Behold our Mightiest Warrior companion!

- GrayZeppelin

10/15/2019

Volume One: A Visitor

Chapter VI

A Night To Remember, Part One

"You. . ." The black bear pointed at the mighty bull, rising from the meadow.

The collector illuminated his green eyes. "Did you miss me," Kai spun his chains over his bulky arms and snatched both jade knives, "teddy bear?"

Phantom growled under her throat — she hated for those who kept calling names toward her. Her paw hurled the shadow ribbons, and the mighty guarded in a criss-cross, deflecting the glooms it struck half of the bandits behind the black bear. Fung and Gahri, ahead of the black bear, dashed away into the thick bamboo forest.

The rabbit with left eye patch hollered, and his paw triggering his crossbow. He and the other two archers fired — Kai sidestepped when maneuvering both blades. He backflipped among the air, and both of his feet smashed an open field where the bandits stood. All three flew away.

Phantom rushed to Kai's side and pivoted her golden dragon dagger and pointy flame blade. Guarding against every blow from the bear as she hammered to both sides, Kai booted her toward the stone. As she flipped and rolled back up, Phantom timorously gasped. The Mighty clenched the stone rock, springing into the air, and hurled it to her.

The stone streaked her into the northern bamboo forest, sticks and branches shattering from the fall. For a moment, General Kai galloped with all fours into the trace line of breaking bamboo trees where Phantom fell. Every third-pace of his sharpened his exhale. While arriving there shortly, his green eyes scanned only smaragdine paths but thick branches, and most of the unease meadows enlightened by the moonlight.

A shadow shaped like long ribbons behind the stone snapped, and the bear roared, launching the rock toward Kai. The collector carved the stone in half and bowled forward.

Red eyes glowered at the green eyes. Phantom regarded one light underneath Kai's neck. She recognized the rarety necklace before. Kai's necklace dimmed its scarlet light — the figure which crafted the sorrowful face was Huoju's she-ox sister. Wugu.

"The necklace of yours is a waste. I expect you to mourn Wugu." Phantom spoke with a solemn voice, flattening.

And why would Kai sorrow more now when he had lost his beloved wife centuries ago? He would not let a single tear stream onto his cheek as he had been through the sheds — with only one fatal fire, he witnessed Wugu burn in the house, his world was full of ashes. The mighty warlord darkly chuckled while both hooves revolved his chains. "You sorrow your lover," He fired back with a grim look. With one blade, he pointed it to Phantom, who steadied her fighting stance. "Did Huoju tear you apart?"

"Did your wife leave you?"

"Too bad for you and me," Kai shook his head, snickering. "The puny Ox princess is gone. So that case: I have a business to claim what I love to grasp."

Behind Kai, as the black bear looked beyond the trees and behind thick logs, many green eyes popped open. Six jombies (mountain leopard, two yaks, wolf, and two badger twins) appeared and readied. The twins armed their long, glassy green sticks, nodding.

The black bear clenched her left claw as her silky fur grew bold, and her back was brushing with the cold flow. "Which is?"

"Yours."

And all hell broke loose. Phantom reached out her claw; she bolted shadow ribbons. Kai leaped and spun above it — jombies diverged to sides as the rapid shadow lines sliced branches. Phantom began clouting her dagger and pointy metal against Kai's swift jade swords, which striking to her arm sides. She deflected one sword where her left cheek was, and Phantom clenched Kai's wrist, slamming him to the ground.

Dodging the pointy metal that almost darted his head, Kai wobbled to the left. The mountain leopard sprang behind her with a sharp roar. Its fangs bit under her neck.

Screaming out in the open, Phantom spread her shadows; it slipped the jombie cat away. The bite wound with a nasty scratch behind her back seared with red velvet gore.

The collector held his sparkling green hoof ahead of the black bear. "Bring her to me!" Kai commanded his jombies.

As the jombies did into diversion as the twins mounted long and thick bamboo branches, Phantom elbowed the bulky yak with a missing pinky to its right hoof. She lifted her foot and booted the wolf's pole, striking the lupine's muzzle into a flying blow — Kai felt the wolf's muzzle cracking apart. The badger twins leaped and flew down to the black bear.

