Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters of Soul Calibur; I'm only using them to have some fun.
Thanks to all of you who have reviewed!
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Well, here's chapter 7, hope the following destruction satisfies everyone's blood-thirst. Enjoy and have yourselves a happy whatever holiday you celebrate (Of course, you're doomed to an eternity in Hell if you don't celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, the only son of God… lol)
The Battle of Venice:
It was one o'clock, the day that Cervantes was scheduled to arrive according to the townspeople's calculations; they were all set on their places and ready for the battle.
"Are you ready Yunsung?" Link and Yunsung were standing next to each other on the side closest to the ocean to keep a watch for Cervantes' ship. They decided to talk so the others would feel less nervous at seeing them confident enough to chat. Link was dressed in his Goron tunic (which was more resistant than the Kokiri tunic and more effective for battle) with his Mirror Shield hanging on his back and the Great Fairy's Sword strapped safely across his left shoulder. Both of them had their bows in one hand and their quivers -full of the poisonous arrows that Link had made- on their backs, as did the rest of the archers with them.
Yunsung had his leather mail on and was wearing a mail shirt of some sort of black metal that looked as if it was simple fabric; it was originally Link's but, since the Korean needed it more for the battle that lay ahead, he let Yunsung have it for today.
"As ready as you are" he said with a smile, he and Link had patched things up during the time they had been together -having trained together for most of the time with the townspeople- and all animosity between them had been reduced to little more than a friendly rivalry to see which one of them was the best.
"Are you scared?" asked Link.
"No, actually I'm feeling quite confident" said Yunsung, his smile growing bigger.
"Well then, how about we have a little contest? Let's see who can defeat the most enemies, the only rule is that whenever you beat one you have to yell the number of enemies you have, so there won't be any cheating." said Link.
"You're going down Link" replied the Korean confidently. Then Link turned around to inspect the seas and he saw a massive ship coming, it was about the size of Maxi's ship, it was obviously Cervantes's ship, but what called Link's attention wasn't that, it was the fact that the ship was crowded with something that seemed statues of rubber, but when they got closer he saw with dread that those weren't sculptures, they were a horde of ancient demons that he knew better than he would like.
"Irch!" he spat the name with hatred.
"What?" asked Yunsung, he didn't had as good sight as Link, who was able to see more than a mile away on plain ground, but now that he was on a higher spot his view range was longer and he saw the ship even before it got close to the horizon.
"Irch! A demonic sect; they've been around in my land since the beginning of Hyrule and they've fought in the Hylian wars and I think that they have been summoned to this world before, you probably know them as the orcs (A/N: all hail and BOW DOWN TO master Tolkien! Oh great master, Lord of Fantasy and King of Literature, show us the path!)" He muttered to Yunsung trying not to be overheard by his men: the orcs weren't greatly skilled, but the sole image would make their 'soldiers' quail in fear, and the darkness of their hearts and the acts they were capable of in battle would break the people's morale.
"Crap!" yelled Yunsung "I've read about them in ancient scriptures! They may not be too strong but they're so ugly that these people will think they are some sort of high-level demon!" he replied in the same manner.
"Exactly! We still have some time: Cervantes will be here in about an hour. In the meanwhile we must let the others know so they can inform their troops and make them understand that the orcs aren't all that powerful" said Link worried.
"I'll go! About how many do you think they are?" said Yunsung nearing the ropes to go down, Link turned towards the horizon and counted.
"They're about five hundred strong, five fifty at the most! They shouldn't be a problem if we stick to the plan and we manage to keep our men from succumbing to fear!" said Link "Quick! You must let the others know, I'll tell the man in here"
"God bless that elven vision of yours!" said Yunsung, he unsheathed White Storm and passed the flat part over one of the ropes, he then grabbed the blade careful not to cut himself and slid down the rope like they were supposed to do during the battle.
"What's going on sir?" asked one of the archers to Link when he saw Yunsung leave.
