Sarajin grabbed hold of his sword and flew at his friend at blistering speeds, shaving the dust off the ground in his wake.
Justek rallied his strange power at full force and filled the space in front of him with a wall of rifts to force his friend's path elsewhere.
Sarajin instead barreled towards the rifts in a spiral leap, dragging the beams around his body until they infused within his blade.
He then grit his teeth and slash the energy through the rifts, creating a string of bright, melting explosions.
Justek took this chance to head for the sky and scorch the ground with fire, bouncing it off his blades to infuse them with the Theorem's power.
Sarajin turned his back to them and held his sword there to split the flames around him, then jumped with a flip to reposition and dive straight at Justek.
Justek briefly summoned a miniature black hole to slow him down and then stabbed the tip of his sword into his gut.
"Even your speed cannot escape a black hole!" He declared before swinging him in an overhead arch to then fling him at the ground.
Justek followed up by launching a few regular fireballs to repeatedly bang him against the ground, then used a massive one to squeeze him down.
By that point Sarajin regained his grip on his sword and stabbed it into the fire to destroy it with light infusion.
He then sprang up with a stiffening of his wings, his aerodynamic form letting him spear Justek in the gut to disorient him.
Justek released his blades into rifts before Sarajin got any funny ideas and proceeded to clap him down before his face.
Justek smirked, then showed surprise as Sarajin used his wings to hold back his raw strength.
Justek redirected both swords on top of him and that forced him to raise his to hold them back.
The sickening sensation of the Theorem sapped Sarajin of enough strength for Justek to overpower his wings and squeeze him down.
The swords then slipped into other rifts.
Justek then dove at the ground and arched his flight upward at the last minute, smashing his friend to give him a little extra time to hold him.
He then flew backwards and pointed straight at the ground, hurtling himself in a spiraling motion to drill through miles of the planet's crust.
Once the temperature started to rise immensely he let go and slipped away to the surface through a rift, leaving behind a proximity fireball that set off a massive explosion capable of bubbling the surface from his point of view.
Justek recalled his swords and waited. First the surface settled down, then it rose back up again with a pale light forcing its way through the cracks.
Justek cut down the spear-like beams a few times then crossed his swords as Sarajin emerged in a single burst of raw speed to strike him.
Justek swung his arms out and let Sarajin wind him, for quickly recovering allowed him to pincer him on both sides with his swords.
Sarajin rose out of the way and braced himself against the backlash, then had to keep flying away regardless due to all the rifts opening up around him.
Now Justek was resorting to pure darkness to knock him out of the sky, but kept mixing in the occasional light to keep him on his toes.
The path of the rifts directed Sarajin to land on the ground and start running underneath his friend, slashing away at the beams so fast that his blade was no longer reflecting starlight.
After playing his friend's game for a while, Sarajin made a sudden swerve towards him and used his wings to shield a few of the beams while he charged his sword in the sheath.
A second later he swung a massive crescent cut straight at him that Justek split in twine with his blade, only for the halves to arc around and reform into a smaller crescent that hit him from behind.
Sarajin then jumped at him with the pressure off and Justek started moving his swords out of the way with a knowing smirk.
Then, Sarajin whipped his sword out and cut Justek across the chest, causing his cockiness to take a brief blow as pain shocked him.
Sarajin pulled back and started performing sweeping slashes of light in different directions to pin Justek down.
With the final slash, Sarajin tripled its size and rose higher, bringing the pressure down on top of Justek to drag him back towards the ground.
Justek stabbed his other sword into the light to diffuse it, making for a softer landing on his end.
He then aimed multiple rifts together to funnel constant dark energy against the light.
He then wound up his swords and slashed massive red flames that melted clean through both forces and sent Sarajin tumbling around with an ill feeling across his body.
Justek then charged through a rift to ram him across the air, slipping back and appearing behind him with his swords being swung down to make him smash into the ground like a comet.
