gabriel-gabdiel - Tumblr blog

[gabriel-gabdiel]

【Draft】 Rurouni Yahiko Chapter 60: The Curtain Falls

We now discuss the aftermath of another assassination attempt by the infamous Brigands Guild.

The Seiryu Clan are now gathering to protect their masters, the hatamoto-class samurai family of the Minakatas, like it's the Tokugawa Era all over again.

As the final daimyo of Shimabara, Tadachika Matsudaira of the Matsudaira Clan pledged his allegiance to Emperor Meiji.

As a show of good will towards the tenets of "Sonno Joi" of the new administration, Matsudaira allowed the new Meiji Government to hunt the Hidden Christians down and eventually crush the new Shimabara Rebellion of Nidaime Amakusa Shiro Tokisada (Shiro Tokisada Amakusa the Second).

Soon afterwards, the Shimabara Domain was abolished in 1871 and it became part of Nagasaki.

To avenge the death of his master (the blind swordsman Hyoue Nishida) at the hands of Hyoue's nephew Shogo Amakusa (at the time known as Shiro Amakusa the Second), Kinta Minakata agreed to infiltrate the ranks of the Kakure Kirishitan (Hidden Christian) cult to destroy it from within on behalf of the Meiji Government.

With his skill with the sword, the former Mimawarigumi Battousai learned to become Amakusa's Kagemusha (literally "Shadow Warrior" but figuratively "Body Double") and master Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu as they continued their insurrection, treason, assassinations, and terrorism of Japan.  

Only for Minakata to double-cross the Christians and defeat their cult leader Shiro Amakusa (real name Shogo Muto) in mortal combat. He became their literal Judas Iscariot.

Nevertheless, successfully deploying Kinta's Nisshoku (Solar Eclipse) against a formidable supersonic technique like Shogo's Amakakeru Ryu no Hirameki (Heavens Gliding Dragon Flash)wasn't possible to do with just the Aoitsuki O Tsuki Nari (Blue Moon Slash).

The Blue Moon Slash—actually a Double Full Moon Slash done at the fraction of a fraction of a second—might be able to match the Hirameki in speed, but not in power.

Especially since the Amakakeru's left-footed torque gave it enough centrifugal force to create a vacuum or vortex of empty air, thus doubling the impact of the second strike.

Instead of creating a second Full Moon Slash, Kinta used his great skill and timing to reverse the direction of his circular slash from an upwards slash to a downwards one, moving the flipped blade on the same trajectory as before but backwards.

Reversing his momentum gave his sword the torque it needed to match the strength or even surpass the speed of the Hirameki's second slash, thus enabling him to do the Solar Eclipse counter on Shogo's ultimate technique. 

Like a reverse-direction Blue Moon Slash that slashed at the same empty space he'd already slashed through previously before the air could fill it up again, resulting in a frictionless strike that perfectly transferred its total energy without any wind resistance.

That was the Tsubame Gaeshi (Swallow Return). This was the ultimate hidden skill taught to Kinta by Amakusa's Uncle Hyoue.

The same one that the black sheep of Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu discovered when he hesitated to deliver the killing blow to his own master, Seijuro Hiko XII.

A reverse-momentum riposte after missing with initial the battoujutsu or iaijutsu slash that sliced faster than the Blue Moon Slash and struck as hard as the second Hirameki slash.

***

Rurouni Yahiko

A Rurouni Kenshin Continuation Fan Fiction Story by Chester Castañeda

Take a bow. The night is over. The Brigands Guild latest assassination attempt has been foiled by Yahiko Myojin, the Sanada Ninjas, and Kinta Minakata… for now.

Disclaimer: All characters used in this fanfic (save some others) are the rightful property of Nobuhiro Watsuki, Shueisha, Shonen Jump, Viz, Sony Studios, Fuji TV, Studio Gallup, Studio Deen, and ADV. This disclaimer also covers all the other copyrighted material that are far too many to mention here. Don't sue me please, I'm very poor.

***

Chapter 60: The Curtain Falls

***

Back at the front yard of the Minakata moneychanger office…

It was finally over.

"Ugh, NOOOOO! DAMMIT!" cried out Lucas Grant into the darkness, a velvet cloth of his own blood draping over his consciousness like a curtain over a theater stage, the light from his eyes fading.

He had him. Well, he almost had him. But he had him. He was so close. But he tripped at the finish line and underestimated him.

Or maybe Luke gave Kinta too much respect because his estranged brother truly was a saint among sinners when compared to the rest of his… their scumbag family.

Faster than even a Blue Moon Slash, he got sliced open from hip to shoulder. What just happened? What hit him exactly as he strode on the verge of victory?

"What was that technique?" Luke demanded to know, his body shaking like a leaf, his blood pooling below him.

"The Tsubame Gaeshi," answered Kinta while brushing away his matted hair in between belabored breaths, his face as pale as a ghost's.

While the bloody Lucas steamed with rage, high-blood pressure, and disbelief, Kinta exuded cold sweats, alabaster skin, and a dropping blood pressure.

The Prodigal Son then heard the self-proclaimed Fuuma Ninja Kai Hidaka scream something about getting over there.

Luke's head snapped into attention and stared to his side, only to see Kai engaged in battle with a tall blonde woman wielding a naginata.

His vision blurring, Luke had a brief dream of himself practicing the art of kenjutsu with his elder brother Kinta and that same European(?) girl he just saw like they were old childhood friends.

As if his delirium had taken over.

Only for the fantasy to shatter with the reality of him living in squalor as one of the forgotten burakumin (untouchables) of Japan, after the Minakata Family forsook him and his mother.

Only to see a vision of the Minakata’s disowned daughter working in the Red Light District of Yoshiwara to make ends meet for them, which roused him from his dead faint.

As he understood it, they quietly sent her away to preserve the dignity of the Minakata name, whatever that meant.

Tetsuo Akahori revealed the truth about him and the traitorous Minakatas who disowned his mother for having an affair with a foreign dignitary during the heightening tensions and growing anti-foreigner sentiment of Japan at the dawn of the Bakumatsu.

The single mother and her son became collateral damage against the hostility between the kowtowed shogunate, the restless samurai, and the gaijin who forced to open Japan's borders by force, revealing how backwards and primitive the country had become thanks to its isolationism.

No, wait. This was far from over.

 ***

Many years ago, before Niitsu Kakunoshin became the disciple of Hiko Seijuro XII…

A young, non-blind Hyoue Nishida faced a dilemma.

The deeply religious man needed to kill his beloved (if strict and no-nonsense) Master Hiko to learn the succession technique of Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu and become the newest inheritor of the swordsmanship school. However, doing so was at odds with his beliefs.

What was he supposed to do? He really needed to complete his training to protect the Hidden Christians from exposure and persecution from the Shogunate.

He'd heard of the horror stories of how the government tortured anyone they caught practicing this forbidden "foreign" religion, such as nearly drowning them by dunking them upside-down into a well or putting long carpentry nails into their fingertips until they recanted their faith.

Some Christians even had their fingernails plucked right out of their bed. Or they were outright crucified like their Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Fearing how Western nations used Christianity to colonize other countries, the Tokugawa Government had a zero-tolerance policy against any citizen converting to Christianity.

This was the reason why the Hidden Christians remained hidden in plain sight, with their churches located inside caves and their statues of Jesus or Mother Mary as well as the cross put under lock and key in secret compartments.

The pacifistic swordsman Nishida wished to have the power to protect these persecuted faithful without spilling any bloodshed. He wanted to practice the Sword of Life the same way he followed the gospel or the Word of Life.

He wished to use Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu as his Sword of Life to wield for the sake of others and to protect people. His people. The Hidden Christians of Shimabara.

He wanted to do so through the same sword that defeated entire armies and saved whole villages during the Sengoku Era.

Those wielding the Sword of Life were absolutely not allowed to kill or to lose. To lose would not only spell their doom but also the doom of the ones they were trying to protect.

If his only options were to kill his master to succeed him or get killed himself, then he'd find a third option to save them both, so that everyone could end up happy. So he wouldn’t break one of the Ten Commandments.

After praying over and over again to God for guidance, the Christian peacemaker found his answer.

'God is great. Praise be to God,' Nishida had taught at the time. 'I leave my fate in your hands, oh Lord Jesus. I trust in You. Thy will be done.'

***

Back at the front yard of the Minakata moneychanger office…

Kai Hidaka couldn't believe his eyes. The damage sponge and unstoppable juggernaut known as Lucas Grant had finally fallen against the hands of the so-called Kagemusha in a single exchange.

At the same time, he heard the righteous indignation from the voice of the blonde bombshell known as Satsuki Sakaguchi (also known as May Brooks) for good measure, with her charging forward with her trusty naginata (polearm blade) in tow.

"Keep your mitts away from Kyoko-chan and Mr. Sakaguchi!" screamed Satsuki at him.

Hidaka, her opponent, also currently looked like a dagger pincushion thanks to the efforts of Zan of the Sanada Demons.

Man, today just wasn't their day, was it? By "them", he meant the Brigands Guild.

Cursing under his breath, Kai charged, ignoring the agony of his body that served as a knife holder to Zan's daggers.

As for May's part, she saw red as soon as she got a look at the state of Kyoko Sakaguchi and her father Satoru. She didn't even have time to register that Kinta Minakata himself faced his own death match just a few yards away.

Like a purebred mare with blinders on, she focused solely on the ninja with the destroyed gas mask. A traitorous Japanese or East Asian man on the side of gaijin assassins.

He'd touch not one hair on either of them. Her Grandpa Sakaguchi's family. No, her family.

Something weird then happened. Kai found himself in the same predicament as before with Zan. Satsuki could reach and slash at him with Old or Young Moon Slashes at will with an insane reach.

Like she had an infinite supply of throwing knives that she used to suppress Hidaka from getting anywhere near Satoru and Kyoko Sakaguchi. Except it was a blade on a stick so she recycled her throwing knives by stabbing the same blade every time.

After struggling against a strange centipede version of the lion dance mascot with reinforced steel carapaces, razor-sharp limbs, and experienced Chinese kung-fu experts serving as its puppeteers earlier, she could finally let off some steam against one of the brigands.

She intended to defeat Kai like she did the gigantic human centipede mascot: By controlling the distance and taking him apart piece-by-piece, like her taking down those martial artist hooligans one-by-one. Thusly, that was what happened.

The already exhausted Fuuma Clan Ninja couldn't even touch the Caucasian martial artist, her naginata's slashing and stabbing range as far as that of a thrown projectile. Or, ironically, one of Hidaka's rope hooks and darts.

She unloaded on him like a Gatling gun onto an advancing army. Or even a Maxim gun. Every time Kai tried to get near her, it felt like he just dove face-first into a cactus patch. Or a shower of flesh-rending broken glass.

***

Many years ago, before Niitsu Kakunoshin became the disciple of Hiko Seijuro XII…

Hyoue Nishida found a way to master Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu and learn the Amakakeru Ryu no Hirameki without murdering his beloved master over it, and it rooted from him hearing about tales of the inimitable Kojiro Sasaki battling against Musashi Miyamoto.

Hyoue had never seen Kojiro's signature technique before, but he heard stories about how the riposte moved so quick it allowed Sasaki to cut apart a sparrow or swallow (hence its name) in mid-flight. 

