chapter 11
Mannen summoned his magical pet manta ray from Leafenia to carry Himeno and Sasame, and all eight of them flew towards the Northwest part of town.
The knights and Himeno landed on the outskirts of the forest. Since it was getting brighter out, Kei thought it would be best if Mannen dismissed his pet so that people wouldn't see it laying around the open field next to the forest.
"We found Tsui and the rose hiding near the edge of the forest about 300 feet ahead of us," Kei said to Himeno, Hayate, and Sasame. "I'll go check and see if he is still there."
"Okay," everyone replied softly.
Kei returned after a few moments. "We're lucky. Tsui is still there, and both him and the rose are asleep. Himeno, you should prét with me and we can attack him by surprise. Then, the rest of you, with the exception of Sasame, should attack him if he tries to run. Sasame, you should probably stay hidden in the brush and wait until we have Tsui distracted, then hopefully you can save Takako if the rose is still asleep."
"Your plan sounds good, Kei. Let's try it," Hayate said.
Kei and Himeno préted, and then transported closer to Tsui. Sasame hid in the forest and the other knights spread out around the area ready to attack if Tsui should try to flee.
Himeno did a light beam attack, and Tsui woke up as the light came closer towards him.
"What the!" Tsui yelled as he tried to scramble out of the way. Most of the beam hit Tsui and he growled in pain as he rose to his feet.
"I see that I was too cocky in thinking you would be too afraid to face me since I killed your friend," Tsui said as he jumped into the air and then started to quickly fly towards the field outside of the forest.
Himeno pursued him, and Tsui was met by Hajime out in the field.
"Guys, Tsui's out in the field!" Hajime called out to the others as he launched a water attack at Tsui.
"Rrrrr, a trap!" Tsui yelled as he found himself about to be clobbered by a water attack. Unable to dodge in time, Tsui got knocked back 20 feet.
"I won't be defeated this easily!" Tsui yelled as he sent an electric attack towards Hajime, hitting him.
Hajime put up his shield, but he was knocked to the ground by the impact.
"Hajime!" Shin and Mannen called out as they flew towards him and Tsui.
Himeno fired on Tsui again from the back as Mannen pelted him with ice balls.
o o o
In the meantime, Sasame watched as Tsui flew out of the forest with Himeno on his tail. The rose still appeared to be "sleeping." Its roots were half stuck into the ground and its bloom, which was half open and half closed, was leaning against a tree.
'It seems like the tree has grown even more. I've got to get Takako down from there. Maybe I can climb up the rose's stem to reach her,' Sasame thought.
Sasame quietly approached the rose, and then slowly reached out a hand to touch it. The rose remained still, so Sasame decided to try to climb it. Sasame started climbing, even though his body protested. His shoulder wound throbbed and he bit back the aching pain it caused him to climb up the rose.
As Sasame neared the rose's bloom he felt the rose stirring. Sasame forced himself to continue and he scrambled up the rest of the stem, practically throwing himself onto some of the outer layers of petals of the rose.
- o o o
Himeno continued to fire on Tsui as Mannen pelted him with ice balls. Shin flew down to make sure Hajime was okay.
After the first few ice balls, Tsui figured out how to block them. He deflected them backward sending them right in Himeno's direction and then he shot up high into the air.
Himeno watched with horror as her light attack missed Tsui completely and was headed for Mannen.
Mannen saw it coming though, and dodged it.
"Himeno! Look out!" Kei said inside of Himeno who was too busy watching Mannen.
A fireball zinged across the field hitting Mannen's ice balls and melting them right before they could hit Himeno.
"Phew, that was close. Thanks Go!" Himeno shouted.
As everyone was preoccupied with the friendly fire, Tsui made it rain lightning bolts, zapping Himeno, Go, Mannen, Hajime, and Shin.
The five knights put up their shields, all of them (with Kei in particular) taking the hit hard.
Tsui grinned like a Cheshire cat as he watched the Pretear and the knights suffer. 'Shouldn't there be one more though?' Tsui thought in the back of his mind.
Hayate stealthily snuck up behind Tsui and "answered his question" when he fired a fierce wind attack at him.
"Aagh!" Tsui yelled as Hayate's attack landed, causing him to lose his concentration on conjuring the lightning.
Tsui turned angrily toward Hayate, and sent a glowing ball of energy towards him. Hayate barely managed to avoid it, and attacked again. This time Tsui blocked it.
"Hayate, look out!" Himeno cried out suddenly.
"What?" Hayate said as he turned around just as Tsui's energy ball was about to hit him. 'It arched back!' Hayate thought as he readied his shield for the impact.
Himeno fired a light beam at it and knocked it off its collision course towards Hayate.
The ball started heading for the ground over by Hajime and Mannen, so the two worked together, firing water and ice at it and caused the ball to loose its energy, turning it into a dead rock.