He then stationed his body in mid-air and gestured his sword forward. Multiple rifts burnt their way into the sky, emblazoning the sky with crimson heat as meteors came barreling down from the farthest reaches of space.
Sarajin flipped out of the ravine he forged and clasped his sword in the sheath, looking up with a hint of shock on his face.
He then accelerated ahead towards each meteor, dicing them up to shreds on his way towards his friend.
But at the last meteor, Sarajin was assaulted prematurely by Justek's fire piercing through, stalling his momentum outright upon hitting his sword.
Justek opened two more rifts and funneled extra flames in from the sun to spiral around his attack and create a more piercing strike.
Sarajin managed to divert the flames towards the sky, where it blazed a trail across half the planet's sky before fizzing out in the atmosphere.
He then flew at his friend and went for a quick stab towards his swords, pulling away at the last second when he felt a black hole beginning to tug away at his sides.
He then hunched down and assessed his options, trying to swing to the left and fire consecutive light slashes into his friend's wings before making a hard swerve right and attacking from there.
Justek flinched a little and swung his sword to lashes flames through all the light, eventually swinging his whole body around to create a field of flames to hold Sarajin at bay.
Sarajin gracefully flipped over the waves and twirled forward rapidly to build up momentum for a mighty slash. Justek timed his counterswing to slip under the sword and ram him in the gut with the hilt of his blade.
Sarajin coughed and was pinned to the hilt the entire length of time Justek swung it forward to hurl him across the sky into another rift.
The momentum carried behind him, where Justek smacked him with his tail through the rift again and again.
Yet, when he stopped to swing his sword right down on top of him, Sarajin's form eased into the shape of a bolt of light and pierced through the center of the sword, delivering a light cut across his friend's gut.
Sarajin stopped to catch his breath and ease his racing heart, then twirled around and pulled away from a sword slash.
Justek advanced with rapid sword swings, filling the air with the cursed flames to cage him inside, then bouncing a fire blast between the crossed blades to hit him harder.
Sarajin felt sick to his stomach but held onto his integrity with a firm grit of his teeth, stalling in mid-air and managing to draw his sword in time to cut down another fire blast.
He then dashed to the right and left repeatedly to try and throw Justek off, until settling on diving under and around to the back of him in the blink of an eye to attack the tail.
But not with his sword, no. He grabbed onto it and using all his might, threw his friend overhead and straight into the ground.
Justek crashed into the ground with a jolly laugh towards the vulnerability he now found himself in.
He then tucked his swords away into rifts and attacked with fire blasts from his mouth, rapidly dropping Sarajin's downward momentum to the point he could catch him out of the air with his claw.
He stood and pile drove him into the ground, then filled the hole with fire that crested the back of his hand.
Sarajin expended some light to burst free from his hand and then proceeded to rise up and start pummeling him across the face with a series of starlit punches.
All for the sake of forcing him to draw his swords back out of hiding.
And when he did, he immediately jumped for his sword and pulled back with a large swing to strike at them both.
Yet again, Justek had his rifts ready to intercept the slash, then withdrew them to pincer his friend between the swords.
Sarajin flew over and was starting to wonder how this kept happening. Justek was smart, but his senses were borderline omniscient in this fight.
Justek looked at his friend's sharpening gaze and smirked over the knowledge that he was piecing the obvious together, and how that would change the battle moving forward.
Sarajin narrowed his eyes and dove to the ground, immediately dropping low and trying to sweep Justek off his feet with a kick.
When he jumped over it he pushed himself forward and rose to an uppercut slash to his chest, then pulled away and followed through with a series of light slices.
Justek guarded them with one of his swords then gave it a twirl, sending a fire circle out to make him hesitate to come closer.
Sarajin rose over the ring and fired a few slices down to draw out his sword again, but this time, summoned a series of white rifts to fire down a rain of piercing light arrows.
A few punctured through Justek's wings and pinned his feet down, yet he powered through this and made them shatter upon his rising frame.
