WARNING: Blood, injury, violence.
Confronting The Phoenix
Believing that someone like Hyoga had considerably exhausted Ikki, June went for a fight with high hopes of winning. It didn't take long for her to notice it wouldn't be as easy as she foresaw, as soon as he projected the first slices of fire aimed at her. She had successes deflecting flames using the whip, but that required her to rethink her aggressiveness and prioritize dodging.
All that open space was filled by Ikki's strength, which he abused without care. Escaping his strikes was easy, as she was much faster, but finding a good opening seemed impossible. Her plan soon changed from attempting to defeat him, to stalling him in expectation for reinforcements, but when she barely dodged a punch that opened a crater in a rocky pillar, she had a glimpse of what would happen in the occasion of a misstep. "Th… this guy is really strong," June whispered, bracing for his next oncoming stride.
She somersaulted back to a higher formation, missing a flying punch, and then Ikki was outrun by her from that height. The girl jumped off and twisted in the air, swinging the whip at his face from far above, a move parried by a gauntlet. Having landed at the same height again, she cartwheeled away from another punch, then flipped once more to dodge another, and finally rolled to the side to escape the last one.
"You're a slippery one," Ikki complained.
June mumbled: "I really need some help here." She peppered him with cracks of the whip, which he expertly averted with the forearms, in the end crouching out of its direction and plunging with immense force at her. To avoid getting rammed, Chameleon jumped directly up and back, flipped uncontrollably in the air dozens of times, and only braked the momentum when she straightened her limbs to brace for the next attack.
"PHOENIX FLIGHT!" Phoenix threw a tunnel of flames at her, and the winds it generated sent her further than she had jumped. There was little she could do besides cover her skin with pieces of her Cloth and twist sideways on the floor to soften the fall. She got up with the aid of her last roll and slid the whip behind her, accruing enough Cosmos to make the Chameleon's iridescence show. Ikki walked slowly at her, raising more Cosmos of his own. "You are strong too, although not enough to defeat me on your own."
"I'm not on my own," June told him.
"What do you…" The man was grabbed from behind, and the cold sensation on his back told him all he needed to know. "What?"
Hyoga coiled arms with Ikki and held him with force. "I told you I haven't lost yet," he said. "I will not go down without taking you down a peg."
Ikki snarled in anger. "You are barely alive! How strong can your death wish be?" When he tried to slip off the trap, he felt some piercing pain, like thousands of tiny needles digging through the flesh of his hands and arms. "AAAH!"
"June, now! Use the Razor Whip!" Hyoga ordered.
"But… what about…"
"Do it now!"
"Fine." She leapt into the air, spun gracefully, then sliced ahead, energizing the whip to cut through Ikki's Cloth and skin. "RAZOR WHIP!" Cygnus was also slightly hit in the shoulders, but the large cuts that ripped their enemy and even shattered some of the armor seemed worth the sacrifice.
Hyoga crawled slowly, blood dripping from his left shoulder, whereas Ikki stood fully with visceral moans of pain. His arms and shoulders felt stiff, sluggish, and pulsated with the frostbite. The cuts June opened were also somewhat deep and wide, and much blood dripped through the holes dug in the Phoenix Cloth. "Damn it! This pain…" He sighed, hovered a hand over the wounds, and proceeded to scream more once he concentrated warm Cosmos into it. The flames crudely cauterized the openings and warmed up the embedded frost to boot, leaving him panting afterwards. "I have to admit you got me good there."
"If you think I'll give you time to recover, you are quite mistaken," June said, going directly for Ikki once more. He gritted the teeth at her sight and, too slow to escape, took a full double-footed kick to his injured chest. The two flew all the way to a wall, fissuring the sides, then Chameleon stepped off him with a back flip. As she came down and whipped at him, Phoenix skipped beyond the speed of sound, following with a heavy jab that made her recoil and glide back.
He flexed the arms again, feeling that pain worsen with every movement. "Grrr! This hurts too much! That damn Hyoga is going to pay!" Ikki growled.
June, already recomposed, strolled around her enemy's perimeter. That was it — if she kept him busy in that state, it would've been enough for when the others arrived. "Tell me, Ikki, why's the Gold Cloth so dear to you that you're willing to die for it?" she asked.
