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Kooroo -> RE: =WPC 2020= Final Battlefield (3/12/2020 23:59:30)
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It must’ve been noon. There were three loud chimes from somewhere in the camp, the electronic chirps making Toyama miss the old days. A decade ago, back when he’d been in charge, it would’ve been a gong instead. But the Lady had always been a progressive and she’d gone through a martial reform and technological upgrade of the Imperial Army as soon as she’d taken command. The hourly gong was one of the first things she’d done away with.
Hiroki knew none of this and simply continued with their conversation, unaware of the old man’s woes. “So, what were Yura’s other friends like? She never mentioned—“
“She never made any when she was a child. Lady Yura only made a handful when she was older, and they were more… acquaintances than friends, really. No one close like you and Aoi, at least.”
“No friends?” The younger man whistled. “Sounds rough. I can see why she turned out like she did.”
“Well, Lady Yura wasn’t completely alone. She had her sisters and I to look out for her.”
“Having someone ‘look out’ for her isn’t exactly the same as companionship. I’m gonna guess that you all just tried to rein her in, didn’t you?”
“I…” Toyama hesitated. “To be honest, I was already getting on in my years and couldn’t really keep up with the young missus anymore so—”
“Saying that you managed to keep up with a young Yura is a pretty big claim.”
“—it was left up to her sisters. However, the emperor’s eldest, Taiyane, was usually far too busy aiding her father’s minister’s with the country’s administration to chase her younger half-sister around. The one it usually fell to was—”
“Was me.” A low voice interrupted the retainer.
The two men turned to see Shion Kurouji glaring at them, hands clasped atop her planted sword as she stood in front of the tent’s entrance. Hiroki started and jumped backwards, landing awkwardly on his futon. Toyama dropped his teacup, hot tea spilling down his front as he dropped to a knee. Neither of them dared to look away from the young girl, keeping their eyes locked with her argent gaze.
An uneasy silence passed, in which the tension in the room grew exponentially. Hiroki’s heart felt like it was about to burst from his chest when Toyama finally stuttered a greeting.
“L-Lady Kurou—”
Her expression darkened. “Shion, Toyama. I gave you a choice before, but I will now have you refer to me as Shion.”
“Of… Of course, Lady Shion. My sincerest apologies.”
The scowl didn’t soften. It had always been present before, but there was something about Shion’s expression that seemed much more intense than it had in their last meeting.
There was another pause before the tyrant spoke again, her eyes now focused solely on Toyama’s averted gaze. “During your conversation, I noticed that you did not mention the late emperor’s name even once. Why is that?”
“You… S-So you’ve been liste—”
“Answer the question, Toyama,” she said, cutting him off sternly. Her demeanour hadn’t changed, but Hiroki felt that she was on the verge of drawing her sword and cutting them both down.
Toyama visibly paled and tried to answer, but no words came from his gaping mouth. Shion’s eyebrows knitted together and the edges of her mouth tightened. In the absence of a reply, she continued. “Is it a sense of shame? Of disgrace, as I, Kurouji Shion, stand before you? Is this your way of trying to disassociate the father from his daughter?”
“I…” The elderly man swallowed, finding his voice at last. “I-I… Rest assured, I would never… could never show such disrespect t-to Lord Hironobu or… or yourself.”
The uneasy silence started again, as Shion stared Toyama down. Hiroki didn’t dare voice his opinion, but he felt that the pauses and glaring was a mite unnecessary at this point. The old man was practically sweating bullets and seemed to be on the verge of a heart attack; any further pressure and he might have keeled over.
Finally, Shion spoke, her voice quiet but clear in the silence of the tent. “Lady Taiyane, Lady Shion, and Lady Yura are what you used to call the three of us. My stepmother was always Lady Akabane, though you may have made an exception for the woman on occasion.”
She tilted her chin up, looking down her nose at them. “Even my father was Lord Hironobu to you. In all those years, never once did you, his ever faithful servant, merely refer to him as ‘the emperor’ or by his family name.”
With a harsh screech of metal, the second daughter drew her sword, revealing a blade of deep, midnight purple, and angled it at Hiroki’s neck.
The threat was clear.
“I will ask you one last time, Toyama. Why do you no longer refer to me, nor my father as you once did? “ Shion asked, her tone soft but venomous.
Stand.
Yura repeated it again.
Stand.
Stand.
