Author's Note: Trigger warning - there is a brief scene of torture, so if you're remotely squeamish, you might want to skip over that part.
XXXXX
When the Earthrealm Champions passed through the gates at Phlegethon, they emerged into the furnace of Netherrealm proper. Here, the dark earth was a blasted badland, lit only by the distant but towering bonfires and rivers of magma glowing orange between the cracked surface. Even still, no lava oozed through them. In spite of the persistent idea that Hell was burrowed deep beneath the earth, this place lacked hanging stalactites from a low ceiling. Indeed, there was an open sky, though it was veiled and clouded, and only a ghastly, distant moon peeked through in spots. The air, they quickly realized, was choked with ash and soot, but also a thick miasma reminiscent of brimstone and roasting flesh hung around them.
None of these features, however, could compare to the most predominant distinction, utterly incalculable by the physical senses but downright torturous on a spiritual level. The heat here was suffocating. It was strangely oily, as if someone had been burning tallow in an indescribable quantity, and the residue of it hung in the air like a grotesque fog. It left a sticky sheen on the skin that was most assuredly not sweat, and a memory of pain in the deepest recesses of the mind. All of the Earthrealmers save for Bi-han, who was used to the harsh and nearly toxic atmosphere, coughed often.
Hellfire.
Kailyn walked beside Tomas, apparently trying to keep watch in every direction at once. "This is a vile place," she finally grimaced after a half an hour, prompting Tomas to hold her hand and squeeze it to reassure her.
"This is the least of what the Netherrealm offers," Bi-han told her. He lifted a slightly melting kori sword before him, pointing, and all of their eyes followed it to the dark palace in the distance.
"I'm surprised those assholes haven't sent out the welcoming committee," Sonya now remarked. She, along with her daughter's special squadron, walked right behind him.
"I'm not," he said as he glanced over his shoulder and looked at her. "They want to keep their power consolidated closer to the castle. Lure us in deeper so that retreat becomes less and less a viable option."
"What if they're not attacking because they're going to listen to what we have to say?" Takeda hopefully asked.
"Don't be naive," he barked.
"Don't be rude," Cassie now snapped.
"If I am rude, Sergeant, it is because your ignorance of such matters is astonishing," he replied. "The four of you do not belong here. Your inexperience and lack of knowledge will only get people killed."
Sonya now bristled in annoyance. "These four have earned the right to be here."
"By whose measuring stick?" he chided.
"Mine," she growled.
He bitterly chuffed at that. "They might be ready for threats that happen inside of Earthrealm," he began. "But this is the Netherrealm. I can assure you that they - or you - have not been tested here."
"I proved myself more than capable a long time ago," she hissed.
"Must be strange for you to be back home," Stryker now said to him in an obvious effort to diffuse the brewing argument. Then he looked at Tomas. "For you too."
While Bi-han preferred not to dignify that with a response, the cyber-ninja defensively replied, "I don't remember this place at all. And it is not my home."
The Cryomancer sensed through their old psychic connection that his long-time friend was lying. Somewhat. It was true that Tomas didn't remember Netherrealm from his own memories. However, the Enenra inside of his soul felt anxiety returning here after fighting so hard to escape. Strange memories flashed through the cyber-ninja's head, memories that were his but weren't, and all of them were driving him to distraction. Bi-han silently willed him to focus on the mission at hand and quiet the noise in his mind. Then he looked over his shoulder at him and saw him give him a subtle nod of understanding.
He understood, though. From the moment they set foot in the Netherrealm, Noob Saibot was also anxious, though his anxiety was not fear, but rather...relief...relief at being home at last. And that joy started to overwhelm him until the line between Bi-han and Noob became blurry like watercolor bleeding through paper. The Cryomancer began to feel he could kill with none of the inhibitions that had held him back these last fifteen years, absolutely murder everyone around him with wild abandon, and worse, he knew that he'd like it. He knew that his shadow growing in power and homicidal delight should scare him, but it didn't. It excited him. He imagined himself hiding deep within Plato's cave, watching the shadows and aching in his soul to hunt what cast them.
Can you feel the ties that bind us? Noob whispered through his head with a sinister coldness. Can you feel them tightening? I can, Bi-han, because I am growing strong once more. Set me free.
He winced and tried to shove the wraith's voice away, but it was far too loud and he began to slip. Noob Saibot was just too strong.
And then...Tomas' voice whispered back to him. Be strong, Bi-han. You were always the strongest of us. Don't let Noob Saibot win.
