Disclaimer:
Love Hina and Mahou Sensei Negima is the creative property of Ken Akamatsu, who created this wonderful anime/manga series. Shingetsugan Tsukihime and Fate/stay night is the creative property of TYPE-MOON. Anything not attributed to Akamatsu-san or TYPE-MOON belongs to their respective owners, such as references to Cowboy Bebop (the Swordfish II) that is a creation of Sunrise and Shinichiro Watanabe, BLEACH is a creation of Kubo Tite, and vice-versa. This story is written purely just for fun, guys; please for God's sake, don't sue me! I'm just a high school student with too much free time on his hands! On the other hand, any specific author created characters I created for this fic (despite how unoriginal they may be at times) are mine. So without further adieu, let's get on with the show!
The Surgeon General's Warning:
Read at your own risk. Multiple pairings inside folks, with KanaxKei and KanaxNegi, just to name a few! You never know what you're going to get so read on (I might even do some alternative stuff, if you know what I mean).
Blue Blue Glass Moon, Under the Crimson Air
I Wanna Go To A Place...
Chapter 43:
Superman?
A Love Magister Hina Negima! fanfic by James "Ray" Edwards
"Anyway, I've got a lot of names to be honest, but to the people who know me..." the boy paused in mid-sentence, flashing a cheery smile that strangely gleamed for an instant with an audible twinkling sparkle. This only irritated the Boss Hollow even more. It was going to enjoy tearing that smile off the human's face. "It's Keitaro the Nice Guy! And if you want the long run of it: Urashima Keitaro, eighteen-years-old, and first-year ronin!"
"Che, Mistaa Nice-u Guy Keitaro is it? AND a ronin on top of it?"
"That's right!"
"Keh, damned good-for-nothing. Your parents ought to be ashamed of you, not getting into college on your first try."
"Oi-oi! Hey, that was low!"
"Whatever; this is going to be troublesome all right, and what do you think you're doing, Mistaa Nice-u Guy?"
"Well, not much, Hollow-san: just helping out a girl who needed a little help."
The Boss Hollow twitched tersely. "A little help, huh? I don't know what kind of a stupid human you are, but you must be damned stupid to interfere with us."
"Hmmmm..."
"You must think you're pretty hot stuff to be able hurt me, bakayarou, but we'll crush you easily with our shear numbers! I'm not the only powerful one here and-"
Suddenly, a tremendous invisible wave of reiatsu exploded from the boy's body with such power that it obliterated the Boss Hollow instantly into a white shower of purified spirit energy. The concealing fog around the immediate perimeter of the plaza cleared with an eerie wounded cry, revealing the gathered masses of nightmarish bodies of the other Hollows. A full hundred of their kind had gathered here from the hell hounds all the way to more hulking brutes as big as the Boss Hollow in its serpentine form. All of them stared at the young man with the same slack jawed, dumbfounded expression.
Setsuna stared.
Keitaro inhaled deeply and sighed with a weary smile. Doing brute force techniques like the one he had just did always did take a good breath out of him, but on the other hand, they were pretty darn cool. "Hey, think you can stand on your own yet, Ojou-san? If I can get my hands free, it'll be a lot easier for me to protect you and fight our way through this mess."
"Uh --- yes --- I think so," she stuttered diminutively, much to her own private chagrin. What was the matter with her?
With a nod, he carefully bent down at his knees and allowed her feet to touch the pavement, giving her a moment to get a feel for her balance before letting go. It was actually quite thoughtful of him as her limbs were still tingling a little, responding a touch awkwardly but no worse for wear. What she did not expect was the wad of tissues promptly presented to her when she turned to face Urashima, a sheepish grin nervously plastered on his face.
"Wha-"
"The drool."
Setsuna's brows knitted suspiciously at her savior. Drool? What was he... Abruptly, her eyes lit up with realization, a bright blush of the wet slickness in twin streams of saliva coating her cheeks from the sides of her mouth.
"It's really not that-WHOA!" Keitaro yelped in surprise as the girl sharply snatched the wad of tissues out of his hand with lightning precision. She was rather furiously scrubing every centimeter of her face. He supposed she was embarrassed at her undignified state, but she seemed to be dealing quite well (if not a little too well) with her near death experience and being surrounded by monsters that wanted to devour her soul.
Hmmm, speaking of monsters... Thoughtfully, the bespectacled young man considered the array of enemies surrounding him from all side. They were still shell shocked, and with the loss of the intelligence that had once commanded them seemingly, they were at a loss of what to do. Reason warred with conflicting instincts, but inevitably, he was certain their insatiable hunger for the living would override their fear, or any sense of self-preservation for that matter. If he was going to make a move, it had better be soon.