The flameborn echoed the command, making it into an slowly intensifying mantra. She had to stand, or that was it. She was going to stay down, permanently. Get up and live, or stay down and die.
She knew which one she’d rather choose. It was a bit of a no-brainer.
Yura managed a curse as she forced her body to move, getting to her knees despite her burning muscles. Movement came back more easily than the first time the wretch had shocked her, back in that hellscape.
It wasn’t standing; far from it. One didn’t stand on their hands and knees, after all.
But it was enough. Enough for her t—
What.
Instinctively, Yura threw a leaden arm up, covering her face as she rose to a knee. A soft ding sounded, as something ricocheted off her glove. There were two sharp stabs along her forearm, drawing a grimace as the sensation exacerbated the flameborn’s fading aches. Her silk necktie took the third and her hair flopped down against her neck as a fourth sliced through its binder.
But whatever had launched the barrage wasn’t done yet. She was barely aware of her foe toppling backwards with a scream, as two last things sliced into Yura’s abdomen, burrowing into her side. Yura shrieked and lurched suddenly, dropping heavily onto her right arm.
Her wounded right arm.
That was a mistake.
Stars exploded across her vision and Yura cried out as the projectiles were forced deeper into her forearm. A dizzying pain shot up through her arm as she tried to move the limb, trying to see what damage had been caused. Two tiny, red pinpricks greeted her bleary eyes, each blemish accompanied by a thin, blackened shaft. That… that didn’t look too bad? But then why in the Six Realms did it feel lik—
Her eyes widened when they fell onto the thing lying on the white floor, the crystal spine that had glanced off her glove. It wasn’t particularly thick, but by the Lords, was it long. How long? … Five… six... seven. At least seven units long. Seven bloody units.
If they’d gone any deeper, then those nails might have come out the other side.
She tried pulling the visible part of the spike and her vision blurred as an agonising bolt of lightning shot up her arm, through her shoulder and all the way down to her tailbone.
So those probably weren't being removed for… a while. Not here, at least. How in the hells was she going explain this to Aoi and Hiroki if sh—when, when she got back?
A cold rage flowered deep in Yura’s gut as she thought about Truenight. Only Truenight could have done this. The blackened woman had hit her and the two-toned mage with her nettles, but why? An accident, clearly. Hah, that was a good one. What a joke.
Obviously, she’d been played. Double-crossed. Betrayed, once again.
Kurouji’s scowl flashed through her mind and Yura growled. Ignoring her protesting limbs, she pulled herself to her feet and stood, panting, a single blade clutched in her left hand. Each movement or flex of her right fingers caused ragged claws of pain to tear through her arm, so she left its twin on the floor. But that was fine. This was nothing. She’d endured worse, after all. This was nothing compared to that fall from the Spire or whe—
A chill shot through Yura’s spine, causing her to narrow her eyes and grit her teeth. The omniscient voices boomed once more, the union of Order and Chaos bringing back the final words of Toyama’s lesson with their proclamation.
”... said that there are two sides to every story. That even if you think you know everything about something, there is always a second perspective. Another person’s viewpoint that you may not have considered.”
“Eh? And why would that matter? Who cares about some nobody’s perspective?”
“Because without the other person’s perspective, you won’t be able to see the whole picture. Sometimes you just need to slow down an—”
There was an exasperated sigh and the squeak of a wood scraping stone.“You’re talking nonsense again, old geezer.”
“Please, Lady Yura, return to your seat!”
The rising voices faded off, leaving Yura feeling… confused. She didn’t know why. It was like her younger self had said, it was all nonsense... Right? What else could it have been? Had she been missing something, all of these years?
Another image of Kurouji flashed before the rageborn. A different memory from the past, that she’d seen just before returning to that accursed bathhouse. The older girl defending herself and shouting, as Yura laid into her father’s killer at the top of Tengamine Castle. The answer dawned on her.
What was Kurouji’s side of the story? Just what had the girl been trying to say before she’d kicked Yura off the top of the Spire? The flameborn wracked her brain, but couldn’t recall anything. It had been a little hard to hear clearly when she’d been shouting and trying to do the murderer in.
Actually, what did it matter? Even if Kurouji had had something remotely worthwhile to say back all those years ago, she’d practically evolved into a tyrant overnight. And that had been over three years ago. Three years of martial law and oppression. What would Yura’s father… their father have thought of her rule?
