WARNING: Violence, blood, injury.
The Wrath of Cygnus
At the start of the battle, June did nothing but stick in place, that long whip hidden in the rear. Nachi studied her curiously, waiting for a reaction, but no movement ever came. Wasting patience as much as time, he shouted and ran at her to test the waters, and she reacted by spinning the weapon around her figure once, then following with a gallop to the side. After that, her image completely vanished from view.
People watched baffled, Nachi a little less so. At first glance, the Chameleon Saint had disappeared entirely, but Wolf could still distinctively hear the steps of her boots. When he first attempted to follow her position, something cracked loudly around his legs, forcing him to be put. It seemed June was using her whip to confuse his hearing, if not to keep him on hold.
"Where is she?" Seiya scanned around the arena, but couldn't find her. "Did she just become invisible?"
"This is crypsis," answered Shun.
"Crypsis?"
"She is completely camouflaged, like a chameleon. Sound can still give her position away, but she is using the whip to create an opening."
"Ah, that's awesome!"
Eventually June did stride at Nachi, but he heard her enclosing steps and swung to strike her with the claws. She barely dodged by twisting her body mid-air and sliding behind him into a three-point stance, fully visible again. He charged at her the next time, therewith she went back into hiding, cracking the whip at his thigh and seeking to mess with his senses.
The next attack she sent Nachi's way was a total failure; it was as if he could hear her steps clearly despite the aggressive noise of the whip's impacts. With a preemptive punch, he did hit June in the face, although the subpar precision made it glance off awkwardly. The girl took advantage of her momentum and bounced behind him again, following with a back somersault onto a single leg.
Before she could fully regain balance, Nachi burned his Cosmos and blasted through the sound barrier, a fist aimed at her stomach. "DEAD HOWLING!" he shouted. The blow was such that Chameleon got launched off into the distance, skidding over the ground to a stop.
"Ugh… not working, huh?" June whispered to herself as she kicked back up. "Got to change strategies."
Nachi was approaching more slowly, not one to fight mindlessly at the sight of success. Both combatants burned their Cosmos, but Chameleon's display of colors wowed everyone once again.
The muted blue shade of June's Cloth began to radiate into iridescent mixtures of vivid tones, from red, to orange, yellow, green, teal, and purple. The sparkling aura she emitted also came with its own palettes, like nebulae as an intricacy of her Cosmos.
Breaking the sound barrier yet again, Wolf was not as confident in what would happen next. June, in fact, did the same, albeit in an entirely different direction. It was impossible for most to see, yet she threw her whip at him and used his own movement to tie his torso, which she used as leverage to fling herself sideways in the air. With the same level of power, the Chameleon Saint pulled the handle in with both hands, being launched towards Nachi, both boots lifted straight at him.
The double kick was perfectly planted into the man's chest, leaving him winded and cracking the breastplate with such force it echoed in the venue. The crowd gasped with how much more violent that strike had been than the last one. Wolf got up quickly despite the lack of air, knowing that striking directly would no longer be an option with that change in strategy. He would have to cut down the distance on his own.
However, it had gotten impossible to reach her. With that long whip, June would hit him from afar and engage in all forms of acrobatics to dodge his heavy punches. It was once he was close enough for a swing that he received the most grueling series of blows, with Chameleon actively using his shoulders as a platform to flip back and up into the air.
"RAZOR WHIP!" Each crack of the whip in the air sky sent slices of lightning racing ahead, three of which opened large and wide cuts through Clothless sections of Nachi's body.
Stubborn, he did sit up again and knelt, but the many wounds made by June's technique bled profusely, and in his further efforts to keep on battling, he only made it worse. His flesh was pierced with the shock of so many large cuts drawn across his flesh, and so he fell back to the ground, a hand slammed in an attempt to get up another instance.
"Come on, Nachi… just stay down," June whispered to herself at the sight. Watching him struggle needlessly was worrying; the longer he spent fighting back, the more likely he was to die from those injuries.
He was able to stand onto his weakened legs, thus he vainly ran towards the foe. After receiving another series of full-on hits, pain pulsated harder from the edges of his open flesh. It was straightforward for June to strike an opponent this weakened, though at that point she held back on the fierceness of every attack. Soon enough, exhausted and having lost so much blood, Wolf fell to his knees, then face first onto the floor, passed out.
The countdown started, although June turned to one of the entrances and shouted at the crew: "What are you waiting for? Bring in medical before he bleeds out!"
Despite hesitation, eventually paramedics entered, since treating those wounds wouldn't be the most difficult. Indeed their hurry was to avoid a worse clinical emergency and nothing else. While June was declared the winner of their bloody bout, Wolf received the necessary medical attention.
