I continue to make my way through this damn snow towards that giant castle looking thing Cerbero pointed out earlier. He said that it might be where this Snow Priestess took Mizore so I have to check it out, for her sake. As I get to the foot of the ramp leading to the temple I see two ice guards. They look like Yeties, standing at least twice my size and covered in a thick white fur. "I'm here to talk to the Snow Priestess. Move out of the way or I'll end you.", I growl at the snow beasts as I unwrap the chain from my arm and ignite it with hellfire.
They look at each other and back to me before saying, "None shall pass without her majesty's permission."
I grit my teeth and wrap one of their necks with the chain and I pull him close enough to knock him out with a punch to the face. That seems to knocked some sence into the other one, because he starts to tremble as he says, "None s-s-shall pass.."
I simply wrap the chain back around my fist and with a singly jump, I leap up to the top of his head and punch him straight into the snow, locking his unconscious body in the snow like a peg. I don't think he'll be getting up anytime soon.
With the first of the guards dealt with, I make my way up the path and it seems to be completely defenseless. Were those the best men she had to defend her throne? This has to be a trap.
I come to a giant fancy door made out of ice. It seems to be quite thick, but it's still ice so it should be easier to smash through than steel. I kick the door as hard as I can to see if it will open and surprisingly it does. As I walk in I see a woman with a long, fancy set of blue robes and some decorative ice on her shoulders standing there, waiting for me. She also has this dumb looking hat like thing. I hope it's a hat, because if that's her hair then she seriously has a problem.
"Ah, Reiji Oni, I've been expecting you.", the woman ominously calls out to me.
"I'm guessing you're the Snow Priestess. Where's Mizore?", I growl at the icy woman as I glance around, looking for any path that might lead to Mizore. I see two doorways in here on each side of the room. Where is she keeping her?
"Mizore Shirayuki is with her fiance.", the woman coldly replies as she shoots me with an equally chilling glare.
"Her fiance? She's getting married!? I can't allow this to happen. I won't!", I furiously shout at the priestess as I hear the news.
With a wicked smirk across her face, she adds, "You don't have much say in the matter, Mister Oni. She will be married off to a rich executive from the human world. This will save this land."
"No, there must be another way! Mizore wouldn't want this!", I growl back at the woman, clenching the metal chain in my fist.
"What are you suggesting ? That we reject this man and let our species die?", she mockingly suggests as she starts to laugh me off.
I hesitate at first but to hell with it, if it saves her from this situation it's worth it. "I'll marry her then! Allow me to marry Mizore!", I shout, my face turning a slight pink from what I'm asking for.
"Oh really? You would marry Mizore just to keep her from marrying a stranger? What do you bring to the table that this man doesn't already?", she questions me with a somewhat playful grin.
"I'm part of a royal family, it's the most powerful and wealthiest in the Underworld.", I explain to her as I take a few steps closer for her to hear.
"Ah, so you're the son of the legendary guard dog, Cerbero then? Though you are just his adopted son and not blood, being part of his family does give you a great deal of power there. You are also quite powerful yourself, too, but it has already been foretold that she will marry that man.", she replies causing me to stop dead in my tracks.
"You are a prophet, aren't you?", I question her with a burning glare focused on her face.
She pridefully nods her head and says, "Yes, that is how I knew you'd be coming and how I knew Mizore was destined to be with that man."
I bare my teeth and growl, "So you know what I'll do if you leave me no other choice, Snow Priestess."
She suddenly reels back at my suggestion and with her eyes slightly widened in confusion, she asks, "Y-you aren't just going to give up? But, my prophecy said that you would simply leave." She then looks at the chain around my arm and asks, "Where did you get that chain!? That wasn't in my prophecy either!"
I guess Cerbero gave this to me for a reason then. If I were to transform in here, this place would simply crumble to pieces from my monster energy. This chain gives me a chance to fight my way through here and save Mizore. "So what's it gonna be then? Are you handing her over willingly, or will I have to take her by force?", I roar at her as I unwrap the chain from my fist, letting the heated metal scream against the frozen floor.
