Author's Note: I hope you all got to see the new Mortal Kombat movie. I had a couple of complaints, but overall I liked the movie a lot. I think the best thing about it was Mileena getting ganked; bet all her toxic stans were all sad too. Just kidding, the best part was Sub-Zero, and you all know it LOL Anyway, this chapter is another long one and I honestly started to get fed up with it after slaving over it for what, two months? Yeah, so I hope you enjoy it. Lots of fighting and action. And because I know you all really missed Rain being diabolical, I made him diabolical. You're welcome. I look forward to your angry emails ;)
Shading his eyes with his hand, Hanzo momentarily watched the twin full moons emerge from behind the grove of trees in the garden, their silver glow muted by the roaring fires licking the sky, setting everything ablaze and razing this side of the palace to ash. The clatter of swords and gunshots were deafening, especially to his unnaturally sharp hearing. Many of the Netherrealm monsters tried more than once to disembowel him where he stood. All of them failed, and all of them were dead for even trying. Nobody could overcome his katanas or his deadly kunai blade. But now his attention was focused on the woman marching through twin columns of fire as if it couldn't possibly touch her, and it wasn't hard to recognize Jade coming straight towards him.
The Grandmaster reached over either of his shoulders and drew his scorpion-handled swords from their scabbards. The blades traced twin arcs above his head, the metal glistening with drying blood. Walking slowly, he made his way across the burning lawn towards the Revenant assassin.
Jade laughed nastily at the gesture.
"Come home to us, Scorpion," she beckoned as he kept walking towards her.
"Never," he snarled.
She smirked as she raised her tri-blade boomerang in her hand. It suddenly grew very quiet around them, almost as if they existed in a vacuum. The weapon hummed when she threw it, but Scorpion's katanas flashed and the boomerang was deflected away with a metallic whine, spinning in the air until it lodged itself in a nearby Tarkatan's chest. But that didn't stop her. She moved toward him with a light, swaying step, her staff glinting ethereal green in her right hand.
Then abruptly Jade leapt, her tattered robes fluttered in the air and, veiled in its tracks, her staff flashed in a short, sparing arc. Scorpion jumped away as her weapon slid over his diagonal parry. He attacked instinctively, spinning his blades and maneuvering her staff, trying to knock it aside. It was a mistake. He barely parried and whirled out of the way, dodging her dancing staff and jumping aside again before she flipped into a no-handed cartwheel; spinning out of the way, he avoided the blow. The Revenant knew the trick and turned with him, their bodies so close he could feel the touch of her breath as she slapped the edge of her weapon across his chest. The Grandmaster felt a twinge of pain in his aging bones but ignored it. He turned again, in the opposite direction, deflected the staff flying towards his head, made a swift feint, and then attacked. Jade sprang away as if to strike from above just as he lunged and swiftly slashed her thigh and groin from below with the very tip of one of his katanas.
She didn't cry out. Staggering backwards, she dropped to a knee and braced herself against her weapon, clutching her thigh with her free hand. Black blood poured through her fingers in a nightmarish stream over her Oni-leather boots onto the well-manicured garden grass. Where it dribbled, the green blades withered and died. She was only stunned for a moment, though. Quickly, she jumped up, lifted her good leg towards him, and rammed him in a flash of green magic.
Jade's kick hit Scorpion like a battering ram, stealing his breath, crushing his ribs, piercing his chest with thorns of pain. Flying backwards, he just managed to throw his spear at her. It narrowly missed her head, but it lodged itself into a tree and managed to yank him back in time to save him from being crushed by the palace wall. Even so, the world grew dark and the remainder of his breath burst from his lungs in a groan.
The Revenant now charged at Scorpion like a bolt fired from a crossbow. The Grandmaster, with the metallic taste of blood in his mouth, shouted and threw his hand toward her, fingers curled around a fireball. Jade, hissing, abruptly twisted through the air to avoid the oncoming projectile, then leapt high into the air again, this time diving down vertically, straight at her opponent. He jumped aside, slashed at her, and missed. She smoothly chopped down with her staff as she landed and then proceeded to circle around him. Scorpion waited, his katanas held high in both hands, always pointed in her direction. At the last second, he jumped - not to the side but forward - dealing a swinging cut that shrieked as it whizzed through the air.
He missed. It was so unexpected that he lost his rhythm and dodged a fraction of a second too late. He felt the Revenant's sharp finger gauntlets tear his cheek before the hard smoothness of her weapon slapped his neck. Scorpion curled up on the spot, transferred the weight of his body to his right leg and slashed backward sharply, missing the amazingly agile woman yet again. Jade howled as she swung her staff hard at an upward angle like she was playing golf, this time catching him in the face, her momentum so powerful that it bowled him over onto his side. Black and green circles spun in the Grandmaster's eyes, his temples and the crown of his head throbbing, but somehow he managed to roll back onto one knee.
The Revenant, meanwhile, moved towards him silently, but Scorpion heard her all the same with his bat-like hearing. Though still stunned from the blow to his neck, he reacted instinctively. He jumped up and, in a flash, matching the tempo of his movements to the speed with which Jade attacked, took three steps forward, dodged, turned a semi-circle and then, quick as a thought, delivered a powerful blow. His blades met with no resistance and she screamed in pain as he chopped twin diagonal lines through her chest from shoulder to hip.
The Grandmaster watched a black stain bloom across her front, on the faded green dress and robes she wore. He knew that she was tired now, but still lethal regardless. So he jumped towards her again. Every move he made, every step, was part of his nature: hard-learned, automatic, and deadly sure. He twisted his torso and delivered another sharp, forceful cut. Their eyes locked on each other as he moved, but he struck decisively like he had hundreds of times before with the center of one of his blades, following the movement around. The katana, freed by the half-turn, trailed after him, shining, drawing a fan of black droplets in its wake.
Her head fell onto the grass, burning it with her poisonous blood.
"I will not be joining you in the Netherrealm today," he breathed before he rushed off to resume killing Oni and Tarkatans.
On the main gate, the Hydromancer Elite called Bay - code named Whitewater - got separated from his sister, Kailyn, and cousins in the melee. He found himself in a thicket of Seidan Guards, their Order cannons firing all around him as he used his powers over water to help them drive back the Oni and the Tarkatans. He thought he was doing well, all things considered, until a flaming ball of pitch slammed into the palace wall beneath him, and the rampart fell out from beneath him. He and several Seidans toppled down, many to their deaths. But by some strange miracle, Whitewater's fall was broken by some sort of leafy tree; he tumbled through snapping branch after snapping branch, finally landing at the feet of a red-clad woman.
"What young, sweet, Edenian blood I smell in you!" she exclaimed in her husky voice as she looked at the blood trickling from his head and arms.
He scrambled to his feet. "That's a creepy thing to say, Elvira," he retorted.
"I will take it all," she murmured before she threw her hand at him. As she did, a bloody tentacle sprang from the aether and snapped at him.
Skarlet laughed sadistically as the blood tentacle snared the Hydromancer's ankle, yanking his leg up enough to kick him in the groin with her hard-toed boot. Whitewater howled in pain but somehow still threw up his arms and formed a twisting water spout whipping as fast as any tornado, sending it at the woman to knock her down. But the more experienced Skarlet chuckled as she quickly ducked aside. The water spout zipped past her and into the rampart wall behind her. With a simple flick of her wrist, the tentacle lifted him into the air by his ankle, and he yelped for help as he snapped at her with his own water whip.
