittedly, Damian no longer tried to deny who he was or what he wielded, but he never took a life that he didn’t have to. Though admittedly, the number of dark mages who would stand down when told to was slim. Shaking his head, he spots a pair of faces he doesn’t recognize. [color=FireBrick]”Hey there! I hear you’re relatively new to Phoenix Wing. Thought I’d see how you’re settling in.”[/color]