Here's chapter 8 of The Ninth Guardian General. Hope you enjoy.
Disclaimer: Asura's Wrath belongs to Capcom, not me. All I own is Nekora.
Chapter 8: The Elder Tactician Appears
She was kneeling in front of the shrine for her daily prayer, when the child began crying. She picked up the child and then started singing to him. She looked up towards the large stone sitting behind the shrine, where someone's body was stuck inside a crack in the stone. She bowed down in front of it as energy started flowing through the person's body. She looked back up at the stone in surprise.
"Huh? What's going on?"
The ground began to shake when the person's eye flashed. She then heard a man screaming, before the large rock broke apart, and she fell over from the shockwave. She saw the ma, who was stuck inside the rock earlier, now moving freely. He looked around the area, seemingly confused. He then noticed her in front of him.
"Where... am I?" he asked.
The girl smiled at him in response, causing him to remember his daughter.
"Mithra?"
"No, my name is Aria." she told him, still smiling.
She then quickly looked around, and picked up a flower that was laying nearby, holding it towards him. The ground started to shake once more, causing the young child to cry again. Aria jumped off the shrine and was about to run back to her village when she saw that she was surrounded by Gohma Howlers. The leader then picked her up and darted off. Asura ran after the creature after quickly killing its minions. As he was running, he saw some Gohma Stingers out of the corner of his eye. They were heading in the same direction as the Howler. He followed them for a while, and spotted another of the Septentrion ships in the distance.
He turned his attention back to the Howler, which growled at him before running off again, with Asura resuming the chase. He fired blasts of Mantra at the monster to slow it down, then punched it a few times before it ran ahead of him. It then launched fireballs at the Demigod, which he dodged. After chasing the Gohma for about thirty minutes, Asura sped towards it and punched it in the face, sending it flying over the ledge and freeing Aria, who then started falling to the ground below her. Asura jumped after her and caught her before landing on the ground.
He looked around the area and saw the Gohma killing all the nearby humans. One of them, who was praying, was crushed under a Gohma Squasher's foot. Asura slowly walked towards it, before the monster attacked him by shooting fireballs out of its mouth. He countered the attacks with his own Mantra blasts. The Gohma then retreated into its shell and began spinning towards Asura, who was thrown to the opposite side of the area. It then jumped into the air above him, and Asura caught the creature as it tried to land on him. He threw it into the wall opposite to where he was, and was about to finish it off when it suddenly exploded. He covered his face so the Gohma's blood wouldn't fly into his mouth, and when he looked again, he saw a familiar figure standing where the monster was.
"Hey there, Asura. How was your little sleep this time? It's been about 500 years since then."
"What are you still doing here, Nekora? And why do you always interfere with my fights?"
"Well, you see, I'm still here so that there's someone who can protect the humans against the Gohma and the Seven Deities, and I prefer to actually fight than sit on the sidelines watching. And that's why I interfered with your battle. Besides, you did destroy Wyzen, remember? That's a bigger achievement than killing some worthless Gohma."
"You do have a point. But the Seven Deities are just as worthless."
The two Demigods were soon interrupted when some nearby villagers started whispering to each other, then walked over and kneeled in front of them, praying. Aria was with them.
"Stop praying!"
"This is pathetic."
They then heard a noise coming from the sky, and when they looked towards it, they noticed the Seven Deities' fleet was approaching the village. Leading the ships was the Septentrion Phecda, which dropped several Taison and Doji soldiers. They surrounded Asura and Nekora, but the villagers ran between the Demigods and soldiers, and began praying to them. The Dojis then opened a path between themselves, where someone could be seen rolling towards Asura and Nekora.
"So this is the reason for the unusual Mantra concentration in these parts." the man said, revealing himself to be Kalrow. His enemies glared at him with intense hatred. "How disappointing. I suppose I should collect the Mantra and report back to Lord Deus."
He turned his attention to the humans, who were now standing behind Asura and Nekora.
