Hello everyone, finally chapter 13 is here! Just one more chapter and we are done! More things are planned with the sequel. Before I spoil some stuffs, enjoy!
Chapter 13: Third Spirit Wars-Devil Awakening
"..."
The scythes are in black, they are elegantly designed with the blades perfectly sharpened, and also contain the savage arts of hell as skull can be found on them.
"GET NANAYA, THAT KID AND THE SPIRITS!"
The hunters surround the group. Arashi calmly joins his sword. Then he shouted.
"SWING IT SHIDO!"
Shido swings the sword sending arcs of shadow that cuts through the hunters. However, the arcs only knocks them back, realising Shido's power is not strong enough. Arashi throws both of his scythes.
The scythes fly towards the hunters, joining up in midair into a gigantic glaive that acts like a saw blade, ripping them apart. With the group of hunters dead, the glaive disappears back into two scythes, fly back to Arashi's hands. The moment they reach his hand, the scythes transform back into a pair of long swords.
With that, another wave of demon appears. Tohka swings her sword, conjuring a large beam that charges towards the demon. However, these heavily armored demon knights are unscathed, protected by the shields protected with demonic magic, Tohka's beam only dissipates upon impact.
"Ugh… It doesn't work!?"
"CHARRRRRGEEE!"
The demons suddenly increases their pace, charging at the group. The Spirits are at loss as they know their powers doesn't work well against them. Suddenly, they hear a sound of metal joining up. They look at the direction where the sound is coming from. The hooded young man whose eyes is blazing in a cold blue light now holding onto a long, double ended scythe. He then charges at the demon formation.
With the vanguards now raise their shields to protect them. Arashi snaps his fingers, a spectral image of Nevermore appears above him and raises his arms in air. Followed by a torrent of big blasts of shadows that erupts behind the ranks. Chaos rampant within, but none of them are seriously hurt. Upon realizing their magical armor protects them from attacks like these. Arashi charges in immediately.
With his sight locked onto the demon in front of him. His adrenaline fuels his senses as everything slow down to a dead stop within his eyes. The scythe turns ethereal upon the contact, phasing through the shield, with the scythe blade materialize behind the shield. The blade traces the line on the demon's neck. With a bit of force, blood spills out front the stump of its neck just as he breaks focus with the demons of all kinds, be it flesh, lightning, fire or ice swiftly surround him. Dark swords start to encircle him just as they seems to flood him. When all seems to lost of the young man, the demons are suddenly blown away by an explosion with souls tearing them apart. Arashi has unleashed the dead souls to destroy the demons. His scythes parry his adversary at the same time impaling the others, killing and extracting the soul of the demons and hunters.
Kotori immediately transform Camael into Megiddo, and shouts at Arashi.
"GET OUT OF THE WAY ARASHI!"
Kotori is aiming Megiddo at the remaining demons and Arashi is in the way.
"DO IT!" he shouted.
Megiddo unleashes a big fireball that consumes the demons. Arashi disappears and reappears into the group while the fireball destroying the demons with the dead souls harvesting them to power up Arashi.
The Spirits have a clear look at the inverted guardian. His cold blue eyes that is covered by his hood is like the Angel of Death has descended into the battlefield.
Suddenly, a dark barrier is erected as a volley of hellish arrow rains down on them.
The demons are shooting at us!"
Realizing nothing is going to happen if he stays around the Spirits and the risk of Amon controlling him.
"Shido! I can't stick around here. I'll go and divert their attention!"
"But…"
"If everyone dies here and that's it! I have to go!"
"Be careful!"
Arashi immediately breaks away, the hunters and the demons intercepts his way. The rain of hellish arrows begin to rain down on him. With his proficiency with his swords. He spins his blade and deflects every arrow, then he heightens his focus and draws out a few throwing knives. He takes a deep breathe and takes aim as everything in his vision to slow down. The young man then throws the knives, all of them hit at the death point of his enemies, killing them instantly.
The Spirits got themselves surrounded by DEM Wizards, the Spirits got their guard on.
"ATTACK! PROTECT THE SPIRITS!"