He had been secretly practicing the Swallow Return over and over ever behind his master's back since he first heard about its legend leading up to his confrontation with his master.

He tried to figure out its mechanics from merely hearing about how it worked. To reverse-engineer a move he'd only heard about from rumors, legends, and folktales.

Hyoue threw caution to the wind and let his fate in the hands of his Christian God, the Almighty Yahweh. If he died in his attempt to spare his master's life, then so be it.

That was the kind of man Hyoue Nishida was.

And so the day of him learning the succession technique arrived. He was able to do the Amakakeru Ryu no Hirameki but intentionally missed with his first strike.

His master blocked then did the Kuzu Ryu Sen (Nine-Headed Dragon Flash) to force him to do the even stronger second follow-up strike. A surefire killing blow with any normal katana (as opposed to the sakabatou).

However, Hyoue refused to do the second strike that would've finished Seijuro Hiko XII off.

Instead, he did an imperfect version of the Swallow Return, resulting in him getting blown back by Master Hiko's Kuzu Ryu Sen.

A miracle then happened during the fateful duel between master and student.

Hyoue ended up slipping off the cliff he and his master fought on, dropping into the waterfall below after getting lacerated all over by his master's multi-hit move.

However, he avoided death from his refusal to do the succession technique properly because the Tsubame Gaeshi managed to shatter Seijuro's sword in turn, so his cuts ultimately ended up shallow and non-fatal.

Later on, after recovering from his wounds, he'd thank God for helping him learn not one but two new skills—the Hirameki and the Tsubame Gaeshi—while keeping his master from dying by his hands in order to learn them.

***

Back at the front yard of the Minakata moneychanger office…

Kai Hidaka had enough of Satsuki Sakaguchi's "Death by a Thousand Cuts" nonsense and pulled one of the daggers on (or in) his person to throw it at the wobbly and spent Kinta to complete their assassination mission.

Predictably, this made Satsuki charge and attack up close, deflecting the dagger before it could even reach Kinta's back. With her moving right into Kai's range so that he didn't need to close the distance between them.

"That's right. GET OVER HERE!" screamed the Fuuma shinobi.

At such a close range, her long-ranged polearm was rendered moot while Kai Hidaka could move freely with his sword daggers and entangle her with his rope darts.

"Satsuki-neechan, watch out!" cried out Kyoko as she covered her face by reflex yet peeked out of her open fingers to see what happened next.

'Ha. Women are so emotional and predictable,' thought Kai as he withstood May’s flesh-cutting slashes and dodged the stabbing attempt that would've run him through.

May Brooks smirked. For the last few weeks, she'd been sparring with Yahiko Myojin to learn how to dodge and defend herself from close-range, knowing that was her previous weak point.

'What the hell…!?' thought Hidaka as Brooks shortened her grip on her polearm and held it closer to the blade, like a regular sword.

This allowed her to parry his quicker, shorter swords with her blade or even use the freed up space on her pole to deflect his attacks from there, with her gripping it like a sword with an extra-long handle.

"MIKAZUKI O TSUKU NARI (CRESCENT MOON SLASH)!"

She could throw Crescent and Quarter Moon Slashes at that midrange as well. Whether it was from the Waxing or Waning Stance.

And, when Kai attempted to escape from her close-quarter rampage to regroup, she merely gripped her naginata normally by its base to slash at him from mid-range to long-range. He couldn't escape from her at all.

The bloody Kai dodged those slashes regardless and moved in even closer, intending to grapple with the tall woman, grab her from behind, and then slit her throat.

The adopted Sakaguchi daughter merely stepped back and responded with a, "HANGETSU O TSUKU NARI (HALF MOON SLASH)!" that, lucky for Kai, hit him by the blunt pole end instead of the sharp bladed end.

Kai dropped to his side like a bag of hammers. Fortunately, he avoided having the knives in his person stab him any worse than before.

***

After Hyoue Nishida spared himself and his master Hiko Seijuro XII from needing to kill each other to master Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu...

Nishida would later become one of the founding fathers of Musou Madden Ryu, the swordsmanship school Kinta would eventually master.

The Seiryu Clan helped him develop his own swordsmanship skills divorced from Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu, which in turn allowed him to protect the Hidden Christians from harm and discovery against the Tokugawa Shogunate.

He became the bane of many an officer of the law, samurai, or local authorities in Shimabara, hiding under the masked identity of Kirisaki of the Hidden Christians. Their divine protector from persecution and death.

Notably, Kirisaki the Christian freed jailed and tortured Christians or helped them find refuge among other Hidden Christians while never taking the life of their enemies.

The ruling shogunate also tolerated Kirisaki’s presence because on top of rescuing rogue Christians, he also helped catch criminals for them.

As though exchanging the lives of the criminals for the Christians he saved.

Kirisaki became an asset to the government it defied, so they turned a blind eye on its treasonous activities of hiding and rescuing essentially fugitives of the law in exchange for his vigilantism.

Like Morihei Ueshiba with the development of Aikido, the Christian swordsman considered Musou Madden Ryu as a synthesis of his martial studies, philosophy, and religious beliefs.

It combined everything Nishida learned from Sengoku Era Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu and old-school battoujutsu with Hasegawa Eishin Ryu, an iaijutsu koryu from the 16th Century founded by Chikaranosuke Eishin Hasegawa.

By the way, the Sakaguchis previously studied under Hasegawa Eishin Ryu prior to the development of Musou Madden Ryu.

From under this school did Hyoue, the Sakaguchis, and several others derive their take on modern iaijutsu or iaido before and after the Bakumatsu commenced in earnest.

Some students followed Hyoue's pacifistic "Sword of Life" lessons. Nishida and Ueshiba shared the same goal of creating a martial art that practitioners could use to defend themselves while also protecting their attackers from harm.

Others insisted in continuing to go the path of the "Sword of Death" or old-school kenjutsu and iaijutsu because in reality, kenjutsu was the art of killing and katanas were weapons used for murder.

They merely used "Sword of Life" as a safe way to practice and temper their deadly skills. Like doing no-contact sparring and kata drills before engaging in "the real deal".

However, as Japan went to civil war and heads of state rolled in Shimabara, the old officers that tolerated Kirisaki and his protection of Hidden Christians died out.

The "Sonno Joi" movement also led to renewed hatred of everything foreign, including Christians who followed the religion of foreigners. They got hunted down like stray dogs in times of famine soon after.

Years after Hyoue rescued his young nephew and niece from being purged for being Hidden Christians, he'd later get blinded by a teenaged Shogo Amakusa because he wanted revenge against the new government.

Hyoue would later train how to use the "Sword of Life" while blind, using his other sharpened senses to deal with people safely in battle, with him only using violence as a last resort.

All this time, even during the middle of the Bakumatsu, Nishida never took a life. He wasn't a pure pacifist. He was willing to draw swords and do battle when push came to shove. However, like Kenshin as a rurouni, he followed a non-killing vow.

And his nephew Shogo bitterly blamed this vow for the deaths of their people.

In the end, the Swallow Return was also the last technique Nishida used before dying in the hands of his nephew, the self-proclaimed Second Coming of Shiro Amakusa, Shogo Muto.

That was the blind swordsman's last-ditch effort to keep his nephew Shogo from going the dark path of cult leader and domestic terrorist.

Hyoue remained defiant to the end, unwilling to compromise on his Christian beliefs and unwillingness to take a life even at the cost of his own.

***

Like a newborn fawn, Lucas stood and wobbled on shaky legs, his clicky knees knocking together like the Shinsengumi knocking on your door, thinking you were harboring an Ishin Shishi fugitive.

By sheer force of will, he trudged forward.

Despite everything, the wheezing Kinta also sacrificed himself to land that last attack when by the tail end of their protracted battle, no Full Moon Slash or Double Full Moon Slash could land on Lucas.

Doing a Full Moon Slash iaijutsu from the start subjected the swordsman’s body to muscle-tearing or even bone-crushing centrifugal forces, especially one involving a reverse-momentum riposte like the Swallow Return!

It was hard to imagine the damage he was doing to his body, but surely it was enough to push him over his own limits!

Kinta's gasping mouth went agape as his little bastard brother marched towards him. Like an unkillable zombie. Like the Ochimusha the Minakatas were allegedly descended from.

What did it take for Luke to go down? How was he still standing?!

What did he go through all those years after he and his mother were banished from the Minakata Family that pushed him beyond his human limits?

Kinta himself sheathed his sword and hobbled in anticipation of his bastard brother's final attack, his scratchy throat withholding a bloody cough.

The Prodigal Son of the Minakatas had every right to wipe out their sinful clan.

However, it remained Kinta's duty as the grandson, nephew, and son of the family to protect his uncles and grandmother.

Lucas then leaped towards his unlucky brother as soon as his body gave in and he coughed, blood spraying from his mouth.

At the side of the entrance, both Yahiko Myojin and Sho Kojima—who accompanied Tatsuya Minakata back to the office to rescue Kinta —ran as fast as they could towards the Prodigal Son as soon as they spotted him attacking a coughing and defenseless Kinta.

Alas, they were too far away to make it.

Ditto with May Brooks, who'd just made short work of the injured Kai Hidaka.

She ran blindly at Lucas Grant, unaware of his connection with Kinta Minakata, but stopped short from running him through in spite of herself.

After years of living in Japan as the only other "gaijin", it was the first time she'd seen someone who was Caucasian like her, which sent a shock to her system for about a second.

A second was all the time Luke needed to finish off the huge wall that kept him from enacting revenge at the evil Minakata Family.

A flying kunai not unlike those wielded by Zan of the Sanada Demons flew in between Grant's eyes.

 "Who…!?" a frothing Lucas demanded as used his sword's handle to deflect the weapon, his one second of opportunity to assassinate Kinta now gone.

Did that damn persistent Zan revive and get in his way again? No, it was the dagger of the other ninja bodyguard who was also from the Sanada Ninja Clan. Their young master, Kaita.

Luke swiped at Kinta regardless, blindly hitting the invisible ninja instead as his crossed short blades broke under the weight of the heavy bastard sword.

The Prodigal Son then turned and blocked a sudden naginata slash with his blade, leaving him open to a number of other incoming attacks. Turning the full-rotation Full Moon Slash into a Half Moon Slash.

"Get the hell away from Kinta-sama…!" screamed Satsuki Sakaguchi, who remembered who she was now.

Or rather, who she became: A devoted student of Musou Madden Ryu and the adopted granddaughter of the Sakaguchis, who in turn loyally served under the Minakata Family since the olden times of the Shogunate.

It was Luke’s turn to wonder where he was and why he was fighting a blue-eyed blonde Caucasian warrior woman in full martial artist garb wielding a Japanese glaive, his brain unable to process what he saw.  

Lucas then noticed the incoming attacks of his other hindrances.

The charging Yahiko's temple then got clipped by a hook punch from the struggling Luke, but as he fell to the ground, he pushed forward and did the Kamiya Kasshin Ryu Tsuka no Gedan—Hiza Hijiki knee strike that made the Prodigal Son buckle.

Finally, Sho unsheathed his sword and let its handle fly into Luke's gut, knocking the wind out of him and making him drop his sword in wincing pain, which embedded itself to the ground.

