Beast Knights 22 - Shinou And The Knights

Standard disclaimer applies. You are warned that the characters might not be in their usual selves (in other words, possible OOCness).

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Chapter 22 - Shinou And The Knights

All three female Beast Knights could only stare in shock at the regal man standing not far from them. Yuri and the others managed to block the view from the other priestesses and the female soldiers who were outside the moment the door heading to the shrine opened.

"What does this mean?" Chie could only ask as her gaze remained at the first Maoh of Shin Makoku.

"This… would take more than a day to tell the whole story, Mari-san, Rina-san, Chie-san," Yuri said as he looked at the said female Knights in turn. "But this is not a dream or an illusion."

"Could it be that you've been sensing Shinou's maryoku from this place using your wind powers all this time, Mari?" This time, Rina spoke the moment she was able to gather her wits from the shock of what they had witnessed.

A sigh came from Mari first before she spoke. "I didn't know it was from him. But it was faintly familiar and also strong. Like something I've already felt a long, long time ago. Not to mention, it was also different from back then as… there wasn't any trace of dark energy at all, unlike what I kept remembering from Queen Hyorin's memories."

"That's because at the time Yunsoo and the other Beast Knights left Shin Makoku to protect the kingdom from the threat of their own powers and build their own land to live on, Soushu's dark powers that entered me when I cut it before had already started to consume me slowly. Maybe that's what you can see from the memories you've inherited from Lady Hyorin," Shinou explained, speaking for the first time since he greeted the Knights.

Mari nodded in awe as the explanation from Shinou made sense to her. She did recall sensing a dark energy from the distant past while the original Beast Knights stayed in Shin Makoku. But she didn't think that it was from Soushu.

"Forgive us for this sudden visit to your temple. But Mari here couldn't sit still until she finally met the owner of the one other energy she kept on sensing," Rina said and bowed to Shinou.

The blonde entity just smiled and shook his head. "You just saved me the trouble of meeting the three of you personally, even though my friend here keeps suggesting otherwise as it might be all too confusing for you."

Chie smiled at the comment. "We can put our confusions aside even for a while if it would help in solving something or answering certain questions that needed answers. In this case, we need to know the owner of that other energy whom Mari described as the one other person who would have an immense interest in knowing more about the original Beast Knights and what had happened to them after leaving Shin Makoku."

"Murata mentioned that you found three more journals belonging to the original Beast Knights that might contain clues about the seven sages," Yuri stepped in this time and joined the conversation.

It was when Shinou's gentle and smiling expression soon became somber. The Knights immediately noticed it.

"The journals have them, right? The information about the sages, I mean," Mari inquired as soon as she could.

Shinou nodded and walked towards the small set of stairs and took something from a podium on one side. It was four hardbound books in different colors. The Beast Knights immediately knew what the colors stood for.

"Gold for Lady Yunsoo, red for Lord Namgi, green for Lady Jihae, and blue for Queen Hyorin…" Mari uttered as she stared at the large books on Shinou's hands.

"Wow… They've actually incorporated their own colors even in their own journals," Rina couldn't help commenting at the sight.

For some reason, Shinou chuckled at that, which only made the ladies look at him.

"That's because a lot of people, especially their earlier servants when we were still dealing with the war against Soushu, tend to mix up their things by mistake. So they incorporated major colors to their own belongings so that it wouldn't get mixed up even when there were no names written or inscribed or sewn on them."

"Well, even I would be pissed off when someone would mix up my things with that of the others," Rina said and then shrugged. It only made her friends laugh.

But it was only for a short while. Soon after, Mari asked the crucial question.

"Have you read the journals already, Your Majesty Shinou?"

A nod was enough as an answer. And it was also enough to confuse Murata, for some reason.

"I thought you would start reading it when you finally meet the current Beast Knights. That's what you told me."

"That was the plan," Shinou replied with a sigh. "That is… until a vision pushed me to break that small promise I made."

"A vision, you say?"

Once again, Shinou nodded at the soldiers, especially to Gwendal who asked that question. As for the others, they just remained watching the entire time the interaction was taking place between the first Maoh and the current Beast Knights.

"One of my Beast Knight friends was screaming hard. It was a blood-curdling type of screaming. And a cloaked man slowly plunging a dagger on his chest. He just kept on screaming 'You'll never take it! You'll never make it follow you without our permission. Not even death would make me give you that permission!' I don't know if it actually even happened and I wasn't sure which among the original Beast Knights suffered like that. I don't even know if it did happen."

Silence ensued after that revelation, especially since the Knights appeared to be thinking hard. They looked like they were recalling something from their minds if any of their original Beast Knight ancestors had indeed suffered like that, as Shinou had described it.

And then, Conrad — who was silent the entire time — saw the immediate change in Mari's thinking expression.

"It did happen… 50 years after they heard the news of your death, Your Majesty," Mari said without tearing her gaze away from Shinou. "It was both King Chunho and Lord Taewon who suffered that way. From what Klaus told me when I mentioned to him about the first time I had a vision of Queen Hyorin saving her husband from the brink of death, the cloaked man — who they later learned to be a surviving sage of the enemy — demanded to know something extremely important from the two captured Beast Knights."

"And that is?"

"They wanted to know about the power and the identity of the master of the seventh Beast Spirit with the intention of using that person to claim that elusive spirit for themselves."

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I made it! Haha! I almost didn't, but here it is. All this 1,000 words or more per chapter or scene is doing me good when it comes to my writing productivity, you know. It'll be good if I will be able to keep up with this and get to finish writing this fanfic through it all. For now, enjoy reading and leave comments/reviews when you can! Love you, guys!