"There's been a slight change on our situation, tell the others to gather in here" Link commanded.
"You know Link? We could use Ivy right now" said Yunsung with an eerie tone in his voice.
"Yeah well, it was our decision to send her to hunt down Nightmare" he replied remembering the last time he had seen her.
Flash Back
It had been three days since they had arrived at Venice. At this point all the seekers were gathered by themselves in a small building and were making plans for the fight with the Pirate
"Hey guys, when we defeat Cervantes, what about Nightmare? He would probably be miles away from us by that time" said Maxi curious.
"You're right, Maxi, what are we going to do to track him down in time? He might be too far away for Talim to sense him, and even if she manages to, it might be months before we catch up with him, in that time he might be able to restore the Soul Edge completely" said Xianghua worried.
They were thinking about it for a while until Yoshimitsu came up with an idea: "We can send one of us as a spy, he or she can pretend to want to be under his service, then, when Nightmare is sleeping, he or she can strike him down and destroy the Soul Edge, but the only problem is who."
"Well, Talim is the only one of us that can sense the Soul Edge Shards and is too young for such a dangerous mission so she stays. He would attack Kilik, Maxi, Yoshimitsu, Sophitia, Ivy and me on sight so neither of us can go" said Xianghua. "That leaves us with Raphael, Cassandra, Link and Yunsung."
"I will go" said Raphael, this was a very dangerous mission and the others were too young to die at the hands of the Azure Nightmare, besides, he noticed that the younger members of their little group were quickly all becoming good friends together with Talim and he wouldn't be able to send one of those good friends to what was probably certain death. He knew that Link was more than capable of realizing the task, but he emanated too much purity for one who would want to help the Soul Edge; there was also the fact that Talim had said Nightmare was heading towards France and he wanted to make sure his foster daughter Amy was doing okay.
"No" said Ivy "I will go" she said with a blank expression.
"But Ivy, he knows you! He knows you want to see the Soul Edge destroyed, He'll kill you right away!" said Kilik thinking Ivy had some sort of suicidal wish she hadn't told them about.
"No he won't, four years ago I came up with a similar plan and he didn't knew of my true intensions until the day you defeated him, I think I can manage to convince him otherwise, besides, I know almost exactly how to destroy the Soul Edge, which I doubt is something Raphael can say, no offense sweetie, but I've researched for years trying to find a way to do it, which makes me better qualified for the job"
"But how are you going to find him?" asked Xianghua.
"Valentine will lead me to him, just like it did last time" she said in a tone that marked the end of the discussion.
"Okay, then, when can you leave?" asked Yoshimitsu with regret and sadness, he obviously didn't approve this but accepted it because it was necessary.
"Tomorrow morning" replied Ivy sounding like one who has been condemned by her own will; she knew she probably wouldn't survive. Even if she did kill Nightmare and destroyed the sword, when the power that was contained within the sword was released it could cause an explosion of magic and energy so big that would burn her to the marrow.
The next morning she took her horse and departed.
End of Flash Back
When all the archers had gathered around Link, he started talking. "My dear friends, in the few days I've had the privilege of knowing you I've come to love you and respect you. (Sigh, pause) Just a few minutes ago, as I looked into the horizon, I saw the evil pirate's ship. But when I laid my eyes upon it I saw a terrible vision: the evil wielder of the sword has summoned demons to fight us"
Screams of alarm and desperation rise from the crowd and link tried to gain control quickly, since it wasn't really working, he decided to grab a Deku Nut and fling it to the ground. The small explosion and the blinding flash caused all of them to go silent and gave Link the chance to speak again.
"But don't worry! I have fought these demons before! They are the lesser, the weakest and the dumbest (laughs), less skilled beings that have or will ever be considered demons! They are the lesser Orcs! Those wretched beings that attack fair, defenseless women in the road, those dumb sprite-like things that lurk in the dark corridors of our mind, those things that fear light and all that is holly above all. Those same demons that are as skilled with the sword as a small child with a stick." By now, the militia had started to calm down and settle, some even grew confident that they could beat the orcs without much trouble. But Link knew that he still needed to say something quickly before the pirate arrived and the orcs had any chance to inflict any damage.