Directly above the palace's main gate, Havik had predictably appeared on the rampart to attack Hotaru. With what might have been a smile or a snarl, he gnashed his half-rotten teeth at the Captain of the Seidan Guard before he immediately charged towards his enemy with his morning star drawn, yelling like a madman. The Seidan easily sidestepped the attack and used his naginata to slice a deep cut in his back. As soon as he wounded the Cleric, his feet had already left the ground, his body weightless, his left leg pulled to his chest, his right leg drawing an arch through the air, yanking him higher. He twisted like a tornado over the morning star and landed before Havik could stop his weapon's forward momentum and redirect the attack.
The Cleric was too huge to have the reflexes which would let him dodge or shield himself from a quick blow delivered by an ordinary man. He didn't even have time to blink before Hotaru's blow landed. An energy ball exploded from the tip of the Seidan's naginata and struck his old enemy in the chest with a resounding whump! Havik collapsed against the parapet, still clutching his morning star in his left hand, though he giggled as if the situation wasn't quite so dire. His unearthly voice chilled the General to the bone.
"Did I touch a nerve, Hotaru?" he jeered at the Seidan. When he didn't answer, merely stood there, chest heaving with hatred and murder-lust, Havik snickered again. "Oh, I think I did. You want to kill me for what I did to your wife all those years ago. How...disorderly...of you, my old friend. Revenge is the antithesis of everything you stand for, especially when it's revenge in the name of love." He wickedly laughed. "I approve. Strike me down if you can, General."
Shaking violently in place, seething with hatred for Havik - because Themis help him, he was right - he met his eyes. Then, without warning, he roared and leapt into the air, chopping his naginata towards the Cleric's head.
Erron Black was an excellent gunfighter; even as a teenager, grown men had been reluctant to face him. In battle, his guns were more than weapons. They became an extension of his will. And he had found a kindred spirit in the young Lin Kuei named Alex - code named Caliber - whose skill with his own guns was quite impressive. Additionally, he had his clan's ninja instincts, and he had wisely adopted a defensive style to hold off the Tarkatans and the Oni, his focus on keeping them off the ramparts. His varied combination of attacks using his guns alternately between his martial arts kept them - at least for now - from overwhelming the combined forces of Earthrealm and Seido.
And then from seemingly nowhere, a familiar razor-edged hat cut through the air and knocked first Erron's guns from his hands and then Caliber's. He yelped as stinging pain cut through his fingers, and then lifted his head in time to see two Revenants - Liu Kang and Kung Lao - approaching the gunslinging duo on either side. Now they were forced to defend themselves on two fronts as they backed into each other, looking at each Netherrealm Champion in trepidation.
On the wall above the gardens, too preoccupied to notice that Bi-han was currently fighting Rain in the Temple of Themis below, Sareena fought down her pain as she fought against her own people too. Seemingly mild dragontooth sword attacks abruptly eviscerated the Netherrealm denizens, or landed violently enough to hurl them into harm's way. The air sizzled and cracked as she threw brimstone bombs at them, blowing them into pieces that reeked of sulphur and ash.
Now one of her oldest friends was almost directly before her, and the white-haired demoness with dead amber eyes tugged a sword from her back, pulling the strap free. Jataaka promptly swung her weapon in a high arc with all of her strength. The blade struck Sareena's dragontooth sword hard, reverberating up her wounded arm, and then she jerked her over. In that same sharp tug, Sareena gracefully sent herself sailing up and over Jataaka in a high arch. She barely cleared her friend's head, propelled as she was with only the strength of one arm, but she didn't need much height. She tucked her slender legs beneath her as she rose, and then thrust down hard in a full-bodied leap. She was spinning as she landed, knees bent to absorb the shock. Jataaka should hardly have been a problem for her. But for all her acumen, Sareena was still hurt, and until now, she'd underestimated just how quickly the woman could move. By the time she had come out of her spin, the demoness had already swept her arm around and thrown flaming balls of pitch back at her.
Sareena was more than swift enough to avoid the fireballs lobbed at her, but there was nothing she could do to mitigate the sheer momentum of the attack. It forced her to leap into the air again, to agily backflip onto one of the parapets, moving up and out. Kicking out and curling her arms, she knifed her body upward at an angle that none but the most agile of angels could have duplicated. Again, the woman whirled to face the traitorous demoness with blinding speed, but this time Sareena was ready for her. Rather than try to block the sword that swung her way, she fell backward, bending at the waist. The weapon hissed over her torso in less than the blink of an eye. Then she pulled her knees from beneath her and thrust them up with hard momentum to pull her back to her feet, swinging her sword down on a diagonal plane...
And cut straight into Jataaka's skull.
The woman froze, her body twitching as her brain tried to cope with the sudden damage. With a vicious shriek, Sareena yanked her dragontooth sword from her skull and drilled it through her middle, twisting it with a ruthless jerk of the wrist for good measure. Tar black blood immediately poured over Jataaka's mouth and her eyes rolled into the back of her head. For a brief glimmer, her beautiful human form vanished to reveal the twisted demoness with ash black skin and horns swept back from her face. But in an instant, it came back to hide her true appearance once more. Her body collapsed a moment later.
As soon as the Hydromancer boys retreated, Ikki was already moving. He leapt impossibly high into the air before he plummeted to the ground, both of his kabutowari knives spinning with impossible speed, nothing but a razored blur. The Horselord's wrists passed over and around each other, and he himself was spinning when his feet finally struck the stone.
Darrius, meanwhile, wasted no time aiming his Order pistol at the Seidan Guard. The first shot rang through the air, piercing the chaos with battle, flashing blue. Ikki cried out - his precise words lost in the tumult - and dived forward. He wasn't quite fast enough. His armor absorbed the impact, and he staggered, struggling not to fall. He howled, his battle-notched naginata automatically lashing out to obliterate one of the nearby Tarkatans.
The traitor's old weapon spat at him, over and over, raining a hailstorm of blue projectiles on the ramparts where they fought. Several of Darrius' own allies fell to misaimed shots, but clearly he couldn't have cared less. Perhaps he wasn't even aware. His focus was purely on Ikki, even as other shots pinged off the stone parapets and the rampart itself, but they merely chipped out bits of stone, pock-marking the walls.
The Seidan rebel was slowly improving his aim, and he had clearly turned up the power on his deadly pistol now. A rapid fusillade of sharp cracks chased after Ikki as he dodged the attacks. The entire palace shook as a series of concussive blasts ripped across the rampart, shock waves hurling stone and dead warriors from both sides this way and that. Where only moments before, the weapon only gouged out chunks of stone, now white-hot flame melted into slag anything those shock waves missed.
Ikki soon grew tired of the chase, though, and fired energy burst after energy burst back at Darrius from his naginata. The blue-white energy now chased the traitor, but he was exceptionally fast, and the Horselord's shots missed quite often, punching holes through the swarming Tarkatans and the walls. The rampart trembled with the sound of thunder.
