Chapter 3:

The trip to the port of Haruna takes almost 4 days. Vicious and the crew members make sure that the presence of Adam Taurus remains private. Once they arrive at the port, Adam is transported to the castle inside an ambulance, a white sheet has been placed over him, this would cause everyone that saw him to think that the person underneath has sustained terrible burns or other types of serious injuries.

Vicious takes the ride in the ambulance alongside Adam. Not an uncommon sight in the city, the king has been known to accompany his men if possible whenever they get seriously hurt.

The city is a mix of oriental and western influence. There are buildings constructed completely out of wood with roofs similar to those of a pagoda, others are made out of stone, concrete or steel. The roads are composed of a strong mix of rocks and concrete instead of asphalt. There is also a strong presence of nature within the city, huge trees, rivers and creeks to name a few, all existing in harmony along with the inhabitants everyday life.

Reaching the castle Adam is taken to a private section of it to recover, Rozen makes sure everything he needs to survive has been properly installed. The tubes that had been previously placed on his chest to prevent the fluids on his lungs causing either pneumonia or any other type of infection have been removed. All that remains is for his body to rest and recover at its own pace.

A few days later Adam begins waking up, the fingers of his left arm start moving slightly then they start closing and opening forming a fist. His head moves from left to right moaning.

The nurse that is watching over him approaches quickly. She is about to call the others when his eye suddenly snaps open and he glares at her. Before she could try anything, he manages to break free from the leather straps confiding him to bed, she freezes on the spot.

The previous person that had come to change his bandages did a very sloppy job and they weren't fastened as they should. He doubles over in pain and groans; his chest feels on fire. "Stop, your stitches will become undone!", she says forgetting who she is speaking to and approaching to restrain him.

He takes a sudden look over himself and when he sees his right side…notices that his right arm is not there, he gasp in shock and confusion and glares at her again before speaking "What did you… do to me!?, he said angrily, his voice raspy and his throat hurting a lot. "Please just stop, okay, I am here to help", she pleads, a guard suddenly bursts into the room to help control the situation, which doesn't help at all.

Not expecting it and a bit wobbly Adam suddenly launches himself from the bed right at the guard and catches him by surprise with a strong punch to the jaw, ripping the catheter from his left arm in the process. This makes the man stumble in pain and Adam hits him again, this time a punch to the stomach which makes him gasp for air, finally a blow to the back of his head takes him out.

The nurse panics and tries to run to the door, but a blow to the back of her head also takes her out. Adam falls to his knees, everything around him moving in circles making him feel sick, his chest is pure agony every breath he takes almost like acid is being poured to his lungs.

He takes a few moments to steady himself before getting up with difficulty, the pain on his left leg almost making him fall. Walking over to the fallen guard he takes the man's weapon, it's a glaive, with a gun integrated at the side of the hilt, not the best choice for him right now, but it can help him as a walking stick. Adam checks him again and finds a small knife in his pocket, he takes that too.

He makes it out of the room slowly, looking at his surroundings, finding them empty. Unknown to him the nurse had a device in her pocket that she had activated, a silent alarm letting the others know about the danger and clear the area. The queen and king are the only ones right now that will confront him.

Adam decides not to stay still, a vacant hallway normally means bad stuff by his experience. And right now, he has a huge disadvantage. He only has his left arm and he is hurting all over, he doesn't dare to take a moment to check his injuries.

He needs to get out of here, he can't end being used as a weapon again. He doesn't know where he can go once he does but that doesn't matter right now. Limping he keeps on advancing, walking through a large stone hallway, the place has intricate golden railing at the edge and statues carved, plants formed part of the decoration including some bonsai and small waterfalls falling through some sections of the walls. He takes no attention to detail, he feels very tempted to stop to take a drink feeling terribly thirsty, but he decides against it, not wanting to waste any time.

He sees some stairs at the distance and moves towards them, however he stops a few feet away from them, he knows and feels that he is being watched. Adam does his best to stand straight and ignore the pain. "What do you want!?", he says in a low voice that promises retribution if anyone dared to block his path. "Where do you think you are going boy!?", a female voice answers him back.

He gets ready for battle expecting either a human or a faunus, he however gets the shock of his life when neither appear before him, but a mostly golden colored kirin appears before him, a huge one that is, she easily makes him look tiny towering over 14 feet in height.

She has huge horns like a male deer, cream colored adorning her head like a crown, golden scales and fur, some black patches covering her whole body piercing slit red eyes stare menacing back at him, stirring a lot of unwanted memories inside him about someone whose eyes changed to red when angry and almost managed to kill him… sadly she didn't succeed and he is in this mess right now.

"Well?", the kirin speaks revealing sharp teeth on her maw. "Just great, why couldn't I simply die at that time, why everything has to be so difficult for me… even dying?", he thinks to himself. "Out of my way this is not your business beast!", he says, not letting his inner thoughts let be known, trying his best to glare back at her with his single icy blue eye.

"Beast!?, You should watch your tone young man, you are in my domain, I am the ruler of this land!", she says her scales and fur bristling, her lips peel back showing her sharp teeth in all their glory, making her look incredibly intimidating, but not to a man that simply has a death wish.