The girl returned to the Saints' benches, grabbing her belly with a groan. "I'm going to feel that one for a while," she complained.
"Who cares? You did amazing!" Shun said excitedly.
"Thanks! Sad that I had to cut him up like that."
"Yeah," Seiya agreed, "Nachi is actually an alright guy. He should be fine soon."
A crew member called from the side: "Last fight's up. Cygnus and Lionet to the halls!"
It was while Hyoga and Ban walked for the stairs that the square end of Shun's chain acted up, albeit with no rhyme or reason. It flipped in multiple directions in his wrist, wildly flipping as if faced with a confusing threat. Unlike his fight with Jabu, this time it did not settle on a clear target, and simply subsided over the course of time. "What?" he muttered, looking down. "The chain is reacting to some threat, but…"
"So that's Hyoga… the Cygnus Saint, huh?" Seiya interrupted Shun's thoughts with a glance towards the Russian coming in their direction. There was silence as the three exchanged stares with him, who turned and went down the stairs without ceremony. To test out a theory, Andromeda looked at the chain once more, but it had fully calmed down at that point.
"That guy gives me the creeps for some reason," June commented.
"I felt that too. He used to be a distant guy, but that's not the same Hyoga I met as a kid," said Seiya.
Shiryu walked in the halls while no longer in his Cloth, but rather in a light blue outfit composed of a long-sleeved tunic suit and baggy pants, the sort of thing he preferred to wear casually back in China. Since he wouldn't fight in the first stage, he chose to watch the battles with Shunrei in the bleachers. As he made his way through the circling corridors, he heard a suspicious knocking from above, loud enough to make him look. "Hm?"
The noise was persistent, and moved swiftly through the ceiling until it turned louder and disappeared in a faraway corner. Shiryu felt the need to investigate, but, after a second thought, decided it could've been some quirk of the building's plumbing. Instead he left the occurrence behind and left to watch the match.
The announcer's voice returned, as excited as when the event began: "Now, to the last battle of the night! Cygnus Hyoga! Lionet Ban!"
The two walked in from opposite ends and positioned themselves at the inner circle, Ban being a considerably taller man than Hyoga, albeit nowhere as tall as Geki. The golden-skinned Lionet Saint wore a copper-colored Cloth even simpler than that of Wolf, with a plain circlet, layered shoulders, and embellishments — shaped after flowing clouds — on either side of the stocky gauntlets.
"So you're Hyoga," he said. "I remember you from the mansion." Hyoga stared on and gave no response, aloof, refusing to express any emotion. Even contempt, which filled his heart at the time, could not be read on his semblance. "What, are you giving me the silent treatment?" Again, nothing came from trying. Without response, both got ready and the fight was announced. "There's no reason to be this cold!"
As Ban finished that sentence, Cygnus stormed in with a full punch to the head. He then threw a punch his own, which was defended with ease in a puff of snow. They engaged in one of the better flowing back-and-forths of the competition at that point, swinging with severe intensity, each smack preceded by a sonic boom, then followed by the sparks of clashing metal. Occasionally the force of their hits was enough to shift their bodies in place, gliding boots on the floor.
Hyoga was not quiet for long, projecting a war cry and a double palm strike with such pent-up Cosmos that Lionet was pushed back a small distance; in its sequence came a flying kick, which knocked the opponent on the nose. Ban was swung aground, turning to the side and holding a nosebleed.
Once up, he noticed the Cosmos his adversary built up beforehand was a joke compared to what he built up next, a pale, freezing aura forming around Hyoga. Not only that, but he had one leg up and both arms in the curved form of a swan, a pose that would seem gracious if not coming from a Saint so menacing.
Perfectly shaped crystals began to desublime straight off the air around them, circulating a trail of wind that originated from Cygnus himself. "This is… snow?" Ban whispered, frowning and noticing that if he allowed this technique, he would be in serious trouble.
Once he lunged at Hyoga, it was already too late, as he was met with an icy fist carrying gales so intense it threw him all the way to a wall and into a newly made hole. "DIAMOND DUST!" There were speckles of frost over the Lionet Cloth and parts of Ban's body, and he seemed half conscious after the harsh impact.
Due to the lack of response, the countdown began, yet Cygnus calmly made his way to the loser. He wasn't done yet, now grabbing him by the black hair and throwing him face first onto the floor.
"What the hell is Hyoga doing?" Seiya said.
Shun couldn't believe his thoughts, but had no other guess: "He is trying to kill him!"