Without knowing her tough situation when focusing the yak thrusting him into the downhill, Phantom hurriedly eyed on both badgers' glassy bamboo sticks shaping X, and they hammered her head. The ding sound made fierce as the bamboo poles shattered. Another yak with Mongolian scathe chest armor locked over the bear's inner throat, lifting her to face the collector who ambled nearby.

The twins spread the bear's arms. The wolf behind the jombies galloped its rope dart, trapping Phantom's legs. "This will be all over soon." Kai menaced. Both hooves of his reached out against her.

Trembling to stand still as all jombies wrestled the bear's movement, Phantom thundered her shout. Her shadows around her illuminated with dark purple velvet, becoming more glimmer as she clenched both jombies. The surroundings banged, and every jombie standing when wrestling around the bear shredded many glass bodies into a thousand pieces.

Kai drove back as he guarded himself against the blinding purple blast. "They were my valuable warriors from the Spirit Realm!"

"Not anymore!" she taunted.

The Mighty drew his knives, spinning the chains and hurling them towards the bear. Phantom rolled down after dodging. He jerked the links and let it whirl under his leg while stomping — the black bear plunged her pointy metal forward; Kai leaped and spiraled above her, avoiding the sharp stab. He and Phantom thwacked both swords, wrestling against themselves in dear life and death.

Kai's chi hammered under the bear's chest, and Phantom's dark chi did the same, delivering powerful blows that they staggered back. The bull oscillated his chains; the blades swayed down to her head. The bear sidestepped in each of the blade's hammerings. But the chains engulfed both of her arms after Kai waved the links in a circular motion. He pulled and launched above her; the collector's right hoof knife-palmed at the bear's head and Phantom's forearms guarded.

The strength which empowered the slam thundered her head and her feet crashing the uneven dirt — the ground shook threateningly. When observing Phantom staggering her feet and head, Kai sprang and delivered a fist blow to her upper chest, flying her into the bamboo hills, she wrecked many sticks. She crashed down the log and tumbled her head to one of the giant roots.

Kai ran into the western forest, jerking the chains back to him. The shadow trails seemed growing cold as if yet warming scent to the black bear the bull was following, dissipated quickly. Deep down into the hills with thick trees in which the breaking glass was shining among the horizon, Kai surveyed at the crash site where the black bear fell, his sinus breathing heavily. She was not around or close as he tracked the scent of the bear's sweat and fur farther.

He heard tiny haste to his left. A one-eyed rabbit jumped in between the logs.

"You stinky parasite!" the one-eyed rabbit screamed.

The Mighty guarded his sword and deflected the rabbit's double-kick, springing him off course. The bandit tumbled to the small hollow under the hill; Kai jolted his head into perplexing. "A rabbit pirate?" he asked, sounding — Are you kidding me? — tone with curiosity. "Why so small and such bravery?"

The rabbit gave his head a hateful glare at the bull, popping his fingers. "Because I'll cake your teeth!" the rabbit snapped. "COME ON!"

As the small rabbit hurtled towards Kai's thick legs, the mighty stood still. Letting the rabbit crawl and bite all over him, Kai felt nothing but soft pinches — gray fur, neck, long mane, and his belly as Kai was tickling, holding his chuckle under his breath.

"One tiny bunny. One worthless pirate. I think I'll invite your soul to my collection."

"YEAH?! WELL, EAT ME!" the rabbit cursed when munching the bull's whole belly.

"Okay."

Kai clenched the rabbit's long ears. With the spread of his lips, Kai clawed his glowing green hoof against the loudmouth rabbit's chest. The bandit no longer pitched his scream as the golden ripples around the rabbit absorbed and shifted to a jade amulet, revealing one, mean bunny bandit with eye-patch. "I like this one." He said with a gruff tone.

Just as the mighty was satisfying the small figure, the steps behind him met the branch sticks shattering. It wasn't Phantom's feet as she would have torn the field. Four eyes of jombies appeared — most of the badger twin bodies cracked, including their muzzles, revealing bright green shatters. "Praise the gods!" Kai simpered. "Find the rest of her bandits and bring them to me. This battle won't take long."

One of the twins nodded, and they dashed, bouncing against the logs. Two yaks (brown and black) underneath the twins charged when roaring, and three deer threw their spears, crafted with metal flames. The twins dug, flipped forward, and towered their glassy sticks, spinning upside down. Both yaks yet approached closer toward the unstoppable spinning kicks the twins advanced; both yaks were struck toward the opposite direction and hammered their heads, knocking out cold.