As he thought of what to say next, something rushed to his mind: the Battle of Delfalas, the battle where he led the Goron troops against the dark Ar-Mòrgûlia from the depths of the Mountain of Doom so he decided that if the speech had worked back then, it had worked when he gave the same speech to the Gerudos in the fight against the desert snakes, with the Zoras in the battle against the Octoroks, the Kokiris against the Moblins, and the Hylian/Sheikah resistance against Ganondorf's army, why wouldn't it now?
"Today, we are about to enter a battle that some of us may not survive; but remember, we have the advantage here! This is your land! You know it a thousand times better than they do! You have spent most of your life in here, is that not worth fighting for? Is that not worth dying for? As those evil beasts approach, or try to smite you down with their sword, remember that you fight for the forces of Light, for your family, for everything that is sacred to you, and remember that you fight for very existence!" the archers the exploded in a huge uproar and Link smiled and thought to himself 'Works every time. Although I've already used this speech to motivate every single army or race I've met… Mhm, it looks like I have to think of a new one for next time, which, with the path the Sisters have put me in, is probably going to be within the next six months or so.'
After that they waited in silence for Cervantes to arrive, they didn't have to wait long though, after about five minutes they saw a huge ship on the horizon looming up to them. Cervantes had arrived.
The air grew tense and everything went quiet, while on Cervantes's ship he urged his troops to another day of massacre and destruction and unleashed them into the harbor.
When everybody saw the orcs, they were terrified, but they remembered Link's words and decided to trust him in this one. They saw the orcs run wild in search of something to destroy, and quickly arrived at the alley that the seekers had prepared for them.
Inside, about one hundred yards deep inside the ally (A/N: this section of the alley had been intentionally been made so long for this part of the plan to work) there were set some dummies to lure them right in the trap. The orcs rushed inside the street and dispatched the dummies then went forward through the street to find another pray. When all the orcs where on the street Link asked Yunsung:
"Are you sure you want to go on with the contest, Yunsung?" asked Link when the orcs and the few remaining pirates started looking for new killings while at the same time giving the signal for the blockade to be set. The mechanisms were activated and a few tons of furniture fell in the entrance of the alley, effectively blocking it. The orcs quickly realized this was a trap and started to look for an exit, which was, of course, the opposite side of the alley, which was badly littered with furniture from the multiple Venetian houses to make it even harder for them to run. They would later realize, to their own horror, that the entire passage was arranged the same way.
"What? Are you scared?" asked Yunsung taunting the elf.
"No, it's just that…" and at this he aimed his bow down to the coming orcs and shot three arrows at the same time, the arrows hit one orc each and they fell dead "I'm already up 3-0" and with that he kept on shooting, Yunsung immediately reacted and started shooting with his own bow. Everyone else took Link's shot as an attack signal and started shooting.
The archers quickly followed the retreating orcs deep through the roof-tops while shooting at the best of their capacity. Finally, they got to the exterior of the city, which was little more than a clearing with some wooden houses here and there, and in the front and on both sides of the clearing, the seekers and the swordsmen awaited them forming a u-shaped line, The orcs tried to turn back, but by then, most of them had already exited the alley and the second blockade had been set up, leaving no possible way out but through the awaiting Venetians, who by then outnumbered them 2-1 counting the archers, which were descending at this moment. The orcs were utterly surrounded, with no way to go but towards the expecting enemy swords.
"Link! Aren't you coming?" yelled Yunsung before going down himself. The elf, however, didn't respond, he just drew his sword calmly in his left hand and the Long shot on the other on. Yunsung couldn't wait to see what Link was doing, so he just decided to go down and just turned around to say "Link! Hurry up!" and with that he went down one of the ropes.
