Hey everyone. Been a while since the last update, but I've been sick with a stomach virus. For the reviewers:

Sabriel41- Thanks for the praise. Fall of the House of Usher is a strange tale, but an interesting one. Poe was a good author, though I agree with you that he does tend to be a wee bit verbose.

Mal- Thanks for reviewing. (Reads review) Chippendale dancer?!? (breaks out laughing) Oh damn, man. That's a good one. Never thought of Yunsung quite that way before...

You'll notice in this chapter that I skip a bit of time when I switch from Siegfried/Ivy/Kilik and move to Yunsung/Talim/Mitsurugi. The quests in both Europe and Asia are happening in the same time frame, but not at the same time. Europe is going on one timeline, Asia on a different one. Hopefully, it won't get too confusing.

Time to get moving. It's now...

"SHOWTIME!"

Chapter 10

Lament of the Fallen

Mansion of the Lions, Valencia, Spain. Daylight.

Grinning like the demon whose sword had possessed him long ago, Cervantes ran forward, left arm thrown over the front of his body with it's attendant pistol sword, right hand back so that the point of his long sword jutted out just far enough to stab. His grin revealed teeth- many teeth, far too many teeth- that would have been far more at home in a shark's mouth. He said nothing, just grinned and ran. Ivy's scream, it's echoes still filtering through the house, said more than enough- maybe too much- about what this thing meant.

Completely dumbfounded by Cervantes' sudden appearance, Siegfried just stared at him, not even thinking to draw his sword. Cervantes took advantage of this opportunity to stab him, piercing his left side. Siegfried cried out, and Cervantes would have finished his life right then if Kilik had not been there. The monk's staff lashed out, cracking against Cervantes' forehead and knocking him backwards. Siegfried stumbled backwards, clutching at the wound on his side. Siegfried took a quick second to look at it, and relief soon followed the realization that it wasn't too serious. He could still fight.

Gritting his teeth against the pain, Siegfried drew his sword out. In front of him, Kilik was using his staff's long range to keep Cervantes back. The ghost pirate said nothing, didn't even grunt or yell in pain when Kilik struck at him, just kept blindly rushing forward. His grin was as wide as ever.

Looking behind him, Siegfried saw Ivy just staring mutely at the scene before her, eyes wide with terror. This was so unlike her that Siegfried stopped for a second, wondering.

" Ivy?" he asked her worriedly. Something was wrong with her, that much was obvious, but what?

Ivy stared at the combat before her, her mind not really registering what was going on in front of her. It was far too busy dealing with far darker matters.

[ And you thought he was a pirate,] part of her mind whispered, a silent, mocking part that had taken root in her mind ever since her first doubts about her real father had crossed it. [ Fool you! He's not just a pirate- he's a monster, dear girl!] Mocking laughter that bordered on tears. [ He's slaughtered more people than you can count. And you worried about him being a pirate!] More crying, weak laughter. [ What a black, bleak heritage you have found. No amount of forgiveness could grant you redemption from this! Even God Himself would turn His face away from the daughter of such a demon!]

Ivy stared ahead, into space, into time, into the Hell that surely awaited her after death.

She stared into darkness.

And saw no light.

Siegfried turned from Ivy, deciding to deal with her later. Right now, he had to help Kilik fight Cervantes. Although, part of him wondered why Cervantes wasn't talking. He'd fought Cervantes before (or, more correctly, fought Cervantes when he was Nightmare) and the pirate was fond of taunts and quips in the middle of battle. He was, really, one of the most talkative fighters Siegfried had ever met. So why wasn't he saying anything, just wearing that damn grin?

Shaking his head, Siegfried ran forward. That wasn't important at the moment. He charged forward, slowed somewhat by the wound in his side, and swung in an upward motion at Cervantes. The dead pirate had been concentrating on Kilik, and he hadn't seen Siegfried coming. Requiem cleaved his left arm in half, splitting it near the shoulder. Kilik slammed him with the Kali-Yuga at the same time, knocking Cervantes back into one of the mansion's ruined walls.

