Youtou Shinnoken: Demon Sword
A Yuyu Hakusho/Rurouni Kenshin fic
by Chester Castañeda
Original concept by Chad Yang
The true meaning of 'Aku Soku Zan' will finally be revealed. It's more than a just mere philosophy.
Disclaimer: Yuyu Hakusho the anime, the manga and its many video game incarnations are the rightful property of Yoshihiro Togashi, Shueisha, Fuji TV, Namco, Sega/Treasure and St. Pierrot. Rurouni Kenshin is the rightful property of Nobuhiro Watsuki and Blade and Samurai Shodown are the property of SNK Playmore. Don't sue me please. I'm very poor.
Chapter 7: Over the Horizon (Part 1)
With a burst of speed that belied its mass, the dragon avoided Fujita's thrust. Its claws dug deep into the ground, causing clouds of dust to form.
'Quick, but it seems he has forgotten the side attack,' Fujita assessed as he flipped his blade and slashed sideways. To his chagrin, because of the fierce stream of air that now shielded the serpentine creature, his offensive merely scratched the dragon's tough hide.
The Shisejyu Seiryu smirked. "After executing the thrust and the side attack, you're now wide open, Saito Hajime."
The dragon Seiryu overturned an entire plot of land, unceremoniously flinging it, along with a slightly irritated Goro Fujita, into the air. The patch of earth consequently crumbled against the dragon's coiling body.
With his feet off the ground, the police officer could do nothing but helplessly float in the tornado-like vacuum the dragon had created with its spiraling movements.
"Aku Soku Zan indeed! All you have are words. I now have the upper hand in this fight." Seiryu smirked smugly. "Watch your body get ripped apart by the might of my Fu no Senrei."
'Dammit, Fujita's in trouble!' Kuwabara reflected as he shivered in frosty agony. 'Without the ground to stabilize his footing, he can't do any of his fancy strikes!'
Seiryu the God of Dragons soon reared its ugly head at the center of the spiral. Afterwards, it headed towards the airborne policeman, its sharp claws ready to tear into shreds anything that passes through them.
"Really now? How presumptuous of you." With that said, Fujita readied his sword into Hiratsuki stance again.
"Fool. You have no leverage for attack. Die," Seiryu stated.
As the dragon coiled around Fujita, the policeman nimbly stabbed at the gigantic monster's back. The embedded sword soon allowed him to set foot on the creature's snake-like body.
He now had all the leverage he needed.
In annoyance, the God of Dragons twisted over its back and charged at the upstart Miburo with the intention of impaling him with one of its claws.
Fujita smirked. "Here's where my attack begins." His Hiratsuki stance swiftly changed into a different stance: with his right leg forward, sword held in the left hand parallel to the body, right hand held in front along the blade.
Seiryu winced. 'Could it be...?'
"GATOTSU ISHIKI!" the Wolf of Mibu roared mightily as he charged and gauged out the dragon's left eye.
"GRAAAAAGGHHH!" the Shisejyu Seiryu howled as his own left eye streamed with tears of blue blood. His alternate self mimicked his panicked cry perfectly.
Fujita shifted to his Hiratsuki stance again as he sadistically added more injury to injury by letting out a flurry of stabs at the dragon's already wounded eye.
An inaudible mental click resounded in Genkai's psyche. 'This Saito person is fighting the Fu no Senrei with the Hiratsuki not because he's holding back. The Gatotsu is an offshoot of the Hiratsuki, such that he could combine his Gatotsu attacks with the Hiratsuki with no trouble at all.'
The dragon's panicked shrieks of suffering echoed across the valley. It violently shook its head in an attempt to get rid of the psychotic policeman.
'In real combat, it's extremely rare to meet the same enemy twice. When it does happen, if there is one technique that can bring him down, all others become useless. To polish one's own specialized techniques until they become certain death; this is his true strength,' Genkai assessed.
"What's the matter? Can't fight anymore?" Fujita taunted as he extricated his sword from the dragon's eye and slid off from the dragon's body. He landed nimbly on the ground while quickly avoiding the Fu no Senrei beast's whipping tail. "Come on. I have only used the most basic of the Gatotsu's maneuvers. Giving up already?"
Seiryu's face morphed into that of a hateful demon ogre, his fangs grit and gnashing in pure, unadulterated anger. Keiko soon became paler than before as he again siphoned energy from her pain and suffering. Genkai and Kuwabara immediately charged towards Seiryu, but judging from their awkward positions, it seemed that only Fujita was within striking distance.
Through a hiss that did not bother to hide the fact that he was enraged, the Shisejyu declared, "Fu no Senrei."
"Again? Don't you know any other attacks?" Fujita snidely remarked. Afterwards, he readied himself. This time he didn't bothering going into Hiratsuki stance, preferring to shift to his Gatotsu stance immediately. It was as if he instinctively felt his previous tricks would not assist him this time.
'This air of tension I feel...' Genkai began, not able to finish her sentence in time as the fight abruptly started before she even realized it.
The titanic Dragon of the Trial of Negation blasted through the air with speeds that defied the laws of physics. Rising above the edicts of the physical world, it charged inexorably at Fujita like a blue streak of greased lightning.
"Fujita..." Kuwabara whispered in uncertainty.
Fujita's eyes widened for a split second as a flash of superimposed afterimages burned into his eyes like a colorful, flowery explosion of light.
"GATOTSU NISHIKI!" Fujita roared as he struck forward with the second form of his Gatotsu a split second later, its wider range of attack enabling him to deflect the dragon's powerful charge. His blade crashed hard against the dragon's underbelly as he diverted its path away from his person. The dragon rose up into the stormy skies.
Suddenly, a vortex of air appeared and arrested all of Fujita's movements. The irresistible maelstrom pulled him towards the dragon's waiting claws. Sure enough, the creature of the Fu no Senrei promptly made a u-turn towards its hapless prey.