Two deer bandits slipped their blades, and the badgers jumped, dodging the encounter. Big buck lashed his spiky stick against the left badger while the other twin bashed his pole behind him. One buck with a missing right antler bowled forward after the right badger slipped his stick. The left uppercutted the tall — the right sliced one poor deer's chest.

At yards away, Kai squinted his jade eyes, and the badger twins went berserk.

The left twin spun his stick, hammering the brown yak's forehead. The black yak behind the cattle stormed and lifted his battle-ax. The right twin reached out his staff, and his brother's stick guarded underneath the blades. One badger skidded behind the giant's ankles, and the other flipped forward, hammering his pole into the black yak's muzzle.

"MY NOSE!" the black cattle covered his whole nose. Rolling to his right as the shout from Kai commanding the jombies to send Phantom's bandits, the yak bandit shrieked as both his ankles crushed. The twins hurled him, and General Kai absorbed the yak's chi.

Four screams later, while Kai gathered his new amulets, the twins followed their master. The scent was fading; the Mighty raced on all fours as he could determine the black bear was running far. Searching would not be long now — the twins were agile enough to fit through thin gaps as he let the twins enter the bamboo forest; Kai threw both blades, slicing every bamboo to his way.

Gahri continued to hold Fung's arm over his back, fleeing for their lives. The branches and swiveling leaves copied the shouts, which Kai was first, and tree logs tearing apart.

Fung grunted. "We better get to Jade Palace!"

"Those jombies will block our path!" Gahri told him, guiding him and Fung in the opposite direction. Farther behind the crocodiles while running, Trees cracked as the roots pulled away, ripping the terrain where it all stood. Struggling to sprint against the cobble bayou when crossing, Gahri and Fung jerked forward without slowing down, their feet plunging.

"Stop, please! Put me down there!" the alpha winced. His whole foot severed the bone within, almost too delicate when not being careful to yourself. The ankle had displaced to where it was usually after the bear's ribbon twisted his foot.

Gahri did what he was told to do when he supported Fung lying against thick bamboo logs. Roars from where they ran from thundered as if Gahri's fingers trembled with hast, thundering his soft heart while examining Fung's dislocated ankle.

Fung pressed his claw against Gahri's heart. "You will get there fast without me!"

"No!"

Fung grunted, straightening his back using his other leg. "You must go!"

"I'm NOT leaving you behind!" he cried.

A thud sound landed on Gahri's left side. Between the glooms and moon leaves of bamboo logs, the figure with two fluff ears loomed. Without hesitation to find anything defensive without any weapon of choice, Gahri rotated his high kick, breaking one bamboo stick to a pointy pole. "Who are you?!" he clenched the bamboo, squinting at the figure who approached with a single step. "Take another step, and you'll end up dying like those bandits back there!"

The moon from the shadow clouds, which emerging away like a straw hat ripping apart, illuminated its crepuscular twilight to where they were and Fung immediately surprised to see this familiar bandit. A water deer with a broken fang revealed.

"Your friend's ankle is losing his blood. He needs to get a recovery, fast!" the water deer urged. The voice was harsh, combined with womanly boldness and care.

"No way, woman!"

The deer flicked her floppy ears back. "Would you want to see your friend suffering tomorrow? You need help!"

The walloping blow was cracking like the wind shrieking behind the crocodiles. Both figures of gray bull and black bear soared among the trees and into the air — Kai first threw his uppercut and sprang, chasing her. Falling as if not gliding the flight among the sky towards the west, Phantom growled while all four of her limbs whirled.

Ahead of Phantom, Kai arrived first. One hoof battered under the bear's belly as the other did the same — repeatedly giving hard blows. Kai clobbered his final fifth punch to her jaw.

Phantom spun backward as she screamed; the mighty bull swung his arms back, diving. His gray cape was whirling as the breeze to both of his ears raged. Approaching the black bear who was shocked after her tenth flip, Kai revolved to one side, and his right foot slugged Phantom's whole head, leading her with rapid falls toward the upper mountain cliff.

Get your stinky, glassy paws off me, you damn, dirty jombies!

These unfamiliar voices were interfering within his head. Kai began speculating one of his jade badger twins, giving a rich view of his soldier guarding and thrusting the pole against Fung's neck.

