Hello all,
This is an old fic I had written on my Quizilla! Account, but was unable to write anymore to it due to Quizilla!'s change as well as my dislike for how it was going too quickly. So, with inspiration from re-watching the Yu Yu Hakusho series and the help of some friends as well as one favorite fanfiction writer of mine, I decided to give the story another try and as a stress reliever.
Thank you xXWinterWindXx for your advice! Her fanfiction for Yu Yu Hakusho titled Angel's Cry, a pairing with the amazing Kurama with an OC that is extremely intriguing, her fanfiction is a work of art. If you've been on Quizilla!, you most likely have read the first making of the story titled Stay by my Side. If you liked that one, this story – a remake with more information and detail—will surely blow you away. It is also posted on her Quizilla! Account, if you don't have one on here.
Go read Angel's Cry people – it's amazing, you can find it under my favorites as well.
I'd also like to thank my friend Kristina, a fellow writer of mine – and a partner, for pushing me to continue writing when I was about to give up – thank you, you're amazing.
And so, this chapter is dedicated to you as well as the story. Please – kick me in the head if I don't finish it. Ha, ha!
And now, with nothing further, please enjoy the remake of Eternal Flames of the Phoenix that was first released on Quizilla! by my penname Twilight-Moon.
And of course…
Disclaimer: Yu Yu Hakusho belongs to Yoshihiro Togashi and the companies that both have turned it into an anime and manga -- not me. I do not own information about the mythological creatures in my story. I do, however, own the characters and any adaptations I have made myself – do not plagiarize, and if you do, enjoy not being creative or intelligent enough to make your own idea – you are a robot.
Enjoy!
Please review -- they make me happy.
Chapter One: Flame
"What the hell does Koenma want now?" Yusuke said, scratching his head. "Hell, I'm not a Spirit Detective anymore, why is he making me come here?"
"And I have to feed my kittens," Kuwabara whined. His cat had gotten older, giving birth to a litter just recently.
Botan frowned and said, "Don't take this out on me! Whatever Koenma does, he must have a good enough reason!"
"Yeah, like what?" Hiei said, his eyebrow twitching from annoyance.
"Yusuke, let's just hear him out," Kurama reasoned. "It must be quite important if he has called us back to Spirit World, he must have no other choice."
Botan nodded quickly. "He said it was urgent and that you boys might be interested in it, it has been a year, after all."
They were walking down the hallway, passing desks of rushing ogres. They moved around them and through them, holding stacks of papers and files. One of them dropped a large stack and quickly started gathering the fallen papers.
When the guys and Botan turned down the hall to Koenma's office, the blue ogre Jorge was waiting outside, his face forgetting the frown of stress and allowing a smile of relief to settle upon his features.
"There you are!" he shouted, bounding towards the group with the cloth around his waist moving with him. "Koenma is really busy these days, seems things are not peaceful, after all."
"Yes, I heard." Botan nodded. "He called for Yusuke's old team; I came with the boys as soon as I could."
"Ogre, are they here yet?" Koenma shouted.
"Coming, sir!" Quickly, Jorge opened the doors and Botan, with the three demons and human, entered the room.
"This better be something good, Koenma!" Yusuke shouted. "Otherwise, I'm going to have to shove that binky down your throat!"
"Easy, Yusuke," Kurama soothed, a nervous smile adorning his face. "Please be cautious of how you speak here, save for Kuwabara, we demons are not very welcome."
Koenma sat at his desk, the surface surprisingly cleared of paperwork to reveal the brown colored paint, seeming bright by the surrounding blue tiled walls.
"I called you all in here because I've heard news, you all may be interested."
"What?" Kuwabara asked his confusion evident on his face.
"There's going to be a new tournament, I was wondering if you four would like to enter."
"A tournament…? What for – demons?"
"Not quite, Yusuke. It's a tournament that is held every thousand years called The Flame Battles, many powerful S and A class demons are invited, their rules are similar to that of the Dark Tournament – there is just a requirement to enter."
"Hell, yeah! A tournament? Count me in!" Yusuke shouted, energy blazing in his eyes.
"Seems intriguing," Kurama considered. "What is the requirement, Koenma?"
"The Flame Battles are a series of fights just like the Dark Tournament but are run like that of the Demon World Tournament, but the requirement is that you must have a certain fifth fighter or otherwise."
"What do you mean?" Yusuke asked, crossing his arms.
"I've heard of this tournament…The Flame Battles, it is the telling of both the union and rage between two mythological and legendary creatures known as the dragon and the phoenix."
Koenma pressed a switch and the television-like screen he had slide down from the ceiling. When it flashed to live, paintings of dragons and phoenixes were shown either twining together in what seemed like harmony – working as one. And then others, of them twirling around one another, looked to be filled with such rage and passion to tear the other apart – fangs pearly white or sickening yellow and beaks that seemed to be made of gold or of the orange/red metal of a burning blade.
The last photograph the boys had seen seemed to be a seal of something -- the tail of the dragon and the long tail feathers of the phoenix seemed to be twined together, making a sort of flame marking – the beasts' faces were facing each other. The eyes were colored red and could be taken for passion – the passion of love or the passion of hate; it was in the eye of the beholder.
"That is the seal of The Flame Battles, if you get a letter soon from them, you will be seeing this," Koenma informed.
"Dragons and phoenixes…it sounds like a fairytale, if you ask me." Kuwabara placed his hand on his chin, imagining flaming birds and angry reptiles.
"That's because you're a child and a fool," Hiei said, closing his eyes and ignoring Kuwabara's angry arm movements and snarls.
"So, we need to have a dragon or a phoenix on our team?" Yusuke questioned, and then he grew annoyed. "We have a semi-dragon, Hiei can summon the Darkness Flame, isn't that good enough?"