Startled, he glanced at his friend, who wistfully smiled at him and rested his hand on his shoulder as they walked. No words uttered aloud passed between them, yet inwardly, he heard the Enenra encourage him and reassure him until at last, Tomas' was the only voice he heard and Noob had gone silent once more.
"Bi-han," Raiden quietly spoke so as the others couldn't hear him, "I sense much turmoil in you. Returning to Netherrealm has opened many old scars. I should not have allowed you to come here."
"I do not recall asking for your permission, Thunder God," he replied.
Raiden shook his head in disgust. "Blasphemy runs strong in your family," he drily remarked. "Your brother is as equally contemptuous as you are."
The thought of his brother annoying the gods amused the Cryomancer, and he softly chuckled and allowed himself a small smile. "It is for my brother that I am here," he reminded him.
"Even if it costs you your soul?" he challenged.
"Always," the other said. "Would you not do the same for your brother?"
Now Raiden smiled and nodded. "On that, we agree," he replied. And then, after a moment walking in silence, he said, "You annoy Fujin, Bi-han."
"He needs to get over it," he said as he rolled his eyes. "Our battle in his Temple was a very long time ago."
"He does not like to lose."
"But he's just so good at it," he replied. Then he laughed at his own joke and lifted his eyebrow in amusement at the Thunder God, who did not share in it.
"He felt sorry for you," the other argued.
"Yes, I'm sure that was it," he sarcastically agreed.
More silence followed, and then a new figure stepped from behind a large stone jutting from the ground to the side of the path. He knew the woman. She used to follow him around after he showed her mercy in battle years ago, before he died and became Noob Saibot. She instantly fell in love with him then, and it had been one of those deep, tragic loves that made her so sad and so happy that she chained herself to his fate from that moment on. And he, in his loneliness and weariness of the world and his half-life, had let her. When he'd fallen to shadow on Shang Tsung's island at the hands of Scorpion, this woman threw herself onto his body and held his hand as he faded from the light, even though Quan Chi later dragged her back to the fifth circle of Hell and let the Furies take turns torturing her. And even still, her love for him never waned.
"Sareena," he breathed. He stepped forward to greet her, leaving everyone to stop behind him. "What are you doing here?" he asked her.
She sadly smiled. "I could ask you that same question," she replied before she stood on her tip-toes to reach him and planted a gentle kiss on the corner of his mouth. When she pulled away, he noted that she was prepared for war with a belt loaded with throwing knives and her dragon-tooth sword strapped to her back. Thick braces shielded her forearms, wrists, and knees.
He inhaled deeply. "You're bringing us a message," he deduced.
She nodded and then tucked her streak of white hair behind her ear with her pinky finger. "Reiko's here, and he's made nice with Ma and Pa Kettle," she reported. "They've agreed to give him Netherrealm's kamidogu and join forces with him to destroy the Earthrealmers who pursue him. So they've instructed me to warn you to turn back because they view you as trespassers. I'd take them up on their offer, Baby. Your mission to sway them to help you is a bust. Fighting them now is only going to get everyone here killed."
Bi-han shook his head. "I can't turn back, Sareena," he told her. "Reiko has Kuai Liang."
She winced. "I know," she murmured. "I saw him. His soul is gone. He is completely under Reiko's control."
"You don't believe that," he countered.
"I don't?" she challenged as she raised her eyebrow.
"No, you don't," he insisted. "And neither do I. I'm coming through Netherrealm to get him, and I don't particularly care what your masters think about it."
She swallowed hard and took a step forward. They were only inches from each other now, and tenderly, she wrapped her fingers around his. "Please, Bi-han," she whispered, her eyes unexpectedly filling with fear. "Don't do this. Leave this place before Reiko takes you too. Or worse, before Emperor Liu Kang and Empress Kitana remake you into Noob Saibot."
"You know I can't do that," he told her in all sincerity, though his heart skipped a beat at the mention of the wraith. Inside, the demon cruelly laughed at his growing fear.
"But you escaped," she reminded him. "You broke free. Why would you deliberately put yourself in a position to become a slave again? Bi-han, I-"
"You have seen me do more than a few impossible things," he replied as he lifted her hands up and pressed them to his heart. "Have faith in me."
She looked down sadly. "I do have faith in you, Bi-han," she admitted. "I have more faith in you than in anyone."
"So what's the problem?" he asked her.
She looked into his eyes with her rich brown ones then. "The problem is that I was sent to stop you, Baby," she replied as she took a step back and signaled with a flourish of her arm. Immediately, hundreds of Netherrealm warriors and oni stepped to the edge of either ridge above the Earthrealmers and attacked.