And that was when something strange happened. Cervantes seemed to... *shift*, somehow, and Siegfried thought he saw a glimpse of something that looked like a human form made of rock, with one great eyeball in the middle... But then Cervantes' form seemed to solidify, and the image was gone. Cervantes got up, still wearing that maniac's grin, lifting his long sword to face his opponents. With a jolt, Siegfried realized that the stump of Cervantes' left arm wasn't bleeding at all. Instead, it looked like a piece of silk, torn in half, ragged edges blowing in the breeze. Cervantes charged them again, long sword swept back in preparation of a blow.

Siegfried did him one better and stabbed forward with Requiem, using the immense Zweihander's length to strike Cervantes' first. The flat but sharp end of Requiem ( which effectively gave it three cutting edges, a unique trait Siegfried found useful) sliced into Cervantes' right chest. Cervantes ignored it and kept going forward, maniac grin still in place, slowly impaling himself as he tried to get closer to Siegfried. Cervantes started swinging as he got closer, and Siegfried tried to pull Requiem out before the dead pirate could come close enough, but it was no good. The bloody bastard was stuck on it.

Kilik came to his rescue, using his staff like a spear, the end going into Cervantes' left chest. It sunk in with no apparent resistance from the flesh, piercing it as easily as if it were paper. And when it had entered in a short ways, Cervantes emitted the most horrible scream Siegfried had ever heard coming out of a throat belonging to something other than a demon. It sounded like great boulders grinding against each other, earth under pressure, the sound of a fault right before a major quake. As Cervantes' screamed, a flood of dark red fluid (it was too dark to be blood; to Siegfried, it looked like liquid rust) gushed out of the hole Kilik's staff had made. The pressure behind the flow made the hole bigger, made the wound larger, and soon most of Cervantes' left chest was open and gushing. Cervantes' mouth gaped and shut, gaped and shut, like a door blowing in the breeze. His teeth, still seeming too large for his mouth, made a horrible clicking noise as they shut. His head was thrown back, staring at the ceiling, and the pirate staggered backwards, sliding slowly down Requiem's edge. Siegfried took the opportunity to move forward and plant his foot on the pirate's right side and push hard, knocking Cervantes' backwards and freeing Requiem. Cervantes' fell to the floor, and lay there, in a pool of spreading rust-blood, twitching and jerking. Siegfried put Requiem on the floor to steady himself, and glanced at his own wound. It had been slightly worsened by the combat, but not too much. If he could just get a wrap on it...

His thoughts were interrupted by the jerking form of Cervantes. The pirate's form *shifted*, became less real, seemed to separate and sink and fall apart... and where Cervantes' dying form had once lain, now a collection of rocks lay (in a roughly human shape), with one great eyeball in the middle. The strange, rust-like fluids were pouring out of a great hole above it's pupil, where Kilik's staff had pierced it. The eye pulsed, like some great and hellish heart, and finally lay still. It's pupil glazed over, blind now, and the entire thing lay still.

On a tide of rust, from inside the eye, a large fragment of the Soul Edge drifted out of the wound to lay on the floor, pulsing slowly. Kilik and Siegfried looked at each other, then at the fragment.

" What the hell?" Siegfried asked, bewildered by what had just transpired.

" What the hell indeed," Kilik said, as he stooped over and picked the fragment up. He began to turn around to talk to Siegfried, and as he turned around he saw something that made his heart stop.

" Ivy, no!"

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Town of the Wind God, somewhere south of present day Tajikistan. Two hours later.

Yunsung walked onwards, bowed slightly by the weight of the talkative, over-exuberant girl on his back. Talim rode piggy-back on Yunsung, and had not stopped talking ever since she'd recovered from her wounds a short hour ago. Part of Yunsung wondered if she ever paused for a breath. He doubted it.

At the moment, she was midway through a monologue about life in the village of the Wind God.

" I'm a priestess," she said, for the fifth time (Yunsung had counted), " and so I get a special place at a lot of the festivals. Usually me and the other priests have to perform the Dance of the Winds to secure the Wind God's blessing. We're not a real big village, but our festivals draw lots of people in. Not so many as they used too, though. Our faith's declining. I heard my elders say that they needed to attract new members. If we keep going down like this, pretty soon my village will be the only one left that worships the Wind God. That would be horrible, you know? Hey, look over there! That's it!"

