Chapter 25: The Fighting Ends

Hak prepared to use to weapon in his hands to defend Prince Il as the footsteps got louder. Turning to attack whoever was coming their way, Hak was thankful to see Mundok with Lord Joon-gi, both men looked a bit ragged. "Gramps!" he cried. He and Su-won ran over to the two men. It was then they saw Guen-tae limping behind them. The wound in his side bleeding, causing blood to drip onto the wooden floor.

"The King?" Su-won asked, only to get a shake of the head from the Wind general. The implications of this meant his father had been successful, which meant he was the son of a Kingslayer. Ashamed, Su-won looked down and away from the two generals. That was when he felt his Uncle's heavy hand land on his shoulder.

"My brother?" he inquired from the two men.

"Dead." Joon-gi answered. "I killed him."

"I see." Il said with regret in his voice. "Kashi?"

"I sent her to the Keep with the white haired boy." The Water general answered upon seeing the worry in the Prince's eyes.

"Thank goodness." Il said with relief only to have it washed away when he heard a crashing sound. "The Keep." he whispered as worry returned to him.

"Hak!" Mundok yelled at his grandson. "You defend us from behind as we advance forward." The youth have a nod, knowing this was his grandfather's way of protecting him.

Joo-doh handed Prince Il his sword that he still held onto, knowing they'd have a better chance if the Prince fought with the general's. "Can you fight?" Mundok asked the younger man.

"If I must, yes." was Joo-doh's answer. "I still have my other sword that I can fight with. My vision isn't too bad."

"But your arm!" Su-won yelled at the man that was his protector.

"I will be fine young Lord." Joo-doh answered. Mundok gave a nod. With that the group made their way towards the Keep. On the way to the Keep they found that there was very little resistance, but once they came to their destination they found dozens of soldiers either fighting or dead. Those still fighting were fighting not two but three young warriors. Kija's arm had tripled in size and he was using it to literally bat the enemy away, slamming most into walls or in most cases, through them. Jae-ha's kicks seemed to have become stronger as the men he kicked became airborne or died instantly upon impact of his leg. The last boy nobody knew except for Mundok. He was covered in golden scales. As he fought his speed seemed to match Jae-ha's and his strength seemed to match Kija's. His actions, however, spoke of some strategic intelligence as he was fighting both of the commanders at the same time. If those two were defeated then the fighting would possibly stop.

That was when they saw the door to the Keep open slightly and an arrow fly through the crowd and hit its target. Kashi was fighting as well. With nobody to defend her, she was forced to defend herself. Il took a step forward and prepared to advance in order to protect his family.

Kashi's eyes widened as she watched the soldiers begin to fall away from behind. At first nobody in the enemy ranks seemed to notice that they were being attacked from the rear. Not until the fighting made its way into the Keep's courtyard. That was when she saw Il in the middle of the fighting. Tears began to well up into her eyes as she saw her husband making his way towards her and Yona. Suddenly she felt the boy from before, the Seiryuu child pull at her weakly.

Yona saw Seiryuu next to her mother pull himself up, weakly. She didn't understand why he was so weak now. "H-Help me." he stuttered. "I can still-"

"You're hurt though." Kashi said not understanding the drive to protect that the boy seemed to have.

"Not hurt." he stated, his voice gaining some strength. "Power backfired." He tried to explain, his golden eyes looked at her. "Please."

Nodding Kashi helped him to sit up. Holding the boy close she watched as the closest soldiers began to grasp at their chests as if something was grabbing at them before they fell like dead men to the ground. Pushing his power to the max, Seiryuu felt himself collapse into the woman's arms before passing out. Kashi looked down upon the boy as collapsed. Worried that something had happened she began to examine him, but found his breathing to be even. He was just exhausted.

"Mommy!" Yona screamed in horror.

With her back turned Kashi didn't see the soldier coming up behind her. Suddenly blood sprayed against her back as the chest of the solder exploded. A foot and a hand were both extracted from the soldier. As the man fell to the side both Kija and Jae-ha were revealed to be their saviors. Yona began to cry as she saw all the blood on them. "Kiji!" She cried out as she got up and ran to him. She was so scared. She wanted this day to just end!