Turning his attention back onto the raven-haired girl, who in a way reminded him of his own dear little sister, he noted that she was eyeing the Hollows quite warily before glancing back to him. It was about then that Keitaro also realized, judging by her seifuku, she went to the same school as Kanako too. Perhaps, he should ask her if she knew about how Kanako did on her first day later.
Of course, he completely missed the faint blush that graced the girl's cheeks when their eyes met. She spoke to him tersely, as if not knowing whether she should be glad she had been rescued or she should be lamenting that she was still alive:
"So do you have a plan?"
"Ah-hehe, sort of, if you can call running away a plan, I guess," the ronin laughed in a good-natured tone of voice. He did his best ignoring the scandalized, accusing expression, which still made him rub the back of his head sheepishly. Yup, she was definitely a lot like Kanako. They ought to get along just fine once he got a chance to introduce them, that is. "Say, would you mind handing me back the tissues you just used?"
"Huh?"
"The tissues."
The Mahora Academy girl glanced suspiciously at the crumpled wad of tissues she still held, clutched tightly in her right fist, before settling her gaze back on him. "What do you hope to accomplish with tissues? You do understand what kind of a situation we're in, don't you?"
"Crystal clear, Ojou-san, and I'm guessing you understand perfectly what we're dealing with too. A normal person would've freaked out or fainted by now, but since you're not doing either of those things, you must be some kind of demon exterminator or another."
"Hmph, and you're not ordinary either are you, Urashi-!" Wait, did he say he was an Urashima? Urashima Keitaro? He couldn't be related to...Urashima Kanako, could he? But then...
Eh, what's wrong with her now? She's staring at me like she saw a ghost or something. "Hey, are you really all right? I know it's overwhelming to be surrounded by this many Hollows, but trust me, we really do have a chance against them."
The girl shook her head vehemently, averting her gaze from him. "Whatever. Let's just get out of this mess alive. We can worry about the details later, Urashima-san. Here, take it."
Humbly, Keitaro accepted the crumpled wad of tissues back without complaining, turning his attention back to the Hollows on his far right just in the nick of time. A pack of the dog-types had just begun to pad forward cautiously, and now that they had been caught in his gaze, they instantly froze up. If Kanako were here, she would have probably looked positively insulted to see one of the many denizens of Keiji, the Other side, behave in a manner that was utterly out of character. They were supposed to be bloodthirsty beasts, the tainted souls of the dead twisted beyond recognition, and yet...
He could feel nothing but pity for them.
"It's kind of sad, I guess, but this is the end of your long journeys; the time for all of you to rest has come."
As if comprehending his words, the Hollows all at once scream in a deafening cacophonic symphony of tortured voices, males and female alike. The air howled violently as the air twisted and churned with the combined might of the hundred or so Hollows gathered, which frankly frightened Keitaro some. Apparently, the smart "Boss Hollow" had not been kidding, after all.
"They're charging in, Urashima! If you got a plan, NOW!" the girl shouted in alarm, somewhat into a somewhat peculiar fighting stance. He recognized it as a form of akido and/or jiu-jutsu, which would have been effective for a swordsman --- well, in this case --- a swordswoman to learn in case of emergencies. Wait --- ahh, now that he thought about it, the girl seemed to quite graceful.
A martial artist? Certainly. A demon hunter? Definitely. Basic taijutsu? Check. A swordswoman's grace? Check. She probably practiced kendo for the sake of building her fundamentals, but what did she really know? Well, he supposed he would have to find out later.
Keitaro smiled, his body glowing with a faint white aura of reiatsu, as it concentrated into the crumpled wad of tissues he held forth:
"Slice and scatter my enemies to the four winds. Kudakichire --- Hayashi no Touken!"
His aura flared brilliantly and the young man --- let go. Immediately, the wad of tissues exploded into a shower of countless glowing shards circulating rapidly into the vacuum of air created by the Hollows and blanketing the entire plaza. Setsuna could have sworn she saw them glinting and flashing in the light of her savior's incredible reiatsu, like hundreds of tiny blades. Was this what he meant by "Forest of Blades"? But what could all these tiny little blades possibly hope to achieve against so many Hollows? They were plowing straight through it like it was nothing!
"Just because it's small, a little detail --- doesn't mean it's unimportant, Ojou-san."
The raven-haired girl was about to protest when he mollified her with an easy smile. She clammed up, a faint embarrassed blush creeping up her cheeks, as she restrained the urge to hit the young man over the head, preferably with a bokken. How could he be so foolishly calm at a time like this? Yes, his spirit force was impressive, but against-!
"Watch and learn."
Suddenly, a blood-curling scream --- actually --- many blood curling screams smashed in her ears then, causing her to glance about hurriedly, while she did her best to keep her flailing hair out of her face. To her awe, she watched as many of the small, weaker Hollows, such as the dogs with the faces of men, were shredded to ribbons, blood and all, before exploding into white purified spirit energy. The white reiatsu permeated freely through the air like snow, and within seconds, over half of the attack force of wraiths had been annihilated completely, leaving only the larger lumbering brutes to carry on the fight.