Link put didn't pay attention to him and decided to go on with his personal game plan. He ran towards the edge of the building in which he was, when he reached the end of the roof he jumped off while aiming the Long Shoot towards a hut nearby and got ready.
The Long Shoot hit the hut's wooden roof when Link was about three feet from the ground and pulled him strongly without letting him touch the floor and brought him in a straight line across the battle ground and through the lines of the orcs, he extended his sword and let the strength of the Long Shoot do the job: by the time he got to the hut he had killed almost 20 orcs, then he jumped down with his sword pointing down and killed another one but they quickly started pilling up to him, he threw away the first ones with a spin attack "57!" he yelled and resumed his fighting, he could hear Yunsung saying a similar number from somewhere in the field, since they also counted the ones they had killed from the rooftops.
On the other side, the other seekers weren't having as much luck, Kilik for example, was surrounded by orcs, there was a small ring around him which was the reach of his strikes with Kali-Yuga, but the ring was getting smaller as the orcs came.
He started giving circular strikes, then, one of the orcs pushed him and he was forced to support his weight on Kali-Yuga, he then set it up perpendicular to the ground and held his staff as hard as he could, then he made a jump that left his body parallel to the ground and kicked the closest orc, supporting himself entirely on the staff, he then used the strength of the kick to push his legs towards another orc and kick him, he repeated this action several times and after a time it seemed as if he was running a circular path, using the orcs as his trail, after there were no orcs close enough to kick, he managed to push himself upwards and hand-stood on Kali-Yuga's tip, he aimed towards a group of incoming orcs and then let himself fall, his back was facing the ground, he then pushed his legs down and did a little flip, he landed strongly but softened the fall by bending his knees and canalized the full strength of the fall into his arms and brought down Kali-Yuga in a vertical strike, the only thing he remembers of that attack is the feeling of several skulls breaking under his staff and the sound of crushing bones and the screeches of pain from several orcs, then it was back to the long-ranged horizontal strikes.
Yunsung was fighting and killing every orc he met without much trouble "60,61,62…" he yelled, he was sure he will win the competition with Link, he saw another orc coming his way he ran up to it, when he was about five yards away from it, he jumped about six foot off the ground, he kicked the orc's head a few times and then, when his jump was about to end, he pushed himself down with a vertical slash from White Storm and sliced the orc cleanly in two, then another one came and he did something similar, except that this time, when he reached the orc, he stood on his shoulders and pushed himself up, when he came down concentrating all his weight on the orc's head, crushing his skull and column, then pushed himself up again and jumped over the heads of everyone, except of Kilik, who had managed to get himself in what seemed a vertical line from the ground to come down in a vertical strike with his staff.
The last thing he saw before he hit the ground was Raphael impaling three orcs that rushed him in a straight line in his rapier like a brocheta. He then did something similar to the spin attack that he had seen Link use on some occasions, landing in a circle of unfortunate orcs that had been stupid enough to come near his blade, he then stabbed another orc and yelled "Sixty-nine!" only to resume his fighting.
Xianghua, Sophitia and Cassandra had opted for fighting back to back, the alpha swords cut through the orcs's flesh and armor as if it was plain air while the omega shields blocked any attack, and sometimes even broke the orcs's scimitars as they clashed against each other, Krita-Yuga shined with a light of purity that burned the orcs whenever it touched them while Carakmaeg -which was the newly named sword Xianghua got after beating Nightmare and loosing Krita-Yuga and meant "piercing fang"- cut, impaled, and slashed everything that came within range.
Raphael stood with Maxi, while the Ryukyu pirate gave wild slashes with his nuchanks, (N/A: is this how you spell it?) and seemed to be getting good results. But not as good as Raphael though, who opted for keeping his calmed demeanor and sticking to his well-learned style rather than improvising, this led him to a beautiful and deadly dance which the orcs quickly learned to avoid, but the young Sorel master gave no rest to his enemies and showed a ruthlessness that could have helped him greatly in past times, like when he was considered too weak by his own family, who hired a group of mercenaries to kill him.