Without warning, the demoness produced a fiery purple skull in her palms and loosed it at Bi-han, and it crashed into him in a deafening, fiery explosion. He felt the heat of the blast sear his face as the shockwave carried him into the air and dropped him several feet away. He fell onto his back and gasped for air when the wind was knocked from his lungs, then he clawed at his chest in a futile attempt to pull in oxygen that didn't want to come. A shrill whine filled his ears as he struggled. God, he must be getting old, he admonished himself. How had he not seen that coming? Finally able to breathe again after a painfully long moment, he groaned as he made himself roll onto his tummy.
"Forgive me, my love, for hurting you," Sareena then spoke. "But you have your mission, and I have mine."
"Some mission," he grimaced. "I thought you were done serving masters who care nothing for you."
She shook her head. "It is not for them that I do this," she told him. "It's for you."
"I must save Kuai Liang," he insisted as he pushed himself to his feet.
"Someday, I pray that you'll love me as much as you love your brother, and that you'll care about me enough to rescue me from this place too," she shot back, and now he saw that she was softly crying.
"Then call off your dogs, Sareena," he barked at her. "Stand down. Join us. I will take you with me. Today. I promise."
The demoness bitterly scoffed. "How can you promise me that when I can already see Noob Saibot taking over your soul once more?"
Promptly, she charged towards the Cryomancer, giving him the opportunity to jump-kick her in the chest with both feet before springing backwards onto his hands like a gymnast. He then formed a kori knife in each hand and then threw both at her, crouching into his usual fighting stance as one plunged into her chest and the other into her shoulder. Sareena screeched loudly as she staggered to the side, and somewhere deep inside of him, Noob laughed at her pain in a chorus of ungodly voices. He was rapidly growing strong again, and Bi-han could no longer keep him contained. Not here in Netherrealm.
"You're pathetic," the demon wraith jeered at her as she slowly yanked the knives out. Black blood stained it.
"How quickly you proved my point, Bi-han," she winced as she threw the blade from her shoulder to the ground and then stomped it, crushing it.
The Cryomancer dropped to a knee and wrapped his arms around his own gut, his eyes squeezed shut as he inwardly fought to wrestle back control from Noob. "Sareena," he grunted in his normal voice. "Help." His hands drifted to his temples and hair curled through his clenched fingers as if the motion could will the demon back to the void.
"Don't worry, Baby. I'm going to save you. I'm going to beat that devil from your heart once and for all," she pitilessly replied.
At least five feet short of him, the demoness suddenly leapt into the air and tackled Bi-han, smashing him into the ground so hard that the other didn't even fight at first when she started beating in his face. Blood quickly smeared around his cheeks, dribbling from his nose and a new cut ripping through his forehead. It was a small wound, all things considered, but it wept like a stuck pig. She recovered from the crash-landing before he did, and she quickly kneed him in the face and knocked him onto his back. More blood spilled from his face, this time from his mouth. She stood over him to continue her attack on him.
But the Cryomancer had other ideas. He finally blocked a shot and then drove his palm into the underside of her chin when she leaned down to grab him, deftly knocking her off his body. Then he swung his kori sword at her head, and she barely leaned back in time before her lover decapitated her. Sareena rolled backwards until she found herself on her knees again, and then crouching, her hands began to glow orange with fiery power and she launched into his gut with her fist leading. With a startled cry, he flew backwards and crashed hard on his butt.
"It's too late for me, Baby, but Raiden freed you," she said as he kipped up. "I'm not letting you come back here, do you hear me?"
Before Bi-han could reply, she lunged at him with an inhuman scream. The Cryomancer stood ready to deflect the blow, but Noob beat him to the punch. Calmly, he flicked his arm as if conducting a symphony, and Saibot obeyed the gesture, blocking the demoness' attacks. For a moment, the wraith gracefully skirted around her, dodging and deflecting her attacks, circling her and keeping her on the defensive while Bi-han recovered his footing.
Somehow, she danced past Saibot and attacked the Cryomancer with yet another flaming purple skull lobbed right at his middle. As if anticipating the move, Bi-han, whose powers were now waffling between ice and death, leapt to the side before back-flipping into a tarry portal behind him, easily avoiding her flaming skull. A split-second later, he reappeared behind Sareena and caught her off-guard as he threw a left, right, and left punch all in a row before she finally leaned back and avoided the next blow. Undeterred, he threw yet another punch, but this time the demoness deflected the hit and slammed her own fist into her lover's face.
