The Colour Purple... The King of Fighters '95
Based on the Characters of The King of Fighters '95 Copyright 1995(C) SNK
Original Fan Fiction Copyright (C) 1995 [ENGEL] Design Room 1995
pointblankassassin . com
This (chapter) fanfiction was originally written circa: [XX.96] (Thank you)
"Which Character are you?"
Note to self: Legacy chapter numbering (32- - -), does not match. [Original chapter written 2016]
If all men had the luxury of turning back [time] at our leisure, then…
But if we did… If we stopped and stared. The word 'Regret' would lose meaning.
But if we did… The word 'Regret' would lose meaning. …however, every WORD has purpose.
{You are NOT my master.}
Perhaps, on cold winter nights when the frigid cold made my joints ache, I do recall that one time when I wondered of a certain choice I made – if I had done so differently would absolve me from loneliness. However, I do think, that everything has meaning. If a man cannot be confident in his choices, then… he should simply die. I have decided to walk forward with no more regrets. Everyone who opposes me, and my grand wish, will die.
"DIE! MASTER!" Miura ROARED, the sharp edge of his forward arcing blade was already on his enemy's neck before the younger Ninja Master could even begin to react.
A!
Unbound by rules. It was a checkmate for the young master.
We have heard this again and again – to the point it seems ridiculous. The sands of time pass through a narrow crevice, the flow of water down a stream, and like the clouds that rotated clockwise across the sky. The paradox phenomena, the twist of fate, and the act of God.
UNMEI KAERU!
Just when you thought that you were about to see how the future would play out, suddenly, everything changed. As much as you were certain, as you were sure –
The phenomenon of [change of fate] rang the bell. …and the passage of time reversed. The clouds in the sky slowly stopped when time creaked to a halt, then, like a demonic decree they turned counterclockwise. As each droplet of water echoed loudly like an iron hammer in your mind…
He was so sure and he was so certain, yet, yet at the last instant, a quick flash rushed across his eyes. How sad and how tragic… how ironic and how sad… Destiny was not so kind, and instead the flow of fate reversed. Unmei Kaeru. The phenomenon of change of fate.
Chapter 88: Auspicious Number. TENACITY.
A Sequence of Uneventful Mornings 23. The curse of immortal life.
To Miura's great anguish, the ninja master was able to frantically reach for his sword with his left hand and swung wildly across his torso. The edge of his master's sword met his own weapon head on at the last moment. At that last moment, Miura's enemy was able to reverse his motion and instead of attack – he was able to pull his arm wildly to block Miura's killing blow aimed at his enemy's neck.
Their eyes met – Miura stared down at the younger master that, by the skin of his teeth parried his attack at the expense of the counterattack. Miura was still alive – and it was only a matter of time. His master sneered under his ninja mask – staring at Miura dead on, a devilish grin that pierced through him so viciously Miura felt it cut his stomach.
{LUCK – IS ON MY SIDE. Old man.} The master roared in his mind when he swung his sword wide hurtling Miura's arms apart at opposite hemispheres.
Just as Miura's own attack flew wildly – his arms open wide, his eyeballs rolled to the side, he heard the familiar rush of footsteps running behind him.
{Jackson.}
"No! Miura!" Ninja Master Jackson snarled as he ran behind the man that was once his comrade. Jackson. The Captain of the 6th Brigade. He was now his enemy.
"Jackson…" His fellow captain had his rectangular cleaver drawn in his hand as he rushed behind him. {Is that your answer?} Miura sobbed when Jackson's wide Chinese cleaver cocked back and was about to drive itself into his back. {Will you punish me?} JACKSON!?
CAPTAIN JACKSON!
"It is over, Miura…" The master said a long drawn out snarl, venom dripping along the sides of his lips. The captain of the 6th brigade, Jackson ran towards Miura's back and despite his pathetic plea, this was his answer. In front of Miura, his master let his left arm grow limp after it deflected the attack with a last ditch defense. Floating upwards like a final answer, his master's right palm opened up one finger at a time and begun to glow a slight yellow before roaring to a bright orange when it ended its journey and covered the picture in front of Miura's face. Five glowing, killing fingers blocked his vision. Soon the pangs of regret manifested itself from orange to a fading white. At the bottom of Miura's diaphragm the old man felt it, a slight pang that he felt on occasion. It was the few seconds before a slave was to be set free. A slave to the world.
He never thought he could ever feel [it], but now his mind grew silent when just seconds before it screamed a piercing wail that stabbed his eardrums. I can be free.
His master's palm. The Kusanagi flames would devour him whole. As he so deserved.
…
{Even if I tried so hard.} Miura thought. {Just so I could repay [him], I became selfish.} Forgive me, all you half dozen to fifty men. I treated you with kindness for my own guilty, selfish desire. For my one true master, 50 some aught years go, I USED you all.
…
The tragedy of an NPC.
I hate being a ninja master.
Just answer the question… A.
