The Eternal Sanctum (Holy Knight Headquarters)

[Apollymi]

The Eternal Sanctum is the Headquarters of the Holy Knights as established by Jeanne d'Arc. Any knight who ascends from the lower world could potentially call this place their home. It is tucked into the entrance of the Cedar Mountain which itself is a place of great repute. It still holds a tinge of mystery and is connected to the previous world. The buildings and current design were the work of the Great Pharaoh Ozymandias, and the Pharaoh Nefertari. There are many expansive walk ways connecting several different observatories and towers which contain all the knights could need. It is concerned a central hub and is decorated both inside and out by golden and ivory back drops amid lush greenery. The lads are fertile and are often used to grow crops and share. The 'kingdom' as it is thought of, could easily run itself and live apart from everything but has a warm and jovial theme. When one ports directly to the Eternal Sanctum they show up on a lower platform at a central plaza which one could follow the main entrance up or take one of many divergent paths out into the greater lands or into the overlooking mountains.

[Bloodedge]

A bounded field manifested within the Eternal Sanctum's vicinity, though not at the structure itself. Six were meant to be present in this appearance. Ah, but there were seven. Charlemagne, the new King of the Eternal Sanctum as dictated by a recent connection with Jeanne d'Arc, brought with him a group of five... as well as a stolen horse currently being kept by Astolfo. "You already stole the horse. Why would you bring it to another country, on a completely different level of the world?!" Charlemagne asked, much to the pink-haired male's dismay. Astolfo would be found embracing the horse by its neck, holding on for dear life. "It's a good horse! Look, it even answered my whistle! It's mine now!" he argued.

With a sigh, Charlemagne removed his sword from its resting place. They were a brief walk away from the sanctum itself, so he considered this the perfect spot to leave behind all weapons. Considering the Holy Knights were likely on high alert, he didn't even expect to make it all the way. As such, Charlemagne sighed deeply. Ailen, who had no weapons to speak of, spent this time inspecting the flora already within sight. "Hmm. It seems I was right. Not only is the atmosphere different; it even has an immediately noticeable effect on ordinary plant life. This will certainly be worth further observation."

[Apollymi]

The group of three lasses and three men had appeared in a new place. There was a general look towards Charles before they'd all departed, and even the girls in the group agreed that this armor upgrade was cool. All three of the girls would soon enough be taking in the sights, each of them feeling and seeing something new for the first time. "Oh, mana density up here is fairly high," was Sakura's first observation. "Ah! This looks like a cool place actually like dwarven ruin spilling out of the mountains!" were the words of Yume who seemed to be quite surprised. At the same time it would be Anais de-equipping her sword to slide it into her magic bag while also having a look around. Of course, it was quite new but it probably wouldn't be needed for a little while yet, they were here to appear friendly after all. "Oh? I might like this place..." she mused. By her own feelings this land was quite nice, it also gave her a very calm feeling.

They probably looked like a strange group of tourists, aside from the fact that Astolfo had brought with him the horse he'd already stolen. Charles chose to question it and received a very Astolfo answer for his trouble. This of course, brought a bit of laughter to the rest of the group including Anais who could only try to deescalate the situation. "Charlie he did already have it. Arguing the point of it is just an unnecessary headache at this point," Anais stated honestly. But the words of her mentor and his immediate observations were things she'd listen to as it was something she needed to be part of in some ways. "Yes, it should be pretty interesting... this place feels really nice. And I've heard the individual islands up here vary a lot so we could see a lot of interesting things," she said. Though Anais didn't go out very often, friends of hers had seen a great deal of the world and she was technically happy to be taking her first steps towards the same kind of wandering.

[Bloodedge]

Interestingly, Charlemagne and Astolfo were the only members of this group to have prior experience in Finis Chaldea. Charlemagne had almost forgotten that detail until seeing and hearing the others' reactions. "Oh, right... I'm old as dirt," he griped. Oh well; they surely wouldn't have much time to enjoy the atmosphere. As such, it was best that they take time to appreciate it all while they could. As Anais claimed, there was nothing but headache to be found in arguing about Astolfo's stolen horse. "You're right. Astolfo, drop your..."

