Chapter 19: Flaring Chaos

Twilight felt a strange, but pleasant feeling inside of her, not any kind of magical, or chemical cause, it was just heartwarming to see that the lavender mares friends would still fight for her no matter what. As usual she was in the middle of it all, sharing her energy with Rarity and Blaze, so that they could stall their opponents. Twilight just needed some more time to regenerate, her entire side still burned like fire, Dawn was without a doubt the most skilled general. Not just strong magic, but tactical knowledge and experience from a long life assisted him in combat.

The most difficult fight took place mere meters away from her, Rarity was trying to survive the attacks of two merciless generals. Her chest turned back to normal fur, without her ability to cast this spell almost immediately, the seamstress would’ve been dead minutes ago. Another barrage of glowing bullets came flying towards her, luckily they weren’t quite as fast as light itself, but nearly too fast to react. These tiny projectiles looked weak for a pegasus, or an earth pony, but even the most magic untalented unicorn could feel the intense magic they radiated.

The white mare covered her left forehoof in a thin layer of crystal and held it straight. It seemed like elemental magic did not mix well with her crystal, the light bullets ricocheted off of her hoof, being redirected into the air or ground. Every time one hit the ground, a massive explosion soon followed, that was another dangerous fact about it, they were fast, hit like a truck, and caused explosions whenever they impacted with something. Deep craters could be seen left and right of Rarity. Even though the mare basically had the magic pool of two unicorns at her disposal she panted heavily, this wouldn’t work for much longer.

Before she had any chance to catch her second wind, another wave of ice-spears came flying towards her. This time she rolled to her left, only to cover her entire front with another crystal layer, to prevent inevitable death through a ray of pure, bundled light. Rarity slowly came back on her hooves, struggling to maintain consciousness, even with Twilight magic boost.

“You… ruffians... ” The fashionista materialized two almost three meter long crystal-spears and launched them at Mistral. The general didn’t even blink while blocking the projectiles that travelled with near supersonic speed with a thick wall of ice.

Dawn used the opportunity and ‘teleport’ himself behind Rarity, using the same method he hit Twilight with. This time his blade was summoned, the almost two meter long, straight sword, formed out of pure light. His first overhead strike came before the white mare could even blink. To their surprise the general’s blade clashed with a transparent, lavender barrier, formed like a six pointed star. Sparks of extremely concentrated energy flew around him as their high class magic clashed with one another, producing powerful, magical shockwaves. A normal unicorn could never even hope to cast top tier spells like this without intense preparations or potions to increase the flow of magic in their bodies artificially.

Only then did Rarity notice the general behind her and jumped sideways to gain some distance, the energy from the impact was nearly enough to knock the mare off her hooves. Dawn growled while the barrier shattered, “The ever so talented Twilight Sparkle… this time you won’t get away with your foolish actions!”

“Heh… Don’t worry about me, Dawn Comet. We always find a way to humiliate Celestia and escape afterwards,” She replied with a weak smile. In truth she was nearly at her limit, the magical backlash from her barrier was incredible, the general hit it with the force of a dragon, effectively deleting ten percent of her entire magical reserve.

Meanwhile, Rarity had finished creating another massive crystal-spear, but only held it in her magic, half of her body covered in the shiny crystal, she was ready to fight hoof-to-hoof now. The only problem was Mistral, who was just standing in the distance, waiting for an opportunity to freeze her solid. Dawn would best her in a sword fight, without a doubt, but she didn’t need to win… just survive for long enough, “Twilight, be a dear and hurry up!”

The mare in question didn’t react, but instead focused on filling her reserves again, and watching the auras of her friends shift and change constantly, due to the emotional stress they were enduring. Every last one of them was fighting to protect her… for various reasons, but they were still loyal. And that was what mattered in the moment...

The battle of the brothers continued inside a raging storm of chaos. Thunder’s lightning attacks made everypony’s hair stand straight, just by being in the immediate vicinity of the elementalist. He was fast, strong and ridiculously aggressive. Just the idea of his brother teaming with these sick criminals made his blood boil.

Silent on the other hoof was oddly calm, avoiding unnecessary movements, and only dodging in the very last possible moment. His brothers spells were dangerous, extraordinary dangerous, yet the stallion stayed completely calm. Not that Silent just took the attacks, no, his blade was an extension of his own being, both moving in perfect harmony. No matter what element currently filled the blade with incredible power, the resulting strikes were always devastating.

