Chapter 849: Divine Gauntlet IV: My Only Family.
Chapter 849: Divine Gauntlet IV: My Only Family.
"Come on. You must agree with me." Vars smacked Gojo's back, "I know you're one sneaky little bastard."
"I don't, weirdo." Gojo sighed, walking forward with his hands in his pockets. "You're the only one thinking like that. I've never seen anyone like you; even other elves don't openly flaunt it." He looked at him with glowing blue eyes. "It's as if, you're desperately trying to look like a stereotypical elf."
"Is it that wrong?" Vars smiled with a confident face, pumping his chest out. "I say what I want, and I love what I love. I don't care what anyone says; they can go and cry themselves to sleep. Feet are the best." Vars pointed at a random passer-by, "Hey, I want you to know something." He approached him.
"What is it?" The man asked.
"I love feet! They are the best. What do you think?" Vars smiled.
"What do I think?" The man looked at him confused, "Honestly, I feel it's at least weird."
"I know, right?" Vars nodded with a large smile on his face, "What I'm trying to convince him with is that it doesn't matter. Since you feel it weird, what can you do about it?"
"Nothing, you can kiss all the feet you want. It's your problem, just don't do it in front of me." The man replied.
"Did you hear that Gojo? This is reality." He nodded and looked back at the man, "Thank you for hearing me out." He then returned to Gojo.
"A stranger's opinion should be as meaningless as their strangeness to you." Vars waved his hand, "For example, that man would have no impact on my life. Whether he thinks I'm weird or not, it doesn't matter." He then looked at Gojo's glowing eyes, "But, it matters a lot for those close."
"Is there a difference?" Gojo sighed as he started to get tired of Vars's weird conversation.
"If I got a sister or a wife and they thought me loving feet is weird or gross, I'd probably try to stop. Since they have an impact on my life, I'll be literarily sharing my whole time with my wife."
"You better... But doesn't that mean I'm a stranger to you?" Gojo looked at him with a confused face.
"We're friends, not family. It's more beneficial for you to know me better instead of a forced façade." Vars waved his staff, "It's just like magic; you need a deeper understanding of a spell to you on yourself than cast away."
"So we're close enough for me to know, but not close enough for you to try and change." Gojo sighed, "What headache, I'll probably find you a wife that hates your feet thing so I can get you to shut up."
"I'll be happy if you found me one, with nice legs and thighs if possible." Vars laughed.
****
"Arad is your brother?" Liliana looked at Gojo with a confused face, as she sat on the stairs in the middle of Alina's plaza. "You two don't look alike at all. He's large and beefy, his hair is black and his eyes are reddish purple."
"I can smell it. We have the same sent, we share the same mother." Gojo replied as he looked at her.
"Let's assume you're right. What will you do?" She looked at him, "I doubt he'll know where your mother is."
"That isn't the point." Gojo shook his head, "I can't close to him; something always repels me away. I must find a solution; otherwise, it'll be hard for us to even speak properly."
"Since you void dragons should repel each other?" She leaned back, "Do you need to? I doubt it'll matter."
"He's younger, my little brother." Gojo stared at her, "In this world, we might've gained a lot of friends and help... But we're the only ones. We don't have a family beside each other." "From what I've heard from you, the repelling problem is a large issue. I doubt you can solve it alone, and going through all of that trouble for a brother you don't know. Are you sure it's worth it? You won't be disappointed. I've heard dragons kill and eat each other, it might end up in a fight to the death."
"That's a possibility. But I still want to try, he's my little brother, my only family, and I'm as well his only family. I can't leave him to live in solitude." Gojo sat beside Liliana, "Even if he were to bite my hand, I'd still extend it."
"You're a problem." She sighed.
"I care about this so I'll try. And even if I didn't care, I still should try in case he cares." Gojo looked at her with a smile. "I'll go find a way. Care to help me?"
She stood, "Fine, I know you can't do anything without me gathering information for you." She smiled, "Would ancient artifacts work?"
"Yeah, please look at them. I'll study magic and see if it could help." He stood and left back to the guild with her.
****
Gug gasped, bleeding from the axe impaled on her side as she took a step back, growing with a raging red face as she looked at the bunch of cultists facing her. "MOVE!"
"Don't charge blindly!" Liliana shouted at her, "We're to hold them back. Even if you can kill them, don't."
"Liliana is right. Their life is important for this crypt, it'll collapse and we'll lose everything." Vars waved his staff and raised the corpses of the dead cultists. "We're to hold them back until Gojo returns." He started at the large closed door of the main chamber.
"Gojo...Lose?" She looked back at Vars, confused.
"Yeah! The artifact, Gojo would lose it." He replied with a growl as he flung a lightning bolt and paralyzed one of the cultists.
Gug didn't think that much about anything, but at that moment she could only remember her conversation with Gojo before the fight.
^Brother?^ She asked and Gojo nodded with a smile.
Gug growled as her skin turned dark red and smoke gushed from her mouth. The axe impaled into her side got ejected as her muscles forced the wound shut. "Gug's family, dead." She lifted her sword up and glared at the cultists, her voice shaking the ground.
"Brother, Alive. Family..." As her muscles expanded, a wave of magic gushed into her body. Gug wasn't naturally born as a barbarian, she had lost her whole family in a monster attack when she was still a baby and a barbarian's clan picked her up. She had never seen her family, always been alone, the other went to hunt with their families while she watched, going alone in the rain to catch her food.
She remained mostly alone until the day Gojo picked her up, he was the first to hunt for her, fight alongside, and protect her. Right now, this party is her precious family.
Battle wounds hurt, but what hurt her most was the solitude and loneliness of not having a family to rely on. Seeing her worst and most hated pain creeping its way toward Gojo made her blood boil, she couldn't withstand it.
She lifted her greatsword up and glared down at the cultists, "Won't...pass." She growled menacingly, ready to tank all their attacks and keep them in one place.
"Gug, it's enough." Gojo's voice came from the main chamber as the door slowly opened up, and he walked out, engulfed in a gust of white smoke as he froze the entire room.
The moment the cultists laid an eye on him, they knew it; this wasn't someone they could fight. He has their sacred relic in his hand. "I've got what we came from." He walked between
the cultists like a ghost and none of them dared breathe.
Those who dared breathe had their lungs frozen from the inside out, they coughed frozen blood, fell on the ground, and died a slow painful death.
****
"Do you think..." Gojo looked at his party with a worried face, sitting on a chair and shaking
his legs. "This will be fine?"
"What are you worried about now?" Vars sighed and looked toward Liliana, "Consult him a
bit. He needs a hug."
"Gug, will." Gug sat beside Gojo and gave him a hug.
"Wait! That's my job!" Liliana gasped.
Vars looked at Gojo with a smile. "There is no need to worry."
"I just can't help but imagine us fighting. I don't want that..." He looked at Vars, "What
should I do?"
"Just go meet him. He's your little brother. I'm sure it'll be fine." Vars approached Gojo with a
smile, "Trust in him."
"Yeah...you're right."
*****
"Gojo Orion; Welcome, and my deepest condolences." Gojo looked forward at the beautiful
white angel standing before him. She opened her arms, "Pick and choose, there are over fifteen different heavens."
Gojo looked down at the countless specs of light rising from the black ground. "This..."
Down in the world, Korah stared at Gojo's lifeless body with a smile. "To think a mortal like you existed. I need to rethink all of my plans."