Darrius continued to fire back, and Ikki twisted aside, letting the hail of energy bolts sweep past him. Soon, he dropped into a low crouch, his body bent sharply forward at the waist, and then leapt impossibly high, arching over the traitor's shots. And then he was falling, twisting in the air beneath and around the rebel's constant fire. When he hit the rampart again, both of his kabutowari knives spun and sliced Darrius' Order pistol in half before he lunged at him.
Quickly, he drilled one of his weapons into his enemy's gut and then dragged it upward through his chest on a diagonal angle. Darrius coughed at once, almost as if he was surprised, but Ikki wasn't quite through yet. In a single fluid motion, he brought his other knife down into the rebel's skull, cracking it in half like a melon. Blood and brain matter spilled from the wound when he yanked the kabutowari out. He fell to the ground in a heap, prompting the Horselord to spit on his corpse.
"It is a better death than you deserved, you faithless traitor," he growled.
Near the middle of the wall facing the gardens, Kabal was helping the Seidans and a handful of Shirai Ryu fight a particularly large and lanky Oni when one of the Netherrealm denizens known as Kia unexpectedly threw a pair of boomerang blades at him; she was deadly fast…but not as fast as he was. He smiled behind his mask at the thought for a split second before he danced around them like a flash and watched them sail harmlessly by his face before he took off towards her.
He was spinning around as he came to a stop, his bent knees twisting to absorb the shock, his hookswords whirling around him, twin blades circling in a deadly orbit. The demoness screamed as they sliced through the exposed skin on her back, and she reared back with arms flailing. Kabal quickly realized that he had badly underestimated how fast she could move, and by the time he'd come out of his spin with his hookswords raised, there was nothing he could do to mitigate the sheer momentum of her reaction. The impact lifted him off his feet and drove him up and back. He landed hard on his stomach and almost puked up his lunch.
"Puny Earthrealmer!" she spat as he writhed on the ground. "I will string you above the River Phlegethon and spend eternity dipping you in its boiling blood for touching me!"
"Hey, don't be mad at me that you chose fashion over functionality," he croaked as he pushed himself up. "Maybe put on some real armor instead of that black bra thing you've got going on there, lady."
Kia shrieked at him as she lunged for him, but he was already moving once more.
As his allies fought back Reiko's armies, Fujin charged towards Bo'Rai Cho.
His opponent stood perfectly still, focusing and channeling his power. At the last possible instant, the drunken master opened his mouth and unleashed a roaring stream of fire to put a dragon's fiery breath to shame. It struck Fujin in the chest and lifted him off his feet, sending him flying backwards.
The Wind God twisted in midair so that he was able to roll with the impact when he landed. He quickly sprang back to his feet and advanced again, moving more slowly this time. His old friend still stood in the exact same position as before; it was as if he hadn't even moved. Fujin began to sense the oppressive presence of the Netherrealm's influence weighing down upon him. Bo'Rai Cho was trying to crush his will, to dominate and enslave him just as he had been dominated and enslaved. This time, however, Fujin was ready.
Instead of charging forward, he opened up his divinity, letting the light of the universe flow through him like a rushing river. But instead of focusing or channeling this energy, he released it in its purest form. There was a brilliant flash as the air between the two combatants lit up. The energy unleashed was powerful, and Bo'Rai Cho, unprepared, was now sent flying backwards. He landed in a heap on the rampart and Fujin raced toward him now. But the drunken master rolled over, lifted himself up on one knee, and his hands flew forward as he breathed yet another cloud of fire at his enemy.
Fujin intercepted and dispelled it with a disinterested flick of his hand that summoned a gust of wind to stop it, though the movement also stopped his charge dead in his tracks. Bo'Rai Cho breathed three more fireballs in quick succession, the air now noxious with the scent of hard liquor. The Wind God batted the first aside with his powers, ducked the second, then deflected the third back in the direction of its source. It struck his old friend in the chest, sending him sliding several feet back on the stone floor. For the first time, the Revenant's emotionless veneer cracked as he let out a primal hiss of hate, the sound of which sent shivers down Fujin's spine.
Bo'Rai Cho rose to his feet, his robes smoking and singed where the fire had struck him. His dark eyes flashed red, and he raised both hands high above his head. Fujin knew he was gathering his power to unleash a swirling firestorm of infernal energy, so he quickly calculated his options. Realizing he couldn't close the gap between them quickly enough to stop the assault, he gathered his own energy and spread his hands before him, ready to catch and absorb the Revenant's attack.
A splintering crash rang out across the palace garden as a burning stone the size of a horse landed square in the wall, ripping it down, dragging Kurtis Stryker to the ground with several of his allies. How many survived? he vaguely wondered. Through the roiling smoke, he couldn't tell. They were scattered; every man was his own battle now. I should've sent Sonya to voicemail, he grudgingly said to himself as he pushed himself up, trying to ignore the pain in his joints and back.
Men were crawling through the garden, men burned and bleeding, coughing up blood, staggering, most dying. Tarkatans twice his size tried to kill him. One of them ran at him. Stryker blew off the beast's head, then whirled around and crushed another's armblade with his nightstick before blowing his head off too. An Edenian archer, bowless, thrust at him with an arrow, holding it as if it were a knife. He swung his nightstick at the man's face hard enough that he completely unhinged his jaw, barely noticing it fall completely askew as blood poured over the man's lips like vomit. Another Tarkatan thrust at Stryker's face with his armblade, but the detective knocked the blade aside and shot him in the face; he was anointed once more by fresh blood and black smoke. Bits of brain and bone clung to his face and chest.
For a moment, the detective paused to peer around him at the garden and the walls still left behind him. The enemy was clambering over the burning Temple of Themis to reach the great hole in the garden wall and flooding into the palace proper. Squinting into the smoke and glare, he watched them in despair. Parts of the wall were crumbling and other parts were afire and the whole thing was creaking and shifting and likely to collapse at any moment, but still the Earthrealmers and Seidans fought on. It inspired him to keep fighting as well until they won the day or he fell in battle.
Quickly, Stryker found his nerve again and lurched forward, and then he was fighting, staggering and splashing through puddles of blood. Tarkatans came at him. Some he killed, some he wounded, and some ran away to face down some other threat, but always there were more. He lost his nightstick but gained a spear - he could not have said how. He clutched it and stabbed at his enemies, shrieking curses. Edenians ran from him and he ran after them, climbing over the low stone partitions dividing up the garden into smaller tracts of land.
The detective stabbed a vicious, snarling Tarkatan in the kidney when his back was turned, and grabbed another by the leg and upended him into one of the roaring fires. Arrows hissed past his head and clattered off his kevlar armor; one lodged between his shoulder and the breastplate, but he didn't feel it. One of the Seidan Guards dropped from the sky and landed on the grass before him, his body bursting like a watermelon dropped from the top of the Empire State Building. His blood splattered Stryker's face. Burning stones launched by the siege engines plummeted down, crashing on the lawn and grinding men to jelly, until the whole garden rumbled and twisted violently underfoot, knocking him sideways.
