It had been so long since the foolish warrior had made a move, the dark lord was beginning to think, hope even, that the fool had fallen ill. Perhaps, he mused, the samurai had realized his folly and chosen to give up his pointless quest. The demon chuckled, taking a messy bite of his favorite pizza.
Yes, this future was Aku. No creature, no hero, could ever change that simple truth.
"What interests you so?" Aku murmured, leaning forward in his throne and narrowing his eyes. The fool had come across a dirty old shack. Nothing fantastic, nothing troublesome. But, stroking his beard, Aku couldn't help but wonder what business the fool had with such a worn old place. Did he intend to rest there for the night? Perhaps he'd stumbled upon a kitten who needed milk? Or an ancient apparition of indescribable horror who would devour the wretched warrior?
Any of these things were certainly possible. And all of these things would surely lead the samurai ever closer to finding a way to deal him a fatal blow. Of that, Aku was certain. Clearing his throat with a noisy "harumph," Aku prepared to send out his latest elite force to deal with the fool.
Before he could so much as utter an order, the flames around him parted and a minion appeared. Aku narrowed his eyes, annoyance written on his face clear as the flames in his brow.
The minion fumbled for a moment before quickly saluting, "Lord Aku! I've an urgent message from Overseer Kal'riky!" he barked, a bit too loud, clearly nervous.
"Is that so? Something so urgent as to interrupt my VERY IMPORTANT DELIBERATIONS!" Aku questioned with a roar, slamming his fist on his throne. The minion screamed and took a step back while Aku took another messy bite of his dinner. Already the cheese was starting to cool. Urgent nothing. No message could forgive this slight against the dark master's meal.
The minion saluted once more, anxiously averting his eyes, "Lord Aku, Overseer Kal'riky has informed me that," he swallowed nervously, eying the demon's pizza with a distant, starved gaze, "We have, um...we've...ah! We've discovered the vault hidden within the Labyrinth!"
Aku's eyes widened, though he quickly hid his surprise behind a mask of indifference. Urgent indeed...perhaps his plan to send more forces to die by the samurai's blade could wait.
The Labyrinth: that is what they had dubbed the catacombs hidden beneath the Lost City, one time home to those wretched, talking mutts. The city was an enigma, even to one such as Aku who had reigned for over a thousand years. When his forces reached the shores of that country, once called "Usa", they found the Lost City already long destroyed. The dogs claimed the city to be home to their ancestors, but Aku had always been skeptical.
The Lost City was a remnant of a time before Aku himself.
In the battle to retake the city from the mutts, his forces had discovered a strange contraption. A door, a door of such alien technology it seemed more advanced than the marvels of Aku's own world. It took them several days to simply open the door, which seemed indestructible. Within...they discovered the Labyrinth.
A twisting, turning tunnel that led deeper and deeper beneath the Lost City. Guarded by creations of impossible science, littered with traps that could obliterate even the most powerful of his forces, the Labyrinth had proven...troublesome. Now, nearly a year later, had they, at last, discovered the secret it guarded so fiercely?
Would Aku at last know the missing piece of history that had eluded him? Could it be...he would finally understand the fate of the Lost City?.
"Is that so…" the Deliverer of Darkness murmured, stroking his beard in equal parts curiosity and excitement. Already the minion was speaking, but, without a word, the devil cut him off and rose from his throne. So intrigued was he that he failed to notice how his pizza, now forgotten, tumbled to the ground with a distinct "splat!"
Aku chuckled, eyes narrowed, brows blazing, "Yes...reveal to me your secrets at last!" With a mighty chortle, the monster vanished in a flurry of magic and darkness.
XxXxX
Aku cursed whatever brilliant mind had developed the Labyrinth. Whatever it was they hid within, they had taken every precaution to prevent its extraction. Much to his frustration, he found himself unable to simply teleport himself into the heart of the labyrinth. Those walls, their mad science protected against even the blackest of magics.
What could have been so important?
Quick as he was without teleportation, it took the Overlord of Terror nearly an hour to reach the heart of the Labyrinth. There, he found the room filled with troops, ten of Overseer Kal'riky's most powerful warriors, surrounding an odd contraption at the far end of the room, weapons pointed at it, their brows slick with perspiration. Their eyes…
Aku blinked, taken aback. Their eyes were filled with a fear normally reserved for himself.
Overseer Kal'riky, a slim, but bug-eyed creature, approached him. He was a strange one, but a vicious warrior with an unparalleled track record of success. This was a minion he could entrust with such an important task.
Kal'riky bowed, his tongue slipping through his lips, "Lord Ak-k-k-k-ku," he greeted him with his usual stutter, though...Aku noticed that Kal'riky seemed shaken as his men. And, with a frown, Aku acknowledged that it wasn't his presence that had them so flustered.
"Kal'riky, at last your expedition has reached the heart of this place. Speak, and tell me what you've discovered. What has Labyrinth hidden away from the Great Aku so desperately?" Aku boomed, speaking louder than he would normally. He was the only one who deserved their fear and admiration. He would have no lost treasure stealing the terror that was rightfully his.
