-1Chapter 9: Lilith is Thicker the Friendship

A/N: Sorry for the late chapter. Midterms were last week, had to buy Homecoming ticket just to get rejected by girl I liked, eventful week. Anyhow, here you go.

Shade saw on the Neo's gliding straight for him as Shade panted. "Damn." he said as he moved along the wall. He had learned to recognize the Neo's by slashes he had made on their sword. He had identified the fastest one as having a slash through the middle of his sword. He noticed the fastest one gliding on the floor towards him. Just before he got to Shade, Shade bounced off the wall to avoid him but got slashed on the leg. He shouted in pain, as blood started coming down his leg.
"I need…help." said Shade as he ran to the other wall despite his pain. He noticed the other Neo's coming from the other wall. "Damn…" Then, it hit him.

Flashback

A younger Shade was sitting on a chair of a very decorated temple, reading a book. The temple seemed to be very broad, similar to a church, with several columns and paintings hanging from the walls. The chair itself seemed to be old, made from wood.

"Brother! Brother!" shouted a voice. Shade rose an eyebrow. He looked up from his book to find the similar short girl with elegant red hair that was beautifully parted down the center, with her bangs, running towards him and tackled him while he was reading. The chair fell down and Shade looked up at his sister with anger.

"What is it, Rose?" asked Shade as he pushed her off and got up.
"Izzy is in trouble!" she shouted, still panting as she stood up. Shade sighed.

"What is it now?" asked Shade.

"Culex and his friends. They are chasing him!" said Rose, as she started getting her breath back. Shade sighed.

"The puppet guy? Damn it, Culex. Where are they?" said Shade as he ran out of the temple into what seemed to be a jungle.

"Look up." said Rose. Shade look up to find some smoke above, drifting above the tree.

"Thanks, I will be back." said Shade as he ran to where the smoke was, without realizing Rose was running behind him. Shade managed to get to the smoke and saw what was going on. It looked like a younger Izual jumping from tree to tree, bouncing of the trunk's of the tree. Behind him, there were three people following him. The one closest to him had long black hair, with purple eyes. He was wearing a black shirt with black pants. He seemed to be holding a long, skinny sword, with swift strikes. It looked like Izual knew how to fight all three, somewhat. He kept jumping, and since the purple-eyed person was the fastest, and most skilled. He would caught up with Izual, they exchange a few strikes, and in the end, he would come up victorious and slash Izual a few times, which lead him to jump again to avoid him. It looked as this cycle had gone a lot and Izual seemed to be covered in slashes, and his pace seemed to slow down.

"Damn, Culex is fast." said Shade as he headed towards them. Izual lied against a tree, panting with blood flowing from everywhere.

"You...are…too…good…Culex." said Izual as Culex placed the tip of his swords a few inches away from his face.

"I know, I try." said Culex, grinning then he stopped grinning when he saw Shade coming. "Yo, defense!" He jumped back seeing Shade coming. Shade quickly stepped on the spot he was before, then quickly turn to slash Culex. Culex used his sword to block it. He growled as Shade took the offensive. His weak sword wouldn't stand up to many blows. Then, two other masked warrior, one wearing a white mask, the other a black mask, appeared and tried to slash Shade. Shade quickly jump back against the tree Izual was lying against and looked at the warriors, at Izual.

"You owe me for , you know that?" asked Shade. Izual grinned a bit and nodded. Shade rushed towards the one with the black mask. They all prepared to defend, then Shade jumped to the left, rather than against them head on. Then, from the left, he jumped to gain momentum and hurt the black masked warrior from the side. The masked warrior defended him self, and as he did, Shade jumped back and the masked warrior chased after, with Culex and the other masked warrior behind. Shade turned around and ran to a tree, knowing he was being chased. Then as he neared the tree, he raised his leg and placed his feet against the tree then used the momentum to take another step up the tree trunk, then another jumped off it and landed behind the black masked warrior, and in front of the white masked warrior and Culex. As he was descending, he slashed the white masked warrior's mask right through the middle. The sword to have pierced more than the mask as the warrior shouted in pain, and blood trickled from his face. Culex jumped to one side to it ended up with Culex on Shade's side, a stumbling bleeding warrior in front and a charging black masked coming from behind. Shade jumped towards Culex before the mask ninja could get to him. However, since he came charging, he crashed into the stumbling warrior, and ended up slashing his chest several times, which let to the warrior to fall down. Meanwhile, Shade went for Culex but this Culex managed to attack first, causing Shade's attack go on the defensive.
"You were always a worthy adversary." said Culex as he kept swinging his swords in swift strikes. Due to the blade's structure, he could strike fast, and deadly, though defensively, it shouldn't hold much.

"Likewise, Culex, but what makes you think you will beat me?" asked Shade . Culex grinned as he managed to slash Shade's hand, making Shade drop the sword. Shade quickly jump back.

"It's over now!" shouted Culex as he went for the kill. Then, out of nowhere, came out Izual holding his sword that was similar to Shade's took the blows from Culex's strikes. He had managed to block most of 'em, but a good amount got through, hurting Izual even more. "Imbecile!" shouted Culex as he placed his palm up to Izual's face. He had a strange insignia in his palm. It was a big black circle. It starts glowing a bit.