Black smoke and acrid wind blew into Prince Jiayi's face as he faced off with his younger brother on the palace wall close to Lady Olivia, who was still embroiled in her own battles with the Oni and the swarming Tarakatans. In front of him, Xinyi glared at him, tears streaking down his face as blood dribbled from the corner of his mouth, the split lip and cut tongue gifts from the elder Cryomancer, who'd already beaten him up once today in a flurry of fists and kicks. Jiayi had hesitated to do worse so far, but his brother's heart was so hard and frozen that he still refused to concede defeat.
"The Crown will be mine," he growled around a mouthful of blood.
"It is not your destiny," he sadly replied. "If the gods had meant for you to rule our people, you would have been born first, not me."
"To Hell with your gods!" he screamed and then threw an ice ball at him.
Jiayi danced around the projectile, feeling the chill of it breathe frost on his armor as it passed and plunged into one of the Oni, who was trying to creep up on him. Instantly, the Netherrealm beast froze into a pristine ice statue. In response to the attack, he slid on a sheet of ice towards Xinyi and knocked him into the parapet behind him. A fine webwork of cracks broke the stone where he hit, and he slid to the floor with a choked groan.
"For your crimes against our people and for your treachery against our Emperor, I condemn you to death," the elder Cryomancer sadly proclaimed as he lifted Xinyi to his feet by the scruff of his neck. He drove his fist into his gut now and watched as he doubled over.
Xinyi chuckled insanely a moment later. "That's it, Brother," he panted as he evilly grinned. "There is the King that I can respect."
With an anguished yell, Jiayi backhanded him. His silver gauntlets split open his cheek in a wide gash that spilled more of his blood. "You are despicable," he spat at his younger brother. "Did you learn nothing from our people's history? That monster, Reiko, has massacred us and our family. He orphaned us. Why would you want to follow him? How did you become so jaded and bitter?"
"I did you a favor," Xinyi retorted through a mouthful of thick blood. "I know you secretly long to abandon your duty and abdicate your throne. Reiko is merely giving me the means to force your hand. Just give in, Jiayi. Don't you deserve to have what you want for once? Don't you want to take who you want, when you want her, without having to worry about Tsai Bing telling you no? Admit it, Brother, I know what and who your heart desires. Give me the Crown and I will let you have everything you ever dreamed of having."
Jiayi roared as he started to punch him again - this time for tempting him, and also for his anger at allowing himself to be tempted - but now Xinyi produced an ice dagger and swiped his blue and black whale armor with it, sliding beneath his arm to get free again. The Crown Prince yelped as his fist bounced off the brick wall. His sore knuckles screamed at him for it, but he ignored the pain and whirled around to face him. Shorter and more agile than his older brother, Xinyi easily scrambled out of his reach and leapt like a panther onto the parapet nearby.
Jiayi snarled and lunged at him before he dove into a pool of ice on the rampart and teleported to a spot on the wall beside his younger brother. It happened so fast that even before Xinyi realized what had happened, the Crown Prince had already yanked him off his spot. With a ferocious growl, he threw him face-first into the dirt and then dove on top of him, driving his elbow into his nose before he drew his fist backwards across his cheek. But the younger Cryomancer barely slowed. He laid there almost motionless, panting, his gaze fixed on his brother. And then he kipped up, slashing at Jiayi with a newly formed kori sword.
The Crown Prince jumped to the side and spun a swift pirouette as his own kori sword formed in his hand. Xinyi rubbed against him, also spinning around, slicing through the air with his weapon. He didn't lose his balance and attacked again, mid-spin, gnashing his even white teeth fractions of an inch from his brother's face. The elder Cryomancer jumped away, changing the direction of his spin to confuse the younger man. As he leapt away he dealt a hard blow to the side of his head with the knuckles of his silver gauntlet.
Xinyi wailed horribly, fell to the ground, and froze as he clutched his temple, which was now streaming blood in rivulets down his cheek. The flesh there was ripped clear to the bone from his eyebrow to his amputated ear. The Crown Prince allowed himself to smile somewhat maliciously at his brother's suffering, even as the younger Cryomancer climbed to his feet. With difficulty, one rasping step at a time, he slowly advanced.
To gain time, Jiayi jumped on the stairs leading up to the slightly higher wall that faced the Seidan graveyard and more of Reiko's siege engines. He had not even climbed halfway up when Xinyi bolted towards him, speeding along like an enormous blue spider. The Crown Prince waited until he had run up the stairs after him, then leapt over the balustrade. The younger Cryomancer turned on the stairs, sprang over as well, and flew at him in an amazing twenty foot leap. He did not let his older brother trick him this time; twice his sword cut across Jiayi's whale leather tunic. But another desperately hard blow from the Crown Prince's silver gauntlet threw him aside. Jiayi, feeling fury building inside of him, swayed, bent backward and, with a mighty kick, knocked his younger brother off his legs.
Xinyi slowly sprang back up, shaking with uncontrollable rage and murder-lust. The elder Cryomancer waited. He held his sword high, traced circles with it in the air, and skirted the younger, taking care that the movement of his sword wasn't in rhythm with his steps. He couldn't afford to have his brother guess at his intent. Xinyi was patient, though, and he did not attack yet. He approached cautiously, following the bright, glistening streak of the blade with his eyes.
Jiayi abruptly stopped with his sword raised; his brother, now disconcerted, also stopped. He traced a slow semicircle with his blade and then took a step in his direction. Then another. Then he leapt, swiping him across the neck with his sword, cutting him deeply. Xinyi's blood sprayed into his face. The younger Cryomancer howled, striking his brother in the eyes with his free hand, but the Crown Prince tackled him, grabbing him by the wrists, pinning him to the grassy ground. The younger gnashed his teeth at him, but he calmly butted him in the face with his forehead and pinned him down harder. Xinyi had lost much of his strength; he could only writhe beneath him in the pool of blood forming beneath him, pouring from the wounds slashing through his throat and temple, spitting up almost as much from his mouth. Jiayi cursed and then slid his kori blade up into his chest, piercing just below his ribs, pushing towards his head. He clenched his teeth until Xinyi's inhuman howling became a thin, despairing croak and then a choking sob.
"I wish...you could have believed in me...just once…" he labored to say. "Jiayi…"
Xinyi's words caught in his throat as he began to gurgle and his head slowly fell to the side, his whole body going limp. The Crown Prince only let his brother go when he stopped moving, when his chest no longer rose and fell, then he pushed himself to his knees and watched the light in those tear-dampened blue eyes go dark. He desperately wanted to weep, but only his throat tightened and his head ached. Everything hurt inside. But he had no way of releasing it. He was locked up as hard as stone.
"Elder Gods forgive me," he croaked as he carefully brushed his fingers over Xinyi's eyes and closed them. "It should not have been like this." Trembling, Jiayi took his brother's hand in his own. It was as cold as a doll's. There was truly no life there anymore.
At last, he found his tears.
Morgan, code-name Hydro after the grandfather she'd never met, had been fighting back Oni when she was unexpectedly approached by the Netherrealm Empress, Kitana, whom she had never seen before but knew through reputation. She wasn't dressed like any woman the young Hydromancer had ever seen, though. Like all the other Revenants, her clothes were tattered and worn, the clothes of someone who'd been dead and buried in the ground for centuries. She specifically wore a dingy blue catsuit with a tight bodice, and matching gloves that stretched above her elbows. Her glossy black hair was pulled back into a bun and secured with decorative chopsticks, and her face was concealed by an intricately painted hannya mask that concealed all of her features except for her eyes. Those flame-wreathed orbs peeked out from behind narrow eyeholes, vacant and dead, those soot-black lashes matted.