"There is no Cloth like a Gold Cloth. If one of us got to wear it, Graad would never be able to stop us. Even better, we would have an edge over Sanctuary."
She snickered and shook her head. "You guys are getting ran over by rookies like us, you'd be dead in a second if you started a war against Sanctuary."
"Maybe your latest foes were, but I am no ordinary fighter." Ikki growled in pain and rose his Cosmos, a raging haze surrounding him. "Let me show you some more!"
Chameleon cracked the whip at him and the two moved out to exchange further blows. This once, with how awkward Phoenix's swings had become, June could dodge him with greater ease, and his strikes never connected as effectively. Even still, were his arms to heal enough that he felt safe in using them, she feared he'd become as dangerous as he was at the start.
Time was of the essence, though the other Saints had to rest after their respective plights, and they refused to leave Seiya behind in that state. To them, more Dark Saints could be about, and there was no telling which other ones had been defeated apart from the three they had seen. Pegasus soon did come to his senses, and the pain had faded in its entirety.
"Ah… I think the pain is gone," he said.
"Do you feel like you can stand?" Jabu asked.
Seiya sat up and stirred his limbs. "I'm still a little beat up, but I can move."
"So Jabu was right after all. The Black Death Fist can in fact be healed by bleeding the spots," Shun commented.
After dragging palms on the rocks to dry them up and remove some of the toxin, Jabu got up and stretched. "So, should we continue looking for enemies?"
Shun agreed: "Yeah! We took two of them down, and it is true that you took down Dark Pegasus, is it not, Seiya?"
"I did. He was easy, all things considered. It was just the Black Death Fist that was worse than I thought."
"This isn't good…" Shiryu said standing behind them, arms crossed and lost in thought.
"What's the problem?"
"Jabu has a damaged Cloth and has been severally hurt, it's not safe for him to fight," he said.
Unicorn interjected for a moment: "I can still fight!"
But Shiryu insisted: "Not only that, Seiya has been weakened by this Black Death Fist, and lost a lot of blood, although his Cloth is fine. Mine is as well, however, I have little blood remaining in my body. The bleeding has largely stopped, but I feel lightheaded and realized I am weaker than usual. Shun is the only one among us who is fit to fight."
"As long as we're together, we can get through this," said Jabu.
"Perhaps, but risking ourselves is needlessly rash, especially you, Jabu. Any strike might be fatal with a Cloth that broken."
Seiya planted hands to the floor and got up with difficulty, Jabu and Shun crouching to give him support. "Ah, I don't care," he said, "I'll put my Cloth back on and fight some more."
"That's what I'm talking about," Jabu said with a proud smile.
"Are you sure?" Shun asked out of preoccupation.
"Don't worry about me, I can carry my own weight."
Shiryu nodded and walked closer to the next exit. "Fine. As long as we are not holding Shun back, we should be alright. Get your Cloth on and let's get moving," he said.
After Pegasus had put the remaining pieces of the Cloth back on, the four went down the darker passages of the Ten Wind Caves, now rather deep into its entrails. The three ones behind carried the pieces of the Gold Cloth they collected: the two shoulders, the two greaves, an elbow, a gauntlet, and the breastplate. Andromeda was up ahead, paying close attention to the square end of the chain, no reaction having passed so far.
They tried a couple of exits which were unsuccessful, either leading nowhere, leading to burrows too narrow to enter, or leading to places too dark to see in. So Daedalian were the caverns that there came a point the Saints couldn't tell which passages they had already visited and which ones they had not. Due to the gargantuan length of its insides, it would take days — if not months — to traverse it with cheap strategies, so they kept trying their luck.
It was with a lucky bet that Shun's chain acted up ever so lightly. "Oh, it sensed something," he whispered, stopping and scanning around with his arms. The tiniest of biases and tilts were enough to shift his direction, as the Andromeda Chain gave them the only semblance of security they could find. So they walked, and walked, and walked. At first they blindly followed the chain; later they followed the violent clash of Cosmoi; finally, close enough, they noted the noises of a violent quarrel. The chain could only point directly at a threat, and the Cosmos could only hint at a general direction, but sound echoed in ways that could be traced even in a structure so labyrinthine. "Do you hear that?"
The four went absolutely silent. They could make out the details from that far away, nothing else able to echo that deep if not the battle. They heard rocks being struck, boots running, shock waves, rolling shards… but it was the characteristic sonic boom of a cracking whip that prompted them to chase after its direction.