"Do not cry… augh…" The ninja master said. "Augh…" A ten year old, buck toothed boy with missing teeth put his hands over his eyes to hold himself back. 50 years ago.
…
Miura could now feel the warmth of Kusanagi's flames penetrate through his mask, his arms and legs grew limp – he no longer knew what to do. All his life… for all his sacrifices, all his pains – an old man, now, with outdated principles, and outdated values - he was simply rewarded with a petrifying loneliness. Miura's hands were now chained and forced to spread themselves wide like a bound, imprisoned slave. A Chinese war cleaver at his back that pushed his face into the raging fire in front of him.
{It was a good life.} A long, tiring, and boring life way past due. I have no regrets.
I was blessed – {not CURSED.} "You were wrong Eiji… Eiji Kisaragi." Miura grinned under the mask that protected him, a mask that felt a hundred times its weight in iron. When he let out a peaceful sigh as he bid farewell to the world. I simply could have looked away and would have lived another 10 years as reward. Instead… I die tonight. It was a good life. A fulfilling life. As I protect the meaning of regret.
It's weight we carry, a hundred million times! A ninja mask that protected us for centuries. You would never see my face as I sneer at you ARROGANTLY! EIJI!
For I could die on my own terms… …in 1980.
…
"If you do not do anything, that young boy is going to become a master before you, Captain Miura…" a much younger Captain Jackson said. "Will you allow that?"
Ninja Captain Miura just slumped his shoulders and shuffled his feet. "If the boy has THAT gift, then let it be." Miura said in surrender. "I suppose I do not have the gift." Miura opened and clenched his fist repeatedly in front of his face – perhaps as a nonchalant habit. "I simply do not have the gift, mayhaps…" Miura droned on and on… or simply mayhaps, my body is unwilling to accept that I could ever hope to become better than [HIM]. My Master. The GIFT of my true master. While I serve him. {Even if I will one day serve that young boy, I cannot help but think…}
That I will NEVER allow him to become my TRUE master.
10 years ago. 1970.
…
That night. His master's glowing orange open palm was 12 inches from his face and Miura recalled. As instants passed, that hand glowed brighter, ferociously like an electric stovetop.
'Orochigiri'. It was a special skill that was only granted naturally to royally born Kusanagi heirs. A savage ball of flame that erupted from human hands like a wild beast, and devoured its victims, burning asunder all it touched... However, just with a simple pact, ninja boys who showed an innate born ability could somehow, on loan, as long as Yoshiki Kusanagi was alive, could somehow borrow that special ability. To unleash supernatural FLAMES from their hands. Boys who could copy this ability were granted the luxury to harness the Kusanagi divine power on loan from Yoshiki Kusanagi. This was what separated this boy – him from Miura.
His flaming hand was in front of my face. Miura's face locked itself forward at that fiery hand that grew brighter with each and every split second, yet he could not help but roll his eyes to the side as far as it would go – he could not ignore Jackson's steps and the edge of his sharp cleaver that was about to drive itself into his back.
Rolling back and forth with feverish demeanour, Miura's eyes switched from forward to back then forward, then to the erratic movement of Jackson behind him then back to the flaming hand in front of him. Back and forth he could not decide. The stalemate of two enemies rushing at him, this was too much for an old man to parse.
It was too late – and by now, Miura had accepted that he was going to die either way.
Jackson… or… YOU. Jackson ran ever so closer. {If I turn around…} Miura thought, {If I turn and attack Jackson. Then the master will burn us both with his Orochigiri.} I cannot decide. Rolling back and forth on glass bearings Miura's old eyes slipped left and right an eternity away disconnected from his brain. {I cannot.} He could not decide, and as the pangs of regret and weakness radiated through his body, it was too late. Jackson was only now a step away from him his cleaver cocked back and was about to strike, and in front of his face – one then two bursts of light his master's right hand glowed a white hot light just as it was about to unleash itself with nuclear flames! The power of Kusanagi legacy.
"DIE! MIURAA!" Orochi-giri!
Miura's eyes grew cold and faded into a monochrome of black and white.
…
Eiji.
…
"Eiji!" Miura said. "EIJIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!" Miura shouted. You were wrong. YOU WERE WRONG! How the old man wanted to scream that years ago. Decades, years – months – days - hours – minutes – then seconds. Now. You were wrong,… Eiji.
You were WRONG! YOU WERE. WRONG!
Did you not know? That in this story, in order to prove ourselves [right], we simply had to…
Jackson's arm cocked back as far as it would go, his cleaver catching the light – until.
"I waited so very very long to say this to you." You were wrong Eiji. Miura smiled.
Boom! BOOM! The flames grew brighter. Like twin serpents running down his fingers, then his wrist, then down his arms, the mounting pressure pushing his entire body back, threatening to break his arms at the joints. "Orochigiri!" His master said.
EIJI.
"MIURA! I will not…" Jackson…
…
"Eiji…" The man sighed, the taste of a sweet smile he felt it on his tongue, "Let us see the look on your face, when that day passes…" I will refuse to live forever."