"Reiko's lying to you," she opened. "He's using you and means to kill everyone in all the Realms."
Kitana narrowed her eyes but didn't answer. Then she quickly ran her gloved hands down her trim legs and pulled a long, wavy piece of metal from either boot. She gracefully waved them before her and both sprang open, revealing her infamous large blue Chinese war fans. Without a word, she tossed one at Hydro, and it flew at her like a circular saw spinning through the air. It caught her in the chest, its sharp blades chewing through her flesh, and with a startled cry of pain, she tumbled backwards. She was not prepared for just how bad an attack by a war fan could hurt.
Quickly, Kitana cartwheeled towards the Hydromancer and retrieved her fan blade as the young Elite got to her feet. Then, as if they were extensions of her arms, she swung them both at her and came dangerously close to slicing open her throat. Morgan jumped back just in time, then leaned onto one hand and used her momentum to kick her in the chest. With a grunt, she fell down but immediately sprang back onto her feet, directing a fan at her. She grabbed her fist, but the Revenant Empress came down on her shoulder with the other one, which was now closed, and drove it into her flesh like a dagger. Hydro howled and then shoved her palm squarely into her throat. Kitana staggered back, stunned and choking, dropping her fan and clutching her throat. As she struggled to breathe, the Hydromancer yanked the fan blade out of her shoulder, feeling her own blood cascade down her arm, and throwing it to the side.
"So I guess you're not gonna listen to reason," she said to the Empress. "Then an ass-kicking it is."
On the main wall above the arched gate, Sub-Zero attacked Smoke, and Smoke, who had already blocked a razor-sharp kori sword with his reinforced cybernetic arm, now calmly leaned back to duck a second attack, feeling his body fade into burning vapor and smoke, the familiar nothingness of empty air.
The Enenra agily moved to pounce on him like he was a wounded gazelle, but he was clearly able to spot the familiar distortion through the air where his friend moved. He was one of the few who could 'see' him when he was invisible. With both hands and his enormous strength, the Cryomancer gripped him beneath his armpits, hoisted him over his shoulders, and threw him into the air. The cyber-ninja was airborne for a moment but quickly fell to the ground with a thud, rolling to a stunned stop near the parapet. But Sub-Zero was a ruthless warrior in combat, and he allowed his opponent no rest before he'd already thrown a large ice bomb at him. It exploded on impact, blanketing everything with ice, launching Smoke into the air yet again.
This time, when he landed, Tundra had already jumped in and blasted her father backward with an ice bomb of her own. Then, while the Grandmaster was struggling to pick himself up near the parapet, she lifted her uncle to his feet.
"I thought I told you I could handle this," he grimaced as he stood.
"Yeah, I never listen to any of that talk," she replied as her eyes focused on her father once again. She slid into a boxer's stance and before Smoke had a chance to stop her, she lunged at her father with a strong straight punch.
"No, Livy, wait!" he yelled at her, but it was too late.
Sub-Zero quickly caught her wrist and then flipped her completely over his shoulder. She flopped onto the ground before him, but before she could recover, he hammer-fisted her in the nose. With a sharp crack, it broke even worse.
Tundra howled, and as she writhed on the ground with tears and blood spurting through her slender fingers, her father aimed his foot at her head, clearly intending to stomp a hole through her face. Though in obvious agony, she had the presence of mind to swing her arm around and spray him with a blast of snow directly into his eyes, blinding him. Then she yanked her legs towards her chest to build momentum for a kip-up, the toes on both her boots slamming into his chin and knocking him backwards in an explosion of stars as she rolled back, before she finally leapt to her feet.
While she was recovering, Smoke now skillfully blocked another of Sub-Zero's punches before he punched him in return, and then slid around his body like a snake. Quickly, he locked his arm behind his back at an awkward angle. He twisted his captive's wrist even more, vaguely amazed by his lack of pain. Ordinarily, such a tight joint lock would make anyone cry out. But there was nothing, not even when the Cryomancer mule-kicked him in the shin, prompting the Enenra to yelp as lightning traveled up his leg, forcing him to let go.
Wasting no time, Tundra leaped onto his back and straddled him as if he were a horse, wrapping her arms tightly around his neck, dribbling her own blood onto his tunic. With a furious shout, he threw his arms out to either side, flexing his body hard outward, moving so quickly that it bucked her body to the side and she toppled onto her elbow, giving Smoke the chance to throw his kunai spear at his friend. Sub-Zero, with reflexes that bordered on psychic, danced from its path and it sailed harmlessly into the stone behind him. Frowning, the cyber-ninja yanked the blade back to him, but this time, he caught it, never taking his eyes off the Enenra, and froze it. His face remained expressionless as he then crushed the brittle metal in his palms.
Tundra charged towards him again. A split second before she reached him, though, with her arm outstretched to punch him, he threw his arm out like a sword and caught her directly in the throat, clotheslining her and knocking her to the ground. As she fell, she instinctively flailed her arms and once again threw thousands of tiny ice daggers at him. He scarcely had time to react before he formed an ice clone and back-flipped. The effigy took most of the damage, but some of his daughter's weapons found their way through and sliced both of his arms with dozens of minor cuts. One of them, however, was more serious because it plunged into the thin skin just above his left eyebrow, sticking into the skull and weeping blood into his eyes.
Startled by the injuries, half-blinded by all the blood gushing from his head wound, Sub-Zero didn't quite see Smoke use the opportunity to race towards his ice clone, flip onto its head, and then springboard from it onto him. They fell as one, but as they hit the ground, the Grandmaster headbutted him directly in the forehead. Stars exploded through the Enenra's sight, and for a second he felt stunned stupid. And then sharp, stabbing pain filled his skull as his brain discerned what had happened. But by then, his lifelong friend had lifted him up by his gray tunic and started pounding him in the face.
While Smoke took the beating, Tundra promptly jumped to his rescue. She crescent-kicked her father on his back, driving his body down. But she couldn't stop with just one hard kick. Her first kick smoothly became a front snap kick to the ribs, and another, and another. Only when she kneed him so hard that she knocked him backwards did she stop.
Sub-Zero slumped to the ground now, seemingly unconscious. Once more, the younger Cryomancer stepped towards him, her hands frosty with her powers, and Smoke knew she meant to knock him out even longer. But just as she started to grasp for his shoulder junction, the Grandmaster spat out a mouthful of blood and then promptly punched her in the gut as hard as he could. She immediately choked and dropped to her knees. Immediately, the Grandmaster tackled her, straddling her, wrapping his fingers around her throat. He started to freeze her neck while Tundra squirmed and punched at him to get free.
To stop him and save her, Smoke wrapped his arms around the Cryomancer's waist before heaving him several feet to the side. His friend looked up at him with vacant eyes that almost conveyed surprise as the Enenra clicked his tongue and waved his finger at him. "Now Kuai Liang, you know I can't let you kill your own daughter, even if she is a contentious little clone of you."