Why did Charlemagne hesitate? There was a simple reason. So soon after their arrival, there was a mighty weight applied to the area. Charlemagne knew the feeling quite well. What they were all being subjected to was the fury of a dragon, felt from all the way in the upper sanctum. "... weapons. Now," he finished. The Holy Knights knew their headquarters had been entered. The one called Siegfried especially had been made aware of their arrival, even sooner than Charlemagne anticipated. Soon enough, someone would be seeking them; of this he was sure. Who would it be? He didn't have a clue, but he doubted they would be anything resembling friendly.

[Apollymi]

Arguing with Astolfo wasn't something which should be done most of the time. He in general lacked logic and it was much easier to let him do whatever thing his heart desired as long as it wasn't actually hurting anyone. Moving on, Charles had a gripe about being old and Anais could only shrug. "Come on now he can't be that old..." mentioned Yume who seemed to have no idea about the ages of other people in this world. "Ages can go pretty far, I'm over 300 myself..." she mentioned to Yume who found it startling. "Shut up! You've been here 300 years plus?!" she seemed to be in disbelief but that would have to wait.

"Ooooh? Someone is furious. That's making my skin tingle..." she said about the rather sudden pressure. "Yeah... it is definitely doing that, I really don't want to meet the person giving off that sort of vibration," she murmured her ears were already twitching. If she'd been alone she likely would have gone, but she was a knight she couldn't just abandon ship. Oh well, they were already here, it was too late to turn back and regroup. Instead they'd be left unarmed and waiting, until of course someone started coming into view. A young woman with long purple hair dressed in white and red was carrying with her a giant almost papal staff but she seemed to be moving at a pretty casual pace.

As she approached a rather strange group of people would come into her vision, with only a couple of recognizable faces in the group. How strange, the absolute fury radiating off the man in their main compound made much more sense now, didn't it. "Oh? I don't know what I expected but I didn't expect this!" the woman seemed to be calm and collected but strangely excited. There was a gentle twitch in her unoccupied hand as if she truly wished to fight. Well, they'd been on high alert for a while. Jeanne had gone missing the previous day and now they were coordinating and trying to find her.

[Bloodedge]

Yume had been in this world for only a day, and thus didn't have any expectations of aging, so it seemed. To be surprised that Anais lived in this world for a few hundred years, she wasn't helping Charlemagne's thoughts about his own elder status. There were fossils younger than him. No matter. If he didn't keep focused, he and the others could become fossils themselves. The Holy Knights functioned as Finis Chaldea's enforcers most times, and the group could have only grown more vast and powerful in the last thousand years. Siegfried already seemed to be in a different league than what he recalled. At least that feeling wasn't getting closer just yet.

Ah, but there was one encroaching upon him. Would it be a familiar face? Yes. A purple-haired holy woman walked along, and Charlemagne stepped away from his sword. She was one of the more dangerous individuals to catch oneself in combat with. Perhaps she would be fair? Sadly, her aura said otherwise. How strange. Something about her visage currently was more familiar than Charlemagne expected, but that was of little importance. "Martha..." he said. Charlemagne would take the front, stepping out ahead of Martha and cutting off the most direct path toward the others. If she attacked unexpectedly, he'd be on the receiving end. "We're here to talk."

While Charlemagne went with the straightforward approach, Astolfo finally abandoned that horse. He was content to ignore everything else happening, all to creep his way around to Martha's rear. What was his purpose? Well, Martha was always too voluptuous a target to ignore, so he meant to throw himself against her backside and fill his hands with her sizeable breasts. "Martha my goddess! Goooood morning~!♥"

[Apollymi]

Friends wouldn't be able to catch up for a little while. It was fine, but Yume now had a different concern after knowing how long that Anais had been in this world. Three hundred years was a long time to live, she should have been surprised the girl could even recognize and remember her. This was a magical world, but how much did one need to hang on to their own memory to not accidentally let go of someone they knew for less than a decade in their previous life?