"That was a whip! Come on, it points down this way," Shun said.
The Saints turned a few more corners and exits, and the place became brighter and brighter with more clefts present at the top. When the cave widened into an enormous rocky chamber, they got a panoramic view of the situation: June and Ikki fought fiercely, and Hyoga had crawled over to a boulder in the distance, showing little signs of consciousness.
"Shun, we'll check on Hyoga!" Seiya told him. "You go and help June."
He nodded, although that wasn't what he had in mind. The four ran close to Hyoga; Jabu and Shiryu crouched near him. "Are you awake, Hyoga?" the latter asked, and the other responded with a limp nod. He was just resting in preparation for reinforcements, or so it seemed.
Shun stood ahead of them and watched the fight, keeping up with every movement, no matter how incredulously fast. June cut through the air with a kick to Ikki's chest after missing a crack of the whip, and he responded by holding his right arm and exploding with Cosmos and striking her face with flames. She fell back and rolled, having to hold the mask to stay hidden. "Glad to see you guys safe and sound!" she said. "I need a hand though."
Ikki gave his little brother a wry smile. "I was sure we would meet again, Shun. All of the pieces are gathered here, so I suppose you have defeated my remaining allies," said Phoenix. "You possess great potential. It is your idealism that holds you back."
Shun appealed to him the only way he knew how: "They are all dead, Ikki. This war is over, so please, stand down. You cannot win against all of us at once!"
"Maybe you are right, but regardless, if this will be my grave, I will bury some of you with me for good measure," he said, seriously rather than sarcastically.
"What?" Shun couldn't believe that man was his beloved sibling, the one formerly so protective. "What is the point of this, Ikki? This cannot be you! I know you are better than this!"
"This cannot be me…?" his voice cracked, and he raised it thereafter. "What do you know? This is what I became!" The Saints frowned at that, with the exception of Shun, whose gentle eyes assumed a worried arch. "This — this is who I am now! This is me, and I will die as my true self if there is no other choice!"
"Oh, I get it," June interrupted with a dismissive tone.
"Huh?"
"You're all people who fell into despair due to circumstance, not unlike us. In one hand, you want to inflict your suffering unto others; in the other hand, you want to die as you do it, since you can't stand living with what you became. This is a suicide mission."
"No, you don't get it at all." Ikki flexed both arms and conjured sparks of fire that twisted around the fingertips. "We wish to free humanity from the subjugation of those who control us. This is a rebellion against the gods!"
"I see the same unbridled anger in you that I saw in the last Dark Saint I killed." June lifted her whip to the side and rose her Cosmos, and Phoenix prepared to continue their conflict. "You may be Shun's brother, but to me you're like any enemy I've had before me. I'll give you the same end as them."
Suddenly, the Andromeda Chain hurried to tie around the two's wrists, and Shun tensioned on them so that they'd have trouble moving. "June, stop! No more killing, I beg the two of you!" he yelled.
"Don't get in my way! It's clear this won't end with all of us alive," June replied.
"I will not accept losing the people I love like this! Ikki, throw the towel. Forget the Gold Cloth and let us talk this out. You are just confused!"
Ikki sighed and shut his eyes, pulling lightly to pressure his little brother. "My dear Shun…" he said with profound sincerity "… you should listen to your comrades more often." He screamed and pointed a palm in Chameleon's direction, filling the view with an expanding sphere of ember.
June bounced out at the speed of sound, enough to pull Shun with her slightly. The boy had to kneel and loosen the chains to release the two, lest their added power tear him in half. Although he was incapacitated by disillusionment, Seiya, Shiryu, and Jabu ran in as well, scouting Ikki from afar and studying moments to strike together.
The ensuing fight was intricate and chaotic. The Saints had to make a lot of space with how quickly they moved, so they often stormed along walls, kicked off pillars, and ended up compromising the cave's structure. Ikki first went off after June, his most rested adversary apart from Shun, but she whipped at him and disappeared with a flying cartwheel. Listening to her steps was impossible with the bedlam filling the chamber.
Charging at Phoenix from the front, Seiya had a fast punch defended by the enemy's gauntlet, but still ripped off a painful groan from him. Before Ikki could properly respond, Jabu was just as speedy to kick him in the back of the head, a full-on hit that pushed the man onto Seiya, who then used the spin to throw him to the floor.