Even so… maybe she did have a question or two for the despot. And after that, Yura could pull her head off.
Right now, though, there was someone standing in her way.
Yura gritted her teeth and braced herself. She reached across and under her shirt, and felt around with her uninjured hand, trying to find the pair of needles. Falling on two on her arm had been bad enough, she didn’t want to know what would happen if she fell on one directly above an organ. The first needle came out easily enough from her waist, drawing a wince from the flameborn. The second was located higher, around her ribs. In-between her ribs. This… this one was going to be a problem.
Clenching her teeth, Yura pinched the crystal shard between her forefinger and thumb, and pulled. It came away sharply, causing the girl to holler and lurch as her vision dimmed again. She tried to inhale deeply and felt a jab in her chest, right around the spot she’d freed the needle.
A punctured lung and what might as well have been a broken arm. Could have been worse, at least she didn’t get one in her eye. So what did this mean? No marathons or swimming? Not that there was any place to swim nearby. After all, there wasn’t a pool or lake, nevermind a puddle...
Oh.
She’d been expecting the answer to be ‘non-existent’. As it were, however, Yura could very clearly see a large pool of scarlet a few meters behind the lightning witch. The bodies of the long-named woman and the blackened Aleisha lay beside it, their ruined corpses adding to the growing lake of blood as the flameborn watched. She shot a quick glance at the sides and behind her, looking around at the emptied plane.
That was it then. Tahlmore, that blasted Truenight and Aleisha. All gone, with three of the four Knights of Chaos.
That meant she was alone. It was up to her and Stormcaller to kill each other now.
So really, nothing had changed. It still boiled down to a delinquent teenager against staff-twirling, scum-sucking magus.
Or perhaps not.
The caster’s fluted, metal staff lay on the floor behind, forgotten by its owner. The woman in question was saying something, something incoherent as always.
Why even bother?, Yura thought, taking a single step forward and lurching precariously. She glanced down and noticed that her shirt wasn’t very white anymore. What remained of its natural color was becoming rapidly devoured by a sea of encroaching crimson.
The newly dubbed Champion gritted her teeth and surged forward, ignoring the forebode that had set in over her. It didn’t matter. They’d somehow gotten separated after that Truenight’s parting barrage, but there was still barely any space between them. Now that Stormcaller didn’t have her staff, all Yura had to do was cross that and—
Arcs of lightning burst from the mage’s fingers. Yura managed to get her sword up in time, catching and diverting some of the spray. But still, more came. Innumerable crackling, seeking tendrils surged around and over the blade, and into the rageborn’s body.
The burning filled her again and she wanted to scream. She wanted to, but she couldn’t find the breath to do so. Or was it because she was already screaming? Yura didn’t know, she couldn’t hear anything except for the buzz and the crackle of electricity, around her and within her. Her heart was hammering away rapidly, like it was ready to burst out from her ribs.
But she could withstand it. She had to withstand it. She didn’t have a choice but to press on and kill Stormcaller. The flameborn took another step...
… And dropped to one knee.
No! Stand... STAND!
The burning was starting to fade now, replaced by a dull, consuming coldness. It spread through her limbs, easing the pain and darkening the edges of her vision. The ivory of the tile below her was slowly becoming red, as ruby droplets dripped from her stomach and her arms, staining the unblemished stone.
Unacceptable. Get up. Stand.
Standing was too hard. It was easier to just let go. That’s all she had to do. She could just let go and finally rest. There wouldn’t be any need to struggle; no more fighting, no more pain. No more anything.
Stand, Akabane. Get up. Sta—
The darkness started to close in.
“Stand, Akabane.”
She tried to get up. Yura tried to stand, but she couldn’t. Her hand clutched at the gash in her stomach, where Ryokuzan had sliced cleanly through. The entry wound at her back burned, but her other hand was still holding on to Kimizan. All the flameborn could do was kneel in the icy rain, watching as her lifeblood mixed into the water below.
Kurouji stood several paces afore her, glaring down as she sheathed her purple blade. Her four generals stood nearby, watching from one of the courtyard’s many alcoves.
“I avoided all of your vital organs with that thrust. You will live. Now come,” she slammed her sword into the ground. “Get up. Show me the depths of your resolve. Stand!”
Yura gritted her teeth and tightened her grip on Kimizan. The youngest sister forced herself up to one knee and then started to rise. There was a sharp burst of agony in her gut and she fell back down again, gasping out in pain.