She gave out a happy little laugh and pointed over his head. Yunsung looked at where she was pointing, and saw a single great windmill, vanes spinning slowly in the wind. Even from this distance it was obvious how immense it had to be.

" We'll be there in an hour. Come on, let's go!" she said, kicking him lightly with her right foot (her left leg had been hurt more seriously than they'd thought at first; that was the reason Yunsung had ended up becoming an impromptu beast of burden). " We'll throw a big celebration for you heroes! They'll slaughter a few hogs for everyone. They'll be fish and wine and..."

As Yunsung started forward again, he wondered if he was going to survive another hour of Talim's mouth.

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Town of the Wind God, somewhere south of present day Tajikistan. One hour later.

Talim stared up at the guards and yelled, " Flence! Maji! Let us in! It's me, Talim! And these are the guys who saved me!"

" Saved you?" one of them yelled down. " What do you mean?"

" I'll explain later," Talim yelled back, " just open the gate and let us in!"

The Town of the Wind God gave no indication that the faith of it's namesake was in decline. The place was huge. It's gates were great wooden things, titanic things that easily stood sixteen foot high. The guard towers set next to the wall were strange things, windmills with holes cut into their sides so the guards could keep watch. It created one of the oddest sights Yunsung had ever seen, but he guessed it was proper for a town named after the Wind God.

The great gates swung open, pulled by teams of oxen behind the wall, creaking and groaning in protest. As they swung open, Yunsung's eyes opened as well, taking in this new sight. He had lived most of his life in dojo, all of them in Korea. This had been his first journey into the world, and this new sight affected him deeply. It was also the beginning of another new companion in his mind and soul, to go alongside the just-born sense of justice now within him. This new companion, just beginning to form, not ready to be born yet, would become the basis for the rest of his life; would, in the fullness of time, evolve into a fully-formed wanderlust, into a desire to always see what was over the next horizon. To see and to dream, of new sights and fresh places.

But Yunsung did not know that at the time. All he knew was that the town below him was beautiful.

It lay inbetween and on two small hills, like a river jumping it's banks. The great gates lay at the bottom of the small valley the hill made, and it's top was just short of the hills beside it. A wall circled the village, made of wooden posts, hung with silk tapestries painted over with pictures of long ago battles and stories, and as the ever-present wind that always swirled about the town touched them, they seemed to move, as if the figures upon their cloth surfaces were alive, replaying those ancient tales of love and war, vengeance and hate. Music, played by instruments Yunsung had never heard before, drifted around the town, a cheery music that seemed to ebb and flow like humanity itself. The town's many buildings, all hung in gaudy cloths like court nobles trying their best to impress the king, all seemed to point towards the essential cheeriness of human life. All of the taller buildings seemed to end up as windmills of some kind, and some of these were quite impressive, but none matched the immense thing in the middle of the town. This colossus stood taller than the hills next to it (or anywhere else in the plains, for that matter) and soared into the sky.

It was a beautiful place. Yunsung walked forward, Talim still on his back, gazing at the myriad sights of the city. People hustled and bustled here and there, but all stopped when they saw the strange procession entering the city. Many bowed as Talim passed, revering even this youngest of Wind God priestesses. Some even bowed to her companions, not quite understanding what was going on but believing that any so blessed as to carry a Wind God priestess were worthy of veneration themselves. Yunsung felt rather nervous at all this attention. The biggest crowd he'd ever seen had consisted of two hundred people, everyone in his dojo and the surrounding town, when he'd fought ten opponents and bested them all. All these thousands of people, staring at him and bowing at him, rather unnerved him.

Mitsurugi, by contrast, felt no such nervousness. He had been the top swordsman in his unit (some said in all the army), and had participated in some enormous tournaments. He was used to being watched and respected. Up until the day he was defeated by Tanegashima, anyway...

[ Forget that,] he told himself, not wanting to get dragged into the past. [ That is unimportant now.]