The soldiers of Yggdrasill open fire at the Wizards. Unlike any enemy the wizards have faced before, the soldiers are extremely well equipped to deal with the wizards. A fierce firefight occurs as the Spirits uses their powers to defeat the Wizards. Not even the Bandersnatches stand a chance as the pulse rifle is also chambered with sabot rounds which punctures their armor, destroying it easily. But demons then start to charge in, using their powers, the soldiers can barely deal any damage to them, forcing the Spirits to keep using their powers. Shido also fights the demon with the shadow blade, and also uses the pulse rifle of fallen soldier to fire at the demons.
"Ugghhh…"
Kotori's head start to hurt as she keeps on using Camael. The sight worries Shido and the rest of them as they know Kotori's limit.
"Kotori!"
"Stay still…"
Shadows weave out from Yuki's palm, entering Kotori's forehead, calming her down and sooth her pain.
"Thanks Yuki… We have to get to Arashi."
"Is okay, have faith in him."
As more Yggdrasil soldiers and wizards show up, the Spirits notices that the numbers of hunters and demons targeting them has lessened. Yuki some how has a bad feeling that something is about to happen to Arashi. The younger twin continue to fight through the hordes with his inverse powers.
His swords suddenly changes to a pair of scythes that he rips through the bodies hunters and demons alike. It is clear that the weapon is actually a shapeshifter, the cries of demons and hunters are either caused by the dull sword, a pair of short scythes, or a dual end sabre and finally, a long scythe. The capabilities of the weapon seems beyond estimation as the user himself is so attuned with the dead that it also shifts into the desire form of its user will. The physical blade not only severs object, but also the soul, powering both Nevermore, Azrael and Amon within.
Nanoka is visibly furious to see Arashi taming his dark side. He can't comprehend the decision of Arashi to not give in to his dark side.
"Arashi… Why? There is only one more thing left to contain…"
Arashi continues to hack and slash through the horde. With a squad of archers in front of him, they now starts to take aim at him.
"DIE, ALL OF YOU! REQUIEM-DEATH DIMENSION!"
With the scythes now turns into a pair of swords, a few swift swings from the sword, instantly rips apart the demons. The power of death forms into arcs of blue light that cover the archers. Suddenly, they are sent flying and apart as a vortex of destruction is unleashed upon them. Some of them are still alive in midair, realizing that, they are somewhat relieved as they thought they are safe. But the sighting of black swords in midair only sends fear into the demons. At Arashi's command, the sword rains down upon them. Impaling the demons in a storm of swords.
"One group down, more to go..."
Knowing the demons are powered and spawned by the hell's gate. Arashi immediately rushes towards its location with his sense.
Hell Gate
"Lord Alastor, that Nanaya is coming to destroy the gate…" a hunter reported.
"His soul is strong, even stronger when the Spirits are around. Take care of the Spirits, I will stop him!"
"KILL THAT NANAYA! Ugh..."
As soon as the demons are dispatched, Arashi appears with his dual scythe drawn.
"I am surprised by your soul, that endurance to pain, our lord's powers. Unlike the other one, gave in easily."
"You are talking about Kyo aren't you? He is dead!"
"Of course he is, we chose the two of you for a reason, that is to serve the Hell. Join him in the hell, let Lord Amon dominate your soul..."
His head hurts as he starts to hear Amon's cursed voice again. He channels his precious mana pool to suppress the Sin Lord within.
"IN YOUR DREAMS!"
The scythe is immediately raised, ready to hack down the lightning being. Alastor dodges the attack at re-engage immediately with a fork of lightning blasting out from his sword. Arashi immediately turns his scythes into swords impaling it onto the ground, grounding himself from the lightning. With that, a volley of shadow blades are summoned and hurled at Alastor who promptly destroy it with his powers.
Arashi charges at Alastor with his swords drawn. The demon knows to avoid parrying Arashi's strikes at all cost. Keep blasting lightning to keep Arashi away.
"Shit!"
Arashi switches his tactics, starts to tap into his mana again blasting shadows at Alastor. The lightning demon barely dodge his strikes as he falls down. Seizing this chance, Arashi immediately summons a shadow blade at sends it to the point of death on the Hell's portal.
"NOOOOOOOOOOO!"
Another fork of lightning disintegrate the blade, now Alastor summons an orb on top of him.
"FEEL THE POWER OF THE HELL'S LIGHTNING!"
The orb repeated blast lightning at Arashi, forcing Arashi to keep himself grounded while Amon is coming close. Desperate, Arashi blast shadows again forcing Alastor to move. At the same time, he summons the shadow blade, hurling them at the demon. Also throwing his throwing knives. But all of them got knocked down by the lightning.