This was another form of the Lunar Eclipse: A half-drawn blade with the handle aimed at the opponent's gut before either could fully draw their blades.

Like a rampaging gorilla, Luke punched, kicked, elbowed, and threw the people nearest him, his eyes solely focused on his half-brother Kinta, who had already recovered from his coughing fit.

Yahiko shook his head in disbelief. What did it take to put this man down? He seemed as strong as Sanosuke, if not stronger…!

Soon, a dogpile occurred. Multiple coppers were called into the Yokohama Chinatown to seize the assassin. They became messy entanglemen of limbs, sai, wooden swords, and rope.

The police finally arrived along with Chizuru Raikouji and Abelia La Cerca.

The dead-tired Yahiko surveyed the carnage. Blood spilled everywhere. Several people were injured. Multiple bodyguards were killed inside and outside the moneychanger building.

Regardless, the Brigands Guild's invasion in Chinatown had ended, at long last.

***

The Yokohama Police was busy that night, arresting criminals working with foreign invader mercenaries left and right, most of which were Chinese nationals in the local Chinatown criminal syndicate.

However, only Lucas Grant ended up getting arrested. Somehow, someway, while they were all distracted by Luke's last-ditch attempt at taking out his half-brother Kinta, Kai Hidaka disappeared.

The aching Yahiko suspected that The Faceless had something to do with it. He probably fetched his fellow Brigands Guild member in the middle of the chaos.

He almost had him too during their duel, but the strange masked brigand had more tricks up his sleeve like the experienced mercenary that he was. Like he changed personalities and styles depending on the mask he wore.

‘Now who does that remind me of?’ the teenaged samurai thought with a smirk.

However, their boss had now been caught by the authorities. Will they still continue with their mission of taking out the wealthy and influential Minakata Family?

Meanwhile, little Abelia attended to the gasping and wheezing Kinta after applying first-aid on Satoru Sakaguchi and his daughter Kyoko along with the other medics on the scene looking for other survivors.

Bandages and salves were also handed off to Yahiko Myojin and Satsuki Sakaguchi.

The two sparring mates grinned at one another and crossed their weapons together. Their lengthy training sessions at the Sakaguchi Dojo had paid dividends tonight.

"Good work, Joshua-kun!"

"You too, Satsuki!"

Chizuru herself pinched one of Yahiko's ear and scolded him for not being careful and needlessly involving himself with other people's business to the point of risking his life. Like she didn't know better by now.

Yahiko, Gan, and Minoe had actually met in the middle of him, Kojima, and Kinta's uncle returning to the moneychanger office.

Minoe ended up helping out with the mission but was unwilling to join Yahiko any further.

The ninja turned towards Yahiko, who almost flinched and turned away, but willed himself to stare at him eye-to-eye.

"I had no idea Takae was your father," Yahiko said honestly. "I'm sorry for your loss. He was an honorable fighter who saved my life in the end."

"What is your name, Yojimbo?" asked Kaita.

"Myojin Yahiko," said Yahiko Myojin. "The son of Tokyo Samurai."

"Fine. Myojin Yahiko," Kaita Takae pointed his kunai at the teenaged swordsman. "Until I kill you, make sure no one else kills you."

From there, the son of Masahiro Takae who inherited all of his tricks disappeared in the blink of an eye, his silhouette fading from the light and merging back into the shadows.

***

"It's been 17, almost 18 years since the Meiji Era started. There's no reason for you to be trapped into a master-servant relationship with our family," said Kinta to the Sakaguchis.

Lieutenant Satoru Sakaguchi then said, "Don't be silly. Just because of the administration's edicts, we're going to throw away hundreds of years of gratitude? Don't be a stranger, Kinta-sama."

"It's a stupid old tradition," insisted Kinta.

"Come on, don't make me say it, Kinta-sama." Satoru grinned. "The bonds between our families run deeper than mere traditions and classes. We Sakaguchis are loyal to you because we choose to! We’re bound by fate at this point."

***

Yahiko then overheard the police chatting with the "Sword of Life" swordsman and drunkard who seemed to have finally sobered up after using his mix of the Drunken Fist and Musou Madden Ryu swordsmanship at The Faceless.

Something about them apprehending three of five known Brigands Guild members.

One had been jailed already—someone who almost killed a squad of Yokohama Policemen had they not been saved in time by that other foreigner girl the size of a ten year old who knew all about western medicine and drugs.

They also put in chains a swarthy hairy giant of a muscular man who wielded a huge ax like it weighed as much as an ordinary sword. They arrested him back in one of the Minakata Family’s many mansions.

And now they actually caught the mastermind of the mercenaries with a direct link to the Minakatas, Lucas Grant. Right on time too, before he could murder one member of their family.

However, it was at the risk and cost of the lives of many of Yokohama’s Finest and their hired private bodyguards, one of whom Lucas impersonated in order to get close to the family.

***

To Be Continued...

Yes. I combined elements of the Shimabara Arc and the Black Knights arc together for this fanfic's continuity. In light of that, you can consider this fanfic an "Elseworlds" type of story that happens directly after "Yahiko's Sakabatou".

It hinges on the alternative universe premise of "Had the Kenshingumi never met their filler villains (because Kenshin was too busy dealing with Enishi), what would've happened to them?"

It follows portions of the 1996 anime and the manga's Iinchu Arc but skips the filler episode seasons altogether. I do think that characters like Shogo Amakusa were wasted potential, especially since he was supposed to be more skilled than Kenshin and has his own signature move.

Shogo's Uncle Hyoue also fascinated me, particularly his motivation for learning Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu as a Hidden Christian.

Danke, Abdiel

[gabriel-gabdiel]

【Draft】 Rurouni Yahiko Chapter 59: The Swallow Return

Lucas pushes his half-brother Kinta to the brink while Yahiko realizes something about the Seiryu Clan's personal ninja Kaita.

Will they be able to handle the machinations of the Brigands Guild or not?

Many years ago, during dinner with Kinta's late grandfather, Toshiro Minakata...

Both Toshiro and Kinta Minakata ate in silence at a long Western-style high table in contrast to the smaller and lower traditional family table typical of the Japanese.

The strict and imposing Toshiro was a vanguard among hatamoto samurai.

Realizing that the samurai after the Sengoku Era and during the peaceful Tokugawa Shogunate Era were essentially soldiers without a war to wage, he had tried his hand at business and trade.

He worked to make the Minakata coffers and fortune grow even as many impoverished samurai ended up seeing the merchant class rise and become more powerful during this period of peace.

He made sure the Minakata Clan would survive in the coming eras in every way possible, whether it was by wealth or political privilege.

Toshiro proved himself ahead of the curve, even though he was cut-throat enough to resell the confiscated black market opium of Wokou pirates to his fellow Japanese citizens or even export them back to China as a profit.

He found ways to thrive in both wartime and peacetime. Like a rat or a cockroach. Crafty as a fox, he was.

"I've heard you've been chosen as part of the Kyoto Mimawarigumi (Kyoto Patrolling Group)," probed Toshiro.

"Yes, Grandfather," answered a teenaged Kinta.

No older than his fellow iaijutsu (sword-drawing) practitioner, the Hitokiri Battousai (Battousai the Manslayer) on the side of the Ishin Shishi (Patriots).

"And how are your studies?"

"There are no issues there either."

"That's fine. Keep doing both like you used to."

"Of course, Grandfather."

"Being well-versed in letters and arms, a man from the Minakata Family must excel in all fields. My eldest, your Uncle Tatsuya, became a banker. My second child, your Uncle Kaneda, became a lawyer. Your mother, my youngest..."

Toshiro trailed off and cleared his throat while Kinta stared at him, unblinking. Pretending he didn't notice his grandfather's pause.

"Remember, Kinta. The strongest of people are born from the strongest of adversities," his grandfather said with such confidence, Kinta just knew that he spoke from experience.

Whether it was him battling Wokou pirates in the South China Sea or dealing with local Tokugawa Era politics like he was Julius Caesar amidst the traitorous Roman senate, his every word dripped with veteran knowledge.

He did everything he could to keep himself from swimming in the middle of a sea of daggers and a pool of his own blood, whether in the hands of sea-faring criminals or landlubber backstabbing politicians.

Toshiro continued. "Bring honor back to the Minakata Family. Honor both your father and your mother. Erase any stains the name might have by excelling in what you do. Prove yourself to be a worthy heir of the name and the fortune of the Minakata Family, Grandson."

"I will, Grandfather."

As far as the Minakatas were concerned, winning was everything. The world was composed of winners and everyone else.

***

Rurouni Yahiko

A Rurouni Kenshin Continuation Fan Fiction Story by Chester Castañeda

The Swallow Return makes an appearance after Kinta is pushed into a corner.

Disclaimer: All characters used in this fanfic (save some others) are the rightful property of Nobuhiro Watsuki, Shueisha, Shonen Jump, Viz, Sony Studios, Fuji TV, Studio Gallup, Studio Deen, and ADV. This disclaimer also covers all the other copyrighted material that are far too many to mention here. Don't sue me please, I'm very poor.

***

Chapter 59: The Swallow Return

***

Back inside the memories that Kinta Minakata had of his grandfather, Toshiro Minakata...

Kinta's grandfather told him long ago the following.

"The world is a tough, unforgiving place, Kinta. It's a dog-eat-dog world out there. In an eye blink, a king can become a pauper and a pauper can become a king. Those who adapt the most consistently in a merciless world that's always changing are those that survive in the end. Today, we eat like royalty. But tomorrow, what if the bakufu lost its power? What if Japan was colonized by foreign powers? What would happen to the hatamoto?"

Kinta answered, "We would become nothing."

Toshiro nodded. "Yes. That's why I'm building our family fortunes. So that the Minakatas can survive the dawn of a new century or even a new millennium. If tomorrow, samurai ceased to exist and all our political clout became moot, our wealth will keep us afloat. Always remember to keep moving forward and changing with the times, my grandson."

In order to remain on the top of the food chain and survive, one must win. Always win in everything they did. It was the rules of nature. It was survival of the fittest.

In their world, the winner was acknowledged and the loser was disavowed.

Like how his mother was banished from existence and forgotten as the black sheep of the family, for example.

The clan of rumored ochimusha (defeated samurai during the Sengoku Era considered as low class citizens) that stole away the name and valor of the original deceased Minakata clan knew as much.

They did what they could to save face, thus they were able to pluck victory from the jaws of defeat to cur favor from the Tokugawas.

To the ears of any member of the Minakata Clan, what Kinta's grandfather Toshiro was implying was crystal clear.

His orders were to erase the shameful actions of Kinta's shameless mother by becoming a standout among the Mimawarigumi ranks.

Just like how their ochimusha (fallen warrior) ancestors became hatamoto retainers to the Tokugawa Shogunate, so too should Kinta remove from memory the embarrassment of having an adulteress for a mother and a cuckold for a father.

Winning was the only thing that mattered.

Kinta simply had to keep his head high and win. That was all he needed to do. Because he was victorious over all, he deserved to win.

"Keep on winning, Kinta. Keep on winning because you're a Minakata. And Minakatas are born winners, through hell or high water. Even in spite of fate itself conspiring against us," his grandfather would always say.