But it was important. It was why he was searching for the Sword of Salvation, a quest he meant to resume as soon as this was over. So he could best even a wielder of firearms, best the greatest gunmen. Even if they wielded a rifle like Tanegashima.

Mitsurugi closed his eyes and attempted a zazen, trying to reach that state of meditative peace and enlightenment. It was usually done best when sitting, but was possible when moving. He did not acheive it, but the effort cleared his mind somewhat, and he refocused on what was going on around him. The events that had led to his leaving the army could be dealt with later.

" Head to the great windmill," Talim said to Yunsung quietly, whispering in his ear, then lifted her head and shouted to the crowd, " Everyone! These are the men who saved me! I was attacked by a giant, and they slew him! Give them your praise!"

A roar grew in the crowds, a yell of happiness and gladness, of rejoice and triumph. The sound was enough to deafen anything else Talim might have said (something Yunsung was grateful for), and the crowd parted before the three of them. As they walked down the main road towards the great windmill, people began throwing gifts and flowers in their way. Rather amazed at the attention, Yunsung dodged the various thrown pieces of gold and silver and made his way to the windmill. When he reached it, he met the nine priests already there. Four were female, one young, one old, two inbetween. With the addition of a young boy, the same pattern was apparent with the men. They all looked dignified, if a little confused.

" Dearest Talim," the old woman said, her voice carrying the practiced, smooth sound any orator (completely regardless of whether they preach religion or politics) gains after enough practice, " what has transpired here? Come inside, you and your new-found friends."

As they all walked inside, the two youngest boys shut the door. Inside, the windmill was a rather messy place, with straw placed in seemingly random positions on the floor. The gears that ran the windmill turned over their heads, emitting no noise from their greased bodies. Stairs ran up the side, leading all the way to the top, a long journey no matter how you looked at it. High above them, the second floor began. No sleeping mats were apparent anywhere; the priests apparently slept on a different floor, if in this windmill at all. The priests sat down on the hay, and it struck Yunsung belatedly that the hay piles were actually seats. The priests indicated for them to sit. Yunsung began to sit Talim down on one of the piles apparently reserved for guests, then remembered she was a priestess. He stopped, wondering what to do.

" It's all right," the old woman said. " She is being questioned, so she sits there. But why do you not do it yourself, Talim? Is something wrong with your legs?"

" My foot," she said, from her strange sitting position ( her right leg was crossed under her, but to keep her foot from hurting, it was thrust straight out). " I was out training to read the wind, as I told you I was going to do this morning. I did not bring my elbow blades.."

" We noticed that," the old woman said. " Why didn't you bring them? This area is peaceful, but that doesn't mean you are safe from all harm."

" I didn't think of it," Talim said, " and it almost cost me my life. A giant came up to me and attacked me. We fought for a little while, then he threw me and I became dazed. When my sight cleared, these two men were standing over me, and the giant was slain. They decided to accompany me home, and when I could walk no more, Yunsung, the red-haired one, carried me here." She smiled then, her bright and cheery personality leaking through (much to Yunsung's dread). " I say we celebrate them as heroes!"

The old woman smiled with relief, telling Yunsung all he needed to know about the status of their religion. The loss of one priestess, even one so young as Talim, would devastate this town.

" They are heroes indeed, and we shall celebrate accordingly." The priestess stood up and walked over to a small rope hanging from the ceiling. She pulled it, and a great bell rang out.

" This'll be great," Talim said happily to Yunsung, and even his normally cool demeanor cracked at this simply, innocent statement. He smiled and shook his head, wondering at all that had transpired these past few hours. He turned to Mitsurugi and saw that the samurai was thinking about something. His head was turned down, and his mouth was set in that line that says someone is thinking hard about something. Yunsung said nothing, but he didn't have too. Talim broke in.

" What are you thinking about, sir?" she said, leaning over to look at him.

" I'm thinking of all the food I'm going to enjoy in the next few minutes!" the samurai said, causing Talim to laugh. In truth, he had been thinking about that thrice-damned Tanegashima, and all his efforts to forget it were in vain. Maybe this feast would help.

A short distance outside town, eyes blazing with the hellish power of Mekki-Maru, Taki walked towards the town.

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