"You wouldn't kill me. I'm the one who makes this whole civilization work! Without me this place would fall apart and the Snow Woman species would die!", she shouts in a panic as she shakes her fist at me.
I point up at her with a wicked grin of my own aimed her way as I say, "Well then, tell me where she's at or I'll kill you and find her myself."
Suddenly the priestess stares off into space for a while, a blank expression coming across her face as I'm left looking at her in confusion while she says, "My prophecy.. has changed..?"
"Changed? What are you talking about? Have you gone mad from the thought of dying?", I mock the woman as I wipe my chain, taking a chunk out of the ground as Iit slams into the frosty ice tiles.
She looks at me with a confused stare and proclaims, "You! You are to duel this other man for Mizore's heart, tonight in the pale moonlight! I can not see the outcome, but this is for certain, you both will fight for her!"
After hearing her new fortune, I return the chain to my arm and growl, "Then take me to her and this man. We'll duel outside with any weapon of our choosing. That way he can use his preferred weapon and I can use mine."
Agreeing to my terms, the Snow Priestess walks me through the many hallways in her castle until we reach the room, the room where she's hiding Mizore. As I get to the door she goes to open it, but I just kick it open, shattering it against the wall. I see a man with greasy black hair dressed in a fancy suit and tie on top of Mizore. He's a second away from touching her chest when I use the chain to grab him by the neck and throw him into the wall, sending the man straight through the wall and into the other room.
Mizore looks over to me in surprise and says, "Reiji! You came! Where's Tsukune?"
"Tsukune should be back at your house by now fighting off frostbite. The others are with him, hopefully. Now as for you, , we have a date tonight.", I reply as I shift my gaze over to the guy I threw through the wall.
"What's the meaning of this Snow Priestess? I was told that this girl would be my wife and this degenerate comes in here and attacks me? What is going on here?", the man furiously growls at the snow woman as he pulls himself out of the rubble and dusts himself off, not seeming too phased by what just happened to him. He seems pretty calm about this whole situation, I doubt he's actually a human from the Human World.
"This boy came into my throne room and demanded that he get a chance at Mizore's heart. I told him she was to be yours, but then I had a vision of you two dueling for her heart tonight under the full moon and this is now reality.", the fortune cookie replies as she seems to take a step back away from the grease ball.
"So your original prophecy was wrong?", he growls at the woman in a slightly more irritated tone.
She shakes her head yes and says, "Something must've changed in the time stream causing events to alter into new ones. I am sorry for the inaccuracy."
"If this boy wants a duel, then he'll get one! You said tonight, didn't you? Let's get this over with so I can continue to enjoy my future wife.", he says as he shoves me out of the way and walks down the hall.
She takes us to the armory and says, "You may pick whichever weapon your heart desires. You do not need to pick the same weapon and may pick whichever best suits you in battle."
The man picks a standard short sword and I pick my chain.
"Miyabi Fujisaki, are you certain that this is the weapon you want to do battle with?", the priestess asks the man, to which he nods and says, "I've practiced the way of the sword, long long ago. I'm certain I only need this to handle a child."
She looks over to me and asks, "Reiji Oni, are you certain that this is the weapon you wish to do battle with?"
I give her a quick nod and answer with, "I'm certain. Cerbero gave me this chain for a reason and I'm not giving it up now."
She looks at me with a face of sudden realization before muttering to herself, "That damn Cerbero, always messing with the time stream." As she catches herself, she turns her attention back to us and proclaims, "No matter, we must head out to the courtyard and you two may battle to the death."
"To the death? Interesting.", Miyabi happily notes, earning a slightly raises eyebrow on my part.
"Are you really looking forward to dying that much?", I mock the idiot as I tighten my grip on the chain.
"I'm looking forward to seeing you fail.", he smugly replies as he shoots an equally confident grin at me.
I only laugh him off before saying, "Let's see if you're still this confident after I destroy you."
We finally reach the courtyard and the Snow Priestess says, "This is where you will do battle. Mizore and I will stand back at a safe distance while you two do battle. Once you two are ready I will count down from three. You will start on 'Go,' understood?"
