1Disclaimer: I do not own Zatch Bell or Konjiki no Gash Bell. Makoto Raiku does.
Unwritten Stories
Chapter 1
It was mid-August in Australia and the sun was barely visible through the thick clouds. Here, in some area in a snowy mountain, the warmth was that of a burning candle; it was so cold and freezing despite the summer day. The ground was white of snow, not even a fleck of earth was visible due to the thickness of the snow piled on it. At a glance, that place was greatly resembled of a freezing ocean, very quiet with no sign of life. It was so calm and peace and without disturbance and… not anymore.
The field of snow was disturbed. A great chunk of it was kicked out of the calmness and voices were booming, breaking the silence. Two people were bursting out of the forest surrounding the snow field, letting out a yelp and a scream as they fell and skidded on the snow. When they finally came to a halt, one person quickly got up; he was a boy around twelve years old with wild silver hair wearing black attire and black boots, his sharp gray eyes were glaring daggers at the source where they were came from. Looking around, he found the other person lying several feet from him who, unlike him, was trembling so badly from both the coldness and fear. She was a girl of around eighteen years old and she really looked like a mess. Her waist-length black hair was disheveled and almost covered her entire face, but still, you could see her brown colored eyes widen in terror through the curtain of black. She was wearing a sailor uniform; white shirt with a scorched hole on the right shoulder, a blue knee-length skirt with a short under it, and black shoes. It was odd to wear thin clothes in such freezing weather but apparently she had no chance to change into some warm fur jacket as she didn't have the faintest idea that she would face the change of weather from a burning sunlight to below zero temperature. She was lying on her stomach, clutching dearly on a thick-covered indigo book with strange writing and hourglass-like symbol on it, as though her life was depending on it or maybe it was just her attempt to warm herself a bit.
The silver-haired boy rushed to her side and pulled her, with a surprising power, to her feet. She staggered a bit before the boy catch her on the arms and began rocking her. "Pull yourself together! I need you to read the book!" he yelled.
She stared at him still with the look of terror on her face, countlessly wondering about how in the world could she be dragged in such troublesome situation. If not because of the cold and the searing pain on her shoulder, she would have thought that she was dreaming. A moment ago, or so she guessed, she was walking home from school under the fierce heat of summer sun, got hit by a laser beam till pass out and awoke in a strange place with snow everywhere. She had gone through very weird events ever since she met with the boy. The shock of knowing that she was moved from Tokyo to Australia in a very short time hadn't gone before another weird event started. The boy, whom he introduced himself as Hori, told her something about mamonos and the battle for king and something about books. She didn't really pay him any attention as at that moment she was possessed by shock. She was about to ask him to repeat his explanation when another weird event happened; they were attacked by an iceman that shot ice from its mouth.
The boy, Hori, was furious to see the trembling human before him. He didn't understand the rule of why the fight to determine king had to pair up with such a weak creature. He would have won this fight alone if he had had his power, but no, his power was sealed inside the indigo book clutched by the girl and would not come out unless she read it. Panic began to rise in him like rocket as he was thinking. If he couldn't make the girl to read the book, he would be done for, but was this girl really able to read his book? Now that he thought about it, the girl had not opened his book even once before. He took her with him only because the book was glowing when she jumped in front of a laser that was aimed for him. What if she actually couldn't read his book? The thought made his stomach lurching.
"Listen, if you want to stay alive, open the damn book and see if you can read it!"
However, the girl was thinking differently. She didn't think reading a book could make the situation better or more, to keep her alive. She needed to seek for help, maybe call the police, but then remembered that she didn't have her cell phone with her. Her thought was interrupted by a shouting voice and the next moment, she was on the ground again; Hori had pushed her out of the way of the freshly icicles that now sticking out where they had been a second before.
"Heh, you won't escape us!" she heard her pursuer saying. There, standing right at the edge of the forest was a creature that seemed to be made of blocks of ice. It had blue armor on its body, covering all but its square head. Its eyes were black and round and it had holes on either sides of its head instead of ears. Shortly after, a man in his mid-twenties emerged from behind it, holding a pale brown book just like the one the girl was holding. He had on a thick green jacket with hoodie on, black pants, and black boots. The man panted slightly and had an annoyed expression on his face.
"It's annoying to have you keep running away from us. Why didn't you just encounter our attacks with yours? We were expecting this battle to be a little fun."