"Mortals! The Gohma have defiled your land! Before your tarnished souls fall to Naraka, I shall guide you to Heaven." he told them, motioning for a Taison to walk towards the humans. After stopping front of them, it pointed upwards to the Septentrion above them, to which they began praying again. It then crushed the human closest to it, angering its former Generals.
"Stop! What are you doing?!"
"This is complete madness!"
They turned back towards the elderly Deity, expecting an answer from him.
"I need not explain my ways to the fallen. Worthless monkeys like yourselves would not understand anyway."
The Taison continued crushing the praying villagers, further increasing the rage of the former Generals. The souls of the deceased humans were then absorbed into a nearby machine that a Doji had activated. Asura, now unable to control his anger towards Kalrow, sped forward and tried to punch him, only to find out that he was a hologram.
"What could you accomplish by trying to hurt us?" he asked. "Enjoy your new lease on life."
The hologram of Kalrow disappeared, leaving his minions to take care of them.
Aria, who had witnessed the villagers being slaughtered, tried to stop the soldiers from killing anymore of them, but no one was listening to her. A Taison walked over to them and was about to crush Aria, but was stopped by Nekora.
"What the hell are you doing?!" he asked the soldier. Not waiting for an answer, he threw the Taison's arm back, and Asura punched it into the wall behind it. Aria managed to convince the villagers around her to run for safety, then did the same herself after wishing the Demigods good luck in their battle.
"I will not stand for this." Asura said, turning to face the remaining. "Your lives... will end here!"
The Taison then stepped forward, stopping in front of them.
"Surrender your souls to us. They must be saved."
The two Demigods gave it a look of confusion, then intense anger.
"I'm sorry. Did you say something?" Nekora asked it as he materialized a spear out of thin air, then momentarily disappeared as the Dojis all dropped dead and their bodies disintegrated. The Taison merely watched, amused at their futile resistance.
"I see you haven't lost your speed in these 12,000 long years, Nekora. But I doubt it will do you any good against Lord Yasha."
Asura jumped in front of the soldier, surprising it, then landed behind it and punched it into the air above Nekora, who caught it with the spear still in his hands, before appearing above it and slamming it into the ground. He grabbed it by the legs and threw it back towards Asura, who jumped into the air in front of it again, and kicked it in the face, causing extra damage due to the speed the soldier was flying at. They tossed it back and forth between each other, before Asura got bored and slammed its face into the ground with his foot, crushing its head and killing it.
"Can nothing quell my anger?" he asked himself. He then began stomping towards a frightened Doji, picking it up by the neck as it tried to calm him down by pushing his fist away, but Asura punched it in the face a few times, when he heard a noise coming from behind him. He turned to the source of the sound, and saw that Aria was crushing a deceased Doji's head with a large rock, pausing shortly to wipe her tears on her sleeve.
He noticed Aria's friend lying behind her, also deceased. Asura let go of the Doji, which then ran away from him screaming, frightened at having almost died, but happy to still be alive.
Nekora, who was standing nearby, slowly walked towards Aria, and stood behind her silently, then grabbed her arm as she tried to crush the dead soldier's head again. She looked at him in surprise.
"I know how you feel." he told her. She noticed a look of sadness in his eyes, and dropped the stone beside her, and Asura stood beside Nekora as they looked up at the Septentrion that Kalrow was currently commanding.
"I guess we now know who our next opponent is, huh, Asura?"
"Yeah."
Nekora looked at Aria, smiling softly, as if to reassure her that the Deities would pay for what they did.
"Are you ready, Asura?"
"I am. We'll destroy all of those worthless Deities, no matter what it takes."
*To Be Continued*
I finally completed chapter 8! I hope you guys enjoyed it and I'll finish the next chapter by the end of this week. As always, be sure to leave a review containing your thoughts on this chapter, and if you have any questions, you can PM me. That's all for now, so I'll see you guys later!