We both nod our heads and prepare our weapons. He takes an odd stance that I haven't seen before. It seems defensive in nature, but it has quite a few weak points. I simply unwrap the chain and wait.
"This duel is to decide who will get the honor of marrying Mizore Shirayuki. Are you two ready?", she asks as if this is some television show.
"I am ready.", Miyabi stoically replies as he glares past his blade at me.
I let out a light chuckle at this and say, "Lets do this. I'm ready to go."
"Okay then, three. Two. One. Go!", the Snow Priestess counts down before we leap into battle.
Though the chain is fairly heavy, I'm able to move it quick enough to force him on the defensive immediately. He doesn't seem surprised by my speed, this guy isn't a normal human. He probably isn't human at all based on how he's keeping up with me so easily. I manage to get the chain past his sword and around his neck. I grin as I launch him into the air with one pull I slam him into the ground with all of my strength. He lands head first into the ground causing a small snow storm to happen. He's definitely dead. No normal monster could take that and get up. "Well, I guess that's that then. To think this would end in such a let down.", I scoff to myself as I turn my back on the scene with a slight grin coming across my face.
My eyes shoot open in disbelief as I hear Miyabi growl, "Is that all you got?" I turn around to see him standing there without a scratch on him. "What? Surprised to see me?", he confidently questions as he lights himself a cigarette.
I use the flame on his cigarette to ignite his whole face in a giant ball of fire. He doesn't seem to be too hurt by it, though he's a bit charred. "That was a waste of a perfectly good cigarette.", he groans in a slightly pissed off tone.
With a slight chuckle, I glare over at him as I say, "Neither of us can use our full strength without risking toppling the whole castle. This is pathetic on both of our parts."
He grabs his sword and says, "I guess we have to settle this in a more 'human' way then.", before charging at me.
I wrap my chain around his leg without him noticing and as he gets just an inch away from my chest with his sword I fling him up into the air again. This time though his sword goes flying out of his hands and I just let him freefall back down to the ground. As he hits the ground he starts laughing before saying, "We're never going to finish this duel are w-", and before he can finish, his sword comes down and stabs him through his chest.
"Oh, that looked like it hurt. I bet it hurt.", I sarcastically note as I walk over to him to end his life.
He manages to stand up as he replies with, "Just a little bit. I can still fight you without this sword."
"Ah ah ah, in a duel you're supposed to use your weapon to defend yourself. If you just start using your hands then it becomes no more than a brawl.", I say as I basically throw the rulebook in his face.
He goes to pull the sword out, but I rush toward him and knock him on his ass before stepping on the handle, forcing it deeper into his chest. As blood start to spurt out from his mouth, I growl down at him, "There we go. How does your own blood taste?"
"If you have the upper hand, end me then.", he scoffs at me with a smug grin still plastered all over his face. If that's what he wants, I'll gladly kill his ass. I wrap the chain around my fist and hit him as hard as I can in this form. It's just enough force to shatter all the bones in his body and kill him almost instantly from the shock. Blood splatters all over my shirt and across the snow, it's all just a big mess.
After I'm done with my battle, I start making my way over to the Snow Priestess and she seems to be trembling a bit. "It seems you have won, M-Mister Oni. Here is your bride to be.", the Snow Priestess says as she nudges Mizore in my direction while slowly backing away.
Is she backpedaling in case I choose to kill her next? As long as she keeps her end of the bargain up, she'll live.
"So you came all this way, just to save me?", Mizore nervously asks me with a slightly surprised look on her face.
"Of course, why wouldn't I?", I ask as I wrap the chain back around my arm.
"I thought...Tsukune would've come to save me or something.", she sheepishly explains with a slight smile on her reddened face as she turns her gaze to the ground.
"I'm certain that he would've came here if he were able to, but he kind of passed out in the snow. Seems like something really got to him.", I happily reply, trying to lighten the mood a bit after everything that happened.
"So, what's this that I hear about you wanting a chance at my heart?", she curiously asks, almost mocking me.