Hori just gritted his teeth when he continued, "And now I'm bored. Just hand us your book peacefully and we'll let you live."
"Like hell I would do it!" Hori yelled, and before the girl could stop him, he was already launched himself towards the iceman, his fists balled.
"Gikoru!" the man yelled.
Several sharp icicles were shot out of the iceman's mouth towards Hori. Being shot at close range, he was lucky that he had managed to move sideways a little, leaving only a deep cut on his right arm, however, he heard a surprised shriek from behind him. The icicles were stuck themselves around the girl, who was miraculously avoided the ice from ramming into her. Hori knew she was alright from the absence of the howl of agony and, with a yell, planted his punch as hard as he could to the iceman's face. The ice shattered and a crater was formed in its face but it didn't scream nor show any sign of pain, instead it grabbed Hori's wrist with its white hands and threw him away. Hori spun in the air and landed on his feet safely.
"A good thing of having this body is that I can't feel any pain no matter how serious you injure me, and I can mend my injuries easily." the iceman said as it grabbed a handful of snow from the ground and placed it on the crater Hori had made with his fist. The snow seemed to merge with its face and hardened, giving it a new crackless cheek.
"Well then I'll just beat you up so bad you can't even mend yourself!"
Hori charged again, and the girl, who had finally gotten up, watched him punching and kicking the iceman from behind a sticking icicle, wide-eyed. The iceman of course tried blocking Hori's rampage, but it was too slow to react thus giving Hori several chances to tackle it to the ground and delivered his heavy blows. Apparently it realized that it was in enough trouble and shouted for help to the man holding its book. The girl then looked at him and still surprised to see his book glowing. She had seen it before and knew that every time it glowed and the man shouted something, the iceman would shoot ice from its mouth. She then looked at the indigo book in her hands, which was Hori's. He kept ordering her to read it or else she would die, so she wondered; would Hori also shoot ice from his mouth if she read it?
The iceman finally stopped struggling when its book keeper shouted a spell. It, once again, shot icicles from its mouth and one of it had successfully pierced Hori's right shoulder. He was sent flying and fell to the ground, followed by a shriek from the girl calling his name. She went out from behind the icicle and ran to his side.
"Are you okay?" she said with a worried tone in her voice.
Hori didn't answer. He removed the ice from his shoulder, and despite that it was bleeding so badly and throbbing painfully, he smirked as he watched the result of his work. The iceman was barely recognizable for a lot of its body was missing. Its head only half remained and it lost its arms and legs and a great chunk of its body, all that was left was full of craters and cracks. "There, I wanna see how you can mend yourself in that state!"
It didn't feel any pain just like it had said before, yet it was scowling. "I'm impressed that you can injure me to a state like this, but it's really embarrassing you know!" And they watched, horror-struck as the iceman's body began to regenerate and not long after, it was the same as before, like nothing happened.
"No way, how come—"
"I guess you forgot that I'm made of ice. As long as there is ice and cold around me, I can regenerate my body just fine even if I'm melting."
"Yuki, we've wasted so much time here. Let's just end this battle quickly, I'm starting to freeze." The man holding the book said, shivering slightly.
"Yes, Sora. After all they're no fun at all." the iceman, Yuki said.
And then it was its turn to attack. It raised its fist and charged forward, and Hori, who had just managed to get up, was barely able to block its punch with his crossed arms before tossed back several feet. The girl, who was still on the ground, let out a shriek and backed away, apparently she had temporarily forgotten about the cold in exchange of fear. Yuki then turned to her, its eyes fixed upon the indigo book in her hands.
"RUN!" Hori yelled, and before the iceman could lay a hand on the book, Hori had launched himself to it, causing them to fall and rolled to the side. The girl did not need to be told twice and took the opportunity. She quickly got up and started running across the snow field.
"Oh no, you're not running again!" said the angry voice of Yuki once it stopped rolling.
"Furizudo!"
As the spell had been chanted, thick mist erupted from Yuki's mouth and hurled towards the girl. She exclaimed in surprise as she hit the ground, face first. The spell from the iceman had finally taken effect; her left foot had been frozen to the also frozen ground. She rolled to the side, clutching her bleeding nose and wincing from the pain. She then tried to free her leg from the ice, but it would not budge. She was stuck.
"Don't you dare playing with me, human! I'll be more than happy to destroy the book along with you! Sora!" yelled Yuki.