He pursued his friend through the skies, exchanging projectiles that matched in strength for a while.
From the distance, people would see a series of red and white explosions going off in various locations until the two figures slammed into the ground parallel to each other and slid many feet away.
Sarajin locked his sword in his sheath and Justek swung down with both his. Sarajin's eyes widened and he whipped his sword out with his might, only for Justek to open a series of rifts that intercept the tip of his blades and extended their range to crash down on top of his friend.
Sarajin was quick enough to pull out and use one of his wings to shield against the debris.
A massive fireball came barreling into his wing, slamming it against his face and burning off a multitude of feathers in the process.
Sarajin pulled the wing off right as he slashed upward, redirecting the fireball's halves around him.
Justek opened two rifts to make the halves reconnect and strike him from behind.
And as he was staggered, Sarajin was punted in the gut by his friend's rampage, piercing all the way up to the stratosphere.
Justek swung his swords into Sarajin's back through his rift to send him hurtling back to the surface, then lunged up to intercept him in his claw and swing him around, battering him through a string of meteors brought in from other rifts.
He then let him go towards the surface, ending this assault with an impressive fireball combined with two slashes of his swords.
Sarajin snagged himself in place mid-air by spreading his wings and though a little off-balance, he caught his sword out of the sheath and slashed the attack in half.
He was beginning to sweat and take deeper breaths. His eyes never stopped focusing on the path to his friend's heart.
No matter how far the bridge stretched, he had the ability to cross it.
He dipped his hand into his pockets and tried to reach for the Gaia Temporis, only to have it slip out of the reach of his fingertips through a rift.
Justek descended before him with the stone held between his taunting grin.
It was a trap, but not for who you'd expect.
Sarajin deliberately went for his trump card because it confirmed what he was suspecting throughout the fight.
"You can see the future too." He whispered.
For the time-controlling relic had NEVER been revealed to Justek before now.
"...Clever move." Justek spat the stone out and Sarajin caught it calmly. The two put distance between them and Sarajin sheathed his sword while Justek chuckled.
"What will you do now, old friend? If you wish to achieve the future you want, you must snatch it from the labyrinth of infinite possibilities at my command."
"Nothing's changed…" Sarajin asserted with a smile, almost delighted to have this challenge, "I'll cut through every obstacle in my path to reach the truth."
"So you will…" Justek raised his swords to the sky and created a dozen rifts bursting to release cascades of crimson energy, "Then come!"
A rainfall of massive beams soon followed, forcing Sarajin to charge between them and unfortunately, ignore the damage to the surface behind him.
He needed to find the smallest opening he could and snatch the Gaia Temporis from his pocket. If he could stop time, then he'd finally be able to reach Justek's true feelings.
After this initial rain of beams, Justek launched a rain of speeding meteors after him, filling the skies to the point Sarajin had to stop and cut them down before they collided with the planet.
Justek continued to lift himself higher and higher, utilizing all the various rifts at his disposal to force Sarajin in whatever direction he wanted.
Though Sarajin's reflexes did hold up under pressure.
He drew his sword out in a flash, and from this cut emerged a series of glimmering explosions that consumed the meteors in his way.
He then shot straight through and belted Justek below the neck.
Afterwards he rose and slashed straight down atop Justek's head, yet the dragon's skull proved unbendable and he rammed it against the godly metal to knock it out of his friend's grasp.
Sarajin repelled away with a barrage of light blasts from his palms and then raised his hand to catch the falling sword, swinging it to block his friend's charge.
Justek rammed his skull in and flung Sarajin higher into the air, suspending him in place with a circular bombardment of small meteors.
He then rose like a rocket and rammed Sarajin again from below, dragging him into the stratosphere.
After which he opened his mouth and struck him point-blank with a cone of fire that burned so long it changed colors.
Yet such efforts left him gasping with a hint of exhaustion.
Sarajin was stuck in the sharp descent back towards the planet with his body burning off the smoke from the marks on his skin.