“Running out of magic, Thunder? You always were the rather aggressive type, but this is getting a little ridiculous,” He charged his sword with wind magic, the blade beginning to glow in a faint, white light. Silent sheathed the blade and lowered himself. Before his brother could reply anything, the beige stallion was gone.

Silent Flare was behind him, slowly walking away while sheathing his sword once again. Thunder could not even follow his movements, nor did he see any attack, “What do you think you’re doing? We’re not done y—”

The noise created by Silent’s sword grip reaching the black, decorated scabbard, signalled the end of the fight. A large and deep gash ripped open Thunder’s chest, the unexpected injury made him cry out in agony. Blood seeped out of it, he fell to his knees, nearly falling unconscious, “How did… how did you… do that?”

The beige unicorn turned around, his expression devoid of emotion, “You’re so naive. Did you think I’d let you win because you’re the ‘good guy’? Twilight just summoned us to protect her, so I’ll do that now. Consider yourself lucky, brother. You survived one of my fasted wind spells.”

He began to sprint towards Morning Blaze and Law, because he currently was the biggest threat. Silent saw Morning’s famous flaming Rapier clashing against the general’s semi-liquid lava hooves. With every thousand degree hot punch she slid backwards a little more, towards a still exhausted looking Twilight.

Flare charged his sword with wind energy again, lowering himself just like earlier. It always consumed an unhealthy chunk of magic, that was the drawback, but normally one strike with this speed was enough to finish his opponents for good. This time he stopped right next to Blaze, beads of sweat rolling down his face, “Need some help?”

Law’s body got sliced in half entirely, his inner organs open, clear for anypony to see. The yellow mare looked at him in shock, “N-no… but thank you. This won’t be enough to finish him off though.”

She was entirely right, before they could even blink the two injured halves connected again, his the incredibly hot liquid his body seemed to be made out of. The reformed general punched them again, this time blocked by a sword cross, the two rebels working together.

“Just like old times, right Blaze?”

“Shut up.”

The next battle for survival continued in the royal gardens. Everything that was happening was completely unknown for the common town volk. The pink mare was holding up surprisingly well against the extremely cold-hearted Eclipse.

Pinkie’s uncanny ability to ‘see’ the future did not seem to bother her in the least. Her scythe narrowly missed her every time, the mare just needed to graze her with the incredibly sharp tip of her weapon, because her specialty were curses. One drop of Pinkie’s blood on black steel would drain her life until inevitable death follows soon after.

Eclipse spun her scythe around like a mad mare, letting it hover all around the pink mare, trying to catch her off guard. Her opponent sidestepped, jumped over the blade, or even backflipped over it, without ever coming close to touching it.

“I have no idea what is going on… but if I don’t knock her out, this will be it. I have to protect Twilight, no matter the cost!” The mare thought to herself, getting ready to change into the offense.

The pink earth pony jumped over yet another vertical strike that would’ve killed her for sure. She did a fast roll as she landed to avoid a swing from the other side. Her enemy was just just a meter away from her, staring at Pinkie with those empty and cold eyes. Eclipse stretched her left front hoof out, pointing directly at her opponent.

“I’ve had more than enough of you. May your soul find rest in the endless darkness of the void,” The earth pony felt that this would be the end if she got hit by it. So she put every ounce of her strength into a mighty jump forwards, her right fore hoof behind her head to deliver the final strike.

Pinkie could feel gravity bending behind her, trying to devour the rebel. Luckily it wasn’t quite strong enough to stop her assault, “I will protect my friends!” Her hoof came crashing down on Eclipse, but instead of leaving a mark, or pushing her backwards Pinkie’s entire leg just passed through the captain. She couldn’t stop either, the earth pony tumbled ‘through’ Eclipse, the parts of her body changed into a strange darkness that burned on her fur. It wasn’t just her body though, it seemed like this liquid darkness began to appear and flow around Eclipse.

Coming to a stop several meters behind the captain she clutched her front leg, the pain began to intensify, most of her body was covered in large splodges of this darkness. Pinkie screamed in agony, tears threatening to fall, “Argh! W-what… is this?! Ahhhh!”