I can feel my face getting a bit red and I quickly say, "Oh that, umm... You see... I kind of... maybe.. sort of have feelings for you... okay?" Suddenly she wraps me in a cooling hug and after a bit of awkward silence I tell her, "I know you want to be with Tsukune and all that and I want to make you as happy as I possibly can. So if that's really what you want then-", but before I can finish my moppie 'free the butterfly' thing, she kisses me.
She kissed me! I didn't even know what to do so I just kind of let it happen. As the kiss ends she looks up to me and says, "I'm happy right now."
As I look down at her warm lips, I notice that she doesn't have a lollipop sticking out of her mouth like she normally does and there isn't one in her hand either. I raise an eyebrow at this and ask her, "What happened to your lollipop? Did you drop it or something?"
She glares at the crimson mess over in the snow and says, "He knocked it out of my hands when he tried to ride me." She then looks down at the ground and says, "You know, the whole time he was on top of me, I was pleading in my head for Tsukune to come and save me...but you came Reiji. You came and saved me, and now the Snow Priestess says that this is my destiny, so it's all falling perfectly together."
I scavenge through my jacket pockets before finding a lollipop that I was saving to give to her for one of those 'I got you covered' moments so I guess it can work here. I hand it to her and say, "It might not be your favorite flavor, but it's something."
She happily takes the gift from my hand before warmly telling me, "Thank you, Reiji."
Before we can continue, the Snow Priestess interrupts us by saying, "Yes, this is all nice and romantic, but your marriage ceremony is tomorrow, so go home and get some rest, okay?"
"Tomorrow!?", I frantically shout as I hear this, only earning confused glances from the snow women.
They both nod their heads yes and the Snow Priestess says, "She was to be married to Miyabi tomorrow evening, but now you seem to have taken his place."
"I guess we'll be married tomorrow then. Are you okay with that though, Mizore?", I nervously ask her.
She grabs my hand as she looks up to me and says, "I guess I could." I smile before starting to tear up. Am I crying? No, I don't cry! Why am I crying? She simply hugs me and says, "It'll all be okay."
With that, we head back to Tsurara's house and as we walk together I ask Mizore, "Hey Mizore, can you not tell anyone about me crying that one time? That would be great."
"Why would I do that? This is perfect black mail material you know.", she confidently suggests with a slight grin on her face.
"You already have me wrapped around your finger, what do you need black mail for?", I jokingly reply as I give her a warm smile.
"Maybe for when you don't want to do dishes or clean the house. You know, the little things.", the ice woman cheekily notes with a giggle.
"So, what do we even tell them when we get back?", I ask Mizore as I look to her for an answer.
"I thought you would've figured that one out. You're smarter than I am.", she replies as she puts her hands in her sweater pocket.
I let out a light chuckle and say, "I'm not really good with people or explaining things to others. The best way I could put what just happened is 'I went to that castle thing, met the Snow Priestess lady, dueled some shitty swordsman that tried to rape you, pounded him into a literal pulp, and headed home for bed.' That doesn't really seem to have too many details in it, does it?"
"You forgot the whole, 'getting married' part.", she happily points out, causing me to flinch a little.
I nervously rub the back of my neck and groan, "I guess I did. Well, that would be a massive bombshell to just throw in there, wouldn't it?"
She just shrugs it off and says, "It's the truth though. We're getting married tomorrow."
"We're inviting all of our friends, right? And our parents, obviously.", I ask her, not sure what to do for this kind of thing.
She gives me a quick nod and says, "They've been there through everything. They wouldn't let us hear the end of it if we didn't invite them."
We finally reach the door to her mother's house. Well, I guess by the end of tomorrow it'll be my mother-in-law's house. We kind of awkwardly stand in front of the door, waiting for the other to make the first move, before I ask her, "Should I clean this off?", while showing her the blood all over me and the chain.
"We can wash it off inside, come on.", my soon-to-be wife replies as she opens the door and begins to walk inside.
As we walk inside everyone seems happy to see us and Cerbero says, "Ah, I see you made it back in one piece. Good work son."
"Thanks, it wasn't too hard. Though the Snow Priestess was a pain to deal with.", I cheekily reply with a slight smile.