There was nothing more important than winning at all costs. This was how the Minakatas survived through centuries. Millennia. Ages.

Toshiro also regularly said, "You know that old saying, 'It's not whether you win or lose, it's how you play the game'? That's bullshit. The bottom line is winning."

This was how Kinta earned his place at the Minakata table despite his uncles despising him, his father committing suicide, and his mother bringing shame to the family name.

He looked at his plate. The pristine chinaware was where he ate foreign food like the Salisbury steak.

If it were broken, it'd be thrown away. A plate could never be restored once it had a crack. But if it was still usable and you were desperate, what you had would suffice.

Besides which, winning was the liquid gold that helped glue together even broken pottery or ceramics, thus making it whole and beautiful again in its own right.

That was the art of Kintsugi or Kintsukuroi (Gold Repair), after all.

***

Back at the abandoned building within the narrow alleyway near the Minakata Moneychanger Office…

Yahiko Myojin gasped for air, his face beet-red, his hair somehow messier than usual, and his whole body an aching mess. Also, his shirt and pants were in tatters.

However, it was him who was left standing. It was Fabian La Cerca, the infamous "Faceless" of the foreign assassination squad, "The Brigands Guild", who ended up on the floor on his posterior, his mask shattered into pieces.

God. Dammit. That stubborn, agile gaijin finally fell down.

Unbeknownst to the slightly concussed Faceless, Yahiko had set him up from the start with the Genei Gami (Phantom God).

Yahiko let Fabian memorize his tempo of overhead swings to train him to always anticipate and parry swings from the direction, thus allowing Myojin to blindside him with a side-swiping strike to the temple.

Aware that he couldn't time him by virtue of his odd rhythm, Yahiko instead baited him to counter repeatedly until he followed the samurai kid's more predictable rhythm.

The Tokyo Samurai Descendant bet on Fabian's weakness—his over-reliance on counters—and made his usually broken rhythm more predictable as a result.

Even then, he couldn't have landed his trap on The Faceless had Kaita not arrived to assist him with timely kunai or shuriken throws.

This foreign fencing genius from the West could give most of the members of the Oniwabanshu (Guardians of the Gate) or the Juppon Gatana (Ten Swords) a run for their money! Probably.

'How's that, Cat Eyes? Here's the proof of concept of my anti-Cat-Eyes training! Everything is going according to plan.'

Yahiko grinned from ear-to-ear, feeling himself in the moment.

However, he broke a cardinal rule of being a martial artist or even an old-school samurai from a bygone era. He became overconfident and let his guard down.

It wasn't composure but pride that led to his fall.

"Good work, Yojimbo!" appraised Kaita. "Now let's finish off the assassin before he recovers and goes after the Minakatas!"

"Wait. Let's just take him down and let the police handle him," insisted Yahiko, which made the ninja pause. "He might be useful in learning the whereabouts of their gang or something!"

"He's too dangerous to be kept alive!" argued the young shinobi. "I'm authorized to kill him. I don't answer to the police."

"No! Let the coppers arrest him and have him answer for his crimes!" insisted the samurai boy, going by what Kenshin or Kaoru would normally do in such a situation.

What he said to The Faceless about the sakabatou being a life-giving sword wasn't just empty words. He lived by that code of honor and ethics in swordsmanship.

Kaita realized he couldn't reason with the child, remembering the spiel he overheard from him about a Sword of Life—a reverse-edged blade was blunt on its outside curve, yet he didn't use it like a sickle or scimitar.

Something about the kid's "life-giving" sword sounded familiar to him though. Like he'd heard about the unusual weapon somewhere before in the recent past.

In an eye blink, the shinobi disappeared from Yahiko's midst. However, the teenaged samurai figured out where he went and shielded La Cerca from the incoming ninja throwing knives.

"Despite your looks, you're quite the tenacious guy, Yojimbo," said the unseen Kaita, who kept evading Yahiko's probing strikes with his blunt weapon.

"The name's Yahiko, Ninja Dude!" Yahiko said as he swung blindly at air yet still felt the presence of the ninja by reading his bloodlust. Just like how Kenshin would.

Soon, Yahiko's sakabatou found its target, with Kaita blocking the longer blade with the Okinawan three-pronged weapon known as the sai.

"You know, you remind me of someone I fought months ago. What was his name? Take? Taikai? Tatakai?" Yahiko tried to remember the name of the aged ninja assassin who went after Kenshin several months ago.

The Tokyo Samurai Descendant faced the camouflaged shinobi on behalf of Kenshin Kamiya (nee Himura). 

'Wait.' Something then clicked inside Kaita's mind just then.

 "Oh yeah, Takae! Takae was his name! His invisibility trick was amazing, just like yours! I couldn't see him at all when we fought!"

"…Battousai," said Kaita, which made Myojin's head snap into attention and La Cerca stir in his own stupor. "That's the Battousai's sword."

Yahiko and Kaita then just looked at each other before they asked in unison:

"How did you know that name…?"

***

"Like waves from the sea," said the blood-stained Lucas Grant with a deep exhale. "The high tide and the low tide. The ebb and flow of the limitless ocean."

"…What are you talking about?" asked Kinta Minakata, who only looked a little scuffed up with tiny cuts and bruises while his half-brother looked like he had one foot on the grave.

Or an undead, vengeful zombie soldier from the foreign legion that refused to die.

"Facing your Musou Madden Ryu is like dealing with the rising tides. Your attacks come in waves. You even have a move named 'Tsunami', for goodness' sake," said the bilingual Lucas.

Curiously, even with the crimson mask on his face, Grant's slashes, stabs, chops, and pummels (from his bastard sword's pommel) seemed to increase in strength the more damage he received.

Was it the swell of adrenalin? A second or even third wind? Or perhaps sheer willpower? Kinta couldn't tell. He was just tired of trying hard to land a strike, only for his long-lost bastard of a brother to shrug it off like nothing.

Lucas Grant was no John Rathbone. Nothing about his swordsmanship was elegant or skilled. He kept on coming like a caveman, almost.

However, what he lacked in finesse he more than made up for in undeniable, sobering power. He was the difference between skillfully untying a knot and gnawing the rope apart.

More importantly, after repeatedly receiving the different techniques of the Musou Madden Ryu, Luke had started timing his blocks and parries better.

Kinta was still several moves ahead of him in every exchange, but by sheer trial and error, the stamina monster tanked enough shots to learn their timing, thus allowing him to slip past them better.

Like a sailor navigating his boat through treacherous waters and weathering the storm from experience. Unwilling to sink. Unwilling to let nature take its course and send him down the depths of the unforgiving sea.

Like villagers waiting out a typhoon until it left the area, resiliently rebuilding everything in the wake of its devastation because life always moved on.

Kinta then noticed that like the Prodigal Son of the Minakatas, he was only managing to do nicks and bruises on his half-brother.

The (literal) bastard was blocking most of his strikes with every inch of his heavy bastard sword, including its thick hilt and hammerhead-like pommel. None the worse for wear.

Well, not exactly. But all the major damage he currently had were ones he got earlier from Kinta and Zan. Wounds that might as well looked worse than they really were because of how nimble Grant moved regardless, like he'd long ago recovered from them.

Like the bloodstains all over his body were just war paint. Like his lacerations were scars or tattoos.  They were just for show and he was actually completely unharmed.

Luke had nerves of steel. And the pain threshold of a rock to boot.

A shiver ran through Kinta's spine in realization. Lucas had taken his best shots and remained standing. Could he take one of Lucas's best shots or any one of them in turn…?

His breathing had become heavier and heavier as the battle drew on. The same problem he had with the more skillful Faceless, but this time his half-brother exposed his weakness through a war of attrition.

His arms felt tired from just slashing at his brother over and over with strikes that would've normally plowed down hordes of Ishin Shishi rebels one after the other.

For someone who used techniques based on the moon phases and sea tides, it was Kinta who ended up getting dragged down deep waters by the inimitable, unfettered Lucas.

"Let me be the cliff that stands steady as your waves uselessly crash against my rocks below. The high ground where your waters couldn't reach," said Grant.

***

Yahiko crossed swords with Kaita, his mind racing a mile a minute. Or a kilometer a minute. Or roughly 1.6 kilometers a minute if it were still measured in miles.

"How do you know about Takae…?" Myojin asked Kaita, pushing the ninja away with his hard sword block.

"That's my line!" Kaita countered in words while also countering by disappearing from Yahiko's midst and stabbing him with his twin sais. "His last mission was to take out the Battousai. How did you end up with the Battousai's reverse-edged sword?"

Not knowing what else to say, Yahiko responded, "That's none of your business...!"

Unable to see him in time, the samurai kid attempted to blast the unseen shinobi away with a blind Dou Gami (God on Earth) to the floor, which his fellow bodyguard chose to parry and expose his location anyway by reflex.

The concussive force of the technique then bent and snapped one of Kaita's sais apart.

As Yahiko followed through with the Tsui Gami (Hammer of God) to break apart Taikai's other sai, the two combatants heard a voice from the blue.

"It's because he's Takae Kaita. The son of the man you apparently met. And fought. Did he die by your hands or the Battousai's?"

The recovering Fabian La Cerca had just spoken. Or was he John Rathbone this time around? The Minakata bodyguards couldn't tell.

"No, it couldn't have been you," hissed Fabian, referring to Yahiko. "You would've spared Takae with your foolish beliefs regarding a life-giving sword."

'Takae is Kaita's father?!' Yahiko's blood ran cold in realization. He'd been fighting alongside and crossing swords with the late Masahiro Takae all this time? He didn't know what to think or what to do next.

'Oh no, The Faceless is awake…!' Kaita finally disengaged from crossing blades with Yahiko to face the formidable Brigands Guild member.

Suddenly, the remnants of Fabian's broken saber then ended up on the now-visible Kaita Takae's neck before, a split-second later, his blood-spurting body got replaced by a plank of bloodstained wood wearing the ninja's clothing, the sword wedged deep into it.

With a thousand thoughts colliding inside his mind like a derailed train wreck, Myojin hesitated in attacking the charging unarmed gaijin in that same split-second, which proved to be his undoing.

Yahiko aimed and swung at The Faceless's shoulder with a simple downward sword strike, electing not to use any of his Kamiya Kasshin Ryu Revisal techniques for fear of the blunt-force trauma finishing off the man before him.

La Cerca simply dodged and stabbed the young samurai with three retractable claw blades that shot out of his left arm brace. They looked suspiciously like the claws that the late Hannya from the Tokyo Oniwabanshu.

"You're an amateur after all. To defeat an enemy without killing him... How naïve are you? You should've finished me off when you had the chance."

However, unlike Hannya, Fabian only had a single pair of the claws instead of having both hands sport the hidden weapon.

"Why won't you stay down, Faceless?!" demanded Myojin.

"If you had given me the final blow, that wouldn't be a problem. Also, the name's Haruka now,"  answered The Faceless.

For The Faceless was not Conde (Count) Fabian La Cerca any longer. Instead, he was Haruka. The half-Japanese burakumin (outcast) who had his own unique style of hidden-weapon ninjutsu.  With the destruction of one mask, he had donned another.

"Show me the power of that so-called life-giving sword you have, kiddo!" said The Faceless as he replaced his broken mask over his featureless face with another.