The question was simply ignored, Eclipse walked towards her instead, ever so slowly the pain became even worse. As the near black mare stood right before her, Pinkie’s breath got knocked out of her by a strong kick into her stomach. She couldn’t even stay upright, clutching her belly and screaming, the black liquid seemed to amplify every kind of pain she’d receive.

“Your ability is just a minor annoyance, nothing more,” Her scythe was raised, the steel seemingly shimmering in anticipation. “Now die, traitor of Equestria!” The razor sharp edge soared through the air, aiming straight at her neck. Pinkie could already feel the weapon dig into her body, a last tear rolled down her cheek.

“I’m sorry Twilight…”

Suddenly the scythe shone in a yellow, almost golden light, preventing it to move any further. The sharp steel was mere inches away from her dreck. Celestia’s horn sparkled with the same colour, she was not longer sitting on the ground, her face was no longer filled with fear and worries. Instead, her wings were spread wide, anger took sadness’ place and determination made her even more intimidating, “STOP! This.... is not an execution! You took her ability to fight, that is enough. Their deaths were never part of the plan.”

The Princess of the Sun panted slightly, it wasn’t really any kind of magical exhaustion, but her emotions played a huge role. It was inexplicable for the millennia old being, she hated the Nightmare and all its subordinates with all her heart, but could never bring herself to finish what she began. The pure white mare continued, “Focus on disabling Twilight. Only disable.”

“As you wish,” Eclipse simply said, the darkness around Pinkie’s body faded as quickly as it appeared. Leaving the mare on the ground, losing consciousness from the shock and the pain.

Twilight had watched the incredibly painful scene the moment she heard Pinkie’s screams, but she was not able to focus on anything other than Rarity’s magic and her own reserves. This played out at least somewhat alright though, Pinkie was still alive, and in range for their escape. She was nearly ready, but a shadow travel over such a distance and with so many ponies was far from an easy feat.

“Everypony… just hold on a little bit longer!”

The most intense battle happened just a meter away from her. Despite his power, the hot headed general was able to keep up with Morning Blaze’s insanely fast strikes. Her attacks weren’t completely wasted though, she had been fighting with Law ever since he joined Celestia’s Army, so the mare knew her ways around his elemental magic.

She herself wasn’t able to change her body into an element, but maybe Blaze just needed to train harder. Eventually it would happen, right now the mare was more focused on the furious stallion hammering his molten hooves at her sword, “Would you die already?! ”

Law jumped backwards, his hoof growing rapidly. In one mighty punch he fired a lava projectile from the base of his leg. The mare swung at it with all her might, being pushed back more and more, until Rainbow Dash stepped in and helped her. Both were able to push the attack away, panting heavily.

“Watch out, Blaze. This guy is… dangerous,” Rainbow stated, going back behind Twilight. She didn’t have any tools or magic to hurt any of them anyway, the least she could do was to comfort her sweet mistress…

Everyone was starting to lose ground around the lavender mare. Rarity was still holding up, mainly because Silent Flare decided to fight against Dawn, their battle was even more intense than Blaze’s had been. Dawn’s blade, the Murakamo and Flare’s steel sword clashed against each other, only very few of the present ponies were able to follow their movements.

The only thing visible for the others were shockwaves all around the garden, something like a thunderbolt crashing into some flowers, turning them into ash, or a fiery explosion near the castle’s walls. After another two or three clashing sounds they slid away from each other, to everypony’s surprise both were covered in burns, deep cuts, and various other injuries.

“You still got it, Dawn. I have to admit that I underestimated you,” Silent stated, trying to catch his breath.

Before the general could reply a loud flash could be heard, one after the other. Every rebel was engulfed in a deep, black shine, the cause of this was a certain lavender mare. She rose to her hooves and opened her eyes, they were deep black as well. As Celestia stared into them she could swear to see the void itself, raging inside her student.

The fighting stopped entirely, all eyes were fixated on the pony responsible for all off this. She smiled, her blade casually hovering next to her, the vortex around it faded half an hour ago to preserve her magic, “It was nice to welcome us so warmly, Celestia. But you see, we shouldn’t overstep our boundaries and leave.”

Celestia’s own eyes flashed white. The demi-goddess growled at her student, “I believe it is too late for that. There’s no way you can escape now, not without help. End this madness, Twilight! Come back to us, we can fix it… together.”