'This is...' Fujita started as he struggled against what seemed to be an intense hurricane. 'This is... The Dragon that Soars the Heavens. In other words, Seiryu's Amakakeru Ryu no Hirameki. It has everything; the quick, unstoppable charge of the first strike, then the air void of the second strike. But of course, nothing less than an actual dragon can execute a similar technique. No one can escape the furious winds produced by a dragon's brilliant ascent into the heavens.'
With his footing uneven and the God of Dragon's Seiryu inching closer and closer, Fujita had a very little window of opportunity to strike.
'But while the dragon's advantage lies in the heavens, the wolf's advantage lies on the earth,' Fujita contemplated as he crouched low, avoiding the intense vacuum and regaining his balance and leverage.
Dragon and wolf were again face-to-face.
'The claws and teeth of the dragon that soars the heavens can't reach a wolf gone to earth.'
"GATOTSU SANSHIKI!"
The Sacred Beast Seiryu's mouth formed into an 'o' as a fountain of blood exploded through his split skull. "H-H-how... did... you... Saito H-Hajime...?"
"That Saito; he used the eye of the whirling vacuum to propel his upward strike into the dragon's skull!" Genkai said, impressed. "His attack stance was sunk down low. By maintaining that stance, using the ground's recoil to the impact of air generated by the dragon's first strike, he had a chance of withstanding the vacuum. The vacuum can't work on what's not above it, after all. Then, by using the power of the void to aim, and half-turning to meet the turning second attack, his attack struck home. He's good. He figured out how to counter the dragon's attack at a glance."
"Humph. I haven't really 'figured it out at a glance,' as you've stated. I merely compared it to a similar technique I've already seen," Fujita explained after overhearing Genkai's statements. "So far, it seems that the bastard's technique is nothing more than an inferior copy of the one I saw. It only goes to show that a technique can only be as good as its user, no matter how powerful it is."
Finally recovering from his dumbstruck state, Kuwabara demanded, "What the hell are you two talking about?!" just as he made his way to the decimated combat zone.
"Something far beyond the grasp of your intellect," Fujita answered.
"HEY! Saito, Fujita or whoever you are! You just shut up, you crazy cop!" Kuwabara rejoined.
"I agree with the policeman," Genkai grinningly joked.
"Aw, man! Not you too, granny!" the red-haired boy whined.
"Never mind that! We've got to find a way to reverse Keiko's condition!"
"I told you to stop celebrating each and every minor victory. Celebrate only after you're completely sure you've killed me."
The last statement got everybody's attention. It came from Seiryu.
"Being so presumptuous is the reason why the Chojin defeated you in the first place, Miburo," Seiryu said through gasping breaths. "Are you going to make the same mistake a century later?"
"Be my guest," Seiryu dared, unfazed.
"Wish granted." With one fell swoop, the policeman extricated his sword from the God of Dragons Seiryu's head while completely cleaving its thick skull in half. The following shower of blue blood completely covered the errant law enforcement officer.
Fujita afterwards felt his body go frigid.
The Shisejyu Seiryu smirked despite his bloodied state. "In real battle, there are no rules. Everything can be used as a weapon. There are people who are described to have 'ice' in their veins instead of blood. Well, my dragon incarnate literally has 'ice' in its veins, only colder still. The azure blood of the dragon is colder than even the coldest of ice. It will spread in your body until you become a brittle mass of frozen flesh, blood, and bones."
"Not. While. I. Can. Still. Move," Fujita disjointedly but clearly stated as he struggled against the frigidness of his body.
"No. It ends here." Seiryu unceremoniously shoved his hand into his skull, which opened up his and the God of Dragon's head wound some more. Consequently, a deluge of blue from the dragon Seiryu's split cranium rained upon Fujita, caking him with hardening, quicksilver-like blood. Soon, nothing was left of the officer except for a person-shaped mound of sapphire.
"Saito Hajime-san!" Genkai shouted in absolute shock.
"Officer Fujita!" echoed Kuwabara in disbelief.
Seiryu clutched his head in agony as he experienced the headache to end all headaches. Genkai could only give him a wary look as he slowly came to.
'He's supposed to be dead at this point. On the other hand, he should have been dead from the start, since he had been killed by Yusuke and the others. Negative energy is what's keeping him alive.' Genkai narrowed her eyes. She knew where Seiryu was getting generous amounts of jaki.
Sure enough, the Blue Dragon Sacred Beast yet again siphoned even more jaki from Keiko in an attempt to heal his wounds. 'That stupid ghost gave me a hell of a time. Had he been revived by the Reikai with reiki in the same manner we Shisejyu have been revived with jaki? Oh well, it doesn't matter at this point. However...'
Soon, though the young girl's face was still doll-like and apathetic, her left eye bled crimson tears.
"It seems that my new avatar won't last any longer. Damn that Saito and his Gatotsu!" Seiryu cursed with a scowl.
"It's trash like you who should be damned, Seiryu! Let Keiko-chan GO!" Kuwabara proclaimed as he rolled up his tattered sleeves. "I was able to give Rando a sound beating. I don't see why you should be any different! COME ON! COME AND GET IT!"
Ignoring the boisterous youth before him, Seiryu's eyebrows furrowed. "The old hag is gone." In the blink of an eye, he quickly blocked Genkai's attempt at recapturing Keiko.
"Hag. It's over. You've lost. Not even the great Saito Hajime could help you," Seiryu expounded as he held Genkai's fist at bay with a clawed hand. "Let me guess. You have no intention of letting me use up the girl's life essence and you won't dare let me prolong her suffering in my hands. More or less, is that what you're going to say, my self-righteous opponent?"
"You yourself already know your sin, yet you go about it like it doesn't matter," Genkai nearly spat. "You disgust me. HYAKU RETSU-KEN!"