Well, she'd ponder that question while someone apparently called Martha approached with the full intention of beating someone up. This was obvious even to someone as combat inexperienced as Yume. Anais seemed to be on high alert as if getting ready to move or surrender at a moment's notice. Tension seemed to be at an all time high, and Sakura was watching with rather wide eyes. Martha as she was called chuckled but it didn't necessarily seem like a happiness that reached the entirety of her face. "Yeah, that's probably not going to be a thing that..." Her sentence came to a close a bit prematurely. Actually, she'd done the worst thing she could have. She decided after scanning the group that Charles was the target to take but, in so doing Astolfo would easily do the thing he was always going to do. He broke the tension. In this case, he was rubbing himself against her backside and fondling her chest while greeting her. "Asta, cut it out. It's been years and while you aren't on the list you're definitely ruining my entrance here~" she chimed. Ah and what had been a fist twitching and ready to strike became some well spaced almost tickles to remove the handsy French man from her person.

While this took place Anais maintained a bit of curiosity and since she'd recently become quite used to asking questions as they appeared in her head, she had one for her friend. "Yume, was he like that over there too?" she wondered absently. "Hm, well he's more like the guy who gives the rocking hugs, not enough to be completely weird, but enough that if you thought he was out to get in your pants you'd question it. He's nowhere near as handsy as you though..." she mentioned to elafia, who had nothing but a reddened face as she came to remember some rather strange behaviors of hers. "We're not talking about that..." she countered quickly.

[Bloodedge]

Charlemagne could do nothing but try his best for immediate diplomacy. Sadly, it seemed Martha had no intention to follow the same path. He was completely unarmed, but prepared to defend himself by other means if necessary. Martha was among the more dangerous Holy Knights he knew of from before. Ah, but there was a stroke of luck called Astolfo in their group. Charlemagne could heave a sigh of relief after being the center of Martha's focus, leaving her opening to Astolfo's antics.

Astolfo could consider himself lucky as well. Since Charlemagne provided distraction so easily, he was able to have a very nice feel of a physique so dearly missed. Martha was always a treat to grope, even now as she complained and fended him off. The pink-haired lad was laughing furiously within moments, yet he continued reaching out again and again even after jerking away initially. "Boooo! You're ruining my entrance! That's no way to have a friendly reunion!" he whined. While that little exchange was going on, Charlemagne crossed his arms and lowered his guard just slightly. Astolfo was always good for that sort of thing, though his methods and everything else remained questionable. "So... if you have a moment to consider not attacking unarmed visitors, maybe I can start telling you how we're not your enemies? I'd rather get that part out of the way before Sieg's rampage starts."

[Apollymi]

Charles and his group seemed to catch a break, because of the antics of their patron pink-haired chaos master. Astolfo managed to take a person from obviously ready to beat someone to death to a giggling mess upset about her ruined entrance. He continued to try to grope and harass her but she didn't seem to take it very personality. One would notice this about the lad repeatedly. Regardless of the circumstances these kinds of greetings were technically normal for him. "You brought an enemy with you, it's your fault not mine," she said. Martha was at least willing to consider the only person in the wrong here might have been Charles. But there was a reasonable enough explanation for that, one which was perfectly rooted in logic which she would explain.

Regardless, Charles lowered his guard a bit and started talking... all while the tickling of Astolfo continued to force his eventual release of Martha's person. Sakura watched that exchange and wondered why that was what Astolfo went with as a diversion and then concluded that either he was some sort of genius or he was simply crazy. Either way, he had some pretty useful life skills. "First of all, I was willing to assume you were the only enemy in the group. Second, I am a saint and still a knight, I would have either let you arm yourself or fought on even terms," she said looking up with a tinge of seriousness. Did she know that it was worse for others if she fought without a weapon? Yes. But... it would have been honorable combat which was all any of the codes she followed demanded of her. "Besides all of that, you can say you're not our enemy, but it's been a millennia since I saw you last Chuck. And you stayed with the enemy after what happened with Jeanne so, believing you isn't exactly logical. Sieg's rampage is probably going to happen regardless so you better talk fast, there are only a limited number of people even capable of stopping him..." she explained of her current stance. "He's over a millennia old? Life in this world is pretty crazy..." Yume mumbled to Anais, the elafia nodded in response to that.