The lavender mare just cocked her head and frowned, it was not the reaction she had hoped for, but that wasn’t important anyway. So she just smiled again, “And I believe you underestimate what a little bit of chaos can do. The next time we met, you’ll cower before my hooves, Celestia.” Her laughter rang through the air, all of her fellow rebels disappeared into the shadows below them, until only she remained.

The once so proud and wise princess stared at the ground, tears threatening to fall. Her blurry vision spotted Twilight, sinking into the darkness with unnecessarily slow speed, “Your plan almost worked… almost. Hahahahahaha!” Then she was gone, leaving another war torn battlefield behind, a nearly dead elite, and several exhausted generals.

“Twilight… how can I fix this...” The Princess of the Sun whispered sadly, not wanting to move anytime soon. She had to eventually… she always had too. This war was slowly becoming more and more one-sided… and she was not the one winning at this point. Could it really be? Two ponies tainted by her immortal archenemy were enough to bring an end to her reign? No… this could not be. Even if it would cost the lives of her subjects, the princess would preserve harmony, and rescue her student!

A dull, throbbing pain was still pulsing in every fiber of his body, reminding him of his earlier mistakes. Sharpshot was not really a great warrior, sure, his transformable weapon came in handy, but against monsters with crystalline armor it was nothing more than a mere toy.

Applejack and Sharp sat in total darkness for nearly an hour now, waiting for his pain to subside. To think that their first enemy encounter in these caves could’ve been his last… The stallion shook his head, if he started to think like that their mission would end before it even began. This golem was nothing compared to the abilities of just about any rebel, all of them were extraordinary fighters, even Celestia’s former prisoner.

He rose to his hooves, grunting in pain, “Let’s… let’s go. Who knows what things lurk in the darkness. We have to find the crimson colored crystals, there is the next clue. I’m sorry that I wasn’t careful enough, we can’t let our guard down in this mountain.”

The country mare just shrugged, “It’s all dandy, pardner. It happens to the best of us. Maybe we should jest go this way.” She pointed down the opposite direction from where they came, risky tactic, but maybe their only chance of coming closer to the crystals. The stallion nodded and both made their way towards the ever present darkness of the cave.

“Why do caves always have to be full of monsters...” The stallion asked nopony in particular, maybe it was just to relieve some stress and ease their burdens.

“Do ya want me to answer that? Or…”

He laughed shortly, “You’re definitely a unique travelling partner, Applejack.”

“Now what is that supposed to mean?!” AJ asked, half confused, half happy that he was finally able to laugh a little. She hadn’t seen him even smile once after they found the weird riddle thing.

“Oh nothing… absolutely nothing. Come on, let’s get going.”

She only grumbled something about ‘stupid stallions’ afterwards, hoping that he’d not catch on to it.

The six rebels stumbled out of the shadow travel spell, coming to a halt in the center of Ponyville. Everypony immediately rushed over to Pinkie and Twilight. The pink mare was still unconscious, and the lavender unicorn had fallen to her knees, panting heavily.

Her enormous sword was flickering wildly, as if it would dissolve at any moment. Almost only the large, golden crossguard could be seen from it, the rest was buried deep in the cobblestone of the marketplace to offer her some kind support. She spoke up weakly, still a faint smile on her lips, “Bring… Pinkie into our sick room… darkness spells… are no… ugh… laughing matter.”

Silent did as he was told, gently picking the mare up and carrying her towards the sick room. Luckily one of the last remaining bat ponies was an excellent doctor. He also wanted to check on Silver Night, who was still very weak from the malnourishment. Meanwhile Rainbow put Twilight’s left forehoof over her neck and slowly stood up to support her weight. The lavender mare managed to stay upright with Dash’s help, but could barely do anything else, her magic was completely drained.

“Rarity… Morning… good job out there... ” She looked at her former mentor. “I know… I know that you didn’t… want to fight… and I’m sorry you… had to. And Rarity… I’m extremely grateful… and thoroughly impressed.”

The fashionista’s expression lit up at the kind words, “Oh, please, darling. Without your magic boost I would have been done for. You called for our help, and we gladly delivered it, no need to thank me for that. Although I have to say that it was really… exhilarating to fight against two strong opponents with this fabulous new magic!”

Now it was Morning Blaze’s turn to speak up, and it sure wasn’t easy to find the right words for it, “It’s true… I hesitated at first, but… after I saw that you tried to protect everypony… I think you’re not… as cruel as you act all the time… I will still avoid killing any guards or civilians, but I will protect you at all costs. Just please… don’t go around mocking Celestia again. I don’t know what your final plan is, but I’ll trust you.”