Seiryu spotted and blocked each and every one of Genkai's quick strikes, but he had to relinquish his hold of the aged martial artist to do so. Taking advantage of this, Genkai finished her Hundred Punch Rush with a fierce blow that flung her away from the Blue Dragon Saint Demon. She immediately reversed her momentum as she thrust her right leg forward and shouted, "HIRYU KYAKU!"
Seiryu blocked the blow with his knee as he impaled the old woman's stomach with his extended claws. He reproved, "I've already seen those moves of yours while you fought Byakko. They're now next to..."
"SUPINE KICK KOUGEKI!" Genkai shouted as she flipped over and struck Seiryu's left side where his gauged eye created a blind spot.
The hidden attack sent the Shisejyu sailing up into the gray skies in surprise. "Fu no Senrei," he summoned in annoyance while he remained airborne, only to boggle in astonishment as he saw a much younger Genkai charge up an energy-brimmed Rei-Gan.
"Your Fu no Senrei won't make it in time. I'll finish you off right here and now, for Keiko's sake," the teenaged Genkai announced as she practically poured her heart and soul into that one blast.
"REI...!"
An inhuman roar was the last thing Genkai heard before she got smacked away by a maddened, mindless, and beast-like Byakko.
Seiryu could only chuckle as his dragon self finally merged with his sacred beast self. "My old comrade! It's good to see that even a whipped dog like yourself could be of some use after all."
The Blue Dragon Shisejyu barely had time to block as a blast of pure energy exploded right in his face. He crashed hard on the ground a while later.
Byakko snarled as his jaws burned with energy he stole from Genkai's half-charged Spirit Ball. He repeated his intense onslaught, shouting, "MEI-KO-SHOU-KAI-HA!" over and over as he mercilessly bombarded Seiryu with energy balls.
But Seiryu wasn't Byakko's only quarry.
Genkai herself nearly got pounded with repeated blasts of jaki from the maddened White Tiger Shisejyu. Not even Kuwabara was spared from Byakko's attacks. He attacked everything that moved, everything that breathed. He needed neither logic nor reason to do so.
"Watch out, granny! Byakko's gone berserk!" Kuwabara screamed at Genkai in panic as he hobbled away from one of Byakko's gratuitous barrage of wild strikes, his blue uniform bloodied and tattered.
"Kuwabara! Get away from him, Byakko! REI-KOU...!"
Frustration. Anger. Hatred. Violence. Retribution. Vengeance. Those were the only things that mattered to the fierce, bestial creature as of now. While he had those emotions inside of him, neither Heaven nor Hell could stop him. He was a destructive, mindless behemoth that would go to great lengths just to sate the hate burning inside of him.
"Byakko! What has happened to you?" Genkai shrieked, biting her lip as her feline opponent's claws dug deep into her calf. She was callously flung around like a rag doll as Byakko started to literally maul her.
Byakko looked at his bloodied claws in awe, overwhelmed by the power behind them. With just a few strikes he could literally kill all of them: the old woman, the human boy who defeated him, even Seiryu himself. The destructive viciousness that besieged the beast-like youkai desensitized him of all anguish; of everything. Nothing else concerned him save for the irresistible urge to kill he had.
"Genkai-baasan! LET GO OF HER, BASTARD!" Kuwabara ineffectually grappled with the White Tiger Shisejyu from behind, silently cursing his lack of spiritual energy due to his fight with Rando.
Seiryu could only cackle in glee as he struggled to get up from the thrashing his fellow Sacred Beast gave him. "You really are pathetic, Byakko. The only way you could gain a decent amount of jaki is to surrender to it fully, body and soul. Yes, you've now become a veritable killing machine, but all you have now is killer instinct, nothing more! Go ahead and kill the old hag. Afterwards, I'll kill you again, just like before!"
'Seiryu was the one who originally murdered Byakko?' Genkai thought through the haze of her mind as she struggled to protect herself from Byakko's violent offensive. 'Then that means...!'
"YOU MOTHERFUCKING BASTARD! Stop picking on little old ladies and face ME!" Kuwabara finally hollered as he clawed at Byakko's eyes and burnt face. The youkai yowled in pain as he threw the tall, teenage boy at the barely conscious Genkai.
"Seiryu's right. You really have become pathetic," Kuwabara silently muttered as he crawled over Genkai's prone form in an attempt to shield her with his body. 'You couldn't even think for yourself. It doesn't matter that you have all this killer instinct or berserker strength. You're not the Byakko that I fought with all those years ago.' He faced the berserk Byakko with disgust in his eyes. "I know you can't understand a word I'm saying, but... you're no fighter. You're just another mindless, out-of-control youkai."
'Kuwabara...' Genkai thought, looking over the young man's shoulder just as Byakko prepared his lethal strike.
The strike never came. Instead, Byakko instantaneously pounced on Seiryu again.
"W-Why the hell did he do that?" Kuwabara managed to squeak out confusedly.
"You caught me by surprise the first time, Byakko," Seiryu growled as he evaded the one-armed White Tiger's whirling strikes. He caught Byakko's remaining arm and broke it in one swift movement. "But not this time; I won't be killed by a mindless beast."
'I don't understand. Did Byakko opt to attack Seiryu instead of Kuwabara because the boy had no reiki left in him?' Genkai arduously pondered. 'I'm inclined to believe that, but the look in Byakko's eyes just now...'
Seiryu chuckled as Byakko howled like a mad dog. "And you call yourself a Shisejyu? Pitiful. You should see yourself now. You're even worse than a Class-D creature. You're more pathetic than you were after your defeat by hands of that stripling of a human. You are a mockery of what we Shisejyu stand for. The only thing you truly deserve is death."
