Wish upon the Stars chapter 376

"You have a lot of guts coming here like this." With the words came a  tide of power, pushing back the aura of the two B-rankers through his  own and with sheer force of personality. Zeke wasn't worried at all, and  it showed in the way he spoke. "You might not worry about some small  time scuffle between the Unity and the Cult, but there are other  interests here."

The redhead  didn't seem worried (apparently he was as crazy as all the other  cultists I'd met). "You won't get involved, but in case you did, we  arranged some entertainment for you. Finding out there was an unknown  B-ranker on the planet was an annoyance, but luckily, we managed to get  the details from a reputable source. Isn't that right Miss Selka?" His  smug grin turned to take in where I could see Natalie sitting.

The  teal haired woman next to her, clearly her own guardian, rolled her  eyes. "Stop trying to start trouble, Kix. I'm a neutral party. As long  as my charge remains safe I'm not obligated to take a side, and while  Natalie might think an alliance with her cousin is best, I'm not nearly  so convinced."

It  occurred to me that while Nat might be aware that Zeke was B-rank, and  even knew his name, she hadn't passed the latter bit of information on  to her guardian. Apparently the lack of trust ran in both directions,  she and her guardian clearly had a much different relationship than we  did.

Zeke  looked mildly annoyed at the woman, but not upset. "Selka. That sounds  familiar." He was talking normally now, as were the others, but with the  Perception of everyone here and the cameras, it didn't seem to be a  problem for anyone. He snapped his fingers. "Ricardo's daughter. Your  mother is that little Countess with the teleportation power. The hair  should have tipped me off. Surprised someone from Malachai's branch  contracted you as a guardian, given how much he and your grandmother  hate each other."

She  glared at him. "Inter branch cooperation is important. Grandma knows  that. And no REAL Wyndham would ever violate the sanctity of the  candidate selection. Not that some random's pet B-ranker would know  that." Wow...apparently Nat hadn't told her guardian ANYTHING about me.  Maybe Zeke's little jab about branch politics wasn't that far off.

My  cousin was pinching the bridge of her nose in exasperation. Neither of  us were in danger, granted, but it hardly made her guardian being a  shady asshole any less mortifying. Zeke just looked unperturbed. "It's  always so cute when the little ones make plans. I assume you realized  that the location and importance of this planet made it a prime target  for annexation and decided to arrange this to both get rid of my ward  and advance your own?"

"Pretty  much." She said with a shrug. It would be suicide to attack you, and  bad form even if I survived, but this way my hands stay clean and I make  a nice profit. I'm not defecting or anything, but unlike you I have no  obligation to protect your candidate."

Zeke  just smiled wryly. "I'm guessing you don't know who he is? Or who I am?  Because while a pair of mid to upper B-rankers would be sufficient for  most, I assure you I can handle myself just fine. Tell you what, since I  don't dislke ambition, I'll give you a chance. Help me take care of the  rabble while I deal with thug one and thug two and I'll let you slink  off after this without doing anything drastic."

She  just snorted. "Drastic? You think you can take on a pair of nearly peak  Arch-Bishops and you'll still be alive to hurt me? Everyone knows the  cultists are hell to kill off, and in pairs they're more than a match  for anyone their rank. Crazy bastards will self destruct if they think  they're losing. Outnumbered you have no shot."

Sighing,  Zeke shook his head. "Come on, don't be stupid here." He reached into  his coat and pulled out and old, brittle looking mask. "I don't have a  teleportation volto mask anymore. My last one broke. Unless you were  planning to spend the remainder of your life with your soul trapped in  porcelain I'd take the offer." He held up the mask in the air beside  him, then released it, leaving it hanging in the space he left it in.  Under the mask, a form manifested, a black robe too dense to see a  shape. "Besides." He said with a bloodthirsty smile. "Who said I was  outnumbered."

Snapping  his fingers, a bag appeared, a large black duffel. He unzipped it and  started to remove masks, leaving them hanging in the air. Under each  mask a robed figure manifested, each one floating up and away to take  position around us in the air in a formation. Selka's eyes went wide  with terror as she stared at Zeke, then down at her candidate in an  expression of fearful dismay.

"I...I  didn't know." She stuttered. "I swear, I didn't know. I wouldn't have  contacted them if I had." Zeke just looked at her calmly, and she  swallowed, standing and bowing. "Not a single cultist will remain on  this planet by the time you finish." She said formally, and then,  suddenly, she was gone.

Amusingly,  she had NOT informed her former allies who Zeke was, though she clearly  figured it out herself. Clearly we were far enough from wherever Zeke  usually did his thing that random B-rankers didn't know who he was,  because the hooded figures didn't back down, and Kix (who was an  E-ranker actually) hadn't heard of him either.

The  redhead's ever present grin had slipped, replaced with an annoyed  scowl. "Bitch." He snapped. "I'll let my their excellencies deal with  her after they finish with you. Your brat has been responsible for the  deaths of several of our operatives, including a promising your talent  her to attend the tournament he needs to pay, and since we're here  anyway, we can just send a few messages all at once."