After Rain defeated Bi-han in the Temple of Themis, he used his divine powers to teleport to the Great Hall, a man on a mission. While fighting the filthy Cryomancer, he had touched him and seen in his mind's eye what would really happen to Reiko when he cast his spell, and he fully intended to help the General reach his demise sooner. The demigod had heard of this spell before, the knowledge of it passed on to him by Shang Tsung when he'd visited the sorcerer's Flesh Pits many moons ago and saw all his research surrounding it. It was a spell so dangerous, Shang Tsung had warned, that only a madman would attempt it. His lust for blood will consume him until it rips him in two, he had added as he translated some archaic writing on the brittle piece of parchment he had been studying. It made Rain wonder if Havik even knew that little detail before he gave the spell to Reiko, and if he did - which was infinitely likely - at what game was he playing? Regardless, the Hydromancer decided to feed Reiko victims to accelerate the process and to kill him faster, and when he was eliminated once and for all, there would be no other rival to oppose his takeover of Outworld. And as an added treat, there would be no one left to stop him from killing that bastard Cryomancer, Sub-Zero.
Rain had also seen in Bi-han's mind the Earthrealmers' strategy to resist Reiko as well as their triage location for their wounded, and that is why he easily teleported through their combined defenses and made his way to the Great Hall. Who better to sacrifice to the cause than warriors who could not resist, he asked himself. He appeared on the portico to the building and marched in unnoticed, immediately seeing that it was already packed with the injured. The less critically wounded stayed out of the way, all huddling against the walls, but those who were crippled or dying were arranged on the floor in the middle of the room in neat rows to allow the Seidan doctors easier access.
But they were not the ones who drew the demigod's attention; working on a young man not much older than a boy, flanked on either side by the Tetrach, Kailyn, as well as the wounded boy's twin, was a petite Hydromancer who could've been Anya's mirror image. Her brown hair only fell to her shoulders and her body was so small and slight that she seemed like she would take to the air like a bird at the first loud sound, but there was no mistaking those blazing amethyst eyes or that subtle dimple in her chin. Those lovely qualities easily marked her as the woman's daughter. Rain unwittingly bared his teeth in a wolfish grin as a new plan formed in his head.
Kailyn, though, must be taken out first. She had her arm tucked into a sling, yes, but the demigod knew from experience that even one-handed, the Tetrach was a force of nature never to be underestimated. She had killed him, after all, and he knew that by tradition, she had mounted his previous body onto the walls of Tlachtga. Quickly, Rain ducked in the shadows before she could spot him, and he weaved through the groaning and weeping warriors sitting on the floor. Fortunately for the Edenian, that lovely, ferocious woman was so preoccupied with the young man on the floor - also Anya's child, if he wasn't mistaken - that it wasn't hard to sneak up on her.
"Hello, Kailyn, my dear," he breathed into her ear a split second before he lifted his hand and summoned lightning to hit her. A blinding bolt immediately zipped from the sky, blasting a hole through the ceiling, and caught the Tetrach as she spun around to look at him. The wounded screamed and ducked for cover as a blinding shower of sparks rained down around the Hydromancer. She vibrated in place for a long second until the lightning bolt finally released her. Then she collapsed into a smoking heap on the ground.
"That's for killing me, you unclean whore," he spat at her at the same time a young blond girl shrieked, "Mom!" and darted for her.
She wasn't alone in that; Anya's young daughter also reached for her aunt, but Rain quickly grabbed her and easily wrapped his strong arms around her, trapping her. That didn't stop her from fighting though. The teenager writhed and bucked in his arms, and when that didn't work, she raked her long fingernails through his skin and even tried biting him. He just laughed at her, both delighted and amused by her resistance as he plunged deep into her memory and her soul. Like her mother, she had been born to the Healing Class, and with years of proper training, she could become quite a powerful Healer. Such a gifted soul could come in handy, even with her father's filth polluting her blood. True, Rain was a powerful Healer in his own right in addition to being a mighty Warrior - Argus' divine blood had made that possible - but a dedicated Healer had many uses. Furthermore, he could take her as payment still owed to him by Quan Chi all those years ago. If Anya wouldn't give him the reward he deserved, he'd take it from her in other ways, especially now when he saw through her daughter's memories that she was dying in Earthrealm due to Reiko's spell over Sub-Zero.
The demigod barked out another wicked chuckle as he yanked his storm sword from his scabbard and held it to her throat. "Easy, Samantha," he purred in her ear. "I wouldn't want you to cut yourself." All eyes were on him now, and he slowly scanned their faces. "Do not make any sudden movements," he warned them all. "You wouldn't want me to kill a child, would you?" Samantha whimpered in terror at the threat.
"What do you want?" Sub-Zero's son, Jamie, demanded to know as he stood interposed between Rain and his twin with his own storm sword in hand.
"The first thing I want, James, is for everyone to drop their weapons," he replied.
There was a moment of hesitation, but then the young Hydromancer Warrior swallowed hard and dropped his sword. "Please, do what he said," he told everyone in the room. "I don't want him to hurt my baby sister."
Grudgingly, the others dropped their weapons on the ground as well, and when the clanging din died down, Rain wolfishly grinned and said, "Now, if you are able to walk, proceed to that wall." He nodded to the north side of the Great Hall.
"What about the people who can't walk?" Kailyn's son, Connor, now asked as he glanced at his cousin, Thomas, on the floor.
Rain sneered. "Well, that is terribly unfortunate for them," he replied. "Now, line up."
He watched the young Champions like a hawk as they grudgingly obeyed him and joined the wounded Seidans and Earthrealmers along the wall. They flashed him dangerous, homicidal glares as they walked - especially James, which momentarily reminded Rain of Sub-Zero's frosty intensity in spite of the boy's Hydromancer powers - but they did as they were told without a fight.
"You're gonna kill all of us, aren't you?" Samantha whimpered in his arms.
The demigod softly chuffed at that. "Me?" he coyly replied. "I would never kill a wounded warrior myself. There's no sport in it." He paused to stroke her cheek. "But Reiko, on the other hand…"
She writhed in his grip but he held fast, and then she whispered, "What are you gonna do to me?".
"Oh, my dear Samantha, you already know the answer to that," he whispered back as he allowed her to see through their psychometric connection everything he intended to use her for. As predicted, she tensed and struggled against him, whining as her heart pounded in terror, tears streaking down her face. He simply laughed at her.
"Leave her alone, you coward!" James growled from his spot on the wall.
"Or what?" he challenged, once again pressing his storm sword against Samantha's throat to send an unmistakable message.
"Look, we lined up like you wanted," Connor now said. Rain couldn't help but notice how the pale-haired Hydromancer Healer now stepped in front of his younger sister as if to protect her. "Don't hurt Samantha."
"I have no intentions of harming your cousin as long as you obey me," he replied before he nuzzled the girl's ear and reveled in her fearful trembling.
"Then what?" James snapped. "What now?"
"Now," he began with a wicked smile, "we wait."