Byakko rejoined Seiryu's comment by literally biting off the Blue Dragon's forearm. The cold, blue dragon blood consequently gave the White Tiger Holy Beast lockjaw while Seiryu himself shrieked in agony. The Blue Dragon Shisejyu tore his fellow Sacred Beast's arm off in retaliation.
For the second time that day, an inaudible mental click resounded in Genkai's psyche. 'Byakko's jaki! It stems from...!'
Seiryu gasped for air as he strained to absorb even more negative energy from his newly selected avatar. It was the only way he could survive his present injuries. 'Little streams of jaki won't be enough this time. I have to regenerate my arm and replenish my strength, even at the cost of a powerful source of jaki!'
However, the strain was too much for Keiko to take. She screamed in pure agony and pain as her mask of apathy cracked and shattered under Seiryu's desperation.
"KEIKO-CHAN! Seiryu, you...!" Kuwabara hollered as he struggled to rise. He fell down moments later as he himself experienced pure agony and pain; the result of Rando and Byakko's assaults on his person. "Damn it all to hell!"
Byakko felt it; jaki. The young human girl's beleaguered body was producing huge amounts of negative energy. The Holy Beast was soon drawn to the tormented girl the way sharks were drawn to the smell of blood. He had found his new target.
"MY AVATAR! Don't you dare..." Seiryu started as he pounced at Byakko, only to get blasted away by unexpected Mei-Ko-Shou-Kai-Ha.
One claw strike was all it took to end Keiko's suffering.
But it wasn't meant to be.
'Genkai-baasan?!'
"Old hag."
"WAKE UP, BYAKKO! Wake up and understand the root of your suffering! IT'S REVENGE AGAINST SEIRYU THAT YOU WANT, NOT BLOODLUST! REI HANDOU!"
Genkai used up all of her remaining power on that one powerful strike. Curiously enough, it did not finish off the armless beast as the spark of intelligence finally glinted in his eyes. Byakko fainted soon afterwards.
'Rei Handou; I've heard of that move before...' Kuwabara reflected pensively. 'Wait! Of course! That's the strike granny used on the Ichigaki Team during the Black Martial Arts Tournament! But wasn't it used to get rid off Ichigaki's mind control thingies? Does that mean...'
"The Rei Handou is a technique used to even out imbalanced ki-flow. The Chojin created a disparity in Byakko's ki, which made him go berserk every time he made use of jaki. I used the Rei Handou to relieve him of that impediment to his own judgment and reasoning," Genkai explained.
"Bravo. You figured it all out. I'd clap to applaud you, but I'm a bit handicapped right now," Seiryu derided. "The Chojin didn't want to waste Byakko's 'potential,' so that's why he opted to drive him mad with power instead. Though I personally would have preferred it if he hadn't revived the whipped dog in the first place. As you can see, he's more trouble than he's worth."
"You seem very complacent about it, despite the fact that you've already spent a lot of your strength," Genkai barked as she fell into her characteristic battle stance.
Seiryu sneered. "You act as if you're still a threat to me."
Keiko was shivering in pain, as if she had a severe fever. In turn, Seiryu's severed arm restored itself as more and more negative energy filled his body.
"You motherfucking bastard," Kuwabara seethed through grit teeth while Genkai remained silent.
Seiryu addressed Genkai once more, avowing, "You're so utterly predictable; saving Byakko and the girl with one fell swoop. How very typical, yet impressive. However," Seiryu motioned with his remaining hand as it brimmed with negative energy, "you have now completely depleted all your reserves of spiritual power. And, seeing his current state, that young boy beside you won't be much of help either. You have now left yourselves completely at my mercy. Your melodramatic sympathies have just cost you your lives."
A flicker of emotion was seen through Genkai's shimmering eyes as she mournfully took one last look at Keiko Yukimura. 'I'm so sorry, Keiko. I'm sorry that I wasn't able to save you.'
Seiryu continued, stating, "Oh, by the way, thank you for sparing my source of power's life and getting rid of the bane of my existence all at the same time. As a show of my appreciation, allow me to give you and your companion a glorious death. Feel the full consequences of your foolishness."
Again, the deluge of icy rain came as Seiryu released the God of Dragons from his body. It leaped up and hung in the air, light reflecting off each shimmering scale as it howled a shrill cry evocative of the terrifying shrieks of the blameless.
"Kyomei Jisatsu Jin... Fu no Senrei."
With an eardrum-shattering scream, the snake-like creature ascended further into the dark skies until it was hovering high above the powerless Kuwabara and Genkai. After that, it quickly descended, rumbling down onto the luckless duo like an unstoppable avalanche of ice and snow drawn from the very depths of the Demon World, in the Land of the Koorime.
But it had been said, "What goes around, comes around."
"BOUKO HYOUGA!" Byakko managed to call out despite his stiffened jaw. His body quickly grew and hardened as his muscles hypertrophied in the same manner his Kaiwan had.
The Fu no Senrei pounded hard against Byakko's rock-hard, armless body, yet he would not give an inch to the relentless assault. Genkai and Kuwabara could only stare in shock and awe at the spectacle before them.
"You traitor. So it seems that you've shown your true colors. You don't even know where your loyalty lies," Seiryu derided in revulsion. "I never thought that you could stoop any lower than you could, but again you proved me wrong. Die with those pathetic humans."
Byakko laughed maniacally as he stared at Seiryu through eyes of lunacy.
'I hate you.'
He could not scream the words at that point, but the technique he did was unmistakably the Mei-Ko-Shou-Kai-Ha. The concentrated blast of destructive force tore through the body of the serpentine dragon, continuing on with minimal loss of velocity as it headed straight for Seiryu.
'I've hated you from the time you've killed me in the Maze Castle to the time we've spent together in Hell.'
Frustration. Anger. Hatred. Violence. Retribution. Vengeance. All those emotions were released in that one, all-or-nothing blast.