The rock fell to the ground, but suddenly the ground around it started to shake and the grass started to grow profusely, entangling Himeno, Hajime, Mannen, and Shin (who had all been on the ground). Shin acted quickly though, using his powers to subdue the grass and bring it back to its regular length.
"Rrrrr," Tsui growled, growing worn out from all the energy he had used.
"He's getting weaker guys!" Go called out excitedly. "We just have to hang in there."
"I still have a few tricks in my bag!" Tsui yelled in response.
Tsui began to chant and wave his hands around. A dark colored transparent bubble appeared in front of him and began to grow quickly.
"What is that?" Himeno said as the bubble expanded faster and faster… soon encompassing Himeno and the knights.
Hayate drew his wind sword and attacked the bubble wall. As his sword came in contact with the wall there was a bright spark and Hayate was knocked back from the impact.
"Damn!" Hayate said. "It's some kind of force field!"
- o o o
The climb had taken a lot of out Sasame. He leaned against the inner layer of petals breathing heavily and a sharp, steady pain came from his shoulder wound, which had begun to bleed again from all of the movement.
"Who disturbs me?" the rose said in an angry, raspy voice.
"It talks?" Sasame said aloud in astonishment.
"Takako, are you all right in there?" Sasame called out, ignoring the rose's question.
The rose folded its inner petals back and revealed Takako. She was sitting in the middle of the rose. Pollen covered tendrils were wrapped around Takako's arms and waist and her eyes looked glazed over.
"I am the rose of darkness. Who disturbs me?" Takako said in a raspy voice, the rose using Takako as a puppet to talk.
'Oh no!' Sasame thought. "Takako, it's me, Sasame!"
"Sasame?" Takako said, her voice sounding less raspy and more like her own.
"Yeah, Takako, it's Sasame," he responded hopefully.
"No, it can't be. Sasame hates me," Takako said with a raspy, bitter voice, sounding more like the rose again.
"Takako, that's not true. Tsui's plan didn't work. I still love you."
"Get away from me!" the rose yelled through Takako. The rose quickly jolted its bloom forward causing Sasame to slide down one of the rose's petals. Just before Sasame was about to slide off, he grabbed the edge of it. Sasame struggled to climb back up, but the rose flicked its petal and caused Sasame to let go. Fortunately, with the rose half bent over, the drop was not far and Sasame was able to stay on his feet when he landed.
Sasame tried to catch his breath as tendrils grew out of the rose. After a few moments, the tendrils started flying towards him. Sasame suddenly remembered that he still had Hayate's sword, and he drew it just in time. He sliced the tendrils' ends off with one mighty swing, but it only kept them at bay for so long. One by one the tendrils kept growing back. Sasame kept slicing away at the tendrils, but he could feel that he was getting slower and weaker.
"Takako!" Sasame called out in desperation. In between his laborious swings he spoke, "Can't… you see… that I'm trying… to rescue you? I love you… Takako!"
Sasame leaned on the sword for support, his chest heaving. A tendril came towards Sasame and it grabbed his arm as he tried to swing at it, causing him to drop the sword.
"Takako… my feelings have not changed. I would still even die for you. I— aaaah!"
Several more tendrils had wrapped themselves around the rest of Sasame and began to suck his leafe.
- o o o
"Did you hear that?" Himeno called out to the other knights. "It sounded like Sasame yelling. We've got to defeat Tsui, Sasame needs our help."
"So, Sasame's not dead yet, huh? Well, he will be soon... as will you!" Tsui yelled.
Tsui started to electrify the force field, causing arcs of lightning to jump from one end to the other. The knights and Himeno started bobbing and weaving to avoid them.
'We've got to find a way out of here, Himeno," Kei said in Himeno's mind.
"I know," Himeno whispered back. "Wait, I had an idea."
After a few more arcs went flying across the bubble, one came close to Himeno.
"Owwww!" Himeno yelled as she went into the fetal position and started to cry.
"Himeno!" the other knights cried out, all flying over to her.
The knights formed a cluster around her, with Hayate at the center holding Himeno in his arms.
"Himeno, are you all right?" Hayate said worriedly.
"Yeah, I'm faking being hurt," Himeno whispered. "I've got an idea. When I give the thumbs up signal with my hand, we all attack at once."
The other knights all nodded. Another lightening arc came close to the cluster and Go blocked it grimacing at the strain it took to keep it back. "We've got to get out of here." Go said sounding tired.
"Have you had enough?" Tsui asked in a playful tone.
Himeno separated herself from the knights, going towards Tsui. "Yes! We have!" Himeno called out, her voice sounding like there were tears in it. "We give up! You're too powerful!"