He calmed himself down long enough to grab his sword in both hands and then stall his descent with his wings.
He then flung himself straight at his friend and the air warped around his body.
Justek sharpened his gaze and took a swing, only to wind up hitting a bright afterimage, with Sarajin reappearing behind him and swinging a massive crescent wave into his back.
Justek's pupils shrank and he flipped around to cut through the crescent, but then Sarajin just hit him with a second one, then a third, and finally a fourth.
All together, they rapidly drove the dragon towards the surface and left him at a loss for words.
These attacks were starting to feel stronger and faster over the course of the battle, despite all the exhaustion plaguing Sarajin at the moment.
Was this merely a product of his resolve…or something else?
Yet he was not the only beast driven by resolve in this battle. With great effort on his part, Justek stabbed both his blades into the light and ripped it apart, just in time to steady his landing on the ground.
He then ducked to avoid Sarajin's next attack and swung his tail up for him to slam him, proceeding to whip his body around and blow him away.
He followed through with a flame blast, and Sarajin sharply spun his body back and hit the fire with the blunt edge of his sword.
He let himself fall to the ground and then dug his heels in, eventually throwing the fire into the sky where it exploded.
He swung down quickly to send light blazing in a towering wave. Justek caught the energy in his rift and redirected it towards his friend while stampeding forward, carving the ground on the tips of his swords.
Sarajin caught the light to ignite his blade then jumped and twirled, trying to meet his friend's blades as they swung hard through the air, only to be intercepted by a rift every chance he had.
The two of them clashed, splashing their energies across the ground to differing effects. Sarajin suspended himself and hovered clockwise, continuing to swing away for the opening he needed.
Waves of flames flew off Justek's blades and continued to weaken his friend's best efforts, and Sarajin eventually leaped away to recover.
He tucked his sword deep into the sheath and pulled upon the light from the stars to give his blade strength.
When his friend came flying after him, Sarajin stabbed his sword forward in an immeasurably quick span of time and then tucked it back in.
A field of white slashes consumed the space Justek was running inside of, repeatedly shaving off his scales and making him bleed.
Yet with a smirk and an equally confident roar, Justek shattered through the energy and continued running ahead as though he hadn't lost a drop of vigor.
He swung his sword down on top of Sarajin and then jerked his body in an unnatural manner to swing upward to hit him from below when he dodged out of the way.
Justek then stalled entirely and gasped for air, forced to resort to his rifts to continue the assault.
After catching his breath he scorched the air with fire in a sweeping motion, using rifts to bounce around the path of the flames until Sarajin was trapped in a tight weave.
Justek then created a black hole, swallowing the fire and dragging his friend down, where dispelling the black hole let him catch him in his claw.
Where he then slammed him into the dirt a few times, blasted him with fire, then sent him hurtling miles across the ground.
Sarajin dug his elbows in to force the stop with a heavy grunt.
His heart jumped when Justek did so across this large distance.
He realized too late he lost his sword to fight back, and thus shielded himself with a tight wrap of light.
It took all the brunt of the impact and shattered, rocking deep inside his body.
With the shambles of light motes, Sarajin created an arrow and launched it while calling his sword back with the other.
Justek bounced, cut the arrow, then slammed his feet down on top of his chest.
Sarajin's bones crunched and he let out a pained grunt.
Justek then hopped out and blasted the crater with fire.
Sarajin quickly rose and cut into the fire with his sword, pushing him far out of the crater and tearing into his heels.
Justek then crossed his swords to infuse his flames with the Theorem.
Sarajin leaned in further with his sword and was fighting an uphill battle.
The energies burned through his body and stamina.
But the swords were out in the open.
Driven by a last second urge, he swung his hand down towards his pocket, letting the flames wash over him.
Justek widened his eyes and tried to secure the stone with a rift, only for the stone to wiggled up into Sarajin's touch.