'I've hated you since the Chojin revived all of us from damnation in exchange of our loyalty and freedom. I've hated you as Suzako became one of the Chojin's elite. I've hated you as Suzako trained us to become stronger by means of ruthless torture.'
The subsequent explosion that impacted upon Seiryu's person was beyond words.
'I've hated you even after the Chojin made me go mad with power just to prevent me from murdering you.'
If at that point Seiryu gained the ability to turn his own suffering into negative energy, he would have had enough power to rival that of the Chojin's.
'I hate you so much that I would kill you and then revive you repeatedly just to kill you again and again.'
Byakko cackled one last time before his own body shattered into cold, brittle pieces.
A period of dense tension passed Genkai and Kuwabara in a leisurely pace.
"I-It's good that that those two monsters have finished each other off, eh?" Kuwabara asked hesitantly, just to break the ice.
"But who really is the monster?" Genkai mused as she finally recovered from the energy-draining Rei Handou technique.
"What are you saying, Genkai-baasan?"
"Nothing," Genkai replied, sighing. Next, she added, "Kuwabara, you weren't able to finish Byakko off when you fought with him, right?"
"So what of it?"
"I wasn't insulting your abilities. Seiryu was the one who killed him, wasn't he?"
"Uh, yeah. I guess he did."
"That settles it. Everything that happened was meant to happen."
"Um, okay," Kuwabara said, nodding absently. He admittedly didn't understand the gravity of Genkai's words, but that didn't matter to him much. "Well, at least now that those two are dead, Keiko's safe, right?"
Genkai narrowed her eyes as she grit her teeth. "Wrong."
"Wrong? What do you...?" Kuwabara confusedly asked. He got his answer moments later.
It began to rain.
"Be careful, Kuwabara! That rain, it is no ordinary rain! It's...!"
The warning came too late as Kuwabara literally froze in his tracks like a statue. Genkai tried desperately to outrun the hazardous shower, but soon Death's icy grip took hold of her as well. Each droplet burned through her skin as they spread across her body like poison.
It was a bloody rain; the bloody rain of Seiryu's own blood.
The Shisejyu Seiryu rose from the rubble as an icy flood spread across the ravaged lands. A quarter of his face and parts of his body were missing, but he was for the most part alive. His next words were simple and uncomplicated.
"I've won."
He looked ahead and saw that his avatar, though lifeless as a marionette, was still intact. That was wonderful, since a good avatar is hard to find. His God of Dragons counterpart floated above her in the sky, shrieking in victorious delight as it let its blood flood the mountainside.
"So after everything that had happened... after going through the Miburo, Byakko, and even Genkai, I am still the one who emerged victorious. As Saito Hajime is the 'immortal' one of the Shinsengumi, I am the immortal one of the Shisejyu. And I am even better than Saito Hajime, because I am still alive and he is now dead. I am the one who killed the immortal wolf."
"Indeed, Saito Hajime is dead. But I am not Saito Hajime," said a slightly muffled yet menacing voice.
Seiryu nearly jumped up in surprise after hearing the disembodied declaration. The Blue Dragon Shisejyu swung his head wildly in all directions as he desperately tried to find out where the voice came from. He quickly spotted from behind him a person-shaped mound of his hardened, coagulated blood. The Saint Demon laughed in relief as he regained his cool demeanor.
"I thought I've finished you off. No matter. I'll let you feel the might of my Fu no Senrei for one last time."
"You won't even get the chance to do that."
"Indeed? Prove me wrong, then. Fu no Senrei."
As the Holy Beast said the words, the misty yet unmistakable form of a giant wolf appeared, its shining eyes glowing in the gathering darkness. It pounced on the approaching God of Dragons, ravaging Seiryu's draconic counterpart in the same way Byakko had with Genkai and Kuwabara a few moments earlier.
A muffled chortle was heard amidst the chaos.
Seiryu growled at the frigid Miburo as more of his cerulean blood was spilled on the ground. "Seeing your pathetic state, even if my Fu no Senrei can't finish you off, I still can. Die." The Holy Beast punched through the unmoving police officer's chest area with no trouble at all.
"You've just sealed your fate," Fujita stated as he began crushing and breaking through the blue ice that caked his body. Soon, even at close range, the policeman was able to aim his long katana a hairbreadth away from Seiryu's neck.
"W-WHAT?!" Seiryu exclaimed as he tried to back away from the deadly weapon, but his bleeding legs failed him. His whole body failed him. His own icy blood, ironically enough, had frozen him as well. "Who the hell are you? What the hell are you? A ghost? A spirit? A monster?!"
"Saito Hajime is just a person who lived during a bygone era. Fujita Goro is just a name. I am neither just a person nor a name. I am beyond that."
"Y-You're crazy! GET THE HELL AWAY FROM ME!"
"What I am is justice. What I represent are these three words: Aku Soku Zan."
"A-Aku Soku Zan?"
"With pleasure. GATOTSU ZEROSHIKI!"
The Shisejyu Seiryu... along with the dragon Seiryu... was broken apart in two like Rumpelstiltskin was after losing his bet. The God of Dragons consequently melted away like thawing ice.
Acting by some unknown providence, Iehik ceased his panicky chattering as he felt both the life forces of the two Shisejyu ebb and vanish. In an uncharacteristic grim tone, he ordered to Iehog, "Grab the Reikai woman and bring her with us. The two Sacred Beasts have died. We can now make use of them as leverage."
"I understand, big brother."
"Hold up! This isn't part of our deal!" Botan managed to say despite her recent breakdown. "And I'm not going anywhere until I see Keiko..."
She was effortlessly silenced by a swift, backhanded strike at the back of her head care of the monstrous Iehog. "We should have done that in the first place, big brother."
"No matter. It's of no consequence to us. Today, we shall meet our destiny."