"Let me pass and you will know nothing more about me!", he says trying to reason with the kirin.

"And where to? To cause more misery and pain Adam Taurus!?, the kirin says.

Adam shoulders slump when he is forced to remember all the terrible things he had done, he then gives her a look full of weariness and self-loathing, a look that makes her remember someone else during a past time. "My death is the only thing I desire, and you are on my way… you had me brought here with a purpose… and I refuse that purpose… I won't be your prisoner, your slave, your puppet, your weapon, I won't be those things anymore, I won't be yours or nobody else… I refuse to be used again!", he said the last part with a scream launching at her, forgetting about the pain.

The kirin parries his blow with her scaled tail, the glaive almost getting ripped from his left hand. She lowers her head using her horns, making him parry, the glaive glowing red as he absorbs the energy. The kirin looks suspicious at the glow, but she doesn't have time to wonder as Adam attacks with a series of furious slashes.

Despite only having one arm left, he is pretty good at it, using his torso making him wince every time he did and his legs to adjust when needed the strength and direction of the attacks. He tries to save bullets not knowing how many the glaive has and what he will encounter later.

As he moves, he can feel the stitches pulling at his skin, some of them even popping.

The kirin finds an opening and she charges, Adam is forced to put the glaive in front of him, resting it against his right shoulder to avoid being hit directly by her horns. But the force of the hit is too much for his legs, he focuses and as the kirin approaches once more he uses his semblance, it's not as strong as it normally is, but it's enough to catch her by surprise.

A red arc of energy cuts her left collarbone deeply, causing her to roar in pain, she had her aura up, but she wasn't expecting this half dead man to be able to pull such an attack. The kirin front legs buckle and she drops on her belly looking at him in disbelief despite the pain she feels.

Unfortunately, as this happened because of her previous attack his back painfully hits against a wall making him bite his lips until he bleeds to avoid letting out a scream. He begins coughing making a wet noise, blood dripping from his lips into the ground, almost unable to breath.

Adam closes his eyes for a moment trying to get his bearings and collect his thoughts, which is hard when every breath you take feels like your lungs are being ripped to pieces.

After a few long minutes he manages to open his eyes and looks at the kirin… no… it's no longer that beast from before, but a woman is in front of him instead of the kirin. He knows that they are the same being by the wound she is clutching on her collarbone and the red eyes as before. He could see that she has long blonde hair that she keeps in an intricate bun, her clothing is pretty ornate befitting of a ruler, and of course the flower silk robe she is wearing is being ruined by her blood.

When she begins to stand, Adam quickly grabs the glaive and surprises her that instead of pointing the weapon at her, he points the edge to his throat, making her stop on her tracks. "Are you so desperate to die young man?", she asks.

Adam stays quiet for a moment before answering. "You wouldn't understand… and as you said before, before I can be used to cause pain and misery again, I will end it", he says in a tired voice and then plunges the glaive towards his neck.

Before the glaive could hurt him a hand grabs the handle and with force the glaive gets thrown away, plunging into a wall.

Shocked Adam looks to the owner of the hand and is surprised to see a man almost as big as Hazel standing before him. "Shit…", he says feeling immediately frustrated and angry, gritting his teeth he focuses all the strength he has left in one effort, while looking at the mismatched eyes of the man standing in front of him.

Despite knowing he will fail he refuses to back down and go down quietly. He grabs the pocket knife he took from the guard and charges focusing what little aura he has left. He is not surprised that his attacks failed, the man without much effort catches his hand, squeezing enough to make him release the knife.

Not letting go he raises Adam from the ground to his eye level. Adam tries to kick the man, but this fight is completely one sided, he is too weak to be able to do any real damage and his legs aren't long enough to reach him, not when he is being held at arm's length.

"Stop", he orders, making Adam stop his trashing for a moment and look at him, doing his best to glare back but the man shows no kind of emotion on his face. However despite not showing emotion his mismatched eyes felt like a predator was watching.

"Let me go!", Adam orders back, before he begins trashing again. He stops when a shock of electricity courses through his whole body, making him gasp and lose control of his limbs. Once Adam is no longer moving, Vicious approaches the bull faunus to him inspecting him. A hand going over the blood-stained bandages on the faunus's chest, Adam desperately wanted to fight back and get away not liking at all being touched by a stranger.

"Dearest?", the woman is standing by their side, compared to Vicious she looks pretty tiny, but she isn't a short woman, standing 5"11 feet tall.

Vicious looks back at her and sees her applying pressure to her wound before he could say anything. "I am alright this won't kill me", she says to ease his worries. "What will you do about him? He only has a deathwish.", she asks.

"Deathwish is not to be granted…", he says, before looking back at Adam that's trying to keep glaring at him despite his fading consciousness. "We will talk later… when you are stronger… don't attempt to escape anymore… no matter what you try... I am faster and stronger… I will hunt you down", he says as a warning.

Adam tries to talk back to the man to demand that he be executed, but he doesn't have the strength to do anything and can only watch as he gets dragged back to the room he was previously in. The guard and nurse he had knocked down before regaining consciousness while he loses his own.

Update: I fixed the spacing issue on this chapter as was requested by several readers

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I would love to know what people is thinking of this fanfic so far