Regardless, Myojin blocked the claws in the nick of time with a parry from his iron sheath just before their pointed tips could pierce all the way into his vital organs.

'Magnificent,' thought Haruka, who blocked Yahiko's riposte with his other arm brace. 'The boy does not disappoint!'

"Kenshin's life-giving sword protects both you and me! That's the promise I made to both my master and Kenshin!" Yahiko spat out as his mouth spewed blood.

"Spoken like someone who has never killed a man. Naïve and foolish. If you try sparing my life, it will come at the expense of your own!" said Haruka. "Remember this painful lesson, boy. When at war, mercy is for the weak!"

Personally, Myojin wasn't as closed-minded about killing as the vagabond version of Kenshin who promised his late wife Tomoe Yukishiro to never kill again.

He knew there were times when he had no choice but to kill, especially when defending himself and/or others. However, he also wanted to emulate his idol Kenshin as much as he could.

He wanted to match his resolve as the inheritor of his reverse-edged blade.

"If you won't die so easily then neither will I!" retorted the young samurai with a bloody grin.

***

And just like that, the tables had turned. Or rather, the tides of battle had changed. Kinta's tides had started receding while the tides of Lucas grew in turn.

The exhausted Kinta looked pristine compared to his bloody bastard of a long-lost brother. However, the way they moved belied their appearance.

Like with The Faceless, Minakata had started to tire out and sweat hard. This manifested with his shortness of breath and slower movement. He also hesitated and made more mistakes than before that kept him from finishing off his brother earlier on.

Meanwhile, the bloodstained Lucas Grant kept attacking, swaying, ducking, and countering against quick-draw shots and ripostes like he could still go into battle for many hours longer.

Like Luke was a spry younger man or spring chicken dancing circles around a sickly senior citizen or an anemic old rooster at death's door. In contrast, his estranged sibling wheezed and struggled through every exchange like he was in stuck in quicksand or a tar pit.

It also helped that Grant's seemingly inexhaustible stamina and toughness allowed him to figure out his brother's swordsmanship using a similarly superior blade made of superior European steel versus the pig metal of Japanese swords.

For example, Luke figured out that Kinta relies on momentum and centrifugal force in order to make his iaijutsu strikes increase in speed and power whenever he performed one of many Tsunami kata variations.

The first few shallow strikes served as probing slashes to gauge the distance of the target and the last few strikes ended up the more deadly accurate bone-cutting attacks based on the information gathered by the initial swipes.

By refusing to get herded by Kinta's first few strikes that he also allowed to hit nothing but air to find his range, Grant could sidestep and counter or riposte the deeper cuts with his harder swings.

However, what made the Mimawarigumi Battousai truly dangerous was that he could go from zero to a hundred on the first slash by doing the Mangetsu O Tsuku Nari (Full Moon Slash) straight from the scabbard or even the Aoitsuki O Tsuku Nari (Blue Moon Slash) in case the first slash missed.

Alas, as Kyoko Sakaguchi herself discovered, doing that devastating technique from the start instead of building up to it with momentum-gathering Tidal Wave technique could literally tear a person's body apart.

When used over and over, the double-edged technique sapped the stamina of its user. Or if it was done incorrectly, it could even injure him.

Luke also pressured Kinta to counterattack and react over and over while keeping himself safe with feints, fakes, stabs, and his own probing strikes only to switch to a hard block, parry, or dodge at the last second.

His excessive, elaborate swings that would've been discouraged because of his many openings served as traps for him to catch Kinta with a slash or two. If he got slashed back, he could block or simply absorb the damage with his resilient body.

Whenever Kinta hesitated, Luke turned his feint into an actual attack care of recoveries or follow-throughs like a trap activated by a tripwire.

The Brigands Guild member pushed the hapless iaido master into a corner and made him backpedal from his accurate attacks and automatic counters.

Having both The Faceless and his son Cain scout Kinta's skill level and disseminate his abilities first before Lucas faced off with him had paid dividends for their mission.

The Brigands Guild had caught the Mimawarigumi Battousai unawares and flatfooted with their schemes, research, and preparation.

Kinta's shoulders reached nearly up to his neck as he gasped for air, his red hair matted with sweat and blood.

The Kagemusha (literally meant "Shadow Warrior" but also meant "Body Double") drowned in a whirlwind of steel while his own attacks got deflected, absorbed, swallowed, or tanked by the walking disaster area himself.

An earthquake. An avalanche. A landslide. The irresistible human tempest indulging in a roaring rampage of revenge.

***

"What pushes you to act now?" asked Haruka the Outcast. "You have no relation to the Minakatas. What is your purpose for risking your life for them?"

If Yahiko were honest, he'd admit to pushing through this bodyguard gig partly because he thought it'd be a waste to not use what he'd learned training with May Brooks/Satsuki Sakaguchi at the Sakaguchi Dojo.  

The samurai kid responded through grit teeth, "I met them through a friend of mine. Also, even if we're strangers, what good is the life-giving sword of the Kamiya Kasshin Ryu if I can't save the lives of those under my protection?"

"There you go again with your lies," hissed the foreign super spy and assassin. "A sword is a weapon. The art of swordsmanship is learning how to kill. To believe otherwise is to invite death at your doorstep. Or to give a child a gun to play with. Don't be so gullible."

The Faceless twisted his claw knives around Myojin's abdomen, which made the boy swallow down a guttural scream he wouldn't release to not give his opponent the satisfaction of seeing him in agony.

"I feel like I've heard that speech before," said Yahiko. "I believe in life-giving swords. There is such a thing as a sword that protects. I've seen it with my own eyes."

He didn't actually hear it the first time Kenshin told Kaoru those same words. However, the Kamiya couple did have discussions about their first meeting later on that the boy did listen to.

Dully, Yahiko wondered who could save him now? Munenori Minoe? Gan? The police? A wandering Kenshin Kamiya looking after him? Sanosuke Sagara back from America? Or even Seijuro Hiko himself like when he faced off against Fuji's gigantic blade?

It certainly wasn't going to be Kaita, if what Haruka said about him being Takae's son were true. He might even stab him in the back instead.

Maybe this was it. His luck finally ran out. He bit off more than he could chew.

"…Gesshoku (Lunar Eclipse)!"

"UGH! MIERDA…!"

The next thing Yahiko knew, he ended up on the floor, blood spurting from the three wounds on his abdomen while he saw a lanky man with huge hands grab hold of The Faceless's face and slam it down to the concrete ground.

"…Kiddo. I've learned long ago that the Shword of Life doesn't exist. All shwordsh are Shwordsh of Death. The Shword of Life is one big joke. A deadly one that could getchoo killed," said Yahiko's ultimate rescuer with a slight drunken slur.

"Who the hell are you, man?!" exclaimed Yahiko as his eyes stared at the man before him from his coiffed head to his sandaled toes and his flowery pink haori and hakama (shirt and pnats) in between.

"The name'sh Kojima Sho." The man smirked and let go of the struggling Faceless before standing up and retreating from the swipes from the masked man's claws. "…Ah, screw it. Let me be that silly fool. Let's make the Sword of Life into a reality!"

It was at that point that Myojin noticed the weird man had six fingers on each of his two humongous hands, giving him extra grip on his sword or on Haruka's masked face. Also, his face was as pink as his haori for some reason.

Was he drunk right now? Oh gods. Yahiko's rescuer was a drunkard. Yahiko could smell the booze from Sho's breath from where he lay. "Get away, old man! You'll get killed!"

Also, for some reason, the drunkard reminded Yahiko of Hitokiri Gasuke.

No wait. That was wrong. He actually remembered him. This was the guy who was with Kinta Minakata when they first arrived in the Sakaguchi Dojo!

Meanwhile. Haruka growled, "It's always one thing after another…!" as he jumped around and swiped his claws at Kojima in every which way. It had been quite a long day so far.

The unsteady, hiccupping Kojima unsheathed his cane sword but wielded it strangely. Like it was a scythe. He blocked and parried The Faceless's claw strikes with the spine instead of the edge of his katana.

'Was this the Sword of Life this guy was talking about?' wondered Yahiko, who by now found the strength to sit up. 'A way to wield ordinary swords so that they don't immediately finish off opponents like the sakabatou…?'

Sho then fell into a wobbly Waning Stance of the Musou Madden Ryu, with his back turned against his opponent and his face giving him a sidelong glance at most. Just like the favored stance of his fellow student, Lieutenant Satoru Sakaguchi.

Unlike Minoe and his/her split personalities, The Faceless remembered everything his other identities experienced because he merely donned different guises rather than transform into someone else entirely.

Therefore, he remembered the iaido stance from his bout with Kinta Minakata and prepared to counter it in kind.

The burakumin thusly charged at Sho to stab his back or his neck then sidestep to the right or clockwise to avoid the right-handed quick-draw slash from his scabbard.

It was his way to trip the trap without getting caught in it, just like he did when he faced off against Baku the Bat Ninja.

Only for him to get blindsided by Kojima swatting the back of his head with his scabbard instead of his blade, much to his surprise.

***

Kinta Minakata was one of the few people who've met all the Shidai Nikuya (Four Butchers)—Hitokiri Shinbei, Hitokiri Izo, Hitokiri Hanjiro, and Hitokiri Gensai—of the Ishin Shishi.

They were also known as the Four Hitokiri (Manslayers). The hitokiri who worked under orders of Hanpeita Takechi and Ryoma Sakamoto.

He didn't face off against Hitokiri Shinbei (Shinbei Tanaka) as a Mimawarigumi at 14 years of age, but he did assist his kenjutsu masters in hunting him and his partner at the time, Hitokiri Izo (Izo Okada), down when their identities were still a secret.

Kinta's masters were also the founders of Musou Madden Ryu—Genzo Sakaguchi, his father Azuma Minakata, and Kyo "Sword of Death" Kojima.

The  Shidai Nikuya cried out "Sonno Joi" (Revere the Emperor, Expel the Barbarians) even as the Shinsengumi shouted in turn, "Aku Soku Zan" (Kill Evil Instantly).

He'd later meet and cross swords with Izo, Hanjiro, and Gensai (or Izo Okada, Hanjiro Nakamura, and Gensai Kawakami) at different points of the Bakumatsu.

On top of the Shidai Nikuya were the Choshu Han Hitokiri working in the shadows—the Hitokiri Battousai and the unnamed hitokiri rumored to have a flaming sword—under the orders of Kogoro Katsura and Shinsaku Takasugi.

The Hitokiri Battousai rose to prominence as shogunate forces concentrated their might on taking out the more prominent hitokiri of the Four Butchers, with them dying one by one.

In turn, the Mimawarigumi Battousai rose to prominence himself, such that a fateful duel between two Battousais was expected to happen during the Boshin War. Let the true Battousai emerge victorious in the end.

Alas, they never crossed swords. Battousai Himura ended up fighting mostly Shinsengumi forces while the Kyoto Mimawarigumi moved to Osaka and dealt with the rest of the Satsuma Domain.

As Kenshin Himura battled against his closest rival Hajime Saito, Kinta Minakata instead dueled against the inimitable Kawakami Gensai.

By the time the two Battousais could've crossed swords in the Battle of Toba-Fushimi, the Mimawarigumi had to retreat back to Osaka to regroup with other Shogunate forces on January 31, 1868, after their leader Tadasaburo Sasaki was fatally injured.