"W-W-Where the hell are you going, F-F-Fujita?" Kuwabara stuttered through the coldness of the draconic blood that caked his body.
"Stand still," Genkai admonished as she struggled to thaw out Kuwabara using what little spiritual energy was left in her person. She herself shivered in dread, silently cursing her carelessness during her battles with Seiryu and Byakko.
"To Battousai," Fujita tersely replied to Kuwabara.
"O-Oh, I see." Kuwabara nodded to Fujita, even though he wasn't quite sure to what exactly he was nodding to. Licking his dry and frostbitten lips, he prodded, "W-What about B-Battousai...?"
A sinister smile crept its way into Fujita's mouth as he addressed Kuwabara's question before the young man could even finish it. "He and I have some unfinished business to attend to." And so the immortal wolf left the ice-covered mountainside to hunt down his eternal rival.
As Kuwabara observed the retreating form of the Last Wolf of Mibu, he wondered out loud, "H-Hey, granny. What's a Battousai?" Hearing no response from the Master of the Spirit Light Waves, the adolescent opted to change the subject.
"H-Hey! T-The rest of the Saint Beasts are also here, right? M-Maybe if we can somehow trick psycho-cop to help us, then he can f-finish them all off!"
"We have more important things to attend to," Genkai reproved gravely as she gave Keiko Yukimura's prone form a pensive, guilt-ridden look.
Genbu frantically ranted to himself as Kenshin left him for dead, 'NO! This is all Rando's fault. Him and his harebrained schemes! He wanted me to fight the samurai so that he could take advantage of Urameshi's bond with him. If the samurai gets hurt, Urameshi gets hurt too and vice-versa. Rando said that I could beat Urameshi by beating the samurai, but he's really just using me! Dammit! If I had defeated Urameshi earlier, then I could have been the shining star of the Shisejyu! I would have been the project, the future leader of our group now that Suzako has joined the ranks of the Shinju. Hell, I could have been worthy enough to be one of the Shinju! Not Suzako, not Byakko, and especially not that creep Seiryu, but ME! It should have been me who's the right-hand man of the Chojin! I've been screwed by everybody! Screwed by Rando, screwed by Suzako, screwed by...'
Genbu gnashed his teeth until little bits of pebbles and dust fell out of his mouth as the apparition of a lithe, effeminate Kurama overlaid itself against Kenshin's form.
"IGNORE ME, WILL YOU? Well, I will soon teach you to fear the name of GENBU!" The holy beast shouted, waking the swordsman spirit from his reverie.
Kenshin's eyes went wide as he felt a Molotov cocktail of jaki and youki well up anew in his Shisejyu opponent's shattered body. He turned towards his enemy's direction. His mouth fell open in shock.
Almost immediately, the holy beast's remains blew up into dust and debris. From there, the explosion collapsed into an implosion that sucked clumps of dirt and piles of rock together. The bits and pieces of Genbu's shattered body quickly reformed and reconstituted themselves. After a moment, the stone golem Shisejyu's body was whole again. Genbu gave the ex-rurouni his trademark grin.
The recombinant technique was unmistakable. This was Genbu's Tetsuzan Kou, the maneuver he had used against Yusuke just a while back. Kenshin drew the Youtou Shinnoken from its sheath once more. "I've already warned you. I don't have time to play with you, Genbu-dono. This unworthy one still has to find and rescue Keiko-dono and Botan-dono..."
"SHUT UP!" Genbu spat. Satisfied that that worked, the tortoise-like saint demon continued, "I'm sick and tired of your over-politeness and unassuming behavior. It disgusts me to the very pits of my soul. For being such a complete and total wimp, I'm going to punish you tenfold, samurai! Tetsuzan Kou: DEFENSE UP!"
It wasn't noticeable at first, but soon sparkling pinpoints of light quickly surrounded the stone golem in a hypnotic and enigmatic waltz. Slowly but surely, these glittery spots converged towards Genbu's reformed body.
Kenshin observed warily as Genbu's rocky skin soon obtained a metallic sheen to it. The swordsman squinted. Sure enough, he was able to distinguish the glistening particles that enclosed the shisejyu, coating his stony body with...
"...Iron!" Kenshin couldn't help but exclaim.
Genbu smiled horribly as he merged with the ground and charged at the errant swordsman.
'Ingenious! By melding with the ground, Genbu-dono now has the ability to move through it at a fairly quick pace despite weighing about twice as much as before,' Kenshin surmised. Nevertheless, he saw no point in letting Genbu get the first chance to strike. Calculating his opponent's trajectory, the swordsman proceeded to jump ten feet directly above the Shisejyu.
"RYU TSUI SEN!"
In perfect form, Kenshin executed what could have been the Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu's most powerful leaping attack. Time stood still for both the swordsman spirit and the Shisejyu beast as the Ryu Tsui Sen hit Genbu cleanly on the head.
After what seemed to be an eternity, time flowed again as seconds ticked by; the frozen moment was instantly thawed for all to see. Seconds insistently passed as it woke up the unwilling, making apparent the cruel reality of the situation.
Genbu grinned his broken Cheshire grin as the Demon Sword clanged pitifully against his iron-coated cranium. "I bet you weren't expecting this!"
'The iron coating on his body is too thick!' Kenshin mentally exclaimed, barely avoiding the swat of his opponent's gigantic hand by a hairbreadth of an inch. 'I reckon that I better find a way to get through his armor.'
Kenshin flipped over the youkai, landing several feet away from him. He afterwards charged from behind and swung the Demon Sword towards the ground.
"DOU RYU SEN!"
The resulting strike from the Youtou Shinnoken unleashed a raging avalanche of debris that completely swallowed the Stony Saint Beast. The thick clouds of dust that emanated from the crushing waves of earth slowly cleared, revealing something that left Kenshin dumbfounded.