Mija wrapped his arms around the frightened princess. Placing his human hand upon her head, he whispered soothing words into her ear. "It's okay. You're safe now." He then looked up at Jae-ha, the older boy looking at the unconscious Seiryuu. "Jae-ha." Kija said his brother's name to get his attention.

The sounds of fighting had ceased. Turning around the two warriors saw a tall man, a commander by the looks of it, approaching from the center of the onslaught of soldiers. Duel swords were in his hands. Zeno stood between them and this man with a single sword in his hand. His clothes were either torn in places, revealing golden scales or were covered in blood. The left side of his face was covered in the golden scales as the right side had specks of blood on it. Zeno looked very angry as the man approached.

From behind the group, Prince Il and the generals were slowly making their way through the crowd, killing those who fought against them. Upon seeing a pathway, Il darted forward. Not seeing the fast approaching frowned Prince, the surviving fire commander swung his sword at Zeno to take his head when a sword stopped one of his duel weapons. Just as his second sword came to strike Il, Zeno saw his chance and surged forward. With an upward thrust, his sword pierced the fire commanders heart in one strike.

As the man fell dead, Il rushed passed Zeno and the others to gather his wife and daughter into his arms. Yona crying unashamedly from both fear from the fighting and relief at seeing her father again. The clashing of swords stopped soon after, the soldiers losing their will to fight now that their commander was dead.

Picking the smaller boy up and placing him on his back, with help from Kija; Jae-ha decided that they needed to remove themselves from this place. Suddenly a small hand grabbed onto his pant leg. Looking down he saw that it was Yona. "Big brother..." she called him tearfully, before wrapping her arms around his leg. Touching her head, he smiled reasuredly at her.

"It's okay. It's over now." he told her softly, but the feeling that they should flee wasn't leaving him any time soon.

Beyond them An Joon-gi was looking around at the downed soldiers that the boys had fought and other than a few dead soldiers with broken necks, the others were relatively left alive. The soldiers with broken necks looked to have been professionally killed. Looking towards Mundok, who was looking at the golden haired boy, Joon-gi had a feeling that this new boy was something other than what they knew.

Standing upright, the usually calm and quiet water general spoke. "She's truly the person the priests said she was, isn't she?" he inquired from the older man.

"Only time will tell." he answered before looking towards Hak and Su-won who were helping Joo-doh and Guen-tae to the ground to rest. The two boys had been a big help in ensuring the two injured men didn't hurt themselves even more.

"What do we do about the traitors body and his son?" Joon-gi's voice cut through Mundok's thoughts.

By law, any relative to a traitor was to be killed to ensure no future uprising would come about because of revenge. However, Su-won had seen his father's traitorous actions and the repercussions fighting had on the men that served under his father. The same, however, could not be said of Kan Soo-jin's children and wife. Two traitors were killed this night and with dawn would come the repercussions of those men's actions. Closing his eyes, he with a heavy sigh. "We leave the decisions to Prince Il once he is crowned." Opening his eyes, Mundok watch the light of dawn's first light crest over the walls of the Keep and wondered what this new day sound bring them.

Beyond the generals, watching from a secret passageway, the violet eyes of a former priest watched the happenings of what had occurred. Sighing with relief, Ik-su quietly replaced the blade of the sword in his hand into its scabbard. The former priest hadn't watched to use the blade, but if it was necessary to protect Hiryuu's reincarnation, he would have used it. As he turned to leave his sandal suddenly got caught on a crack causing him to lose his balance and go face first towards the ground. Groaning, he sometimes wondered why the Kami had made him into the klutz he was. Hoping nobody had heard him make any noise, the former priest stood and quickly left the palace he was trespassing in.

However his exit hadn't gone unnoticed by one person. Hak had heard the crashing sound of something nearby and had gone to ensure it wasn't another enemy attacking them. Upon finding the secret passageway open, he looked inside to see someone in ragged clothes making a quick exit. Upon hearing his name called, Hak decided to keep the unknown man a secret; for now anyway.

M-Angel: So I'm almost finished with this story, at last. LoL. I'll then begin working on the next in this series, but it won't be posted until I've finished one of my other stories. Sorry that it took so long for this chapter to be post, as I've been extremely busy as of late.