"It is useless, surrender or die!" Alastor declared.
"That doesn't make any difference!" Arashi retorted.
Arashi then sees an opening, through his enhanced sense of speed, he sees a timing between the orb's strikes. Then, he draws out the last throwing knife.
"You hear me? IT IS USELESS!"
He heightens his focus, takes a deep breathe and just as he sees the arc of lightning about to reach his sword, hurls the throwing knife at the orb. The lightning is grounded, while the knife hits the orb right in the point. A violent explosion comes out from the orb, surprising Alastor.
"WHAT?"
Seizing this chance, another shadow blade is conjured and sends towards the portal, the shadow blade pierces the portal, a violent explosion is heard, the rift disappears with the demons isolated back at hell.
"NO! MY SOLDIERS!"
Arashi now grabs his swords which turn back into scythe and charges at Alastor.
"IT'S OVER, NOW DIE!"
"Ughh…"
A scythe blade impales Alastor's body, the victory is absolute as the blade pierces the point of demon. The demon erupts into a field of lightning, leaving behind a set of armor which promptly crumbles to dusts. With the gate destroyed, demons no longer spawn. However with many demons still exist in the battlefield, the danger is only lightened a little as the hell force compose of demons and hunters continues to fight Spirits and Wizards.
Ratatoskr ships keep firing at Qliphoth, it is well armed enough to even fire at 5 ships. All six ships are not severely damaged as they are well defended also with many DEM wizards fighting with Yggdrasil wizard led by Mana and the man known as Dante.
"Chief executioner down, CEO of DEM next!"
At the other side of the battlefield
"I… We... WE DIED…"
A Wizard cries very hard as she sees her physical body being mutilated by the Hunters. She is not alone, alongside with her are other wizards of other countries and Yggdrasil too, among them includes Ryouko and Origami. They are all dead, their ghost remains.
"It's… It's all over…"
Ryouko lamented as well, while tears start to form at Origami's eyes.
"No… I… want to live… I want to avenge Mum and Dad! I want to live with Shido!"
Suddenly, an ominous voice can be heard.
"Fear not, brave warriors, I can grant you vengeance…"
The voice alerts the ghosts at the scene, a male slender figure donning in black hood with the same black leathery armor like Arashi. Underneath the hood, despite shrouded by the shadow and the night sky, the face can be seen partially, his hair seems messy, his skin is fair. The man also have a pair of white tendril wings.
"What are you? Are you an angel?"
"I am not an angel, but I have the powers to help you fight for your loved ones. Your friends out there, the Spirits and that male Spirit that is fighting the demons. They are the only ones that can save your loved ones. There is chance for all of you to be revived. You all must help them, do you all want to?"
The wizards all answer without hesitation.
"YES!"
The man then levitates himself with his wings spanned out with a radiant light that shines on all ghosts.
"There you go, now, they can see you, they can't touch you, but you can. Fight now everyone!"
"LET'S GO! MAKE THOSE DEMONS AND THEIR ALLIES PAY!"
When the ghosts are gone, the enigmatic figure them mutters.
"The battle had heated up, Arashi's fate now only hangs between love and pain... It is my one and only chance to interact with physical world..."
Many swords of light are formed behind the man, flying towards Qliphoth.
Qliphoth
"Mr Westcott, the portal is down! Ripper is there!"
"MAXIMIZE SHIELDS AND TERRITORY AGAINST ENEMY SHIPS! FOCUS FIRE ON RIPPER!"
Qliphoth maximizes their shields against Ratatoskr ships while focus its cannon fire and missiles at Arashi. One of the cannons promptly fires at Arashi when he lets his guard down.
The blast sends Arashi flying as he didn't see it coming, it is strong enough that he landed near the Spirits.
"Ughh…"
"Arashi! Are you alright?"
"I'm fine…"
The shrapnels had left many cuts on his body which are immediately healed as black flame lit on them. Realizing the battle now have shifted, Arashi now attempts to take everything to himself.
"They are shooting at me! I just killed the Hell force's leader, Westcott is next. Buy me more time guys…"
But he is stopped by all Spirits, puzzling him greatly.
"You are not going anywhere this time! Not without us. You just made your sister and your girlfriend worried sick!" Kotori reprimanded him.