Twilight thought about her conversations with a certain draconequus, his proposal really seemed to be the only solution. First they needed to make her suffer though… and that would mean… “It was the last straw… now that she injured Pinkie a second time we won’t hold back anymore, Blaze. We still have Capone on our side, and Luna is on her way towards him. It’s time to spread the truth… and expand our borders.”

Blaze gasped at her last statement, but kept quiet. Meanwhile the lavender unicorn already talked with Luna over their mental connection, “Luna, I presume you heard our conversation?”

“Indeed, I also extended the spell a little. Your mass shadow travel was impressive and your chaos magic improved quite a bit. I’m almost in Manehatten, Capone and I will begin with Phase Two of our plan. Equestria’s citizens will no longer be able to ignore my sister’s lies. Her sins will finally be revealed under her precious sun.”

“Don’t cause too much casualties. We need them turned, not dead. Good luck to you,” Another short, but definitely heavy pang of guilt coursed through the lavender mare. She just doomed hundreds, maybe thousands of lives, just to get her vengeance. She shook her head violently, this couldn’t be stopped anyway. It was either her and Luna, or Celestia. For the latter they needed a revolution mentality in the population. And what would be the easiest way to reach that? Revealing Celestia’s sins, and causing havoc under her name.

Fluttershy and Rost entered the first open room of this cursed shrine. They were prepared for the horrors, the timid pegasus especially seemed to burn with determination. Something the two of them could really use in a situation like this.

It was something entirely different though, the room was divided with a seemingly bottomless abyss, clearly visible, on the other side, laid a pristine, sparkling cogwheel. On the back end of the room, over the abyss seemed to be slits in the mountain wall, maybe something would come out of them, but how? Then Fluttershy realized that she could just fly over the abyss, before she was even halfway there she was repelled with a strong shock, almost enough to knock her out and letting her fall into the chasm, “Ow… that doesn’t seem like the right way.”

They looked around and found the presumable solution for their problem, a giant machine with two shallow bowls at each end, in the middle was some kind of pointer that pointed slowly to the right.

Placed in the right bowl was some kind of object, frozen and turned into an ice block. Fluttershy’s gaze wandered between the two bowls and the pointer, “Maybe the pointer has to be straight, showing directly into the air… ” Behind the door she spotted some kind of frozen tree, planted in a small pot, the mare decided that it was probably not important.

Rost jumped up to the right bowl and took a strike at the ice block, it looked like some sort of chest inside it. The pointer immediately pointed even more to the right. His large, fiery sword clashed with the ice, creating a small shockwave, and a set of floating runes he’d never seen before. The frozen object didn’t have one scratch on it after his attack, he huffed and said, “This thing is definitely magical… maybe even demonic.”

“Hmm… maybe,” The mare lifted herself off the ground and landed on the other bowl-platform, the pointed slightly turned to the left again. “See? I think we have to balance the weight somehow. Wait! This tree...” She flew over to it, it was surprisingly light, small ice crystals sparkles at its dead branches. It wasn’t quite enough though, it still quivered around on the right, unfortunately there wasn’t anything else on this room to place on it.

In the next few minutes they tried every single combination they could think of. Placing the tree with the chest and only Fluttershy at the other side, then only Rost, then both. Then Fluttershy took Rost’s former position and the stallion picked up the tree on the other side. The machine gave them a satisfying ‘click’ and stone grinding on stone could be heard.

Just like they thought, a stable stone slab moved out of the wall, creating a bridge for them. Fluttershy crossed it as quick as possible, picking up the cogwheel with her mouth and joining Rost again. Another click could be heard, followed by a hissing sound “Maybe something happened outside of the room?” Fluttershy suggested. So they left this weird puzzle alone.

She was the first one to leave the room, the hissing sound slowly faded. Fluttershy saw small clouds of smoke rising from one of the frozen doors. Somehow this mechanism must’ve activated some kind of magic, or machinery that melted the ice. That also confirmed her suspicions that they really had to explore all rooms in all the different floors, to say that it’d be tedious was an understatement.

