Number 7: countless clouds of violet
My boss turned to us. "Get ready, ABB gang members have been spotted in our territory.
I nodded at him, resolute to show the Asians who's boss; I already donned my costume and just waited for my partner to get her weapons. Once she was ready, we gathered some of our men and went outside; there wasn't any point in driving there, it was just a few streets away and those Asians probably didn't even know we would come for them.
It was too easy, really.
Our men were the bravest the Empire had to offer and the Asian scum would stand no chance.
We stopped moving once we saw a warehouse burning; it was one of ours. And the second thing I noticed once I stopped, was the mass of Asians, all armed with guns, blades or improvised melee weapons, it seriously looked like the entirety of the Azn Bad Boyz was assembled and ready to fight, ready for an all out invasion.
At that instance I realized two things: I realized that just our men had no chance of victory, at least not for a brute force victory. The second thing I realized was... both Oni Lee and Lung were missing. If this was truly an invasion, wouldn't it make sense to have the major players here as well? And their positioning... they were easily surrounded.
It was dumb, in a lot of ways.
The Empire had the most Parahumans of all the Gangs, even the Protectorate didn't have as many. There was also the fact that this was just a small bit of our territory and we could simply choose to surround them. They put themselves into an unfavourable position.
So much for the 'Art of War'.
Hookwolf, too, seemed to have caught onto the fact that this was an invasion; he pulled out his phone and made a call, presumably to contact Kaiser. He probably suspected something about Lung and Lee, as well.
Through experience, I knew that, as much as a warrior may pride himself on his experience, numbers were a big factor in battles; charging in would be a bad idea, and I needed to wait for orders, anyway; I was growing restless, nonetheless.
Our group started moving again, surrounding the enemy forces, after Hookwolf barked some orders.
"They're surrounded, attack them now and remove this infestation from the Bay! Forward, my chosen warriors!", Hookwolf's statement was met with a roar of approval.
I could see our men storm at the invaders, determined to take them down and finally get the Empire it's eternal place in the sun.
I looked over at my partner and nodded; together we stormed off towards the enemy.
Line Break
We had them, finally.
They truly were idiots for storming a building when the majority of their foe's forces were outside of it. It made them vulnerable.
But... something was off about the whole thing...
This couldn't be the entirety of the Bad Boyz; hell, they were eighty people at maximum.
Sure, they were rather well armed, for ABB standards, at least, but where was the rest of them. No wonder we didn't have any trouble pushing them further into our building and surrounding them.
Had they done the same thing to the Merchants? I could easily imagine that scum being eradicated by such a simple invasion.
The rows of soldiers behind our line of capes parted and Kaiser stepped forward, Fenja and Menja at his sides. He held up a gloved gauntlet and all the excited battle cries stopped.
"My men, it seems as if we have defended what is ours without much trouble. Your valiant stand shall not be forgotten, for we have cleansed our city of another bunch of scum. We have greatly diminished their forces and the only ones in our way now are their leaders and the rest of their wretched gang. We shall enjoy our victory, for it was swift and decisive; here we stand, our enemies at our feet, begging for mercy! Stand straight and be proud, my Empire! Rise and be proud!"
Roaring approval rang through the night and the moon shone down at us.
Quieter – meant only for the capes to hear – he continued.
"We all know this was not the real invasion; that move was excessively dumb, even for the ABB. A storm is approaching, a storm of an unknown sort, but a storm nonetheless..."
"A storm of fire, perhaps? Burning through the night, it's flames kindled by the moon shining oh so bright"
We turned around at the unknown voice.
There, alone amongst several of our members stood a girl. She was dressed in a simple but noble violet dress, a parasol in her right hand and long brown hair flowing in the night's breeze.
I don't think anyone of us had any idea how she might have gotten there unnoticed.
Her eyes gleamed mischievously like amethysts.
"Come forth, my storm, and do as you please. Feast and burn with vigour, for your fuel, shall be your enemies..."
Her right hand swung to the side and with a horrible ripping sound, a gap in the air – scarlet eyes gleaming and promising terrible pain – opened and widened, ever further.
More ripping sounds rang through the night, all clearly audible as total silence stretched across the Empire, it's breath taken away by the display before them.
And then the first thugs – all clearly Asian and armed to the teeth – exited these strange portals.
And directly behind the girl, through the first gap that opened that night, a flaming metal dragon stepped through, a demon-masked figure at it's side.
"Come forth, and finish this fight!"
And all hell descended upon us.
A/N: Yay, finally the project work for school is done; it took my group long enough... Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter, I'll be trying to make up for all the time I didn't write. But first of all, I want to thank all of you for the reviews, it's always nice to get those, especially when a pleasant conversation originates from such a comment. Thank you very much, those are a great motivation. Anyway, thank you for reading.
-Azralan, signing out.