The Kyoto Mimawarigumi was even temporarily renamed the Shin Yugekitai (from January 8 to 19) and permanently renamed the Sogikitai (April 10) a day before the Tokugawa Shogunate surrendered to the newly established Meiji Government (April 11). The group disbanded soon after.

Like with Hajime Saito and Kenshin Himura, Kinta Minakata was offered government positions in the military, cabinet, or police in recognition of his skill, contributions, and heroic exploits during the Bakumatsu and beyond.

He turned them all down, but the rest of his family were quick to cur favor with the new government to allow them to keep their wealth and remain a privileged oligarch family even as the samurai caste was abolished.

***

Back at the front yard of the Moneychanger Office…

Kinta Minakata should've finished Luke off when he had the chance. Like behead him or cut his jugular before he could even draw his superior European steel bastard sword against his inferior katana.

Lucas Grant merely walked the haggard Kinta down at that point, running him ragged like a fully grown adult manhandling an asthmatic child having a temper tantrum.

There was nothing his privileged samurai half-brother could dish out to him that he couldn't handle. His deadened nerves had gone through  much worse than this.

Good thing Lucas forced Minakata to drag the fight out with the revelation that they were half-brothers. Had the skilled Kinta not held back, Lucas might've ended up half-dead or wholly dead without touching a hair on him.

'Dammit,' thought Luke. 'What a waste for someone like him to get in the way of my revenge.'

To conduct his revenge against the Minakatas properly, Lucas did his due diligence and researched about his estranged family who disowned his mother and removed her from their family registry.

If they weren't as wicked as he believed them to be, he'd spare them from his vengeance. Had the Minakatas repented and changed for the better, Lucas would've not bothered continuing his plans for revenge.

Alas, they were perhaps greedier and more evil than even he anticipated. All of them except Kinta.

Learning about the compromised health of his brother, fighting a war of attrition, and practicing counters to some of his moves beforehand with The Faceless before experiencing the rest firsthand during the fight had paid dividends for the young Grant.

"Sorry, Aniki (Big Bro). In another life, we could've been friends. Or even real brothers," said Lucas while swatting away another iaijutsu attempt by his tiring sibling.

He'd been researching and observing from afar his estranged brother while masquerading as one of the Minakta bodyguards. He'd learned of both his exploits in the Mimawarigumi and the Hidden Christians of Shimabara.

The Minakatas had long been spoiled rotten by money, but Kinta actually fought for his ideals. Like the Shogunate Forces or even the Ishin Shishi of the past.

When Kinta's father got dishonored by Lucas's father by having an affair with their mother, Kinta's heroic exploits in the Mimawarigumi helped recover the reputation of the Minakata name.

While Kinta's relatives filled the family coffers so they could still live a life of privilege after the Ishin Shishi took over, he went and avenged the death of his master then took down the leader of domestic terrorists who claimed himself the Son of God and the descendant of Shiro Amakusa Tokisada.

He infiltrated the Hidden Christians ranks as Shogo Amakusa's Kagemusha (Body Double) before ultimately betraying the cult leader at the cost of his health, even.

 At that point, none of Kinta's Musou Madden Ryu techniques could escape Lucas's automatic blocks and parries, like he'd memorized their patterns and tells over the course of their protracted battle.

"It's over, Kagemusha. You've already lost. Enough is enough."

"…."

Luke had no doubts that six years ago, he wouldn't even have a chance against his venerable elder brother in his prime.

"I don't fault you for what your family did to my mother. In fact, I'm truly honored to fight someone like you. What a damn shame, seeing honorable men like you die for the sake of the wicked."

Kinta had fought for the Shogunate and saved Japan multiple times in several wars and countless battles, only for the leeches he called relatives to reap the rewards of his exploits and prestige, taking government positions and privileges originally offered to him.

It disgusted Luke to his very core.

Kinta's greedy family of swindlers, drug dealers, and money launderers turned oligarchs who control politicians with their blood money didn't deserve to live. They bring shame to the honorable Seiryu Clan.

Kinta, unlike the rest of his corrupted kin, was a man of principle.

***

Back at the abandoned factory…

Instead of a sword-drawing technique, the pink-shirted drunkard did a sheathe-drawing technique and swung it at Haruka's noggin like a hollow baseball bat.

Its impact also got doubled by the brigand sidestepping right into the unexpected strike.

"SHINGETSU O TSUKU NARI (NEW MOON SLASH)…!"

As expected of a loopy drunkard. Yahiko had half the mind to believe it wasn’t a real technique.

The New Moon Slash hit The Faceless strong enough to fling him into another set of windows, with him crashing right into them. He could've died right then and there from the shards alone, but when Yahiko and Sho checked the wreckage, he was gone.

"…Dammit, he got away," said Sho Kojima with a hiccup, a stinky belch as he rubbed his stomach and cleaned his ear with his pinky finger.

'So much for the Sword of Life, huh?' Then again, Sho himself didn't really believe it such things. He himself called it a joke.

Then again, unsheathing the scabbard instead of the blade to catch an opponent by surprise with your unorthodox iaijutsu was quite the out-of-the-box thinking. So was using the flat part of a katana to take people out.

"Well, I hope you're happy, kid. You just helped save your enemy," began Sho, only for him to trail off as he saw the bodyguard tend to his V.I.P.

"…You okay, Mister Thin Man?" asked Yahiko to the shook but otherwise unhurt Tatsuya Minakata. "The Faceless didn’t stab you while we weren't looking, did he?"

"'Bout time you remembered me," the sullen Tatsuya rasped, trying to look like his old boisterous self, but his white complexion belied his bluster.

Myojin exhaled. As far as he was concerned, as long as he was able to protect the people around him, his mission was accomplished. To Sho, he asked, "If you think the life-giving sword doesn't exist then why do you practice it?"

Kojima smirked and winked at Yahiko. "Probably for the shame reashon you do, Kiddo. Shomething a drunkard would come up with, y'know?"

The man with the huge bouffant hairdo and colorful clothes then assisted Kinta's uncle back to his feet and guided him out of the building, with Yahiko following close behind them.

The young samurai pondered those words. As th son of Tokyo Samurai, he'd heard how they had the right to cut down peasants who offended them. "Kirisute Gomen" or something to like that.

The teenager found the prospect of having the power to judge who lived and who died by something as petty as being annoyed by them as quite grisly. Like a politician such as Jusanro Tani abusing his power over the poor and underprivileged.

Like with Kenshin, he'd rather follow the edicts of Kamiya Kasshin Ryu than indulge in the uglier side of being a privileged, rich samurai.

He didn't want to be judge and executioner over criminals. He'd rather protect those before him as he sought the same strength Kenshin had. Let these villains pay their crimes in jail or have their chance at redemption.

Yahiko had always admired Kenshin and how he never used his sword for anything but protecting the weak. He never bullied anyone weaker than him but instead kept bullies at bay without serving as their executioner.

No matter how strong, Kenshin would never wield his sword for his own battles or bloodlust. His sakabatou always existed only to protect other people.

He never drowned in his own strength. He never had any meaningless fights to show that might or strength justified any action.

This was why the Tokyo Samurai Descendant took Kenshin's non-killing vow to heart even though he personally never killed anyone. Not directly, at least. Not by his own hands, certainly.

He didn't need to become someone with a body count attached to his name to do this. He didn't need to atone for murders he'd already committed. He didn't have to make a vow to a loved one he accidentally killed to avoid killing again.

If Yahiko wanted to be as strong as or even stronger than Kenshin Himura/Kamiya himself, the least he could do was be as careful as Kenshin was whenever it came to protecting human life, including his own.

Myojin wished to be pushed as much as Kenshin was before he became willing to take a life to spare others. The Kenshin who still upheld his refusal to kill no matter how angry he got.

That was the vagabond's true strength—his ability to tame the bloodthirsty Battousai inside him and make killing an absolute last resort.

That Kenshin, the Kenshin that risked his life to save others and had the willpower to live on as well, was the strongest man in the world in Yahiko's eyes.

Even stronger than Makoto Shishio, Hajime Saito, or even Kenshin's master Seijuro Hiko.

Even against monsters like Shishio, Saito, or Hiko, Kenshin's resolve allowed him to always find a way to win. That was the kind of man Yahiko wanted to become.

For Kenshin Kamiya (nee Himura) was a man of principle.

***

The gasping Hatamoto Samurai Descendant refused to give up, much to the chagrin of his bastard half-brother. Much to the detriment of his own health. Like the principled man that he was, he intended to go down swinging.

Like there was nothing else he could do but fight. A Shadow Warrior who was a shadow of his former self.

Thusly, he launched another Tsunami that Lucas anticipated, blocking the first few slashes to prevent the waves of slashes from gaining any momentum while the tides were low.

'You were something else when you aided your masters in hunting me down, kiddo,’ said a voice from within Minakata from out of the blue.

A familiar voice from Kinta’s past. The voice of Shinbei Tanaka (Hitokiri Shinbei). A ghost from his past. 'I saw your potential from the start.’

Also known as the Ansatsu Taicho (Captain of the Assassins), Shinbei had previously crossed swords with the Seiryu Clan’s best and brightest swordsmen under the Musou Madden School of swordsmanship, before his identity was exposed and he was arrested for treason.

The young prepubescent Minakata merely served as support to the adult swordsmen battling the rebel forces of the Ishin Shishi and their top assassins like Shinbei.

However, Kinta showed his mettle by saving their hides from time to time by fighting alongside them and showing off his early mastery of the Mikazuki o Tsuku Nari (Crescent Moon Slash), which was able to keep even the skilled Assassin Captain at bay.

Kinta started landing those Crescent Moon Slashes on his brother again after a long stretch of him failing to penetrate through the gaijin bastard’s impregnable defense. As though Luke had long ago memorized all the tricks in his bag.

Shinbei also died in July 11, 1863 by seppuku at 31 years old while under custody of the police. The same year as the establishment of the Shinsengumi and a year before the establishment of Kinta's own group, the Kyoto Mimawarigumi.

'That flat, bored look on your face pisses me off!’ said the Izo Okada (Hitokiri Izo) in Kinta’s mind. Izo was Shinbei’s partner-in-crime for most of their assassination missions. 'You look like an emotionless mannequin, you’re so creepy!’

The man they’d later identify as Hitokiri Izo had said as much to Kinta’s face when they themselves battled each other—Musou Madden Ryu versus Nakanishi-Ha Itto Ryu.

So his expressionless face gave Okada the creeps? As far as Kinta was concerned, the feeling was mutual. Izo's manic smile as he slaughtered his foes unsettled him in kind.

Compared to the more patriotic and straightforward Shinbei who wanted to deliver “Tenchu (Heaven’s Retribution)” on every weak and submissive head of state who submitted themselves to the Western nations, Izo was a wild card who enjoyed his job as butcher of men a bit too much.

From Kinta’s encounters with him, Okada fought like a wild beast. Or a serial killer. Izo certainly demonstrated resiliency bordering on the supernatural in their duels against each other that would put Lucas's current performance to shame.

Okada would later get arrested for assassinating Toyo Yoshida. He’d then get tortured, crucified, and then beheaded in May 11, 1865 at 27 years old.