Kal'riky cleared his throat and slithered to a console, clacking at the keys with his long claws, "We're not sure, just yet, Lord Ak-k-k-ku. We...we c-c-c-couldn't bring ourselves to release the f-f-f-f-final seal. We've lost c-c-c-c-countless men to this p-p-place, it would be d-d-disastrous to r-r-rush ahead," Kal'riky cleared his throat and glanced back at Aku, "P-p-par-p-p-par...ahem, esp-p-pecially after what we s-s-saw here,"
Aku folded his arms behind his back and joined Kal'riky at the console. With a few more clacks, the monitor sprang to life, a stream of data flying across the screen so fast none, save Aku himself, could begin to understand the words.
It said, simply, "Final Warning!"
The lights in the room dimmed. The dark lord raised an eyebrow and turned, as casually as he could, to the center, where a hologram appeared. It was an older human male, with a scratchy dark beard and a thinning head of hair. Aku wasn't sure how old he should have been, but he could tell the man's appearance exceeded what was likely his true age. This was a man who had been aged well by...fear.
The man spoke in a low voice, breathless even in his recorded message, "Please...I'm not sure…" he stopped to catch his breath, "I'm not sure how you m-managed to reach this place, b-but if you are seeing this message, you've somehow reached the vault," He shuddered and looked over his shoulder, toward the contraption the other minions had surrounded.
He looked up, straight into Aku's eyes, "Whatever you are, whoever you are, I beg you...turn around, forget about this place. Please, for your sake, for everyone's sake, leave now! It was a mistake coming here, n-no...no one should...this is all wrong, everything went wrong. I don't know...I don't know how we even got here," He took a shuddering breath, clutching at his chest.
Though he wasn't real, Aku could swear he heard the man's heart pounding furiously. He swore he could taste this man's desperation, his heartache, his fear.
"Forget everything you've seen. Every horror you've somehow managed to get by, every...everything about this God forsaken place! Just leave, leave now! If you...no, no!" The man spun around, stumbling away from the contraption. Aku could hear an unearthly, horrifying sound in the background of the recording. Something…
The man turned once more, as if looking at Aku himself, "Everything about this place was a mistake. I've managed to stop h...I stopped h...you can't begin to understand what I've done. I'm...I…" his hands dropped to his sides. Again, Aku was astounded by how much older the man seemed, "I'm a murderer," he muttered.
"What?" Aku questioned, the word slipping from his lips before he could stop himself.
The message continued, "I tried to play God, I tried...I only wanted to make the world better! I only wanted to...to make a difference," The man hugged himself, a few tears streaming into his dirty beard, "I never meant for this...my family, my home, everything is gone. I'm a murderer, the worst this world will ever know."
"Please, whoever you are...whatever you are, give me this last wish, let me know that my efforts weren't in vain. Let me know the lives lost weren't for nothing! Whatever you do, you must leave this place! You must forget about...about her…" He brought his hand to his mouth. Another unearthly roar erupted from behind him. More tears streamed down his face.
Whatever courage the man had left broke. He dropped to his knees, pounding his fists on the floor, "Don't let her out! You can't free her! Whatever brought you here, whatever you've heard, whatever you think you have to gain, it isn't worth it! Give me this! Don't let what I've done be in vain!" He grabbed his head, sobbing into the floor, "You can't let her out...if you do...there will be…" he spoke in small sentences, stopping to catch his breath with every word. Now, Aku noticed, the man was dying. Blood was seeping through his ratty old lab coat, "There. Will be. No. Second. Chances." He forced out, "If you open this vault, no one. Not the Devil or God himself will be able to stop her again. It will be…"
He trailed off, tilting his head up, once again looking directly at Aku, "It will be...the end...of everything," There was another unearthly shriek, this one so great it caused the hologram itself to shake. As the man closed his eyes, the image cut off.
"Th-th-th...th-th-th...The message s-s-sto...sto...stops there Lord Ak-k-ku," Kal'riky explained, punching something into the console before the message could repeat. Aku nodded, slipping across the room until he reached the chamber.
The man had called it a vault. Something was inside.
Aku placed his hand on the vault. Deep within it, he could faintly feel something.
A heartbeat.
Whatever the man had sealed inside, it had slept for over a thousand years, waiting for this moment. When someone passed by that man's impossible traps and brilliant machinations to set it...her...free.
Could this creature, whatever she was, be the one responsible for the Lost Time? Twenty years before Aku's rise to power, all of history seemed to just vanish. Twenty years of empty history. Not a single newspaper, not a single record of persons born or killed. Nothing...just an empty canvas in the middle of eternity.
Now...even the Great Aku: Master of Masters, Shogun of Sorrow, Deliverer of Darkness...trembled with uncertainty.
"What s-s-sh-sho-sho-should we d-d-do, Lord Ak-k-ku?" Kal'riky asked, his opinion clear in his tone. His troop clearly agreed, tightening the hold on their weapons.
Aku furrowed his brow and pursed his lips. The human was certain that whatever was sealed within would be the end of the world. What had he said? Not even God himself could hope to stop her?