Ikki instead flipped fully forward and crouched without much balance, seeking composure only to swing flames at Unicorn and force him to jump back. June appeared yet again, her whip being grabbed in Phoenix's fingers, through which he pulled her in and struck her in the stomach so hard she flew far.
Both Seiya — who had run around the action and returned — and Shiryu attacked at once, the second tackling with the shield forward. Ikki was pushed back, then pushed Pegasus' mid kick off with both hands, keeping an eye on an approaching Jabu. "Too much!" he yelled. Unicorn produced blasts of energy from his leg; Ikki blocked them with crossed arms, then erected a wall of fire to push them off.
It was clear he wouldn't have time to counterattack properly if all of them kept raining on him at every opportunity, so when Shiryu's fist reached him and produced a shock wave, he grabbed it in his palm and pointed an index at the man's eye. Hyoga quickly recognized the move from where he sat. "Watch out!" he warned.
"DEMON FIST!"
Dragon raised the shield arm again, and the reflective material scattered the string-thin light into many dimmer lines that affected no one. Impressed, Hyoga took good note of that, trying to think the same way a fighter like Ikki would.
From left and right, the man's mistake was punished. "PEGASUS METEOR FIST!"
"UNICORN GALLOP!"
Ikki was beaten so brutally he couldn't even sound off the pain, and the remaining Phoenix Cloth was reduced to smithereens. Its large shards fell with him to the ground, leaving him only in a blue t-shirt and denim pants.
"Ikki!" Shun yelled, running to him while all Saints — with the exception of Hyoga — stood in a circle around the enemy. "Are you alright?" The boy approached, as dangerous as it was, and offered to aid him.
"Shun, don't!" Seiya warned.
His big brother back slapped him away without care, to the extent that he almost fell. Andromeda eyed him with fear and confusion, tears pooling in his eyes. That certainly wasn't the one he knew in his childhood. "Never treat your enemy as a friend again," Ikki demanded.
June cracked her whip against the floor in frustration and said: "You bastard, he's your brother!"
"More reason to keep him on his toes," he answered while getting up. The sensation in his body, especially from frostbite, still caused him to groan. It was clear to the Saints that he was falling in pieces.
"Now your Cloth is gone," Seiya said, "the next time we attack, there will be nothing to protect you. Are you sure you want to die?"
Ikki started with a chuckle, then a hoarse laugh. "Do not be so naive. How can my Cloth be gone?" The fragments on the ground turned to ember, then ashes, and then burst from his feet, blazing from the ankles up to the forehead. "I may be bruised, bleeding, frostbitten… but my Cloth, gone?" Soon the orange shine of a perfectly reformed Phoenix Cloth reappeared, covering his whole body, and the other Saints watched aghast. It felt as if most of their effort had been wasted. "This is no mere Bronze Cloth, Seiya, but the greatest of them all! By destroying it, you have only given it back to me fully repaired."
"Whatever, I don't care." Seiya lifted his fists and prepared to continue, and this time Shun squeezed the chains too. "With or without a Cloth, we will beat you in the end."
"Shun," Ikki whispered, closing his eyes and bearing a genuine smile. He flexed carefully as he amassed Cosmos, a great bright aura enveloping him. "I will try to kill you, first or last, but whatever happens, if I am to die here, I want it to be by your hand. I want to see the blue in your eyes as you end my life, do you understand?"
He looked at his little brother again, and despite the boy having more tears to cry, he was intent on fighting as well. It became obvious that Ikki was ecstatic at the prospect of a deadly strife with his one sibling, the one love he so irremediably held in that hateful heart his.
Then, all of a sudden, the image of an approaching Hyoga took him by surprise. "You…?" The Saint stumbled to Shun's side and assumed a stance as if to join the battle.
"Hyoga, there is no need to push yourself so hard!" Shun told him. There was no response; he simply continued to stare Ikki down, who scoffed.
"It surprises me that you yet live. You are like a zombie at this point," said Phoenix. Hyoga merely stared. "Be reasonable. What damage will you do in that state? You will just make it harder for your friends." The other didn't falter, continuing to challenge him no matter how injured. "As per usual, you are inflexible. Then this time I will have to kill you for sure."