Half-delirious from the pain and exhaustion of the prolonged battle, Minakata soldiered on against Grant. Unwilling to let himself falter against his long-lost brother who tried his best to keep up with him.

From there, he got his second wind and pushed back with swinging ripostes and counters to Luke’s hard blocks, parries, and attacks.

Meanwhile, someone else said, 'You really are a true samurai, Minakata Kinta. Your father would be proud,’ to Kinta’s mind. It was the ghost of Hanjiro Nakamura (Hitokiri Hanjiro).

Nakamura would later be more famously known by the Meiji Administration’s history books as Toshiaki Kirino. The longest surviving hitokiri among the Shidai Nikuya.

As Kirino, he lived all the way to 38 years old before getting killed in action on September 24, 1877 during Saigo Takamori’s samurai rebellion against their fellow Ishin Shishi and the Meiji Government they helped build.

A practical and pragmatic man in life and in combat, Hitokiri Hanjiro’s Ko-Jigen Ryu reminded the Mimawarigumi Battousai a lot of The Faceless’s fencing swordsmanship.

Every move they did was deliberate and calculated, with  one move always leading to another five moves like a high-speed game of chess or go, but enacted by sword attacks, counters, ripostes, and feints.

Thusly, Kinta began focusing more on tactics and strategy.

Luke used wide sweeping swings with his blade that would normally lead to straightforward stabbing counters or precise well-timed ripostes, but he didn’t just swing randomly.

He baited the Counter Attacks changed the levels of his swings every so slightly to deflect, recover, and angle his own Counter Times, like The Faceless himself would with his rapier.

He also only needed fewer strikes to cause major damage while he treated most slashes to his persons like annoying if prickly paper cuts.

Also, even though the wounds on Minakata’s body weren’t as deep as Lucas’s, his body was apparently frail enough to get affected by them. His movement slowed to a crawl compared to his “fresher” yet bloodier brother.

This was an insult to Kinta’s manhood. He hadn’t been as damaged as his little brother yet he was the one on the brink of defeat?!

'What is this? You can do better than this, surely,’ drawled another voice. 'You survived the Bakumatsu. This li'l brat is nothing compared to what you’ve been through.’

This time it was from Gensai Kawakami (Hitokiri Gensai). The Mimawarigumi Battousai’s greatest rival and most common opponent.

Despite the pain, injuries, and depleted oxygen, the Mimawarigumi Battousai dully remembered his battles against another swordsman who also drew comparisons to the famous legendary manslayer, the Hitokiri Battousai.

Hitokiri Gensai was the closest thing Kinta had to that Battousai versus Battousai duel that neve happened during the Boshin War. He couldn’t imagine the whirling dervish that was Shiranui Ryu to be any less dangerous than the Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu.

An underrated tactician, Gensai’s savagery in the battlefield belied his intelligence that could challenge even the likes of his fellow brainy manslayer, Hitokiri Hanjiro, when it came to cerebral battles.

Kinta truly dealt with better slashes than those thrown by Luke. Bone-cutting strikes that killed many a man from one of the deadliest hitokiri of the Shidai Nikuya, Gensai Kawakami.

This frightful man would later go by the name Genbei Kouda. This name change was the reason why by the time Kinta learned that Kawakami had been incarcerated for harboring Kiheitai stragglers, it was too late.

Kinta learned months later that Gensai had already been executed on January 13, 1872 at 38 years old before he or the Minakatas could pull some bureaucratic strings and have him pardoned for his crimes.

All the Shidai Nikuya ended up dying before hitting the age of 40.

Thanks to their mutual sacrifices, they paved the way for a much stronger Japan with a brighter future than becoming another potential colony for foreign superpowers.

Was Kinta headed for the same fate as Gensai and the others? Maybe he'd learn the answer in the next exchange.

' You should've taken me with you, Gensai. To heaven. To hell. To limbo. It doesn't matter,' thought Kinta. 'I can't wait to face off with you in the afterlife, old friend.'

The Mimawarigumi Battousai dodged and parried the chops and slashes at him from Luke’s bastard sword, his body remembering the extreme quickness of Gensai’s Shiranui Ryu compared to his brother’s comparatively clumsy Western swordsmanship.

'There’s still some life in his swings,’ thought Grant. 'What will it take to take you down, Aniki…?’

***

'Man, that Kagemusha is hard to kill,' thought Kai Hidaka with a head shake and a heavy sigh. 'And here I thought Luke was resilient!'

He stood on wobbly feet. Winning his fight against Zan the Sharpshooter Ninja and his gigantic warfork took its toll on him.

However, it was only a matter of time. This second wind from Kinta should be his last. The Mimawarigumi Battousai of yore was no more, replaced by a sicklier version of him with low stamina and respiratory problems.

The Battousai became a mere Kagemusha. A copycat of either the more famous Hitokiri Battousai or the seditious Christian rebel Shogo Amakusa.

Kinta Minakata was the moon to Shogo Amakusa's sun. The satellite orbiting Battousai Himura's planet. 

Kinta actually served as the body double of Shogo until he betrayed the cult leader, in fact. Minakata was merely a shadow of people stronger than him. Or he was supposed to fill that role.

Could it be possible for the shadow to be greater than the man…? A Kagemusha that became his own protected dignitary? An imposter that usurped the role of leader?

Fine. If Luke failed to finish his brother off, it was his duty as a fellow brigand to complete the mission for him. They had a 90 to 100 percent completion rate on all their assassination missions for a reason.

He looked over his options. The recovering cop and daughter was still nearby, unable to escape because they were still worried about Kinta's state of health and mind while battling his half-brother.

They could again serve as Kai's hostages, distractions, or meat shields when push came to shove. Or he could be the distraction himself to allow Luke to land the final blow.

However, just as he was about to again pounce on Officer Satoru Sakaguchi to avenge himself from their exchange earlier, a golden blur arrived at the periphery of Hidaka's vision.

No, not a golden blur. A blonde blur with a huge warfork-like naginata (glaive).

'What in the world…!?'

***

What was Kinta Minakata's reason for living? For the sake of his family? To honor his deceased father and estranged mother? To uphold his honor, whatever that meant?

What was the gold lacquer that kept his fragile, broken self together? How did apply kitsugi in his own broken life and home?

He needed to win. He needed to always win and survive. To save his loved ones or even those who weren't beloved to him, he had to shoulder the burden of always winning no matter what.

If he won, the world kept turning. If he lost, their world would stop. It would be the end of the Minakatas and even the Sakaguchis by proxy.

He couldn't let that happen. Not when he still had a lot to fix. Not when he still had a lot to atone for.

As long as he had the resolve to win, his fragile self would not break apart. Like broken ceramic kept together by gold lacquer.

But still, maybe dying here in the hands of his family's bad karma made flesh wasn't so bad.

If it was his fate to die here in the hands of his half-brother then so be it. He couldn't have written a better end. Surely better than committing seppuku in jail or getting crucified.

Kinta took careful breaths to calm himself down and conserve his energy. His counters to his brother's counters were enough to make the (literal) bastard hesitate for once.

Besides which, he'd been playing defense all this while to brace himself for the tidal wave to come. Like waves on the beach receding like an extreme low tide before a big tsunami hit it.

Luke had a feeling that something big was coming though. Through trial and error, he'd memorized the essence of Musou Madden Ryu combat in his heart and soul.

And so finally, Kinta stopped dodging then charged forward in his Waxing Stance or iaijutsu/battoujutsu form.

Grant grabbed his bastard sword's handle with both hands, bracing himself for a heavy impact.

So should Kinta do the Blue Moon Slash? His body felt like it was about to break. Like how his Akatsuki sword banging against the slab of steel that was Luke’s bastard sword.

At this point, after being hit by it over and over, Luke could see even the supersonic iaijutsu technique coming a mile away, allowing him to block, sidestep, dodge, or counter by reflex.

Luke's reaction time was also fast enough to recover from any feints done to him. The half-breed swordsman could course-correct and turn a missed swing into a stab or a parry at the last second.

Also, the effort of doing that body-straining technique would only hurt Kinta in the end. It was almost not worth doing.

The thicker European sword used more high-grade carbon-rich steel versus the multi-layered Japanese steel folded unto itself that made up for the lack of carbon by putting powdered carbon into the melted metal during the forged process.

However, the Akatsuki katana was different. It could take the hardness of foreign steel because it was made from melted European swords during his grandfather’s exploits against pirates and stolen weapons from the galleon trade.

Toshiro broke his sword and Genzo Sakaguchi reforged it with high-carbon European steel and folded it unto itself to create a new, better sword.

It was a Japanese sword that used Western steel to forge something stronger. Not unlike the old primitive Japan being reforged into the current modern one after the Sakoku (Closed Country) policy was lifted.

The Western steel was the kintsugi to his katana. Like a broken bone mended so that it'd grow stronger afterwards.

With the fall of the bakufu, the New Japan—a stronger, modernized nation-state version of Japan that mixed Western technology with Eastern sensibilities--would hopefully get a seat on the table of world affairs.

Where both Western and Eastern superpowers viewed Japan as a respectable peer instead of a primitive, backwards country ripe for colonization and invasion.

'Heh. What am I even thinking?' thought Kinta. The way he mused about the Akatsuki, you'd swear he was thinking just like one of the Ishin Shishi.

And so the Akatsuki sword flew from its scabbard. At this point, Kinta's resolve was thusly if Lucas could win against this exchange then he deserved to kill him.

All this time, the Prodigal Son had been blocking any point-blank iaijutsu with the intention of tiring his brother's body with the mere effort of doing Full Moon Slashes.

However, Lucas realized that if this was a last exchange then his half-brother had every intention to cut through the block.

He could see it in the X-shaped scar in the middle of Kinta's face that deepened like wrinkles every time he strained himself. That was his most telling of "tells".

Grant then used the Tactical Wheel that The Faceless drilled into his very core.

Simple Attacks were beaten by Parry and Ripostes or Counter Attacks. Counter Attacks were beaten by Counter Times (feints used to draw out the counter). Counter Times were beaten by Feints in Time (feinted counters to draw out the counter times).

So Luke expected Kinta to feint a Mangetsu O Tsuku Nari by half-unsheathing his blade then sheathing it back again (Counter Time) and responded with a Feint in Time (feinting a counter).

However, Minakata's feint itself was a feint and he went ahead in the split-second he motioned to re-sheathe his sword, he instead unsheathed it.

The iaijutsu expert turned his Counter Time into a Simple Attack, which was the best way to counter a Feint in Time in lieu of two swordsmen continuously saber-rattling and posturing against each other without ever actually attacking.

However, Lucas was a bunch of nerves himself, his adrenalin rush slowing time enough for him to notice the change and electing to do a hard block (Parry and Riposte) instead.

The Full Moon Slash created a flash of steel that rotated fully and turned into a moon-shaped perfect circle, shining like a second moon that appeared on the ground.

As though Kinta used his iaijutsu and twisting movement to create a perfect circle using his sword and his center of balance like a protractor.

The Aoitsuki O Tsuku Nari worked like the Tsunami in that it built upon the momentum of the first perfect-circle Mangetsu O Tsuku Nari. Using foot pivots, full body rotation, centrifugal force, and the empty air left by the Full Moon Slash, the Blue Moon Slash should travel at double the speed and power.