"Move away Izual!" shouted Shade as he pushed him away and the circle in the palm started opening from the middle…

Shade looked at the Neo's. "That's it." said Shade as he moved ran towards the opposite wall while the gliding Neo stopped before crashing and quickly chased behind him. Meanwhile, the other Neo's position them between Shade and the other wall. Then, they all moved towards him. The Neo's started closing in on Shade from both side and they, as well as Shade, knew he could stop them. Then just before the fastest Neo got to him, and the two slower ones got him as well, he seemed to pressed his feet against the ground, causing a sliding maneuver. This caused his for body to turn horizontal and slide between the slower Neo's while the fastest Neo just cruised right through them knocking them to the floor. The Neo who was near the blade seemed to have his neck slashed smoothly, which let to some wires being cut. The wires themselves, emitted electricity, causing a short circuit on that Neo. The head exploded, and the Neo fell on top of the one ground leaving the Fastest neo currently standing. Shade quickly got up and ran as he knew that the Neo that remain was fast but he also knew he would stop him like he stopped Culex in the past. Shade noticed the Neo was gaining on him but he smiled as he reached the wall, and used the momentum of his movements to take two additional steps on the wall and jumped from it. The Neo turned to break before it crashed but it was no dice and it crashed into the wall. A loud bang could be heard but Shade wasn't done as he landed on the floor and did a similar move to the one he did against the white masked warrior, except in this case he stabbed his sword on the swordsman's head before the Neo had time to recover from the crash. As he stabbed, several sparks flew out, and shade quickly let go of his sword. Neo crashed.

"Quite the shock, eh?" asked Shade, smiling a bit as he grabbed one of the Neo's swords. "This will work better…" Shade started slowly walking towards the real pillar. He felt several wounds everywhere in his body. Blood trickled from his body onto the floor, most of his pain almost unbearable. He reached to the pillar and slash the glass. He was about grab them but the pillar started moving. "No way in cold hell am I gonna let you go…" Shade jumped and grabbed the pillar as it glided through the floor. Shade seemed to be dragged through the floor, his blood spreading on the floor, similar to the blood of proctor he had killed. Then he notice the pillar was gaining speed and heading towards the window. "This is isn't gonna stop is it…" said Shade as the pillar headed towards the window and went straight through it. From there, Shade realized he was on the second floor as he felled from it and fell to the ground with pillar. He landed with a great pain, as the glass broke and the Sacred Beast spread on the floor. Shade slowly stood up and shook a bit, laughing almost like if he was crazy. "Crazy…defense system…but it…couldn't stop me!" said Shade, as he rested against a tree the cards on his hand. He looked up at the moon. "Damn…Culex is waiting…" He started running almost stumbling but slowly regaining his posture as he ran.

Meanwhile, Izual looked down at Jasmine. He didn't know what to do, what to think, and if Jasmine were to do something , he wouldn't know how to react. Jasmine moved her hands to the back of Izual's head and slowly pulled him towards her face, their lips no more an inch away then Izual's hand glowed but since they were facing down, it couldn't be seen.

Flashback

It appeared a younger Izual lying against a roof that seemed to be made of fancy rock, like the one the temple was build on. His head was placed on Rose's lap as they both into the night.

"Pretty night, eh Vishnu?" said Rose, smiling a bit. Izual changed his gaze from the sky to Rose.

"Vishnu? You are still calling me that?" asked Izual

"Why not? It's cute, besides it suits you." said Rose.

"Whatever…Shiva." said Izual, laughing a bit.

"So now I'm Shiva? Isn't that a male god?" asked Rose.

"Eh, sound female to me, we'll go with it." said Izual.

"Oh Izzy, you fool." said Rose as he laughed and Izual laughed. Then a noise could be heard as a younger Shade came from a trapdoor on the roof. He glared at a Izual and Rose, who shifted their gaze at him.

"Izual…" said Shade as he seemed to clench his fist and go back into the trap door.

"Oh…crap." said Izual as he got up. "He's mad, and I gotta talk to him…" Izual quickly moved to the trap door and saw Shade walking away. "Shade! Wait up!" Shade started running and Izual chasing him.

End of Flashback

As soon as Izual snapped from the flashback his first thought was: Shade. Through the flashback, he managed to regain some his sense, and soon the bushes moved a bit. This got Jasmine, and Izual's, attention. Izual quickly moved off Jasmine as he noticed Shade running through the forest towards the dock. He quickly stood up looked at Jasmine lying there. He held back most of the thoughts in his mind.

"I'm sorry…" said Izual, as he ran grabbing his chain mail. He ran, chasing down Shade who stopped at the end of the docks.

"Where the hell are you Culex?" shouted Shade. "He's late."

"He was never good to depend on, you know." said Izual as he appeared at the part of the dock closest to land, on swim trunks and wearing a shirt, the chain mail hidden under the shirt.

"Izzy…glad you made it." said Shade, grinning bit as he turned around to face him. Izual looked a bit shock, as he took a step back. He looked at his old friend, now bleeding from many parts of his body. Shade was panting, holding onto on his arms. Izual was highly surprised he could still stand from his figure, having no clue of what Shade has been through.

"Shade, what happened?" asked Izual, worried. Shade flashed the three sacred beasts.

"Had to…finish Lilith's bidding." said Shade, chuckling. "And you reached the step in our adventure." Izual looked at him, then examined the situation.

"You are right…." said Izual.

"Indeed. And now, it's where everything resolves." said Shade. "Your last chance…at stopping Lilith, is here."

"But Shade…" said Izual, but he understood what he had to do. "Okay." Shade grinned a bit. as he threw his old at sword at Izual.
"You'll need, if you want a chance at winning." said Shade.

"Shade…" said Izual.
"Quit saying my name Izual. Listen, if I win, then Lilith wins, which means we all lose. If you win, it means I lose, which means we all win, and I'll be free." said Shade. Izual picked Shade's sword.

"But what if you kill me? Or I kill…" said Izual. "We were supposed to be friends till the end…" said Izual. Shade smiled as he used the sword he stole from the Neo's and charged forward and said one last comment.
"Guess the end is now…"