"That's right. No one is as powerful as me. Maybe you're not as dumb as you all look. You can tell when you have met a master of evil like myself…" Tsui began gloating away.
Himeno nodded her head with a sad look on her face as she casually put her arm behind her back. The knights slowly came closer to Himeno, acting as if they were trying to comfort her.
"I'm so devious!" Tsui continued with delight. "I am far better than Fenryl ever was. In fact, I am so evil—"
Himeno signaled the thumbs up as Tsui talked away.
Without warning, everyone attacked full force at Tsui. He had lowered his guard as he bragged away.
Himeno and Go hit Tsui with their light and fire attacks. Shin tied Tsui up with his vines. Before, Tsui could break free of them, Mannen and Hajime hit them with their ice and water attacks.
"Aaaaah!" Tsui yelled, shocked by the changes in temperature, barely able to move being half frozen.
Hayate charged at Tsui with his wind sword and he struck him down.
Tsui's force field dissipated, and Tsui lay on the ground grumbling.
"I can't believe they did that. I'm an old fool. Letting down my guard, and using too much of my power at one time," Tsui muttered.
Himeno flew down next to Tsui. "I'll spare your life if you stop doing evil things and you let Takako go," Himeno said gently.
"Get lost!" Tsui yelled as he fired a lightning bolt right at Himeno, using the last of his energy for one more dirty deed. Tsui collapsed as Kei blocked the lightning bolt from Himeno. Kei cried out in pain, having blocked so many hits previously.
"Kei!" Himeno called out.
"I'll be… okay," Kei said warily.
Himeno and the others watched as Tsui's fallen form disintegrated into a small pile of dark ash.
"Tsui's gone. Let's unprét, Kei," Himeno said.
Himeno and Kei unpréted. Kei stood a little hunched over, catching his breath.
"Are you going to be okay?" Himeno asked him.
"Just give me a second. Then we've got to go find Sasame," Kei said.
- o o o
The rose's tendrils held Sasame tightly, draining him of his leafe. Sasame's words and cries of pain reverberated in a distant part of Takako's mind. 'I love you… I would still die for you…' She watched as Sasame grew weaker. 'Sasame…no…' Takako thought straining to bring her mind back to reality. 'Rose… stop this,' she pleaded, talking to the rose's consciousness through her own. 'He loves me,' she said with joy, 'and I love him too!'
At this declaration the rose heard in its mind, the rose had no choice but to let Takako go since she no longer was a fountain of negative emotions. The rose grew angry and confused because it no longer felt as strong. It flung Takako out of its bloom and into a nearby bush, and its tendrils retracted a little, dropping Sasame to the ground. The rose "looked" around but could not sense its master, and so its anger grew.
Takako came to her senses after a little while when the angry rose started walking around making huge indents with its root-like feet and snapping tree branches with its tendrils. Takako scanned the area for Sasame.
Sasame was sprawled out on the ground, eyes closed, breathing heavily, and he was right in the rose's path of destruction.
"Sasame!" Takako called out as the rose was getting closer to him.
Sasame's eyes snapped open, hearing Takako calling his name. He propped himself up with his one elbow and looked up to see that the rose was practically on top of him. Too tired and dazed to really move, Sasame could only watch the rose advance. 'This is it,' he thought. 'I'm sorry Takako, my love.'
'I've got to stop this thing before it tries to snap Sasame and I in half,' Takako thought frantically.
She ran towards Sasame and the rose and spotted the sword Sasame had been carrying. She quickly picked it up and charged at the rose.
"I will destroy you," Takako yelled, "and I know your weakness."
Tendrils lunged at Sasame's weak frame. Takako stepped in and cut the tendrils short and continued onward, plunging the sword through a black symbol that was etched into the rose's stem. (Tsui's spell and his mark of his craftsmanship.) The rose began to reel to and fro and then it slowly began to crumble into dark ash that was whisked away by the wind.
Takako dropped the sword and ran to Sasame. She helped him to sit up and she wrapped her arms around him in a passionate embrace.
"I love you so much Sasame," Takako said ecstatic.
Sasame weakly put his arms around Takako. "I love you too, Ta…ka…ko…" Sasame said, his voice trailing off.
Takako felt Sasame's body go limp in her arms as his head fell forward, lying on her shoulder.
"Sasame?" Takako said with panic, as the other Leafe Knights and Himeno entered the "clearing" that the rose had made.
"Sasame?" Takako repeated, her voice faltering, tears forming in her eyes. The knights and Himeno ran over to the two of them.
"Is he…?" Himeno started meekly.
Kei and Hayate knelt down next to Takako to check Sasame's vital signs while Go and Himeno kept the younger knights from crowding too close.
"He's still breathing," Hayate said, relieved.
"And his pulse is slow, but steady," Kei added.
"Thank goodness," Takako said quietly, as all the others sighed in relief.