The demon chuckled and narrowed his eyes, folding his hands behind his back and walking away from the vault.
What was God before Aku?
"Open the vault," Aku commanded, a wicked smirk on his lips. For the first time, Kal'riky hesitated to obey. The overlord turned a dark look on his loyal minion. The alien jumped, slowly nodding. His men readied their weapons. One, Aku noticed, had begun to cry.
For the next few minutes, only the sound of Kal'riky's claws clacking at the console filled the silence. Aku closed his eyes and took a deep breath, waiting with a smirk still plastered on his lips.
Whatever lay within the vault, it too would bow to the mighty Aku.
Kal'riky hit one last key and a siren began to blare through the Labyrinth. A siren so piercing, so harsh, it could be heard on the surface. It shook the very room they stood in, filling it with flashing red lights as the monitor filled with countless warnings. Kal'riky looked back at Aku, who nodded, his grin growing more excited. Swallowing his nerves, the minion nodded and pulled a switch to the side of the console.
The contraption, the vault, sprang to life. The front peeled back, revealing countless locks, each more complex than the last. With each one undone, the machinery vanished. Nanobots, of course, Aku thought with a nod. This scientist was far beyond his time. A man who had created a prison that had stumped the mighty Aku for nearly a year...to hide away another creation. One that he felt could destroy the universe itself.
Aku had never been one to be afraid. Only the samurai's steel had ever given him reason to pause. But as the nanobot locks melted away and more and more steam filled the room, he felt his black heart began to pound in his chest.
Sweat built up on Aku's brow and the flames in his eyes dulled, ever so slightly.
There was one final warning siren before the last lock melted away. Thick orange liquid poured from the vault, seemingly without end. As the smoke began to clear, they saw the source of the liquid. Twin pumps on either side of a large, dark tube. They had come undone and spilled their strange, precious contents onto the floor.
The glass of the tube was fogged over, though Aku was certain he could make out more orange liquid within. Suddenly, he saw something move.
Aku's breath caught in his throat. The rose red eyes staring back at him narrowed.
Steam erupted from the top of the tube as it began to recede, quickly filling the room. More orange liquid spilled onto the floor. The demon heard a soft thud on the ground.
"P-p-p-protect Lord Ak-k-ku! Don't j-j-ju-j-j-ju...don't st-st-staaaa-stand there!" Kal'riky hissed. One of his men stood upright and walked into the steam. He hadn't taken more than two steps before being jerked from his feet. The poor creature had no time to even scream before a sick tearing sound filled the air and both ends of him, top and bottom torn apart, flew across the room, spraying them all with hissing green blood.
"What?" One of the minions cried out, moments before some impossible heat tore into him. Again, there was no mortal scream. His frayed lower half simply fell to the ground, the wound melted shut by the force of the red rays.
Aku glanced up, eyes wide. The rays that had torn the minion apart had also torn through the walls of the Labyrinth itself. Something so quick, so...reflexive, had pierced through this prison that had repelled even his magic. Through the hole they left behind, he could see the mid-evening sun in the sky miles above them.
This Labyrinth, Aku realized, wasn't meant to keep the creature in. It was meant to keep anyone else out.
In the time it took Aku to turn to face the fog, the minions had charged. There was finally a horrific scream, silenced by an abrupt crunch. The minion tumbled to the ground and into sight, head torn clean from his shoulders. This time, Aku could hear a soft, almost melodic sigh, moments before one more ray of searing heat, like the breath of the sun itself, ended the last two minions, tearing a gaping wound miles deep into the walls of the Labyrinth.
She threw the minion's head, crushed with no more difficulty than a soda can, to the ground, and stepped into sight at last. Aku's heart stopped in his chest and his eyes widened.
The creature...no, the woman, wasn't tall. In fact, compared to the dark lord himself, she was tiny, surely no more than five feet tall, with strange proportions and oddities that, though she was obviously made in the image of humanity, clearly defined her as something else entirely.
Those features though, they could wait until later. As the woman approached him, he found himself unable to tear his gaze away from her eyes. Large, piercing, colored the sharpest shade of pink, like a cherry blossom with a razor's edge.
Her eyes, Aku thought, were captivating. They were powerful. But, more than anything else...his heart raced. Her eyes were beyond beautiful.
"Who are you?" she asked. Aku forgot to breath. She spoke with such authority, her voice carrying such sheer force of will he felt compelled to answer.
"I am Aku," he replied stupidly. His voice had lost all it's usual grandeur, it's normal power. In her presence, under her gaze, he, the unstoppable, immortal Aku, felt powerless.
The woman looked him over. One hand slid to her hip, one tiny foot slipped just behind her. It was a strong, confident pose. When a smile crossed her lips and her eyes narrowed just so, Aku was certain his heart would burst.
"It's a pleasure to meet you," Comparing her voice to an angel, no that would be a disservice to how beautiful it was. She was no angel. No, this creature, this woman, seeing her face to face, Aku could believe the foolish scientist. He knew, with absolute certainty, that she was something more than any angel.
She was a Goddess.
"My name is Blossom,"