"Who the gods name one of my special soldiers?!" Kai demanded as he could see the poor crocodile bandit springing his back with a yelp.

Hey, both of them are talking! Fung startled.

Which one?! Gahri insisted.

A female growl diving ahead of the jombies was the water deer spinning her kicks. The twin clouted her ribcage, leading her to fall beside the river bank.

Gahri, diving his head by another twin who took a swing close to the reptile's neck, tackled the badger by simply slicing his shaft to the jombie's head. The glass was too thick as its blade became thin and sharp, but now the metal had shattered, and half of the grip broke in half.

The badger on the dirt gave a silent glare. Shit! Gahri gasped, before a twin near Fung, spiraling his jade pole, thwacked Gahri's head, knocking him out cold.

"GAHRI!" Fung sobbed, but the badger pressed his stick against Fung's whole neck, restraining his resisting movement, including his breath.

"You are one of the panda's friends. I have a proposition for you." The badger spoke in Kai's intimidating tone.

Phantom clawed the rocky steppe and clenched against the roots lined up with many plants over the towering cliff. Beside her was the waterfall storming its misty cloud to the lake below her. Her pupils painted to a threatening violet color of the horizon's dawn, browsing to her right as he could hear the low echo voices down into the trees.

For a second, the bear was odd to witness this gray bull talking to himself as if both of his jade eyes remained illuminated. "Whether you like it or not, you will bring them to me," Phantom overheard the mighty General.

Who are "them" you are hunting? That doesn't matter now.

Phantom rapidly stretched out her pointy blade, her shadow ribbon snatching the bull's feet. Startling to look down but too late to dodge, Kai was jerking away as he yelped. Gripping her fabric, Phantom shoved him upward toward the edgy structure, slamming him above the cliff.

Letting the shadows swarm over his chains and disarm away from Kai, the black bear jerked herself, reaching to the edge, and twisted her agility body, her left foot clouting Kai's head the bull was kneeling to rise.

Kai flipped his cape to his left as it blinded his sight ahead — Phantom advanced and flew her fist toward him. His bulky wrist guarded up against the intense blow, and his other limb drove at her chest.

Relieving a defensive position after sliding her feet, the black bear withdrew her golden dagger. Kai was about to make his diversion move as his jade knives were behind him, but his opponent was far too aggressive. Phantom drove first, and Kai rushed ahead of her, avoiding eight slashes when the black bear swiveled her weapon, hailing.

Phantom thrust her dagger toward Kai's forehead — he crossed both arms below her wrist, blocking in rigid, and pivoted his foot. Blowing her upper leg, as Phantom was wobbling, the mighty General heaved her whole left arm, which her claw had armed her dagger, forcing her to the rocky structure. Thudding, Phantom dodged her head to her back when Kai bashed his hoof at once.

With simultaneous second as he struck his hoof, somewhere next to his rib cage under, a cold, pointy metal stabbed his fur.

Not — possible! Kai feared, grunting before swaying back. The shadows from Phantom's left paw battered him. Gliding his feet back with an utter diversion to sweep the shadows, Kai checked his wound, which luckily not entered one of his internal organs. Disoriented visions of his began with short glimpses of himself from another time when he flipped the table against his brother.

General Kai strolled within the ancient bamboo library. It once stood from the Panda Village. Inside the library, the floor was brownish marble, meeting the horizon with apotheosis stars, which glimmered into spectacles. Structures were fine gold as the tears covered with pale brown lightning. The ceiling bore with both columns of dragons slithering against the top, the reptilian bodies over both squeezing pillars.

Entering the library, the Mighty warlord registered breathy mandarin voices elsewhere, which Kai caught a single word gōnglǜ, meaning "power." Warlords, such dignity and ruthless generals, conquered the land to wipe common enemies, those who followed their lord commander, and Mongolians they bypassed over the Great Wall. He, including his generals, wanted such being powerful enough to stand and never let a daring warrior defy or deny orders.

NO!

The elder monk with long, pale Fu Manchu in draped brown kimono and straw hat, cried to the warlord. And the mighty warlord battled his tortoise brother before Oogway's Wushi grasp vanished the bull.

"What did you do to me, woman?!" Kai snapped, grunting.

"You see," the black bear began with a sinister glance, "you have interest some visioning chi from a sacred bamboo palace within. At one thousand hikes down to the northern pike, pandas monks destroyed the curse of men, but only this — oracle they have found before you."