"It may pass you through the first stages, but it'd be best if you had a real dragon or phoenix that you can actually speak to – you'll be fighting them, Yusuke." Koenma told Jorge to get Ayame.
When the pale, black haired woman walked in, her dark kimono swishing with her movements, she handed Koenma a file. "The one you asked for, sir."
"Ah, yes. Thank you, Ayame," he said, taking the manila folder.
The woman disappeared in a blue light, leaving the group to themselves as Koenma opened the file.
"I highly recommend bringing a phoenix," Koenma said, not looking up from the file and its contents. He pressed a switch and pictures of paintings, carvings, and artifacts created by ancient civilizations were all of one thing – the phoenix. Even the constellation of the phoenix Koenma showed, along with the drawing mapped over using the stars as a guide.
Koenma even pulled up the Marvel character known as Phoenix which made Hiei make an annoyed sound and mumble under his breath.
"Why a phoenix?" Kuwabara asked, leaning forward in wonder, curious as to what was in the folder.
"A phoenix is a vessel for knowledge, an excellent ally to have in battles such as these," Kurama explained. "They tend to be woman, in Chinese culture it is believed that the phoenix represents The Empress while the dragon represents The Emperor. This, however, is a sort of yin and yang – which is why this battle is also about unity. The beliefs point to their most likely gender, though sometimes, the phoenix or dragon can choose to be male or female – the males show themselves more so in the cases of phoenixes, that is the reason they are seen to be mostly male. The females tend to hide their true forms."
"Isn't the phoenix that bird that dies and comes back from the ashes?" Kuwabara's brow furrowed.
"Indeed, every five hundred to one thousand years, the phoenix dies and is reborn, it dies by its own sacred fire, the only fire that can kill it," Kurama said, smiling from Kuwabara's curiosity. "They have existed since the creation of everything, therefore, their intelligence is something to worship and some have done just that – they are sacred creatures. It is believed that they even helped in the creation the worlds that exist today and even the ones that no longer do, and even so, they will never give anyone the secrets of that topic – it's forbidden. Some believe they are the incarnation of gods such as the Egyptian god Ra, et cetera."
"How the hell do you know all that?" Yusuke raised a brow. "You read some books or something?"
Koenma shouted from finding something, interrupting the investigation into Kurama's knowledge. He wore a smile, but it quickly turned to a frown when his pacifier almost had fallen.
He regained himself and shouted in excitement, "The last sighting of a phoenix was in eastern North America!"
"Do they know how to fight?" Yusuke asked, earning an annoyed look from Kuwabara. "What, it's a tournament!"
"I believe they do, though, they concentrate more on knowledge than fighting," Koenma explained.
"So, we will have a half useless fighter like Kuwabara," Hiei said, turning to lean against a wall.
"I'll show you useless," Kuwabara rolled up his sleeve.
"Try me," Hiei pressed with a smirk.
"Pu will have a new friend," Yusuke snickered.
"Enough from you three," Koenma sighed. "None of you have changed much, have you?"
"You were saying, Koenma," Kurama sighed.
"Yes, as I was saying, there was a phoenix sighting in eastern North America, it seemed to fade in the Chicago area, it most likely has hid among humans and it will be especially hard to find."
"How will we know if we found the damn bird or not?" Yusuke asked with an attitude that made Koenma's eyes narrow.
"There are certain signs: one is by the eyes, if you are able to get close enough which I doubt you will, it is said that flames dance in their eyes.
"Phoenixes are creatures of beauty as well as knowledge, so just think an abnormally handsome man or beautiful girl – perfect entirely.
"Another sign would be the color of their nails, they will always be gold or a certain color that is associated with a phoenix – reds, purples, oranges and yellows, et cetera," Koenma explained. "Think of the claws of a bird for instance."
"If the phoenix is a girl, haven't you heard the latest invention known as nail polish?" Yusuke made an annoyed face, this making Koenma growl in his chest. "And if the guy is girly, it might cause problems!"
"Of course, you dolt! That's why there's another way to tell! Don't you think I've thought of that? Why the hell do you think I've done all this research for?"
"Yusuke," Botan sighed, rubbing her temple.
Koenma settled back into his chair, fixing his hat and pacifier. "Now, as I was saying, there's another way to find out if someone is a phoenix."
"Which is?" Hiei questioned, his crimson eyes staring into Koenma's form.
"You must be cautious, because if a phoenix is angry, it can melt your bodies from the inside out so quickly you'd be dead and not know it. A way to see them is to injure them, make a deep enough wound to bleed – the wound will steam and hiss, as if being cauterized, then it will close. It will seem to be burning, which is exactly what it does, or so says the myth."
"Phoenixes have internal flames that can never be put out, just like dragons who breathe fire. It heals them rather quickly," Kurama added. "It is a good mechanism for healing, makes sense."
"But has never been proven, no one has come forth, anyway. If they did manage to wound or touch the creature, they didn't live long enough to inform Spirit World," Koenma said, a vein slightly pulsing from the revealed skin of his forehead.
Kuwabara gulped at the thought of his bones turning to liquid, his flesh melting off the muscles and tissue. Hiei smirked from Kuwabara's thoughts, as well as the challenge.
"Correct, Kurama – as always," Koenma praised. "You must find this phoenix."
"And how do you say we get to North America?" Yusuke growled. "I can't afford frequent flyer miles."
Botan giggled then, making everyone shift their attention. Smiling, her oar appeared in her hand.
"Botan, Pilot of the River Styx, at your service."
Koenma nodded and said then, "And when you find it, bring it to Sprit World. And don't worry; phoenixes speak every language known to man and demon. The tournament date is set to be released soon, I will inform you of it as soon as I receive word."