But if anyone was truly feared, it was the manji Yoshimitsu, who wore a white mask with three faces, a human face, a demon face, and a holy face together with green and blue dressings and his traditional armor (A/N: second suit), the orcs ran away from him because, due to his garments, powers, and merciless way of fighting, they thought that he was the fallen herald of the underworld -or Hellspawn- foretold to bring doom upon the armies of the unholy ones. They couldn't be more far away from truth.
After about short while, the Venetians seemed to have the upper hand, the orcs pulled back towards the city, but this proved it their destruction, the Venetians followed them quickly and the knowledge of the city and its alleys and streets gave them a great advantage, also, to avoid troubles, whenever they could, they pushed the orcs to the many rivers of the city to get them out of the way, which resulted in the drowning of many orcs due to the fact that they don't know how to swim and feared the water above mostly anything.
But then, Cervantes came, no one who stood up to him lasted more than five seconds, Soul Edge feasted on their souls and glowed with an aura of fear and darkness while the pirate threw the death ones to the water as if they were a useless cloth, where their blood flowed freely through the rivers of the fair city and tainted the air with death.
When Sophitia heard of the Pirate's coming she ran to look for him, the last time they had met, she had been able to defeat him, but she had been fighting for a long time and she didn't knew if she could beat him again, but she had to try.
"Well, well, if it's none other than Miss Sophitia Alexandra! We meet again." hissed Cervantes in an arrogant and hateful tone when he saw her.
"Cervantes! I don't know how you managed to come back from the grave, but I'll make that this time you die and stay death!" she said, hatred dripping from her every word.
"Oh, yeah? I don't think so, my child" said Cervantes, he then lifted Nirvana, (his short sword) and set the base of the hilt at the level of Sophitia's heart, she realized what he was about to do and jumped down, but it was too late, Nirvana's pistol-hilt shot a bullet which connected Sophitia in the shoulder and made her drop to her knees.
Link, who was fighting nearby, heard a loud explosion, he turned around and saw Cervantes, he was in front of a kneeling Sophitia, who was holding her shoulder, then Cervantes raised again the Nirvana, this time aiming to her brow, Link ran up to them while drawing his bow and jumped in between them.
"Step aside boy and I might spare your life!" yelled the pirate when he saw Link, he then noticed his ears and laughed "What's this? A Hylian? I guess you came from your land to stop the Soul Edge from unleashing that fool Ganondorf upon your pathetic kingdom! Well then, go back tell those idiots in your land that after I'm done here, you will be next!" he said with an amused tone and started laughing again.
"Quiet, you Spaniard scum!" Yelled Link while setting an arrow on his fairy bow "the Soul Edge serves no one but itself, Ganondorf has been as much master of it as you have been, you puppet!" he said with as much hatred in his voice as Sophitia.
"You think that your arrows can damage me? I am immortal! I'm this world's master and lord, and when I'm done with it, I'll move over to your pathetic land!" he yelled with disgust towards Link and his kind, Link only pulled the arrow and aimed at Cervantes's heart, or at least to the place where it should be. "You do think you can harm me with your little toys, boy? Well then, give me your best shot" he said at the edge of laughter while extending his arms, leaving himself open for any attack.
A confident smile appeared on Link's face and he said softly "You asked for it" he then pulled the string even more and charged it with all the holy energy he could and shot it, the mark on his hand shining like golden fire, Cervantes's eyes grew wide in fear when he felt the pure energy emanating from the arrow approach him, he knew it was too late to duck, so he tried to cover himself, but to no avail, the Arrow of Light pierced his heart and passed cleanly through his body, he fell to his knees while holding his chest.
"What kind of magic is this?" he said gasped in pain.