Bi-han groaned but she quickly followed with a hard punch to his gut. Suffocating pain swelled from his belly, and he crumpled slightly as she took advantage of the opportunity, grabbed him by the shoulders, and threw him against the rock wall that the oni had attacked from. Loose rocks fell over his shoulders and some pinged his head, but he was not terribly wounded by any of them. Sareena charged at him while he was momentarily stunned, but he rose up and scooped her over his shoulder, dashing with her until he shoved her into the opposite wall.
This time, he threw his arm out at the demoness, hoping to freeze her to unconsciousness. But as if it were a tangible thing with a mind of its own, Saibot bolted from his body instead and ran like a freight train at her. It caught her around her waist, easily lifted her up, and drove her into a jagged boulder nearby as hard as it could. Bi-han heard her bones crunch loudly as the shadow faded back into oblivion, and she moaned in pain as she slid to the ground, clutching her side.
"You cannot kill what is already dead," Noob's husky voice told her as he stood above her, cruelly looking down upon her.
"But you're not dead anymore, are you Bi-han?" she gasped and struggled to get to her feet. "Raiden pulled you back and gave you life again." When she finally stood again, she hunched over the rock, clearly in agony. "You beat Noob Saibot once, Baby. I know you can do it again."
The wraith seemed to think her remark terribly funny, and burst out in sinister laughter. "I am Noob Saibot," he said in his legion of ghastly voices. "Bi-han is nothing without me."
"Bi-han is your better," she retorted.
Enraged, he charged her once more, but this time she caught him by the neck and shoved him backwards with an angry open-palmed blow to the face. It did little but annoy him. Quickly, he grabbed the demoness and kneed her in the gut with all the force his leg could muster, knocking her onto her back where she writhed in pain. Tears, he saw, even streaked down her face. Something strange flexed inside of him, then. Something like guilt.
But Noob bitterly shoved it away.
Fiercely, he lobbed a blue-black ball of energy at her, fully expecting it to freeze her into a block of ice. But he had been wrong. It wreaked more havoc on her body instead, and she was helpless and paralyzed as she began to scream in agony. The relentless wraith then grabbed her by the shoulders, and suddenly, he was dragging her through tarry darkness, like they were falling through molasses. She flailed around futilely in his arms, frantically trying to hit him or break free, but failing. They fell for what felt like forever through the black, sticky goop before finally emerging back on the battlefield, crashing head-first into the scorched dirt. Sareena struggled to stand, but she was promptly punched again, and she fell once more.
As Bi-han produced a kori sword and held it to destroy her, he saw her whimpering on the ground in pain and fear, and something then fractured inside of him. And worse, he quickly realized, it had fractured so completely that he knew there would never be any hope of repairing it. His anger instantly vanished, and it dragged Noob Saibot back to that oily pit lodged in his heart without a second thought. And when it was gone, he collapsed to his knees and gathered Sareena in his arms.
"Oh, God, Sareena, what did I do?" he demanded to know, his stomach churning with guilt to see the pain he'd inflicted on her. He buried his face in her hair and began rocking her, all while begging for her forgiveness.
"Retreat!" he heard another female's voice cry out, and when he glanced over his shoulder, he saw Kia and Jataaka motioning for their militia to fall back. The Earthrealm Champions, he saw, had won the skirmish.
"Please just leave, Bi-han," she wept when he returned his attention to her. "Don't let him destroy you. Please, Baby." She winced and closed her eyes as Kia jogged to him with her boomerang blades poised to throw at him.
"Get away from her, damn you!" she yelled.
Immediately, Bi-han laid Sareena on the ground and backed away slowly with his hands in the air to show Kia that he meant no harm. He'd already done enough of harming innocent people today. He swallowed a ball of thorns growing in his throat. If guilt caused heartache, the Cryomancer decided, then he'd definitely experienced it. Seeing Sareena hunched over and crying for probably the first time in her really long life made him feel like the worst person in the world, even worse than Noob Saibot. With her tear-streaked face in her hands, she looked so fragile, so vulnerable, so...human. But when Kia curled her hand around her commander's arm, the demoness rose to her feet proudly, even as she pressed her hand to her side once again.
"There is no reason to come any further into Netherrealm," she strained to say as Raiden and the others now joined the Cryomancer. "Turn away before you are all destroyed." And with that, she limped away through a portal Kia had conjured, leaving Bi-han to loathe himself more than he already did.