[Bloodedge]

An enemy? Oh, right; the whole point of this ordeal was that they would be considered enemies by the Holy Knights. Well, that wasn't wholly the case for Martha; she only considered one person an enemy. She and Astolfo would not agree, however. "I didn't bring an enemy. It's a good horse!" he insisted as if the horse was being blamed.

Charlemagne might have to let Astolfo keep the horse after all. The other male was doing quite a bit to cut the tension early, whether intentional or not. Regardless of intention or lack thereof, Charlemagne didn't have to immediately fend off one of the more threatening Holy Knights before the guaranteed problem of Siegfried. "You mean arm myself and fight on even terms? It hasn't been long enough for me to forget what you're like without a weapon," he scoffed. To Martha's credit, her belief was not wrong. Their perspective had him on the side of their greatest enemy for a thousand years, but there were so many more details the Holy Knights didn't have. "I can stop Siegfried; I just won't like it. Anyway... here," he said, casually tossing the Holy Grail toward Martha. That was something best dealt with as soon as possible. Besides, he could use it as a conversation piece and the proof of his coming story. "You know what that is?"

[Apollymi]

Martha was shocked, for several reasons not the least of which was apparently the idea that Astolfo thought she was blaming his horse for being an enemy. She had a quick look at the horse wondering if it was male or female, and upon making her discovery she only had this to say. "I know the relationship between people and their mounts are none of my business but if you honestly think I see a horse as an enemy you might think I'm as crazy as you are," she said. Given the random assortment of people in this group the only old faces were Charles and Astolfo. And of that pair only Charles was problematic, as far as she was concerned everyone could have simply been coerced into making this trip or didn't know the truth of the lad. It wasn't in their nature to harm any who didn't mean harm in the first place.

Moving on, Charles spoke of arming himself to fight her on even terms which made the woman look a bit embarrassed. She thought she was going to actually get to fight. She snapped as if she'd just barely missed an opportunity. "Shoot, I never get to have fun anymore," she grumbled as if it was a perfectly normal thing to do. At the same time, he claimed that he could stop Siegfried he just wouldn't like to and tossed her something she recognized and caught after flailing about sightly. "Oi oi, I don't know what you think Siegfried is but... This is a Holy Grail. We haven't seen a new one in ages! Where the hell did you get this? And if you won it, why did you come here? You'd have been better off trying King Gilgamesh or the Pharoahs or hell at this point even the trial by combat that would have come with appearing in Albion," she said. Well half of those people were currently missing, but why he chose to appear where people wanted him dead was not the most brilliant thing that could have been done.

"Oh, there are Holy Grails plural?" this was a question of Yume. "Hai hai, we found out yesterday that they are supposed to spawn in regular intervals and be fought over on the lower world so that people can lift their kingdoms, countries or themselves to this level, and interact with the Nexus. But the person in charge of Aincrad had been... taking the grails while they were in more manageable forms and hoarding them. So Charlie's that he won from the Labyrinth is probably a bit of shocking news. His having it also gives him the right to be up here so..." she murmured to her friend to keep her up to date on natural situations. At the same time, Sakura was quite impressed at this tactic had worked and that Anais had managed to retain such information the previous day while being in an obviously distressed state.

[Bloodedge]

"Oi!" Astolfo yelled immediately. "I don't know what you see as an enemy! As far as I know, gorillas and horses just don't get along," he continued, offering a rather pointed jab at the intimidating physical capacity of Martha. Bending at the waist, he took himself to eye-level with her posterior, an extended forefinger on a path toward it. "Really soft for a gorilla, though. Like really soft! What sort of troop did you come from?"