…
I cannot. I just. I just cannot decide.
"Loyalty above all else…" He remembered a broken ratty cloth of a saying they exchanged amongst themselves – of the Kusanagi 8th Brigade. Miura lifted his fist up, his body had now become a concrete hard granite. This is our way. A forgotten memory now, as soft, sweet visions came back to him, voices not matching the movement of their mouths – like still frames, taken out of sequence and out of context.
"Loyalty above all else, boy." Miura's hardened master broke a smile and offered his knuckles to his student in reply. "My sword…" The old man's voice said. In a lazy Sunday afternoon indiscriminate in 1945 just like any other. But at this final moment in time…
Master and student. Their knuckles touched. In this memory lost in the wasteland of time.
…
NO!
No. Miura's closed eyelids blared open, all eight cylinders throttled open, 8000 RPMs at full blast.
…
Miura bit down hard with a savage rage that seemed as if he let himself go any further his molars could crush each other into ivory powder when he bit down. That word still had meaning after all.
Regret.
I do not accept your terms.
NO. No. Not like this… After all HE did for me. NOT like this.
With arms open wide Miura dropped down the pit of despair, yet, just as he was about to accept death, just the last instant his stomach tied up into knots. Just as the last bit of warmth left his fingertips, Miura's hand reached out to the edge of that cliff he had fallen from.
…
I do not want to die…
…
Not like this.
REGRET.
EIJI! Miura's mind screamed. If…
When his fingertips dug deep into the mountain side as he desperately tried to delude himself that clawing into the rock face could somehow slow his fall...
If.
IF YOU… If you are indeed the Goddess of fortune.
Miura held on to dear life as his spirit scraped along the side of the jutting rocks that ripped into his chest into tatters as he fell to his inevitable death.
Then, LOOK at me, and LISTEN to me, intently, to my selfish plea.
Even when the claws of fate grabbed his ankles and dragged him down with shadowy talons he still looked up, gasping for breath.
"Eiji." Miura said, after all these years, these long forgotten years, his voice broke. "Eiji."
The familiar feeling overcame him. Never give up. Never retreat. NEVER surrender.
If you have become the goddess of fortune then…
Miura begged. His lips trembling in frightful regret.
NEVER!
I cannot save you any more, my boy. My precious, sweet sweet child of mine. EIJI. IF you [are]… THEN. Show me a sign, and SAVE OUR DESTINY! Please, My…
Miura's mouth roared open and he screamed as loud as he ever could. He screamed a primal roar so deafening, his throat twisted and blood gushed from the curled towel of flesh – so loud, even the goddess of fortune could not ignore.
MY.
SWORD!
…
Once upon a time. "Those things you hold in your hand, are garbage, old man." The king whispered in the beggar's ears when the water that drenched his knees by the seaside began to envelope his body in petrifying icy cold.
The dirty, tattered beggar paid no heed to his king's voice, and as if he was told "the world is flat", in same manner he only chuckled innocently when he continued to collect seashells in his palms.
"You are mistaken," he replied so plainly, flashing a crass smile – from a beggar to a king.
…
"Well," Kaori stopped herself, blushing, "Maybe, you can go with me to see the ocean."
Just the two of us. Take me away, so far away. Just the two of us.
What say you? My love?
…
You.
You are my master.
And [I]…
I. AM. YOUR. SWORD.
…
Rise.
Rise…
RISE.
RISE FROM YOUR GRAVE.
And…
"Haaagh…" The warm yellow smoke erupting from the sides of his mouth.
RISE FROM YOUR GRAVE, AND SERVE… YOUR MASTER.
Eiji, from his frozen state, grew animated, his eyes opened, the yellow glow like a nuclear reactor erupted from his eyes and his mouth, his arms darted back to life and reached upwards to the sky. To defy it.
…
"You are mistaken," the beggar replied so plainly,
For these things I collect, my dearest king…
…
Unmei.
Fate.
GYAKU TEN. Hazu ga aru.
A celestial phenomenon to DEFY the CHANGE of FATE gave birth to life.
"MIURA!" Jackson screamed.
To DEFY the change of fate! An absolute COUNTER to a REVERSAL.
[Unmei gyakuten.]
Jackson tucked his right foot on the side of Miura's ankle, his knee stabbing onto the pocket behind Miura's knee, trapping him and making him unable to move. Jackson grabbed a fistful of Miura's shirt by the shoulder and pulled his comrade backwards.
UNMEI GYAKUTEN! The one and only counter of REVERSAL OF FATE.
"This one…" Captain Jackson roared with seething poison from the edges of his lips. "This one…" Jackson's tears were hidden behind that wall…
THIS ONE IS FOR MASA AND MIKAIDO!
This is for MY children you let die. You SON OF A BITCH!
Jackson's cleaver rushed down and separated their master's right hand cleanly from his wrist.
…
"Loyalty above all else…" Miura grinned.
"…above all else." Jackson replied, exchanging smiles neither could ever see.