"Bi-han…" Tomas' voice trailed off as he went to his side and gripped his shoulder, but the Cryomancer just angrily shrugged it off.
"What did you do?" Raiden sternly asked him, and all the other Champions' eyes were on the two of them.
"I did what I had to," he curtly replied.
The Thunder God bit his lip and furiously shook his head. "I told you what would happen if you ever-"
"I am not in the mood for a lecture," he hissed. "What's done is done. I'm managing."
Barely, he heard Tomas' voice in his head. Angrily, he whipped his head around to look at his friend. They cyber-ninja merely frowned and shrugged.
"And how soon before you fall back to the shadow completely and turn against us?" Raiden demanded to know.
Bi-han swiveled his head back to him with a scowl. "I told you, I'm managing."
"Then why would you do what you did to the only woman you've ever loved?" Tomas asked aloud.
The Cryomancer glared at him. "I don't love her-"
"Oh, who are you trying to fool?" he replied before he pointed to his temple, reminding him of their connection.
He glowered at the cyber-ninja. "She attacked me and I hadn't expected Noob to take control like that," he told them all, though he looked straight at Tomas. "Now that I know that he's going to try, I will be ready for him. So this conversation is over."
"Then we should discuss what our next course of action is going to be," the young Shaolin monk named Kung Jin said. "Raiden, it'd be foolish to continue on further if Reiko has already joined forces with Netherrealm."
"I believe that was a clever feint to trick us into leaving," Raiden replied. "I do not believe they were telling us the truth."
"Is that what you think?" Bi-han bitterly scoffed. He shook his head angrily.
"Oh, is the Big Bad Wolf afraid of some demons?" Cassie chided him, prompting him to whirl around and stalk towards her. Immediately, Jin, Takeda, Sonya, and Jacqui protectively surrounded her, none of whom deterred him.
"Your mother should probably take this moment to remind you that the Netherrealm demons are afraid of me," he snarled. "And I would remind you that I'm here to save my brother, with or without you. I'm staying, regardless of whether the rest of you run away. But I absolutely believe Sareena."
"Dude, I know she's your girlfriend, but she's a demon," the Sergeant argued.
"Yeah," Jacqui now threw in, saying, "and what if you're not yourself right now? What if you're Noob Saibot just stringing us along so that we'll leave and your asshole bosses can conquer all of us without any resistance?"
Bi-han scoffed at that. "I'm going to find my brother. I don't care what the rest of you do," he said as he stormed away. "But whatever you do, I wouldn't linger long. Liu Kang might send more of the oni to attack you."
"I'm going with you," Tomas declared.
"As am I," Kailyn agreed, joining her husband's side as they trotted alongside Bi-han.
"Me too," Stryker said. "KL would do the same for any of us."
Bi-han looked at him and slightly bowed his head in thanks. "Let's go," he said, leading them once again.
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"What do you mean," Emperor Liu Kang growled, "you failed?"
"Precisely what it sounds like, my Lord," Sareena struggled to breathe as she crouched before him on one knee. Her broken ribs wobbled beneath her hand every time she drew in air. She bowed her head, not out of deference towards her master, but just because it was easier for her like that. "The Earthrealmers defeated us and would not be deterred."
"They are marching here as we speak, Emperor," Havik announced. Despite the importance of his declaration, the Cleric sounded delighted, almost giggly, as he hovered over a blood-filled pool in Quan Chi's tower. Then he resumed his work, speaking words in a language no one present knew. Liu Kang and Kitana traded suspicious glares, uncertain what their tentative ally was up to.
"Do not fear the Earthrealmers, Emperor," Reiko now spoke. "As we speak, I am devising a strategy to defeat them. Even Raiden will not make it through an attack on Netherrealm unscathed."
"For your sake, General, you better be telling the truth," Liu replied. Then he looked at Kitana before he pointed to Sareena. "How shall we punish her for her failure?" he asked her.
"Nightwolf," the Empress called to one of her revenant sentinels standing guard at the chamber door, "flog her."
Like an obedient dog, the undead Matokan lifted a heavy cowskin whip from the wall, and trembling, Sareena saw that it had at least twenty long, thick tails that would easily tear open her skin. He then stomped to her and pulled her upright before pointing to her tight leather corset.
"Take it off," he barked at her, and for a long moment, she glared in defiance back at him as if to say, "Make me."
But she would not give him the satisfaction of ripping her clothes off first and then beating her still. She would cling to what dignity she could. She inhaled as deeply as her wounded ribs would allow, and then glaring daggers at him, she untied the laces and loosened her corset until at last, it fell to the tile floor and she bared her breasts for all to see. Then, before Nightwolf could order her to turn around, she slowly turned and faced one of Quan Chi's obsidian pedestals and leaned over it, exposing her back to him and his whip.