Hyoga knelt beside Ban, lifted an elbow above his head, and struck him violently on the left side of the back, apparently shattering through some bone and making the enemy cough blood. Saori, who watched everything from an individual well lit cabin at the highest point of the Colosseum, stood from her armchair and realized in shock what was about to take place. "Stop! You're going to kill him!" she yelled. Of course, this was useless, for he could not hear her.
Even still, to her surprise, Cygnus stood and stared directly at her from where he was, in an apparent act of defiance, if not a direct threat. Having been declared the winner, he would've continued hitting Ban if there were no possibility of other Saints getting involved.
Saori squinted, finding his attitude too suspicious to be the mere lashing out of a rebellious orphan. "You are not here for the Cloth either, are you, Hyoga?" the woman whispered in thought.
First-aid responded with haste to Ban's situation once they were clear to enter, knowing there was a high chance of cardiac arrest. They put him onto a stretcher and pressed on to have a chance of saving his life, all under shocked eyes of ignorant folk. People were told to expect a clash unlike any martial art event in history, but they never stopped to think it could end in death in the name of spectacle.
On the bleachers, Shiryu seemed apprehensive, whereas Shunrei was genuinely frightened. "Do you think he'll make it?" she asked.
When the girl turned to Shiryu, she noticed he no longer gazed at the arena, but rather somewhere far inside the Colosseum. Apparently he pursued something in the shadows, then noticing Shunrei's piercing, innocent look in the corner of his view, which pulled him back in. "Huh? I'm not sure, but I believe he will," he told.
"You have to quit! This tournament is dangerous after all! That Cloth is not worth your life, Shiryu."
"Shunrei…" He nodded negatively, albeit understanding of her worry. "Based on what Old Master said, way more innocents could die if the wrong person gained possession of that Cloth. I have to fight no matter how dangerous."
The girl sighed, hands tightly held together while she witnessed Ban being carried out. "I'll be honest, I'm scared."
"It's fine to be scared, though somehow it's not Cygnus that I'm concerned about, but something else…"
"What is it?" A response pended. Like before, she saw that Shiryu wandered his attention to the shadows. "Shiryu…?"
"I get a strange sense of dread in the air. It might be just a feeling."
With the end of the first day of the Galaxian Wars, the Saints who fought were either exhausted or hospitalized. Seiya, Shun, and June strolled peacefully during sundown, the sidewalk a little bit more populated than was usual. Pegasus stretched his arms. "Man, what a crazy day!"
"Agreed. It started today, but I cannot wait until this tournament is over," Shun said.
"Yeah, no joke."
June's face turned to a fancy flower shop on the other side of the street. "Oh, look! A flower shop! I might get some flowers for Nachi when I get the chance to visit him at the hospital," said the girl.
Seiya looked at her, baffled. "For Nachi? What, you're in love with him?"
"What? Did you see the way I kicked him? I'd never do that to someone I have a crush on," the girl replied with a goofy giggle. "I just want flowers to wish him quick healing and to make up for hurting him."
"Good idea!" Shun, gentle as he was, couldn't help but think the same way. "Maybe I should buy some for Jabu too."
Now Seiya was more than baffled, but perplexed. He tried to snap them out of that mindset: "Seriously? Come on! You guys are going to buy flowers for your opponents?"
"Is there a problem with that?"
"You guys fought each other! Not only that, I'd feel insulted getting flowers from someone who beat me up." Seiya shrugged and rolled his eyes. "Just my opinion."
June contested that: "Seiya, it's not because we're fighting each other that we're no longer friends."
"I'm friends with you guys, not with, like, Jabu or Ichi… with them I'm colleagues at best."
"Well, colleagues are better than enemies," Shun remarked.
"Yeah, yeah, tell that to him! Tell that to Hyoga as well, I don't think he'll be that kind of a colleague if you get to fight him."
With a nervous scratch to her nape, June remembered the tournament tree and the fact that, if Hyoga won against Ichi, he would certainly be her next opponent. Judging by the power he had shown that day, that was very likely. "I still wonder why he acted that way in the Colosseum," she sang in preoccupation.
"Hyoga has always been a bit cold, but never cruel," said Shun. "Something must have happened in Siberia."
"The extreme cold must've rubbed on him while he was there."
Shun disagreed: "Hyoga was born in the Soviet Union, he must be used to the extreme cold. There is more to it than that. I think he might be fighting for something important, like you and I are."
Seiya breathed in deep and released it all at once, a sign of the weight he felt over his shoulders. He doubted that was the case, but there was no argument that no one would try to kill an opponent needlessly just to get the Gold Cloth. The amount of thinking required to come up with a plausible theory made him shake those thoughts off and keep walking in front of his partners. "Ah, nothing's ever simple, is it?"