Martha had every reason to recognize a Holy Grail, and it seemed she even recognized it as different to the one Jeanne once possessed. The topic of Siegfried aside, Charlemagne could move on without an additional explanation. Good. It was for the best that he move on to the more important parts. "I got it in Aincrad. I thought it was given to me by Father An when I was coronated as Holy Emperor, but it apparently belonged to me since I cleared the Labyrinth," he explained. "Which he did by himself!" Astolfo added proudly. "Y-... yeah. Anyway, you're targeting the wrong guy. You're probably thinking I'm the guy who's lying to people about what happened to Jeanne, but I was one of the people being misled. The Father is the problem here. I saw Jeanne a little while ago, by the way. She's fine; she and some others apparently got trapped somewhere. I didn't get a lot of the details. I came here for help. Being An's 'second sacrifice' got me dropped out of Aincrad, so I need to find it again. I've got people still there, and a bone to pick with the Father after he tried to hijack my soul yesterday morning."

[Apollymi]

Astolfo's logic or lack thereof, served to make him the actual target of any aggression real or playful. At the mention of the term gorilla a small vein above Martha's left brow began to twitch gently. That staff she hed was planted in the ground rather swiftly thereafter. And by the time Astolfo was aiming to poke her bottom and question what kind of troop she came from, she was aiming to twist her knuckles against the side of his head after pulling him into an aptly ordained headlock. She would remain rapping against his brain for the foreseeable future while Charles explained about how his grail was obtained.

According to his own words, he'd been misled as well. Astolfo chimed in to mention that he'd cleared the Labyrinth by himself which caused another question from Yume. "Is that a big deal?" she asked seeing how proud Astolfo seemed to be about that fact. "Hai, the Labyrinth is a super hard dungeon it takes a lot of different skill types to get all the way though it. The only other person in the history of the Labyrinth to clear it alone was Jeanne d'Arc. But given the whole of Aincrad was told she was a heretic it was assumed that it wasn't actually meant to be possible to clear it alone and that she could only do so by colluding with demons. I was attempting it on my own and I'd only gotten to floor 70," she explained of the situation. "But groups began clearing it a while ago... most by 'any means necessary'." she finished that explanation to Yume who could only frown. "Is this world demon racist?" she asked quickly. "Until yesterday, it was assumed that anyone with a demonic presence was evil... those things were innately synonymous. But there are exceptions to everything, a few in our group give off those kinds of vibrations but aren't bad," Anais explained.

All the while, Martha had stopped moving and heard out Charles story. How was she meant to react? The lad had nearly gotten his soul broken, she'd never heard of that happening before, but it didn't sound good. Even so, she wasn't sure how much she should actually feel for him. The whole thing felt a bit suspicious regardless of his circumstances. He'd even claimed to have seen Jeanne recently and that she and some others had gone missing but they were trapped no details. "You realize that story is a bit too convenient right? You happened to be misled for over a thousand years, despite being from the other side and having the extra knowledge you went along with it. You happen to be the secondary person to get tossed out and didn't see it coming. You get put back together again and happen to see Jeanne after, she's gone missing form here. And now you just happen to be looking to get your friends out of that same horrid place and you're seeking our help? Beyond it being overly convenient as an explanation for both your absence and your continued connection to a corrupt organization, we don't have any way to corroborate that you've actually seen Jeanne nor do we have any proof that you weren't the one doing the things. You get it right? You know how this looks?" At the end of Martha's speech Sakura gave a firm nod. She liked this woman, her thoughts were rooted in logic and all the information she listed was solidly what happened regardless of the extra details. "I mean that is a logical assertion but it isn't really fair to Charlie, he was looking into what happened to Jeanne, several in our group were helping with it," that was Anais's stance on the matter.

[Bloodedge]

Eventually, Astolfo would always land himself in some sort of headlock. One might consider that at a certain point, he considered it an acceptable greeting from some of the women he knew. The lad was a giggling mess even while having Martha's knuckles ground into his head, even as she kept up a conversation with Charlemagne. As for that conversation, of course Martha didn't believe a word Charlemagne said. He expected as much. "Of course it sounds too convenient. That's how evil mastermind plans work," was his initial rebuttal.