Each step they took was like an earthquake, and they forged ahead determinedly, though the tiny blades from Urashima's technique seemed to be hindering their movements considerably. What kind of technique was it anyway? He seemed to need an incantation just like any kidou, and yet...
"Hey, stay close to me, okay? Just keep your head cool and I'll take care of the rest!" Keitaro called back reassuringly, motioning her to follow with a nod, as he charged straight ahead at head. Not having much of choice, considering there were Hollows converging on them from all sides, she hesitantly followed.
The first brute was some twisted mockery of a massive rhino, rumbling like a tank, as it stampeded towards them, brandishing its many horns. Yet the dark brown-haired young man ran headlong into its path, cocking his hand back into a fist that glowed faintly with spirit energy for an instant, and let it fly with a battle cry. She held her breath in dreadful anticipation. And then, a shrieking explosive shockwave erupted from the point of impact against all of her expectations, his fist plowing through the bone and mask, the Hollow's head literally disintegrating underneath the force of his punch.
The wraith hardly had a chance to give a pitiful gurgle before it exploded into a white shower of purified spirit energy, but there was no time to rest. Another Hollow appeared right where the first one left off, a towering caricature of a gorilla at least five meters tall by her reckoning, with simply immense fists; one of which was coming straight for the bespectacled young man.
"Urashima!" Setsuna shouted, hoping to warn him. If he took a hit from that...
Reacting quickly to her call, Keitaro caught the enormous fist, his knees trembling somewhat as he was driven back --- only a mere foot, despite the tremendous force, the ground beneath his feet cracking from the impact. Absolutely astonishing; even the Hollow had the decency to look stunned as she watched, with trembling fascination, the young man twist aside the arm, dislocating it at the elbow with a sickening audible twist. He dispatched it swiftly, cleanly with a disemboweling punch to its exposed gut before it had the chance to scream in agony, vaporizing instantly into a purified white cloud of spirit energy.
On his own, he had single-handedly dispatched foes that would have ordinarily taken considerable effort, even on her part, to be properly given "soul burials." He had no particularly special technique or skill, his attacks straightforward and without guile, but he simply was a force of nature in himself and in that respect, his grace was unmatched. Blow by blow, he crushed the Hollows as if his fists were ordained "Heaven's Judgment."
Setsuna watched in awe, drinking in the powerful display of prowess before her very eyes. Soon, she stopped following him and could only stand there watching him, intoxicated by his simple yet amazing power. Nothing could stand in his path.
A massive scorpion-like Hollow struck at him with its poised stinger. Yelping almost comically in apparent shock, Keitaro scrambled out of the way, dodging it by a slim margin but just enough to avoid the deadly stinger as it smashed into the tiled pavement with a sickening crunch. The stinger now immobilized, he quickly latched on to the now vulnerable tail with a mighty shout and heaved, hurling the wraith skyward. Leaping up after it, the young man joined it in mid-air and somersaulted forwards, bringing his heel down in a tremendous axle kick. The blow smashed into the Hollow's exposed chitin abdomen with an explosive crack before neatly bisecting the creature in two.
He was amazing, a "Superman" just like Arisugawa-sempai, with that crazy strength that made no sense. How could such a person exist? How was it possible that he had escaped the notice of the Kensai Association and the Magic Associations? Even better yet, why had the Church not approached him? They were always looking for new "paladins" to join their mad cause to purify the world in the name of their God, so how was it possible?
"You bastards! SHI-NEEEEEEE!" roared an eerily familiar voice in a rage.
Boss Hollow.
To Be Continued...
Author's Notes:
And there you have it: Chapter 43 as promised! Keitaro kicks butt and takes some names, and Setsuna gets WHOA'd. You really got to wonder if he's right that Setsuna and Kanako could actually become good friends? Where does all of his power come from exactly, anyway? How come none of the not-so-nice people Setsuna mentioned have not found him yet? And --- oh snap, looks like the tables have just turned again! Is everything really gonna be all right?
Well, maybe we'll find out on the next episode Glass Moon-desu!
Reviewers and readers alike, I'd like to thank you all very much for your continued patronage. Remember, I encourage each and everyone of you to feel free to comment, review, and/or discuss the story. Your comments can really make a difference, I assure you, and if you're up to it, feel free to ring me up on AIM, or even send me an e-mail (although you really don't need to boost my ego too often). You know how to get in touch with the maestro here.
So without further adieu, that wraps it up, folks (see you around the same time as usual): For the love of the School; Charge, YO!
Omake!
Naze Nani Glass Moon Desu
Episode Preview!
Chapter 44:
Break It Down!
"Eh? A cellphone? Ha! What the hell are you going to do with that?"
Tsudzuku!