"Heh. That tickled." Unfortunately, notwithstanding Kenshin's efforts, the Dragon Earth Flash didn't even faze Genbu.
Laughing mockingly, Genbu remarked, "What's wrong, samurai? Is that all you've got?" With that said, the tortoise-like golem quickly melded with the ground and disappeared yet again.
'I can still avoid Genbu-dono's attacks and counterattacks from up close because of the sluggishness of his heavy body, but considering the circumstances, he still has the upper hand. He can still get me. I can't give him that chance, for Yusuke-dono's sake,' Kenshin thought as he used his heightened senses to feel out the whereabouts of his current adversary.
"Now it's my turn!" Genbu exclaimed as he suddenly appeared just ten feet away from Kenshin.
'I have to finish this fight now. I can't risk getting in the way of Yusuke-dono's fight with the other demon by hurting myself; or rather, by hurting the both of us. This bond we share with this accursed sword has left us both compromised.'
Waking up from his deep contemplation, Kenshin turned and charged straight for Genbu's serpentine tail.
"I've got you now!" Genbu roared as he swung his deadly appendage towards Kenshin in a nigh-inescapable spiral. "Say good-bye to life, samurai!"
During the split-second where iron-coated stone should have impacted messily with ethereal flesh, Kenshin pivoted on his right foot and turned. His resulting pirouette helped him avoid the weaving motions of Genbu's metallic tail. Then, using the centrifugal force of his sudden body rotation to balance himself, the former Ishin Shishi delivered a retributive blow at the back of Genbu's thick barrel neck.
"RYU KAN SEN!"
Kenshin executed the Dragon Sword Swathe flawlessly; in the same manner he executed it against Hajime Saito, even. Alas, all that was for naught. He did not achieve the same level of success against the fourth Saint Beast as he did with the Third Captain of the Shinsengumi.
"Good job!" was Genbu's mocking riposte as he shrugged off the revolving sword strike like it was nothing. He thusly turned and reared back his twin boulders-for-fists as he prepared to squash Kenshin like an oversized gnat.
However, the Ryu Kan Sen was only the first part of Kenshin's assault. The real reason he used the move was to get close enough to execute his follow up attack.
Despite the metallic skin exterior and hard granite interior of Genbu's body, the balls and sockets of his joints were still left bare and unprotected. This was because joints in general were basically just gaps that permitted free movement; exploitable openings that were susceptible to attack.
'If I were to hit Genbu-dono's joints all at the same time with the Ryu Sou Sen's multi-hit strikes, then his top-heavy body will collapse into itself,' Kenshin thought as he quickly sized up the distance needed to implement his counteroffensive.
"RYU SOU...!"
At that very moment, Kenshin's world promptly exploded.
Rando's vision blurred as he tasted the rusty tang of his own blood. The spray of crimson from below his chest was in stark contrast to the pasty complexion of his veined chest, making it look as if he were wearing a tattered red bib of some sort. Upon rubbery legs did the demon fall.
Under normal conditions, Yusuke's powerful strike would have literally beheaded Rando save for two facts. First, the demon was an alumnus of the Dark Arts of Kyuuketsuki Kakutou Ryu, which left him immune to every sort of ki-attack so long as his blood pressure remained stronger than his opponent's. Second, the Iron Body technique kept him away from bodily harm's reach. Purely physical attacks meant nothing to him. There was no way Yusuke could get through the iron gauntlet of his dual extreme defenses.
So why was he stabbed on the heart by a stolen sword technique that, by all intents and purposes, shouldn't have hurt him at all?
'Why? How?' Rando mentally wailed to the mocking and niggling fates as he swung his balled-up fists at the unseen hands of circumstance.
Blood had always been a key factor in the propagation of life. Blood was one of the factors that influenced ki-flow, dampening or strengthening it at will. Blood ki was an altogether different power from spirit ki, sword ki, or demon ki. To put it simply, neither of Rando's defensive countermeasures could have blocked the amplified power of Yusuke's unpredictable attack. His blood pressure was
'Vampire blood, for all its mutated glory, magnifies and absorbs ki-energy a bit too well. All energy, ki or otherwise, has a propensity to flow freely into vampire bodies unfiltered, which explains why vampires possess nigh-limitless strength and heightened abilities. On the other hand, it also explains why they have such intolerance to ultraviolet light. Left unchecked, too much sunlight... pure energy, in a sense... would quickly burn a vampire inside out,' Rando contemplated at length as he continued to struggle against the inviting darkness.
Ironically enough, the same blood ki that protected Rando from the Rei-Gan earlier was what ultimately led to his downfall. The blood ki from Rando's own blood was the very thing that focused the Jigen Tou's reiki to the point that it bypassed his supposedly impenetrable shield. By underestimating his opponent yet again, Rando was compromised once more.
'But that's impossible! Inconceivable! I had everything figured out. This shouldn't have happened. Not to me, at least. I've sacrificed too much to get to this point; too much. Every day, I've dreamed about this moment... the moment when Urameshi Yusuke would die by my hands. Whether awake or asleep, vengeance was the only thing in my mind. To me, our first fight just happened yesterday. Time meant nothing to me as I whiled away the endless hours of solitary confinement by training doubly hard so that one day I can finally use the upper-echelon techniques that I've stolen from countless fighters against him! This is a simple goal. Can't I have this simple goal? Or is that also too much for even me to attain?
Darkness beckoned, but Rando didn't answer. He straightened himself up, relishing the heartrending pain that kept unwanted slumber at bay. 'I won't be defeated by that little son of a human bitch who's undeserving of both his great power and demonic lineage. I have infinitely more talent than he'll ever hope to have. If I had inherited the Spirit Light Gem and the Rei-Kou-Hadou-Ken School, then I would have reached A-Class, or even S-Class. I would have become the next ruler of the Demon World; Raizen, Mukuro and Yomi be damned. That bitch Genkai was stupid to make Urameshi her student. I would have made her school famous in all of the three worlds. To think, all that potential and luck wasted on a loser like Urameshi. He's trash. He threw away his opportunity to rule over the whole of Makai, of all things! I'll show him. I'll show him here and now who is the better choice. I'll show him that I'm the only one who really deserves the kind of life he has.'