There were many things to take into consideration regarding this story. Of it all, there was one particular part he needed to debunk. Yes, he was from the other world where many of these things were part of history. On the other hand, however, he knew how skewed history became when this magical world was involved. "King Arthur is a woman who lives during the same time period as King Gilgamesh, Charlemagne, and the pharaohs Ramesses and Nitocris. Anseis de Carthage is the deer girl right over there," he said, pointing a thumb over his shoulder toward Anais. Next, he pointed at the grail still in Martha's hand. "The Holy Grail? You're holding one of at least several hundred right now. Don't start preaching to me about how I should have expectations based on a history that isn't anywhere near the same as what our world thinks. I've been through a lot of things, dealt with this crazy world for a long time, and a whole millennium doesn't compare to what I've had to go through in the past 48 hours, so don't tell me I should have seen anything coming!"

Charlemagne was getting a bit riled-up. Didn't he have every reason to, though? Something was very annoying here, and he hadn't yet realized what it was in the midst of a paused rant. Many people from their world came to realize historical figures were living their lives on this side, or even were those figures themselves. Some, however, came to realize in a very direct manner how very different the stories were. Moving on, he'd yet to address the other alleged inconsistencies of the story. "And I didn't just randomly stumble upon Jeanne. I used the grail and spoke to her within the Nexus. She even burned the hell out of me before we could have a conversation. But... ignore that. Ignore all of that, because I've got one big problem right now. You know the Jeanne that appeared after she was killed. You probably know the story of how it happened. So tell me, what part of that story mentions me at all? Because here's the fun part: I was in the middle of a war with the fucking Saxons while it all happened! Check your history on that!" Ah, Charlemagne understood what the annoyance was now. Three of the six people in this group were from Aincrad, yet he was the sole target. Why? He'd easily take the blame for negligence in the aftermath ─ he'd even take it for ignorance. He would not, however, let a belief that he directly did anything to Jeanne d'Arc stand.

[Apollymi]

Apparently the convenience of his appearance and all of that was to be attributed to an evil mastermind sort of plan. That may be the truth but even if it was the case, then he still hadn't been conscious enough of multiple aspects of this situation. What was more a tirade was on the way which would bring a slight end to the rapping of knuckles over the head of Astolfo. He took issue with the inconsistencies of history and this world, given the time span and several other things. She disagreed with that point but could understand the confusion. From what she'd seen in a technical sense, the overlap of these people was mostly concerned with extended human lifetimes and nothing else. But... logic wasn't going to work here and she was sure of that by the time the lad restarted. She took issue with different things the lad said at this point including the idea that the organization he was with had hundreds of holy grails but not nearly that number of king worthy candidates among them. It simply wasn't possible truly. But a real show of emotions didn't a lot of things and firstly it made this whole situation a lot less staged then it could have been. Martha's eyes hadn't left the lad and she was busy hearing him out. He'd obviously been sitting on whatever emotions he had going so she'd let him finish. Sometimes people needed to vent, and given he wasn't armed she'd allow it.

Anais looked over at Charles and realized that he'd been bottling that up for a bit. She'd warned him about his invasive thoughts, but she supposed this woman seemed well trained enough to handle his potential emotional breakdown. At the same time, Yume had to question something but as the lad was on a tirade she didn't want to interrupt. "You've been through something traumatic, obviously and I am not unsympathetic," she clarified. This was of course the truth, Martha held a healthy skepticism for all who didn't return after the death of Jeanne d'Arc and very few would above such criticism. Even so, the Jeanne who returned was very different but still very much herself. "The Jeanne who came back had taken are more pragmatic approach, but she was still herself, you've seen her so you know what I mean. I am aware of the work of a certain man named Charles against the Saxons, but I think you are also forgetting that the lower world broke apart. As for Jeanne's story, she mentioned directly that 'Father' person and Gilles being directly enemies, still she didn't know who else as in on it and all from Aincrad were to be treated as hostiles until their alignment was determined. The only exception to that is whoever Angelica is, she saw her as another victim..." Martha mentioned all these things were logical. "I would also have you know that people from Aincrad periodically attack Holy Knights including the Sanctum itself," Martha clarified. Given the more visceral emotional response she was willing to believe Charles didn't directly have anything to do with what happened to Jeanne, but him not understanding the hostility seemed a bit off.