The small, iron cogwheel clicked into place without any effort, now they knew what they had to do at least. She sighed quietly and said, “Let’s look into the other room… I hope it’s another puzzle…”

Rost looked quite lost, of all the things he would’ve expected in a place like this, deadly traps, monsters, demons, none of them came even close to what they found. To state it clearly, he hated puzzles. The brown stallion wasn’t a pony of many words, or thought for that matter. If his friends or allies needed help, he was there, as simple as that, Rost’s combat skills were useful in ninety-nine percent of the occurring problems in this land, but of course they had to solve some random puzzles to activate this weird platform thing.

He followed the timid mare without being aware of his surrounding. Otherwise he would’ve noticed the odd emptiness of the room ahead. Torches lined the dimly lit room, casting an eerie glow on the two intruders. Strange banners hung between the light sources, depictions of two giant, and very weird looking birds could be seen on all of them, one silver, the other golden.

Fluttershy looked around once again, trying to find any kind of puzzle, or mechanism to reveal the next cogwheel. After a minute of searching her frustration grew, “I think something is not right here… Maybe we should—” Just as she was about to say something, the door noisily shut itself. Iron bars came out of the broad side of the stone next to the door, making it impossible to reach it.

She gasped, “Oh no! We’re trapped! Oh I knew we should’ve stayed outside...” It went from bad to worse, the torches lining the wall changed from a normal red flame, to a surreal burning blue one, flickering under the slowly dimming light. The temperature dropped by several degree, already enough to make their breath visible in the cold.

The coldness inside the room manifested itself as three of the demons they already encountered on their journey, Wanyūdōs, three Ice Mouths to be more specific. They shook themselves shortly before beginning their hellish ride, never stopping and constantly breathing extremely cold winds at the two weak ponies.

Rost was the first one to react, jumping out of the way before one of the demons could crush him. His sword began to grow hotter as well, at least giving him some of the warmth. He swung his enormous blade at one of the wheels, they were different than those before though, as the blade was about to impact with the frozen wood, it clashed against floating, icy-blue symbols instead, it seemed to be the same language like the runes on his sword. The Wanyūdō noticed this and spinned around while still staying upright, the massive wooden cartwheel hit the stallion’s side, sending him flying a few meters. The demon’s wheel had responded to his sword attack too though, the wood had thawed a bit, making it stop breathing ice at them.

Before Fluttershy rushed over to Rost, she saw her chance, one bead grasped with her teeth and a wide arc with her head was enough to change them back into their ‘whip’ form, burning the wood of the Ice Mouth. A last cry of incredible agony came from it before the demon dissolved in a flowery explosion. Hm… they seem to block one attack, spin around, but then lose their ability to produce ice for a while, that could be useful with my longer range, the timid mare analyzed inside her mind. Those demons were pretty simple now that she thought about it. Fluttershy helped Rost back up, his side was bruised, and it would definitely leave some marks, but it was nothing he couldn’t handle.

“Thank you, Fluttershy. Let’s finish them!” Both attacked one of them, this time Rost was prepared for its attack pattern. They seemed to do the same thing every time, really predictable if the victim lives long enough to understand it. Not even two minutes later both demons dissolved in another explosion, filling their nostrils briefly with the scent of cherry blossoms, freshly cut grass and sunshine, as odd as it may sound.

The heavy iron bars that kept the door unreachable disappeared. The middle of the room began to glow, and the scent of the defeated demons flew towards it, getting sucked into the brief vortex. After the glow was gone, Fluttershy saw the next cogwheel, laying there, completely still and unmoving as if it had been there since the beginning. The yellow pegasus picked it up gently and left the room without another word. She was worried about the situation, maybe even about herself. Fluttershy did not hesitate for even a moment to slay those demons, normally it would’ve taken a great deal of convincing her, but now it was … almost normal, it just came to her.

The hissing sound returned as well, signalling that the last door of the base floor should be unlocked. Rost sighed in relieve, “At least we got out of here alive. These things aren’t as dangerous as I thought.”

The yellow mare turned her head around and looked at his bruised flank, lifting an eyebrow. He blushed and scratched his head awkwardly, “As I said… ehehehe.... we made it out alive. That’s all that matters. For a pony that never used a weapon before, you mastered this strange thing pretty quickly.” She still had the cogwheel in her mouth and just shrugged. Maybe it really was odd, but she’d definitely keep these ‘life beads’, they comforted her, and offered some kind of protection… she just hoped it would work against anything other than demons as well…