As soon as Miyuki saw Reiko cast his spell and then collapse to the ground unconscious, she fearfully exchanged a glance with Dairou and then fled down an adjoining corridor to hide. She didn't know what was going to happen when the General woke up, but she didn't want to find out. He wasn't her main objective anyway. She'd attacked him in order to steal the kamidogu from him, but for the moment, she'd failed and now, they were lying in a circle on the floor beneath him. Miyuki quickly took cover in a niche in the wall and hid behind a pedestal displaying a marble bust of some Seidan man, and it was a good thing she did. Reiko was only unconscious for a minute before he pushed himself to his feet and then glanced around, patting himself as if puzzled. The Cryomancer risked a peek around the corner in time to see him summon his scythe to him.
"Did your spell work?" Dairou asked him, for the moment unconcerned with her.
"Yes," he slowly drawled, contemplating it.
"How do you feel?"
Reiko lifted his head and gazed at the man. "Hungry," he replied.
"Hungry?" he repeated, puzzled. "I don't-"
Suddenly, a terrible, quivering, frenzied scream tore through the vaults, shook the ancient walls, continued rising and falling, vibrating as Reiko threw his hand towards the Seidan and twisted his wrist slowly around as if winding up an invisible rope. As he did, it seemingly yanked a red aura from Dairou's body, a blood-red mist that visibly enveloped the man, and pulled the ethereal substance into the General's palm. Miyuki covered her mouth to stop herself from screaming as she watched the Seidan's skin instantly wither until it was sheet-white almost to the point of translucence, watched his cheeks hollow and tear apart like tissue paper, watched his eyes shrivel like raisins in their sockets. And still Reiko held onto him, seemingly gorging himself on all the juices from the man's body. Only when there was nothing left of Dairou save for a shriveled, mummified husk did the General let go.
"That is what I think of your threat against me," he jeered at the corpse.
Miyuki, terrified that he would do the same to her now, retreated to the shadows of her niche once again, curling up in a tight ball at the rear base of the pedestal as she prayed for him not to find her. Even still, she sensed his green eyes fluttering over his surroundings, searching. She covered her mouth again, this time holding her breath completely in order to keep him from hearing her panicked respirations. What could she possibly do now when he'd succeeded in becoming a god? She trembled, wrenching her eyes shut as she listened to him shuffle closer.
But to her surprise, he didn't catch her. Instead, a portal swallowed him up like a bloody tornado to whisk him away elsewhere. But the floor began to shake, stirring the palace from the foundations up. Miyuki waited for many long moments before the violently creaking stone walls behind her started to crack under the pressure, raining dust and small rocks onto her head. She scrambled from her hiding spot and staggered back to the main chamber to find her way out of here.
Oddly, she discovered, Reiko had left the kamidogu in a circle around Kuai Liang's Dragon Medallion. The Cryomancer frowned. Was this his first mistake of the day, or did he simply no longer need them now that his spell was completed? She then shook her head at the thought, choosing the latter. The General didn't make mistakes. At least, none to this magnitude. And even his astonishing ego wouldn't be so unwise as to risk ruining his plans now. He'd definitely left them here because they were useless to him now.
She knelt outside of the circle and started to reach for the Dragon Medallion, but yanked it back just as quickly. The last time she'd touched the sapphire jewel, the Blue Dragon, the Guardian of the Medallion, brutally killed her for it. She swallowed hard, now wondering how to take it without getting killed for her trouble. She frowned.
"Please don't kill me," she pleaded with it. "Oh, please don't kill me. I'm not trying to take it for myself this time. I'm only grabbing it so I can return it to my brother when he comes to his senses."
Flinching, she yanked her long sleeve shirt down over her palm, making a makeshift glove to protect herself before grabbing it like it was a nuclear bomb on a hair trigger. She kept her eyes wrenched shut, bracing for the thing to kill her again. Nothing. Uneasily, she opened her eyes. It sat harmlessly on her palm still. Now breathing an audibly loud sigh of relief, she stuffed the Medallion in her pocket before focusing her attention on the kamidogu.
There was no discernable way to tell them apart, she noted in frustration as more dust sifted from the groaning ceiling, and she didn't have much time to try. Every blade was streaked with black whorls and stripes like Damascus steel, and every blade was fitted into a somewhat ordinary handle wrapped in black leather. A single polished, rounded jewel had been carefully inlaid into each of the pommels, and here she found the only difference between them - each jewel was a different color, and embedded in each one was a different symbol that she couldn't begin to decipher if she tried. There was not enough time to figure out which one belonged to Outworld.
"Guess I'll break them all," she muttered to herself as she flexed her fingers to freeze them.
Up top, the battle came to an abrupt halt when the palace began to quake violently and a thick, blood-red fog rolled from the ground. The strange miasma advanced quickly, roiling over the grass and flowers, obliterating everything it touched save for Reiko's forces, blotting out the stars, swallowing the moon. Those watching it could see nothing in it and nothing behind it. Reaching the palace's gardens, the fog boiled over them. The gardens and the graveyards vanished from sight as if they'd never existed. Loud cries came from that part of the palace, but they quickly faded, and no one on the ramparts above could tell what was going on.
Watching the advance of this strange and unnatural fog, Hotaru, in between strikes on Havik, shouted for his men to return to the walls. Jiayi was already ahead of him, as were Stryker, Scorpion, and Bi-han, who had woken up from his fight with Rain, all of them having fled the lower battlegrounds just as soon as they saw the scarlet cloud desiccating their allies. Unfortunately, most of the people outside of the palace walls were not so lucky. Their agonizing wails pierced the night.
"There is sorcery at work here," Jiayi told Olivia when he returned to the wall and found her again. She had just punched her own father in the face before her uncle tackled him and smashed him into the parapet. "I have not seen magic such as this since the unholy days of Shao Kahn and Shang Tsung."
She panted, glanced at him for a moment, and then ferociously sprayed a barrage of ice shards at a cloud of approaching Oni. "You think is Reiko's doing?" she said, clearly exhausted.
"I think it is very likely," he replied as he threw an ice ball at a Tarkatan that was sneaking up behind her, freezing it into an ugly statue that he promptly kicked into pieces. "We need to leave. I must get you to safety."
Olivia barked out a bitter laugh at that. "Look around you, Jay," she remarked. "There's no safe place to go. And even if there were, I'm not abandoning my people. I'm in this until the end."
Jiayi frowned at that. "Foolish, stubborn woman!" he snapped in exasperation. "That fog is tearing through our forces without any effort at all. You'll die!"
"Then I die with my family and my clan," she retorted, her jaw set in determination.
Panicked, the Crown Prince whirled around and peered through the notch in the parapet while the younger Cryomancer jumped back into the fight with her father. As far as he could see, it seemed that no matter how fast the Seidans or the Earthrealmers moved, that strange fog engulfed them before the closest soldier could reach the safety of the ramparts. Even then, no one was safe. The fog slid up and over the parapets with the eerie, deliberate movement of a snake. Jiayi stared at it stupidly for a moment before he had the sense to back up to avoid touching it as it drew nearer. Stared at it, blinked, and rubbed his eyes as the bloody mist took the shape of Reiko.
"Olivia…" he trailed off, awestruck.