The first lash came so fast that at first, Sareena's brain didn't register it as fast as her body did, and in what could only have been described as a delayed reaction, her lungs released a harsh, half-stifled yell. Then the second lash came, and pain sheeted through her with blinding intensity. More lashes followed. Ten seconds passed, then twenty, and then thirty. She'd lost count of how many times he'd hit her with the whip. In the thick soup of her brain, there was only fire flaring through her, amplifying to pure lightning every time it jostled her back, shoulder, or neck. She began to howl, though she wasn't even aware of it. And the louder she screamed, the harder he whipped her. Where her blood ran fastest, there he whipped her the longest. And he did not stop until Havik's voice yelled from somewhere far away.
"Shut her up!" she vaguely heard him cry. "I need to concentrate!"
"Enough, Nightwolf," Emperor Liu Kang promptly ordered him, and his servant backed away, still clutching the whip that was now dripping with Sareena's blood.
The demoness collapsed to her knees then, and then she fell onto her stomach, only mildly aware that her blood was rapidly pooling around her. Her thoughts were on Bi-han. He was in her hair, her eyes, her fingers, her heart. She daydreamed about what he was doing, thinking, seeing, smelling, feeling, and somehow, it made the pain better. She could not bear to think about how Noob Saibot was trying to overtake him once more. She knew that if she did, she'd surrender her will to fight and leave it right here on this cold tile floor.
With tear-stained eyes, Sareena managed to twist her head around to look at what Havik was doing. Around the chamber, the candles burned low, snapping like some enraged hound while the others save for Reiko struggled to look in all directions at once. But Havik appeared frozen, save for the beading perspiration on his forehead. An odd breeze, one that seemed to blow upward from the floor, passing through the necromancer's runes etched into the stone, ebbed and flowed around them. And in Quan Chi's pool, beneath the Havik's open palms, the blood began to bubble.
The figure of a person began to rise from it, a red golem made from gore. Slowly, as Havik's strange words grew louder and more urgent, the body coalesced further, growing thicker, until definitive features began to solidify. It quickly became apparent that this was a woman, someone Sareena thought was long dead. Yet, from the desert sands into which her body had rotted, the dark magic and iron will of the Chaosrealm Cleric summoned it back.
The chant emerging endlessly from Havik's throat shifted tone. The blood continued to bubble around the woman, but now it also began to swirl, to pump itself into her body in a way that should never have been possible in nature. It soaked into the woman's pale skin, and for several long moments, the blood surged through her veins and arteries, making them all stand in stark contrast against the white. Her eyelids exploded open, revealing ethereal red light glowing from them. She gasped, taking in her first breath of air in years. And then the lights in her eyes faded to their natural brown, and she slumped in Quan Chi's bloody pool with a startled sigh.
With a wolfish grin, Reiko walked towards her and offered his hand to her. "Welcome back, Skarlet," he said.
Elder Gods, no, Sareena winced, knowing it would be that much harder for the Earthrealmers to walk out of Netherrealm alive. Bi-han, run!
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MKDemigodZ-Warrior, well, the focus of this story really isn't on Darrius' rebellion, so I only mentioned him in passing. But yeah, I was really excited for Aftermath and the new DLC, and it lived up to my expectations. Unpopular opinion: I kind of liked Sindel as a villain. It seems like in recent years, they've tried hard to ret-con the original bad guys into good guys. It was nice to see her stay a bad guy. That's my hot take.
alwaysdoubted, yeah, it's gonna take a big push to get the Seidans involved. And thanks, I was just really inspired by Fujin's appearance and personality in Aftermath, so I had to incorporate some of that. Especially his intros with Johnny Cage.
reptalitator, lol, I'm not sure if it matters if she was a friend or a prostitute, but yeah, she was a prostitute. I'm on the fence about actually having Fujin cut his hair. And come on, even in the darkest of times you've gotta crack jokes or you'll go insane ;)
Obelisk of Light, yeah, Morgan's a good kid, but even she's gotta let loose and mess with her dad a bit lol We'll see what I do to Fujin's hair. This is going to be my new "what's gonna happen to Erron's hat?" that I did to Hell on Training Wheels in Ascension.
ROCuevas, thank you!
the-06, no, I sure didn't see that! And I'm glad you're caught up now. I hope my story continues to entertain you!