There was a snarl from above her and she looked up. Kurouji’s expression had changed, her usual, frown twisting with hatred and disgust.
“Disgraceful. Your tenacity was your only redeeming quality, even that has faltered. So what use are you?” she bellowed, losing all pretense of composure. “Felled by such a paltry wound? After declaring that you will fight to your last, to avenge our fallen father and liberate the rights of his Crown? Pathetic!”
Yura didn’t respond. She tried to rise again, tried to stoke the flames of her rage, but her legs refused to move. The flameborn brought her hand up from her stomach and coughed, tasting copper and then feeling something wet splatter on to her palm. She shivered and Kurouji snarled again. A screech filled the air and Ryokuzan slid free from its sheath, its tip angled towards Yura’s throat. There was movement in the distance as one of the generals looked away; Harukaze, judging by the short, white hair.
“If this is all you can muster, then I ask again, what is the point? I would be doing Father and Mother a favour by ending your miserable existence.” The second daughter stalked towards her, the argent eyes and silvery underside of her hair glinting through the downpour. “You have disappointed me utte— “
The flameborn coughed again. Blood dripped from her hand to the ground below, joining the cloudy, red puddle at her feet. Everything was starting to go blurry. Yura tried to focus. Everything sharpened momentarily, but she couldn’t hold it.
Had Kurouji really missed her vitals?
The rain was starting to feel colder. Kurouji was still glaring, but she wasn’t advancing anymore. She wasn’t even glaring at Yura. There was something right in front of her, in between the two sisters. A hunched, curved blur, with a bright red stripe around its middle.
... Mother?
Yura bit her lip and tried focusing again. Her vision sharpened and held, revealing the blue-haired woman in front of her. She wore a white, floral-patterned kimono with a red obi around her waist.
Mother.
Was she saying something? Her mother must’ve been saying something, but Yura couldn’t make it out. All she could hear was the sound of the rain splashing around them, the thump of her heart in her ears, and her own, laboured breaths. The flameborn watched helplessly as Kurouji’s face darkened, going from a perplexed, but irritated scowl, to a look of utmost fury. Her father’s murderer screamed something and the generals started running towards them, their expressions grim.
Ryokuzan rose up and over Kurouji’s head, and spikes of terror stabbed into Yura’s heart. An image of her father’s body flashed before her eyes, and the terror changed to anger.
Rise. STAND UP.
NOW.
So she stood. The delinquent rose to one knee and then, using Kimizan as a crutch, pulled herself up and to her feet. The pain had faded now, but so had every other sensation.
That was enough. The movement drew Kurouji’s attention to her and her expression changed. The fury in the second daughter’s eyes changed, replaced by an emotion that Yura had never seen before? Was that… concern? Fear?
It didn’t matter.
Yura bared her teeth and tried to snarl, but no sound came out. She took one step forward, and then coughed again. Her vision blackened and the blood-soaked ground came rushing to meet her.
How long had it been?
Hours?
Minutes?
Seconds?
She didn’t know. The lightning was still flowing into her, the sparking and crackling filling her, trying to fry the flameborn from within.
But Yura was standing. She was standing, propped up by her single, red blade. And she could feel again.
She could feel the fiery, burning current filling her. She could feel the jagged, rippling pain from her right arm.
And she could feel the weight of her father’s sword in other, left hand.
The youngest daughter looked up at her foe one last, final time. The blinding brilliance of the lightning fulminating around her made it difficult, if not impossible to see her attacker, but Yura’s didn’t care about the finer details. Whether they had raven or purple-colored locks, she couldn’t say. Was her target’s eyes a gleaming silver, matching her own, or a mismatched of blue-green orbs? Who knew?
She took one step forward and swung her left arm up, throwing the red sword with all of her remaining strength. Yura screamed a name as she threw it, but she couldn’t hear her own voice. Whose name had she shouted? Kurouji? Ebriva? She didn’t know.
There was a dull noise and the lightning stopped. Two things in front of her dropped, and Yura slumped to the ground, her breathing ragged. It took all her remaining strength, but she forced herself to look up.
The red sword further ahead of her, along with the prone body of her foe. Yura didn’t know what had happened, but judging by the lack of blood, she still had to finish the job.
The young girl tried to rise, but her body refused to move. She fell forwards, down on to her chest and her eyelids fluttered, then closed.
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