He wasn't the only one. At the sight of the Blood God floating in the air as if he'd been borne of the sky, many of the Seidans - who were ordinarily so disciplined and fearless - threw down their weapons, heedless to the furious shouts of their officers. The Earthrealmers paused and shuddered in horror. Their instinct was to do the same as the Seidan Guard, to drown in their feelings of fear and panic. Discipline held them for a moment, discipline and stubborn human pride, but when each faction turned to look at each other, uncertain what to do, each saw his own terror reflected back to him in the faces of his or her comrades. They, too, quickly broke ranks, and scattered to get away from the General and his unholy fog.
That blood red miasma now flowed over the parapets, swallowing entire swaths of their number, the blood and life pouring from their mummifying bodies into Reiko, who was groaning as if he was being pleasured by a woman. That fog now threatened Jiayi and Olivia and Tomas. The Crown Prince only had a split-second to make his decision, but that was more time than he needed. Instantly, he was moving towards the Lin Kuei Elite, and just as she froze her father up to his knees in ice to immobilize him, he wrapped his arms around her body and then leapt through sheets of ice, teleporting her to the palace courtyard. Blessedly, when they emerged on the worn cobblestone below, the cyber-ninja also appeared beside them.
But Olivia was already furious with Jiayi and punched him in the arm with a beastly grunt. "How dare you!" she squealed before she shoved him in the chest. "We had him on the ropes!"
"Perhaps so, but Reiko's fog was about to kill you!" he shouted back.
"Můj sladký anděl," Tomas now spoke, "he's right."
"Don't take his side, Uncle!" she screeched at him. "We could've captured Dad!"
"I have already lost enough people I care about since Reiko first attacked Mòhé! I will be damned before I lose anyone else!" Jiayi yelled at her, then immediately bit his lip, winced, and ground his teeth together in regret. He shouldn't have said that. To her, least of all.
The scowl fell from Olivia's face as both she and Tomas looked at him in surprise. "What does that mean?" she asked, clearly flustered.
The Crown Prince never got the chance to answer her. At that moment, Reiko's voice boomed over the warriors cowering in the courtyard around them. "Valiant Seidan Guard. Noble Earthrealm Champions." He addressed them, his voice ringing so that none beneath him had to strain to hear. "You have been beaten. I claim this city and this palace. No one else has to die in this struggle."
Hoarse cries of shocked anger and disbelief rose from the dwindling allies. Hotaru marched forward to the head of their number to face the General. His armor as well as the twin flags jutting from his back were dark with blood, and his right arm hung limply, useless at his side.
"Dishonorable chaosmonger! We do not believe you!" he shouted at his enemy. "Perhaps you have conquered our city and this palace, but you have not conquered our hearts. As long as we have hope, we will resist you."
Edenian archers appeared on the walls, stepping through the miasma, taking aim at the newly conquered General. They loosed their arrows. They landed all around him, stuck, quivering in the ground at his feet. He didn't so much as flinch.
"Look to the Heavens," Reiko then commanded with a wicked grin.
Reluctantly, Hotaru and all the other allies raised their heads, their gaze searching the skies. They did not have to look long to see complete and utter defeat. Black wings slid over the stars, blotting them from view. Black wings sliced across the face of the moons. Thousands upon thousands of Oni wheeled in the air, flying in low victorious circles over the city of Seido. Fear, awful and debilitating, shook the Seidans and the Earthrealmers when they saw them, and more than a few flinched and whimpered. Instinctively, Jiayi yanked Olivia to him in order to shelter her from them should they attack.
"There are more Oni than stars in the sky," Reiko told them. "Kill one and seven more will sprout in their place. And they all obey me. I am their god. Do not resist further or things will be very unpleasant for you."
"You are no god," Raiden shouted at him.
"You are a terrible excuse for a mortal tyrant, nothing more," Fujin added. Both brothers stood defensively, bracing for an attack.
The General jeered at them both. "Terribleness is a part of greatness, gentlemen," he countered with. "Let us not deceive ourselves, gentlemen."
"What do you mean to do to us?" Hotaru now questioned as Havik, Sub-Zero, Skarlet, and their other allies joined the newborn god in looking down on the crowd.
Reiko's green eyes fluttered over them, and just as he was about to say something else, a sudden clap of thunder cut through the night. The strange thing, Jiayi thought, was how quiet everything became just in that moment. Everything. All of existence, covered in a thick, still blanket of complete silence. And then it happened: the white flash. It was a blinding bolt of lightning, taking away all definition of earth and sky, leaving nothing visible but the awful purity of the white. Then came the roar as it struck the Great Hall. It was a guttural growl, like some great evil had just been released into the world. But no, that was not it, not quite. That was the horrible sound of the walls cracking and breaking as it imploded and collapsed on itself.
"Kailyn!" Tomas howled as it fell, and then broke into a sprint towards it.
"Sam!" Olivia squealed as well and started to follow her uncle. But before she took a step, one of the Oni scooped both her and the Crown Prince into its talons and soared towards the rampart where Reiko was standing. When it dropped them - as well as many of the other Earthrealm and Seidan Champions - the Edenians snapped cobalt collars on those with supernatural powers and cuffed them all behind their backs.
They finished in time to see Rain marching a line of people from behind the ruins of the Great Hall towards Reiko. The Hydromancer held the girl called Samantha tightly to his body by a storm sword, and presumably this was how he had coerced the others - including one of Olivia's brothers as well as her golden-haired cousins - into marching to the courtyard with their hands in the air. Jiayi tensed when he saw this; he'd tried hard to put aside his past differences with the Hydromancer race, but for the traitorous Rain, he would gladly make an exception. The man, if he could be called such a thing, was a disgrace to not only his own people, but to all Outworlders.
"What is this?" Reiko suspiciously called.
"I've brought you a present, General," the traitor sneered. "And I've killed the wounded for you as well. Call their deaths a...sacrifice...to express my devotion to my new god."
alwaysdoubted, pretty much!
Reptaliator, yeah, that's become my catchphrase when I've done something evil in a chapter LOL
MKDemiGodzilla-Warrior, well, we're all going to find out together how this ends LOL
ROCuevas, thank you!
DinoLord00, thanks, I try. I don't necessarily think it's a step-by-step play-by-play account of a fight that makes it interesting, which is why I want to go back to my earlier works and edit those fights I wrote when I was still learning. Hell, I'm still learning, but I think I'm better than I was. But yeah, who cares about a fight if you're not invested in how it turns out? So, I have to think of ways to pull at your heartstrings. I think you may have gotten confused or just mixed up, though LOL Smoke didn't get crippled, it was Tommy, his nephew (he's his namesake). You know, one of Subby's sons? And Ikki is a guy that I based off the Hodge Twins, who I think have the most gorgeous eyes in the world. As for Xinyi, I hope that was satisfactory for you ;) And I hope I do the Reiko Blood God more justice than the comics, although you might be giving me too much credit, I don't know LOL
Pom Rania, you had quite a lot of things to say for several different chapters, and I thank you for the positive things you had to say. But on the issue of Kabal's angst, I don't know that "shoving his need for therapy down your throat" is fair or accurate. And even if it is, this is my story and I'll continue to write him how I feel like writing him. You're gonna just have to take it or leave it, learn to accept it or not. It's really not my problem, especially since the overwhelming majority of my readers don't mind how I write him and can actually empathize with his pain. You're more than welcome to write a story about him that depicts him in a way that makes you happy, though. I wholeheartedly encourage you to do so. ;)