Rando's eyes snapped open, ending his battle against oblivion. 'This fight hasn't even begun. It can't end this way. It won't. I won't let it.'
Chanting a secret hymn to himself, Rando summoned a unique skill that he reserved only for last resorts. "BLOOD WIND!"
A crimson tornado that reached all the way up to the ceiling of the dojo emerged from, surreally enough, Rando's bloody chest. Yusuke was taken completely by surprise as the red cyclone swallowed him up and whirled him around in a raging spiral of death.
Rando smirked as he reveled at the destructive power of the Blood Wind. 'By this time, the Blood Wind should have finished siphoning all of Urameshi's goddamned reiki. Just like before, he'll be helpless against me without his precious spiritual power.' The demon afterwards scowled as his legs buckled underneath him.
Just as Yusuke's reiki was reduced to dangerously low levels, Rando's physical strength had also been jeopardized. It was the perfect stalemate.
The Blood Wind was a desperation move created specifically to help a heavily wounded fighter in battle by the use of his own blood. Utilizing his blood plasma as heat energy and his natural state of shock as cold energy, a powerful tornado could be formed. This tempest, in turn, had the ability to reduce an opponent's ki to zero.
As Rando mentioned early on, the ki of a wounded opponent was far more likely to disperse than that of an unwounded foe's. It didn't matter if the injured fighter was able to miraculously summon large amounts of ki by sheer force of will; the spiritual energy wouldn't hold for long against students of the Vampire Martial Arts.
But the reverse was also true. If a Kyuuketsuki Kakutou Ryu disciple were injured in battle, then his ki would also be compromised. That was why the Blood Wind technique was created; to help users of the discipline during these critical situations.
The Blood Wind had one setback, though. The use of this technique was so perilous that it could actually kill whomsoever wielded it. Its tendency of consuming large amounts of its user's blood could put its user's life at risk.
That was the reason why Rando shrunk himself a while back after his fight with Kuwabara; he could recuperate from losing so much blood faster in a smaller body. The Blood Wind was the double-edged sword that almost killed him, not the Jigen Tou.
'Damn it,' Rando and Yusuke unwittingly chorused.
As such, as Yusuke was sucked into the vortex that was the Blood Wind, Kenshin's whole world exploded; the wayward half-demon's current plight and pain were now his to bear as their emphatic bond with each other activated.
Seizing the window of opportunity before him, Genbu proceeded to smash the hapless former vagabond in between his stony fists. He subsequently whipped him around with his ball-and-chain-like tail like there was no tomorrow.
The Golem Saint Beast cackled as he dribbled Kenshin's body in the air like a volleyball, never letting the corporeal swordsman spirit hit the ground.
"Y-Yusuke-d-dono..." Kenshin barely blurted out while being roughly manhandled by his Shisejyu opponent. "I'm s-sorry..."
As the luckless Yusuke was flung around by the miniature typhoon, he remembered his shared dilemma with Kenshin. The swordsman ghost's efforts to not get hurt for his sake had somewhat become fruitless amidst his own failure to protect himself. They were now both trapped in an endless cycle of mind-numbing agony.
'I can't let that wimpy samurai get hurt just because I myself have gotten careless. Hell, I can feel his regret all over me. Dammit, it ain't your fault, Kenshin. It's mine.'
Yusuke was somehow able to get a glimpse of the weakened Rando in the face of the dizzying rotations of the red twister. The demon seemed exhausted by his efforts as he just crouched there and trembled; he was practically a sitting duck, even. 'Let me make it up to you, Kenshin.'
Using the momentum he had gained by whirling inside the miniature typhoon for so long, Yusuke impetuously hurled himself into the eye of the storm.
If it was Kurama who was planning the dangerous move, he would have calculated his trajectory, velocity, momentum, and aim with unerring precision. If it was Hiei, then he would have used the power of his mystical third eye and instinctive speed to accomplish the seemingly impossible. If it was Kuwabara, then boundless amounts of luck and a sense of foolhardy courage was called for.
But this was Yusuke Urameshi, the incarnate of spontaneity and chaos. He did not have a third eye, unerring precision, or boundless amounts of luck on his side. All he had was his devil-may-care recklessness. Most of the time, that was enough.
Using only his determination and willpower to control the direction of his unceremonious flight, he went straight towards his intended quarry.
"RANDO!"
Kenshin's eyes widened as his body twisted and flew in concurrence to Yusuke's. The sudden shift in movement inadvertently helped him avoid further flogging from Genbu.
'What is Yusuke-dono planning?' Kenshin wondered as his body spun around in a spiraling fashion. 'This is absolutely insane! Insane, I say!'
Genbu growled in frustration. "GRAAAGH! Stay still, samurai! Stay still and take your beating like the piece of shit that you are!"
'So I'm moving in coordination with Yusuke-dono. Fascinating,' Kenshin reflected in awe. 'But Yusuke-dono's movements are too erratic. At this rate, the success of his attack will literally be a gamble.'
After a few more seconds of quiet contemplation, Kenshin noticed something vaguely familiar about the pattern of his aerial flight. The synchronized spiraling movements were coincidentally similar to one of the Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu's many techniques.
Altering his trajectory ever so slightly while quickly increasing the speed and velocity of his bodily rotation, Kenshin executed unto Genbu one of the many variants of the Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu's Dragon Sword Swathe.
"Ryu Kan Sen TSUMUJI!"
To be Continued...
Next: Turtle versus Dragon, Demon versus Mazoku.
Ja!
Abdiel