Arashi clearly doesn't want to risk their safety, but decides to let them follow him.
"...Alright…"
"Let's move out then!"
On board Fraxinus
"Assailant and the rest are moving towards DEM Ship Qliphoth!" one commander reported.
"STATUS OF ALL SPIRITS." Kyouhei ordered.
"COMMANDER STATUS IS ALL NORMAL, ALL SPIRITS STATUS OK, NO ANOMALIES ON ASSAILANT EITHER OTHER THAN INVERSED SIGNATURE!" Kawagoe report quickly.
"What about Mana?" Reine asked.
"Vitals, checked, all system checked. All green!" Shiizaki reported.
She place her hand on her chest, praying something.
"Shin… Mana… Kotori… Be safe out there..."
"FOCUS FIRE ON THE MAIN ARTILLERY CANNONS!" Kyouhei ordered.
However, Woodman seems to know about the defense system of the ship.
"Wait up, the ship is well guarded with shields and territory. How is the Anti-Territory cannon?"
The commander of another ship reports on the risky side of using the weapon.
"Negative sir, AT cannon is an EMP-based weapon, if we fire right now, all wizards from both side will just die with their equipments dead. We need to get them out of the blast radius."
They are interrupted by the other ship's report.
"SIR, THE MISSILES... THEY EXPLODED BEFORE THEY CAN EVEN REACH ASSAILANT!"
The scene has everyone puzzled from both side.
"That's odd..."
It turns out, the ghost that appeared just now is stopping all missiles from reaching at all. But he is invisible to everyone's eyes. The soldiers and wizards notice that demons, hunters and DEM wizards are being struck down by ghosts. With both living and dead forces fighting side by side, the battle is now evened.
"Tell Dante to move the soldiers out of the blast radius. Fire at will, Fraxinus fire at the cannons."
"YES SIR!"
The crew immediately contacts Shido.
"Shin, can you hear me?"
"Yeah, what's up."
"Listen, we are gonna fire an EMP round, which is going to fry this device of yours and all your weapons from us. Just move towards the ship with Arashi and it will be fine."
"Alright."
"Hunters!"
Kurumi keeps firing bullets from her pistols. One of the hunters got hit by the seventh bullet-Zayin. Just as she is about to finish off the Hunter with a normal bullet, to her surprise, another hunter appears to deflect the bullet and uses his unholy magic to purge away the effects of Zayin.
With both Hunters approaching fast, Kurumi heard Shido's voice.
"DUCK!"
Kurumi immediately squats down, only to see an arc of shadow hitting both Hunters, sending both of them flying, just as they touches the ground, they are frozen solid by Yoshino.
"Get Avatar of Zadkiel!"
Yoshino is now in fear as several Hunters approach. But Tohka and Shido appear at her side, protecting the docile Spirit. A dark of blade arc appears followed by a purple energy wave knocks the hunters back. Yuki sprints towards the hunters in midair, swings the sword of Abaddon, killing the hunters. Miku also got herself surrounded, using Rondo knocking the Hunters back. In mid-air, Kurumi fires her pistols, killing the Hunters. With another wave of Hunters coming with the demons. Yamai twins conjures a big tornado right in their ranks. As their enemies are sent flying in the twister, Arashi infuses the shadows and dead souls, ripping them apart. Now the group moves very quickly towards Qliphoth. At the same time, the wizards of Ratatoskr and Yggdrasil are retreating and also being forced back the world's strongest wizard Ellen who managed to recover and rejoins the battle.
"All clear, fire it!" Dante reported.
"AT cannon, FIRE!"
The ship's cannon suddenly fire a bright blue beam of light. The light swiftly hits Qliphoth, exploding into a bright blue light, lighting up the night sky.
"SHIELDS-20%, ALL DEFENSE REALIZERS-10%, overcharging shields!"
The EMP damage is done, but Qliphoth's shields are still on with minimal capacity. Many Wizards and Bandersnatches that were in the blast radius immediately fall off from the sky as the EMP fries their systems.
"Oh no!"
The blast distracts Ellen as many Wizards are lost. Wizards of Yggdrasil on the other hand are depressed as they almost bring down the shields of Qliphoth.
"Fate… The ship cannot escape his fate, neither is he going to escape the fate of possession…"
Suddenly the moon turns crescent and then full orange, a lunar eclipse, shocking everyone.