Kai began clenching his teeth as the wound stung within inner nerves firing. Growling, he pressed his hoof against his injury. Phantom, giving a wicked smile, stretched out her claws; the bull's jade eyes dimmed, and him disorienting was now the black bear began satisfying to watch him struggle. "Of course, you are no longer invincible, because only now, your cursed age lasts until the Year of Tiger, on June to your 55th mortal year."

Kai roared and jumped, fisting forward.

Phantom snarled when pivoting the wrist and thrust her dagger under the bull's neck. Kai's other open-hoof hammered her wrist away. The pointy blade launched in between his eyes. Spinning back with mobility, Kai booted the pointy knife and the other to her jaw, flying the bear back. Crashing her back to the rocky ground, Phantom jolted her feet. The mighty warlord aimed his foot at her whole head.

Phantom walloped her foot under Kai's crotch, thrusting him away as he winced. Her shadow ribbons from her claw grasped his feet after she stood up, yanking him upward. She slammed him down, and Kai bellowed in deep agony to his whole chest. His left hoof reached out the chains ahead of him —

Shadow ribbons tangled Kai's wrists, spreading both limbs from him, reaching both jade knives. The clouds hastily swarmed the chains. Phantom caught the links, engulfing them around Kai while the other continued resisting both of his limbs. "You remind me of Wugu's pain," Phantom softly snarled next to the bull's ear. "Huoju could have pulled your eyes out to let his sister see your vision."

Her claw pulled the chains and the other aiming the wrist-dagger behind the bull's mane. Making tight enough to choke Kai's breath, let Phantom pull her grin. "I know what it's like for you to have. Something much more valuable than taking the Dragon Warrior's chi and your tortoise brother's head."

One of her ears flickered, and her eyes pointed to the south, where the wind made a sharp blow of the iron hammering and blade slicing. This was something the black bear being aware of this presence. Something she had heard this familiar song, blessed and brushed against her heart. While Phantom unmasked her frightening look, Kai's necklace glimmered to a pink-crimson orb, with she-ox's piercing-cry casting the claw away.

Crimson surroundings swung the black bear into the air, like an iron maul slamming under the jaw. Phantom cast away to the north, wailing into the clouds.

Kai tumbled his whole body forward, rasping. The chains over him were still tangled, yet his visions began blurry with balloon sides, and his wound flared with more slices than a single stab. Most of his strengths were wasting as if him becoming frail. Underneath his neck, his necklace dimmed back to normal, crying with the husband's name Kai was easily beamed. His back drew his weight to the edgy cliff, and Kai fell beside the waterfall towards the lake. Shutting his eyes without lifting to eye on his fall, Kai only felt as he was soaring into the clouds — then a loud splash swallowed him.

Sinking deep under the surface as the moonlight ripples lid at the bull and farther away, Kai faced the surface, thinking of his time would soon pass on. Forget Oogway. Forget the black bear. Forget for those who faced me. Kai thought in downcast.

The surface was ripped with foams as the splash muffled. And this time, it was either the Spirit Realm he returned, or a better life Kai wished not to be disturbed once more. The bull repeatedly blinked above, making sure his vision was not in delusion. The last thing before his lids shut was a blinding, misty azure figure swimming down to him.

Everything went to black, lungs emptied and filled with water under the bull's throat. Kai lastly felt his giant right wrist band grip — firm and small paw.

Author's Note:

— Instead of Kai watching her dead wife swim down to him, who do you think of someone's paw clenching the Mighty's hoof? Find out soon enough before the next chapter this Friday!

— Okay. It's not entirely the best fighting of both Kai and Phantom as they opposed to themselves with emerald and dark chi abilities. Realizing that how our mighty friend either absorbed his forbidding chi that hungered (or kill) living souls or something made him a power-hungry warlord where he should not ever be at the wrong place at the wrong time.

— Who do y'all think has the best female voice for my princess black bear?! Kate Winslet with I'll never let go, Jack? Lena Headey with the Mad Queen of the Seven Kingdoms? Or Cate Blanchett with Goddess of Death? My boy Huoju voices as Khal Drogo, so choose his nǚwáng(queen) carefully! Sorry, Khaleesi!

— We have some unfinished party business to attend to where our panda friend endlessly devours his dumplings. Move on to the next!