Time stopped and now washed over with relief, Sarajin leaped back and aimed his finger at the center of Justek's blades.
A shorter pink silhouette with floating twin tails stood parallel to him and mirrored his gesture.
Sarajin then fought through the pain roaring through his head to grab his sword and charge ahead.
Light emerged from his blade to form a wing and he dragged himself through the fire with a roar.
The pink silhouette diffused around his body like a spiral as he swung out with a quick and weightless slash, curving his path away from his friend at the last step.
He hunched over as time resumed, white and pink energies backlashing out of the center of Justek's blades and forming into twelve clockwise arrows that fired into the blades again.
Each hit deepened the cracks until the final one speared through the blades and his chest and made the swords shatter apart.
Sarajin froze, his heart stirring with conflicted emotions.
Justek staggered back with lumbering weight to every step.
They both turned to look at each other, holding their heads up high under the starlight as a silent wind blew across their feet.
Justek smirked, and kept his weary claws clenched in determination, "Now you've seen the truth."
"I…will never stop. Not until I've seen my path through to the end."
"There's no deeper meaning behind my actions. Just pure hate…and the drive to kill."
He took one thunderous step forward, which drowned the cracking of his bones.
"I am everything you despise. I have become violence, endless and empty."
Another step was taken, and Sarajin continued looking at him the same way. His thoughts were enigmatic.
"I have already killed Aurians to make Borealis bleed…and I will kill more."
With his shadow towering over his friend, Justek's knees weakened and he fell onto one hand with a gasp.
He then forced himself back up with a tired growl, "This must end…one way…or another."
Gravity pulled him down on both claws and knees and his draconic features were slowly being forced back into his flesh.
He showed outstanding mental resistance, but soon found himself the feeble, wrinkled man who could not enforce change.
And at that moment, Sarajin pointed his sword at his shoulder, seemingly staring at him with fierce hate.
Justek shivered, then closed his eyes with a smile, "But I suppose…if it had to. I'd rather it be by your hands…"
A weightless swing was taken, and a chill went down Justek's spine.
When he looked up he saw that boy he first met all those years ago, extending his hand to a boy who thought he knew better than everyone…
One blink, and Justek saw that man extending his hand towards him with a smile.
"I choose a different path." He said without a hint of disdain in his voice.
Justek sat up and his eyes trembled. With a forced chuckle, he remarked. "Do you not understand what I've done?"
"You didn't kill any of those Aurians," Sarajin asserted with confidence, "Right now I can feel them across the planet. You used your rifts to displace them, right?"
Justek hung his head slightly, "Heh…even Borealis fell for that trick…"
"So what? This does not change my feelings, nor the offenses committed against me."
"Peace cannot be achieved while the Ten Sages stand. And if you let me live, I will simply try to kill them again."
"Then I'll stop you again," Sarajin said. "Because I made a promise to a friend long ago."
Justek choked up inside, his laughter strained and pitiful. He squeezed his hands on his knees and muttered, "You really are an idealistic fool…"
"So what does that make me…for…"
Sarajin raised his brows curiously.
Justek smiled at him with tears rolling down his cheeks, "It hurts to want something…yet be unable to have it."
"But…" he started to pull his hand up, "If I can at least still have this moment…to call you my friend, the pain only feels bittersweet."
Sarajin smiled back, "I don't know what we'll do next. But…we'll figure that out when we get there."
Before their fingertips touched, Justek was forced stiff by crystal golden chains around every limb of his body.
In the silence of this moment Sarajin looked up to find Yen Sid floating in the air with a holy sword made of two bladed keys pointing at Justek.
"Wait…WHY?!" Sarajin cried out.
Yen Sid closed his heavy eyes and turned away, disappearing with Justek into a sea of starlit magic.
Sarajin dove at his friend but failed to reach him.
And in the dust left in his wake, he punched the ground, crushed by the confusion of despair…
Chapter -6: …I Found Your Smile
Next Time: Paid Forward