The pale brown book started glowing again and the girl knew that this time the attack would be aimed to her. She closed her eyes while a desperate thought filled her head; I am going to die!
"Gikoru!"
She had braced herself for the hit but it never came. Opening her eyes, she saw the icicles had been stuck several inches away from her. She looked around and knew what had happened; Hori had pushed Yuki aside right after the spell was chanted, causing the icicles to miss their target. Howling with fury, Yuki then punched Hori in the stomach that sent him flying and fell hard in front of the terrified girl.
"Hori!" she yelled, hating herself for not being able to help. Hori coughed up blood as he was trying to get up; a scenery of torture to her. No…
"You're really pissing me off! Just die already!" Yuki yelled angrily, the book on its partner's hands glowing brightly.
Tears were forming in her eyes as she saw Hori spread his arms in front of her, ready to counter whatever came to him; to protect her. She closed her eyes and shook her head. No… don't hurt him anymore…
Just then she felt some light forcing its way inside her closed eyes. Her eyes fluttered open almost instantly to see the book she was holding glowing violet color, brightly. Unknown to herself, she opened the book and observing it while Sora's voice yelled.
"Gikoru!"
The sharp icicles came hurling once again and about to pierce Hori when suddenly a voice yelled.
"The first spell, Nekoru!"
The icicles never came to Hori as they were evaporated halfway by a blast of purple flame that shot out from Hori's right palm, causing some thick white mist to linger in the air, temporarily blocking each other from view. Everyone was shocked, even Hori, to see the sudden development of the situation. He quickly turned around and smirked at the sight of his glowing book in the girl's hand. Apparently he hadn't mistaken at all; she was really his book keeper.
While Hori was savoring his triumph, the girl was becoming more terrified. She knew he was different from normal human, but the fact that he could fire some strangely dark flame from his hand still made her shaken. The glow from her book disappeared as Hori walked up to her, raising his fist threateningly. She grew paler as for some wild moment she thought Hori was about to hit her for a mistake she did not know what. She closed her eyes automatically and heard something breaking, yet she did not feel any 'new' pain. When she opened her eyes, she saw the ice binding her leg shattered, freeing her.
"I see your book keeper has finally come to her senses, but it won't change anything." Yuki mocked when the mist cleared and they could see each other again.
Hori smirked, "No, it will change everything." He then turned to his book keeper and said, "Give me a spell when I need it."
Without waiting for her answer, he was already running towards Yuki. "Now that I have my power, I'll be able to beat you easily!" he yelled.
"Not a chance!"
"Gikoru!"
Again, sharp icicles were hurling towards Hori, who ducked to avoid them and jumped. He pulled his fist backward and swung it forward as hard as he could to Yuki's chest, breaking its armor and some of its body. He then put his hand forward, his palm facing Yuki, and yelled, "Read the book!"
Seeing that she might have the chance to get out of there alive, the girl read from the book without hesitation, "Nekoru!"
A blast of purple flame escaped Hori's palm and hit Yuki's left side, its arm and a great chunk of its chest were melting instantly. Yuki wasn't pleased at all and readied itself to regenerate its melting body, but Hori did not give it any chance for he was blasting another flame to its right side, melting its remaining chest and causing its upper body to fall to the ground.
Yuki's eyes were widening in horror as it watched Hori lunged for the book in Sora's hand. "No! You will not touch it!" it yelled as its body began to regenerate.
"F-Furizudo!" Sora's voice trembled a little at the sight of Hori running to him.
White mist shot out of Yuki's mouth towards Hori's feet, but he had expected that to come and jumped just in time before the ground freeze. Yuki and Sora were speechless as Hori landed safely in front of the now terrified Sora. He smirked at him.
"Do you mind if I take that book?"
Whatever Sora was going to say was never left his mouth as Hori had punched him across the face, sending him flying, crashing, and rolling several times before stopped by a tree at the edge of the forest. He fell unconscious instantly. Hori then picked up the book Sora had dropped and formed a victorious grin in his face. Yuki, who was finally fully regenerated its body, screamed and dashed for its book, its face contorted with rage. But before it could reach any nearer, Hori had already ripped the book into two parts and it suddenly burst into flames. He watched with a satisfied expression as Yuki's body turned transparent and disappeared shortly after its book turned into ashes.
A/N: There, I hope you liked it. It was longer than I thought it would be, so, sorry if it was boring. Anyway, please review and tell me what you think. :)