"Lunar eclipse? That just happened last week!"
Yuki's eyes are glowing, knowing it is eclipse.
"I'm going in!"
The black and bright blue wings appears and Arashi flies towards Qliphoth at high speed.
"RIPPER APPROACHING!"
"FIRE!"
The cannons now aims at Arashi, who still charges at the ship.
"Bring it down, Arashi!" the ghostly figure muttered.
Arashi opens his eyes, realizing the death of the ship instantly. Lines are immediately formed on the ship, as if it is cleanly cut. The ship then crumbles into pieces and explode.
"ISAAC!"
Ellen flies towards the raining down debris and finds Westcott among them, still alive. She saves him and flies away from the debris. But Arashi at the back giving hot pursuit, with his powers in eclipse, instantly kills Excalibur CR Unit. Sending them to the ground just as the eclipse ends.
"Ugh… YOU!"
Ellen channels the diamond dusts at Arashi, but the young man spans out his wings, the light instantly crumbles all dusts. Rendering all of them useless as the death powers killed the atoms and molecular bonds.
"I have been waiting for this…"
Ellen and Westcott's vision are being engulfed in darkness, only Arashi can be seen in this dark realm.
"What? Just what in the world are you?"
"Demon, demon that ends other demons..."
"Shut up!"
Ellen attempts to channel the dusts, but to her surprise, she can't use them anymore.
"It's useless... I can kill everything that does not belong to the Gaia. Which includes you, me, everyone else, your petty magic including demons and angels."
It is visible that his rage is about to channel onto the two of them.
"Your crimes... Your sentence is death... But you don't deserve a clean death, prepare to face the fate of worse than death..."
Both of them realise what the young man is about to do as fear starts to form on their face.
The young man starts to approach them with his scythes drawn. But suddenly a pain strikes his head.
"Aarrgghhh..."
The unbearable pain forces Arashi to be released from his inverse state, returning the astral suit back to the assassin armor like astral suit and his wings back to the full black. Both of them can see that red curse marks on the skin of his arms between the gloves and the sleeves. His eyes turns blood red. The two can't seems to comprehend what is going on, except the fact that they see it as the fact that he is inverting into a devil like other male Spirits before him.
"Arashi! Amon, the demon souls are answering to him. They are overwhelming me!"
"It's useless Azrael… As close you two have come. Shut the hell gate won't matter anymore, with 14 Blades and Nanaya gone, the world shall witness the true power of Fallen Spirits, avatar of the Burning Hells! Oh, Nanaya Arashi, you are a perfect vessel for the Hell to not just kill your loved ones, and also the High Heavens!"
"ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
Arashi's vision goes dark as his soul is now overtaken by the Sin Lord. His astral suit combust in black and red flames for a while. Afterwhich, the suit's visage now switches to the devil's.
"Hehehehehahahahahahahaha…"
The two are stunned to see that as they never thought they can be alive for a little longer.
"You two… Shall be the first two victims of my total domination of this world. Die and fuel my powers with your soul. EL-DIABLO!"
The demonic sword now forms in Arashi's hand, as he starts to approach them.
"No… I swear, I'll leave you alone next time!"
Westcott's plea is turn to deaf ears as the demon possessed Arashi immediately rips the CEO apart and grabs his soul, absorbing Westcott.
"ISAAC! YOU MONSTER!"
"I am a lord of hell, not just a monster…"
The devil kills Ellen in the same fashion, severing her into parts before absorbing her soul.
"Muhahahaha… Finally, the Spirits, they are doomed…"
The lost of Arashi's soul seems to have been detected by the ghost that bestowed powers and Nanoka himself.
"The final test. Arashi, do your best as a vessel…"
Nanoka himself smiled devilishly as he sensed that. It is visible that the ghost is worried about the fate of Arashi.
"Arashi, everyone, the final testament, please save him. I shall maintain the field now…"
That's all for the chapter. Now for the sequel, the main characters are going to be Mana, Dante(protagonist of Asharoth's fanfic), Spectre(former and last surviving 14 Blade member, or so he claimed), and one computer genius/hacker who I have yet to decide what his last name would be. I currently name him to be Ian. I have not decide whether he is going to be British MI6 hacker or a computer prodigy that is from Malaysia who happens to know about the truth of Spirits. Give your thoughts to me. Thank you.