Zeke  smiled. "Really? I thought you guys had found out his mother is the  Star Queen and decided to enforce that shitty blood feud you nutcases  have with those stuffed shirts at the church." At the shocked expression  Zeke put on a faux embarrassed face. "Oh no, did I say that out loud?  Now everyone knows. Of course, once they see what I'm about to do to  your little buddies I don't expect they'll find the risk worth it."

I'd  been shocked when Zeke blurted that out, but now I got it. People would  learn about my mom eventually. But since he was in a position to fight  them personally and make an impression, he'd thrown out the information  himself. Now when he butchered the cultists two to one everyone would  see it, and anyone who thought about getting to mom through me would  think twice. Anyone B-ranked that is. But I doubted an A-ranker would  bother. They could just attack her head on. and that wouldn't offend one  of the biggest factions in the universe.

I  was low ranked and part of a competition, them attacking was  technically within the scope of that since Zeke was here to protect me.  If they started moving out Saints and Popes to kill me it would  literally just be declaring war on the WCP, and the Church would sure as  hell jump in on the other side.

Kix,  meanwhile, was turning red, his face looking like he'd had an anuerysm.  "H-heretic! How dare you protect a heretic? That bitch has killed more  of our Saints than any ten A-rankers in the entire church, and the  Radiant Pope murdered our Saintess of the Drowning Shade, our Lady's own  flesh and blood daughter!"

Zeke  rolled his eyes. "Oh come on, that happened before he even broke  through to S-rank. None of us were even alive. Besides, Drowning Shade  was a psychopath, even by Ascendant standards. I've met serial killers  lost in full recursion that weren't unstable enough to have spawned some  of those stories."

The  redhead was shaking like he was going to explode. "YOU DARE!" He  screamed, his voice cracking. "Defaming our lost Saintess, speaking ill  of our Lady's bloodline. Crimes! Crimes against the Cult! Blasphemy!  Heresy! Sacrilege! You'll die for this. You and your brat and every  person you've ever met!"

"See."  Zeke said turning to me. "This is why no one likes dealing with  Cultists outside strict mercenary assassination contracts. One wrong  word and they turn into a gibbering lunatic." Looking back at the other  man he clicked his tongue. "Also, heresy is the holding of an opinion  counter to a religious precept, and usually carries the assumption of  being a heretic, and heretic's can't by definition, blaspheme, which is  defined as 'showing contempt for god or sacred things'. Can't hold  contempt for something you don't believe exists."

Before  the redhead could retort, he held up a hand. "Don't mistake me, I know  Black Sorrow is real. I'm just making the point that you're  contradicting yourself here. Regardless, this whole fight is deeply  inconvenient to me. I don't have the materials to make two more B-rank  masks. I'll have to seal your souls until I can make a shopping trip to  get the materials for a porcelain that can contain them." He shrugged.  "Oh well, doesn't matter I suppose. Any artist would be glad to have a  new canvas to work with."

The  two Arch-Bishops, predictably, didn't take this threat well, but before  they could do more than step forward, Zeke snapped his fingers. Two of  the masks began to glow, the hooded manifestations under them vanishing  and appearing around the ring. A third gestured and the remaining  contestants were subsumed in suddenly liquid earth, then spat out off  the now self repaired stage. The two figures raised their arms and a  cube of glasslike energy appeared, then shifted as the second masked  figured warped the energy, creating a defensive perimeter.

Zeke  took a step, vanishing and appearing inside the ring with the three  cultists, while all the other robed figures, seven of them in total,  drifted through the shield as if it wasn't there to join him. Smiling  grimly, he reached into the bag again, withdrawing one last mask, then  snapped his fingers to dismiss it as he raised the porcelain to his  face.

As the  mask covered him, I felt a sort of...shift, in the air. Zeke's body  language changed, like someone throwing off an old cloak. Perception was  important, and he was making no effort to hide the differences. His  stance screamed aggressive and sadistic, and even the two hooded  Arch-Bishops had stepped back, clearly realizing that they had picked a  fight with someone with whom wise men did not fuck.

The  floating robed figures had spread out to surround the enemies, slipping  the edges of the ring to create a second line of defense. Zeke cracked  his neck. "Oh dear, this one is always so bloodthirsty. Perhaps I should  have used one of the others." He shrugged. "Oh well." He flickered,  appearing in the middle of the B-rankers, right behind Kix, and shoved  and arm THROUGH his chest. "Too late now."

The  two B-rankers whirled, one bringing to bear that black energy and the  other releasing a red lightning in a massive cloud of power that  literally turned the shield into a box seething black with red sparks  through it. When the energy faded, Zeke was back in his original spot,  safely behind a line of defense erected by his masks. There was no  evidence at all of the attack, since Kix's body was obliterated by the  other B-rankers.

Zeke  just clicked his tongue. "Killing your own subordinates. How gauche.  Especially since he would have been fine." Their fists clenched and he  cocked his head. "What? Did you think I actually attacked him? Didn't  you hear me earlier? I don't have a teleportation mask." He flicked a  hand and a perfect copy of him appeared to one side, high fiving him  before vanishing. "But we've had enough fun for now. Let's get started.  And with a snap of his fingers, both he and all his mask bearers  disappeared.