"That's the magic of my pathetic kingdom, Cervantes!" said Link setting another arrow on his bow, he came closer to Cervantes and aimed the arrow to his brow "And when you get there, tell those fools in hell that after I'm done here and in Hyrule, they'll be next." He reloaded his bow and pulled the string, aiming at the middle of the downed pirate's forehead, he started charging his energy on it, but then:
"WATCH OUT LINK!" yelled Sophitia and then fainted of the pain her wound was causing her, Link turned around and saw five orcs approaching him with their swords up, he took two of them down with his charged arrow and they disappeared in a flash of holy light, then he quickly drew his sword and started fighting the other three, it took him a little while but he managed to defeat them without too much trouble.
When he turned around to face the undead pirate he was gone, he ordered a nearby Venetian to take care of the Athenian and rushed to finish Cervantes off, by the time he reached the docks he was too late, Cervantes's ship was sailing away, too far for the Long Shoot to reach it and, even though it was still on his firing range, Cervantes was nowhere to be seen on the ship's deck, he probably went inside to heal his wounds.
Feeling frustrated, Link returned to where he had left Sophitia, all the orcs had been killed and the cleaning work had started, they told him that they had taken Sophitia to a nearby house, where a doctor who had stayed lived and was treating her wounds, he decided to first find the others and tell them what had happened.
The first one he found was Yunsung, when he found him, he found striking down the last orc, he was covered in both orc blood and his own, he had many scratches and bruises, but he looked triumphant, like a soldier who had won the greatest battle of his life; the demon he had taken down was face-up on the ground with Yunsung's sword on his chest while giving the last spasms before his death.
"Looks like we won't have to worry about Cervantes for a long time" he said when Link had told him what happened, he then put one foot on the hilt of his sword digging it deeper into the orc, which started to convulsion harder, then he sat down on the orc so it would stop moving, also, he was tired and felt like sitting down.
"I suppose" said Link with a triumphant smile.
"So, how many did you killed?" asked Yunsung curious. "And remember, you didn't kill Cervantes so it doesn't count"
"I killed148" said Link confident he would win, but to his surprise, Yunsung started laughing. "What's so funny?" asked Link taken aback by the Korean's laugh.
"I won! By one! I killed 149" he said joyful and kept laughing, especially after he saw the mix of surprise and anger in Link's face, but the anger then turned to happiness and he said:
"No you haven't! We've tied!" he said taking his bow and arrows and aiming towards where Yunsung was sitting.
"WHAT! If you kill me you will loose anyways! We said enemies so it won't count, and killing the opponent is cheating!" he said trying to find a way to stop Link from shooting at him.
"That's not what I was planning, Hong" And with that he shot, the arrow hit the orc in between his eye and it stopped moving, it was death. "But that makes my score 149, Yunsung!" he said with a sarcastic smile.
"WHAT! That doesn't count! Defeated it!" said Yunsung outraged.
"But I finished it" replied Link.
"But it has my sword on it!" the Korean yelled, feeling pretty pissed at the elf.
"And it has my arrow on him" countered Link confidently, the debate went like this for a few hours, even after they had found the others and when they were having dinner at the inn that night, but in the end, they agreed that it had been Link's killing and that it was a tie, although Yunsung still felt like he had been tricked and that Link had cheated.
That night there was a great feast in the city, they had been able to defend themselves from the attack and the Immortal Pirate had been greatly injured, also after the battle, some Soul Edge shards had fallen off the pirate's body, which they quickly recovered.
The next day, they departed, the Italians made a lot of gifts to the seekers, a great deal of provisions for their journey like dried fruits and salted meat, they were also given new horses, these were stronger and faster, and could carry more, they also gave Yunsung a metallic breast plate in change for his leather mail, which had been utterly ruined during the battle, and a sheath for Krita-Yuga, Xianghua's newly found sword; they were also offered many jewels and riches but they wouldn't take them, they left the city of Venice at noon and rode north-westwards, to where Ivy had headed, and where Talim said Soul Edge was.