"WHAT!? YOU REALLY KILLED THE SNOW PRIESTESS!?", Tsurara frantically exclaims as she slams her hands on the table.
"No Mother, the Snow Priestess is fine.", Mizore answers as she tries to calm her mother down.
"Then who's blood is that then?", Kokoa asks as she points to the blood all over me.
"Oh, this poor bastard? His name was Miyabi something. Don't worry about him. He won't be a problem anytime soon.", I reply as I sit down at the table.
"So you let her live then, interesting. And this Miyabi person was Mizore's soon to be husband but now death has done them apart. How tragic.", Cerbero happily notes as he pours Mizore and I some tea.
"Well, you see...", I begin to say before Cerbero cuts me off by saying, "Oh, so you dueled him then? That would explain the blood all over you."
"A duel? What kind of duel? Do you mean a duel with guns and cowboy hats and stuff?", Yukari innocently suggests, not quite getting the right idea.
Kurumu delivers a quick slap upside the little witch's head and scolds her, saying, "Stop being a brat and listen. You're such a kid. Can you tell us what happened Reiji?"
I let out a slight sigh, knowing this would probably end poorly for me to say the least, and as Mizore sits next to me I explain what happened, saying, "First I talked to the Snow Priestess, she said she that Mizore was supposed to marry some random guy and I said fuck that shit, she had some sort of vision and said I was to duel the guy if I wanted to have her heart, I go and fight the guy, pound him into a pulp, and head back home with Mizore."
"Wait, can you go back a few things real quick?", Moka requests as she raises a finger in the air to stop me from going any further.
"I beat the guy into a pulp?", I reply, trying to act like I don't know what she's talking about.
Sadly, she shakes her head no and says, "A little further."
"She had a vision?", I continue to play stupid, hoping she'll give up, but to no avail. She heard the heart part, didn't she?
"Yeah, but the whole thing.", she continues to demand, seeming to pout as she realizes my attempts to derail her questioning.
I sigh and say, "She had some sort of vision and said I was to duel the guy if I wanted to have her heart."
"You were dueling for Mizore's heart? Wait, does that mea-", Moka begins to ask herself before Tsurara's eyes widen in complete disbelief as she shouts, "What!? You're getting married to that guy, Mizore!?"
"You two are getting married?", Tsukune gasps, seeming more confused than usual by all the commotion.
"Yep.", Mizore calmly replies with a nod.
Kurumu jumps over the table and hugs Mizore before saying, "I'm so happy for you~", while almost suffocating her with her boobs. Kurumu suddenly drops her and says, "Don't think I'm just going to forgive you for what you tried to pull earlier. I'm still mad at you for that, but I just wanted you to know I was happy that you were getting married."
I lift Mizore off the floor as she says, "Well, you're all invited to the ceremony."
"Oh great, when is it exactly?", Tsukune happily asks as he shoots a smile our way.
"Tomorrow.", I bluntly reply, causing the room to somewhat freeze in disbelief.
"Wait, isn't the flower thing tomorrow too? How does that work?", Kokoa asks as Ko shrugs from her shoulder.
"It was already setup by the Snow Priestess for my marriage with that other guy. It won't be anything too flashy.", Mizore explains, holding my open hand in her own under the table.
"A wedding! How marvelous! And it's my son's wedding at that! This is absolutely perfect! I'll wear my best suit, you'll need one as well, right Reiji?", Cerbero says, his voice ringing with excitement as he turns to me with a gleeful smile.
"Yeah, I think I'll need a suit. Can you spot me one Cerbero?", I nervously ask, I don't think I've ever wore a suit and tie before now that I think about it...
"Well of course, anything for my son. Now we must find you the most perfect suit! We don't want you to look like a fool on your big day! Come Tsukune, you'll need a suit as well to match our trio.", Cerbero says as he opens a portal to the Underworld right in the kitchen.
"I do need a suit. I'll be back guys.", Tsukune says as he gets up and walk over to Cerbero.
"To think, soon I'll have a daughter-in-law and after that, grandchildren! I'll finally be a grandfather! I can't wait!", Cerbero cheerfully exclaims as he pulls us through the portal by our shirts.