This broke through Luke's defense, but he'd been memorizing the timing of the expected Blue Moon Slash all the while. With one hand on his claymore-like bastard sword, Luke prepared his riposte.

The bastard child knew what to do. Sidestep then stab at the center of the Full Moon Slash as the swordsman prepared to do a second one. In other words, stab the eye of the spiraling storm. This will drill the sword into the body of the rotating samurai.

A grisly death for sure, but an honorable one at least. A warrior's death in the line of duty.

However, none of that happened. Instead, halfway into Kinta raising his Akatsuki to do a Blue Moon Slash, as Lucas timed his stab, the Mimawarigumi Battousai flipped his sword, reversed his momentum, and did a downward slash.

Somehow, the bloody Lucas became even bloodier than before, producing a fountain of red from his sudden chest laceration. His deepest wound yet. 

Grant had forced the gasping, cornered Minakata to do his ultimate forbidden hidden technique.

The legendary technique of yore known as Tsubame Gaeshi (Swallow Return). The same technique he used to defeat Shogo Amakusa.

And now Luke was the one gasping and cornered in turn.

Originally the signature technique of the legendary swordsman Kojiro Sasaki, the Kagemusha himself learned the similarly legendary skill from his second swordsmanship master, the blind swordsman Hyoue Nishida.

The maternal uncle of Shogo and Sayo Amakusa (formerly Muto). The black sheep of the Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu.

Nishida's Tsubame Gaeshi allowed him to survive his master's Kuzu Ryu Sen (Nine-Headed Dragon Flash) when they were doing the succession duel to pass on Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu to a new successor.

The pacifistic Christian Hyoue actually learned the technique solely to find a way to counter the Kuzu Ryu Sen without killing his master, Seijuro Hiko XII, with the Amakakeru Ryu no Hirameki (Heavens Gliding Dragon Flash).

Regardless, that last technique from out of the blue was the straw that broke the camel’s back. That ripped the last thread of the rope that kept the hanging Lucas from falling into the abyss below.

Lucas had finally hit his limit.

***

To Be Continued...

The exchange between Toshiro and Kinta is based on the exchange between Seijuro Akashi and his father from Kuroko's Basketball. The Faceless and his ornate masks are also based on Baldwin IV of Jerusalem, who wore elaborate masks to hide his crippling leprosy.

Also, Lucas Grant's first name is taken from George Lucas, who famously created the Star Wars franchise that started with a movie about an orphan forced to fight a relative in the backdrop of an intergalactic war.

Also, thusly, Lucas uses Form IV (Ataru) of Lightsaber Combat when fighting against his half-brother's more precise and rigid iaijutsu reminiscent of Form II (Makashi) of Lightsaber Combat.

Danke, Abdiel

[gabriel-gabdiel]

【Draft】 Rurouni Yahiko Chapter 58: Déjà Vu

For this chapter, we’ll be harkening back to things like “The Mark of Zorro (1940)” and the impressive on-screen duel between Captain Esteban Pasquale and Don Diego Vega. 

Yahiko is feeling a bit of déjà vu from battling The Faceless. What is it about him that’s so familiar anyway?

Yahiko Myojin remembered the first time Yutaro "Cat Eyes" Tsukayama came back to Japan and the Kamiya Dojo after years of living abroad to seek treatment for his arm injury.

Yutaro was supposed to be injured by his traitorous "master", Raijuta Isurugi. He went overseas for treatment, which enabled him to regain use of his right arm for the most part but he still went "southpaw" or left handed during sparring matches.

Yes, that was right. Mr. Tsukayama had decided to still practice kendo instead of retire.

Inspired by this, Mr. Myojin promised to give his rival the match of his life, showing off his skill honed by his past battle experiences.

When they had their first sparring match in years, Yahiko expected to blow the one-armed Yutaro out of the water, only for Yutaro, with a one-handed handicap, end up making the fight close.

The goddamn magnificent bastard really was a kendo prodigy. Yutaro's careful counters from Gedan-no-Kamae (Earth Stance)`made Yahiko second guess his shots and miss his attacks from the Jodan-no-Kamae (Fire Stance).

Feeling indignant by these turn of events since he went through so much more than him after they last met, Yahiko dug deep into his soul to summon his past battle experiences into the match point blow that literally blasted Tsukayama's helmet off of his head.

He rocked his socks off and then some.

However, to Myojin's annoyance, he still had to do his best against the one-armed student.

Not only did Yutaro remember what little kendo instruction he got from Kaoru Kamiya. He expanded his knowledge somehow when he went overseas to get his arm treated.

He did not waste his time while undergoing treatment and rehabilitation for his nerve-damaged right arm that Raijuta had nearly lopped off.

The cunning "Cat Eyes" somehow added western martial arts and weapon techniques to his solid kendo arsenal, somehow merging east and west together to form a truly unique repertoire.

His approached his kenjutsu like fencing, fighting at a controlled tempo then bursting in speed at the right moments with fluid motion.

It took some time for Yahiko to figure out how Yutaro bested him half of the time, but he eventually realized that Cat Eyes was using mind games and what was known as the "Tactical Wheel" to outsmart him at every other match.

It was from this flashback that Yahiko figured out what this Brigands Guild member's sword techniques reminded him of.

***

Rurouni Yahiko

A Rurouni Kenshin Continuation Fan Fiction Story by Chester Castañeda

Yahiko has seen the sword style of The Faceless before.

Disclaimer: All characters used in this fanfic (save some others) are the rightful property of Nobuhiro Watsuki, Shueisha, Shonen Jump, Viz, Sony Studios, Fuji TV, Studio Gallup, Studio Deen, and ADV. This disclaimer also covers all the other copyrighted material that are far too many to mention here. Don't sue me please, I'm very poor.

***

Chapter 58: Déjà Vu

***

Back at a narrow alleyway in the Yokohama Chinatown near the Minakata moneychanger offices…

Multiple things happened at once. Like a hurricane of events.

Meanwhile, the lion dance mascot full of martial artists retaliated against Gan by stretching itself like a snake around him and kicking him with spiked shoes and hidden daggers.

Like a wounded animal fighting for its life, even though it was actually multiple men wearing a costume.

"AUUUGH!" cried The Distressed Gan, who did his best to parry and block the slashing and lacerating kicks with his metal bat.  

"GAN!" cried out Yahiko Myojin and Munenori Minoe at their comrade.

Because Fabian La Cerca lost his dagger, he thought fast, grabbed hold of Tatsuya Minakata, and threw him through the already broken windows of a probably abandoned house in Chinatown.

This distracted Yahiko long enough for him to withdraw his thin rapier sword before the frightening strength of the eye-patched Munenori beside him could break his weapon in twain as well.

Then, for a split-second, a shocked Myojin and a pale-faced Minoe stood and stared at each other and the violent scenes before them, this brains barely registering what had just happened.

"H-Hey. Thanks for saving me, Minoe," said Yahiko, sheathing his sword and slipping it back on his cloth belt.

"N-No problem," stuttered Munenori. "You better go, Yahiko-chi! We'll keep the mercenaries occupied while you retrieve, uh, Kinta-chi's uncle."

"Of course. Thanks again. I owe you one! Thank Gan for me too!" answered Myojin before both turned and went opposite directions.

Or they would've had the lion mascot not suddenly appeared beside Munenori and snatched him off the ground with its unhinged puppet jaws, like a real lion biting its prey.

From behind the mascot hobbled the Gasping Gan, spurts of blood making small fountains on his legs and calves.

"AH! Minoe!" yelped Yahiko, intending to run after the eye-patched dual wielder but Gan stopped him cold with an outstretched hand and an open palm.

Without looking at him, Gan said, "Don't worry, Yoshi-boy. I'll take care of Patches. Go after The Masked Rider instead. Time is running out!"

"…Fine. Make sure you finish that mascot off!" said Yahiko, who finally sprinted towards the abandoned building where The Faceless threw Tatsuya.

Their brief hellos and goodbyes kept them from realizing how na��ve their presumptions were.

***

Back at the exterior facade of the Minakata moneychanger office building…

The cackling Kai Hidaka briefly distracted the two brothers from the same mother.

One was a Eurasian bastard child who somehow ended up as part of the Brigands Guild of international mercenaries.

The other was the grandson of a samurai turned pharmaceutical tycoon with generational wealth and significant government clout as an oligarch.

They then realized that somehow, the high-flying spidery ninja somehow defeated the formidable shinobi that the bastard with the bastard sword couldn't finish off.

"…You know what? I don't hate you, mate. You're a fine bloke to me," Lucas Grant said to his estranged half-brother, Kinta Minakata. "You spared me from having to deal with both you and that troublesome ninja bodyguard of yours so this ends up a fair fight."

Kinta spared a glance at the motionless Zan, whom he presumed had critically injured Lucas, but was actually somehow like a steam train running on fumes.

Maybe they should've double-teamed the bloody Prodigal Son while they had the chance. Maybe he was too "honorable" for his own good.

Their pattern from before resumed. The wounded but aggressive Luke plodded on, only blocking the most bone-cutting of sweeping slashes from Kinta to avoid getting his limbs lopped off.

Meanwhile, on Minakata's part, every last chopping blow or lunging stab from Grant was potentially a one-hit kill. He also had to watch out for his half-brother's pommel strikes too.

This was confirmed with how, despite outlanding Lucas in strikes, the Sanada Demon Zan succumbed to internal bleeding from a blow or stab.

Nevertheless, like with most of his fight with Zan, Luke couldn't land a significant blow on his big brother and his superior swordsmanship skill.

However, the bastard son of the Minakatas had started clipping and slicing bits and pieces of Kinta's flesh.

"It kind of irritates me that you're as good as you are despite being given everything in the world," confessed Luke.

They clashed swords again. The Akatsuki held true, but it could not stave off the longer reach and thicker steel of Lucas's bastard sword and its superior steel.

"I didn't know what to expect. A spoiled little rich boy, maybe? Someone who has no idea how cruel the world can be. An entitled dishrag of a man drowning in wealth and privilege. But you're something else, Big Brother."

Like a lion to a gazelle, Lucas stalked his prey, his strikes that previously whiffed and got countered slowly clipping and slashing his tiring brother, wearing him down.

However, like a gazelle to a lion, Kinta evaded Lucas. The bastard child of the Minakatas had yet to land a significant blow on him even as his collection of flesh wounds increased.

Even when Luke blocked the Mangetsu O Tsuku Nari (Full Moon Slash) with his much longer, sturdier bastard sword, Kinta's Akatsuki (Red Moon) katana could still penetrate the block and leave cuts on him.

Deep cuts. Cuts that almost dug deep into his bone. His nerves. His veins. Or even his very soul.

Like a dashing stag's horns piercing through the lion's hide from mid-pounce. The prey fighting for its life, injuring its predator.

'Of course it wasn't going to be that easy,' thought Lucas with a smile that formed on his bloody mouth, his teeth dyed red. 'Fine. Anything that's worth anything should be this hard to get!'

***

Inside the nearby abandoned warehouse building…

Yahiko wandered into the area where The Faceless threw Tatsuya Minakata into, the banker's body messily crashing through the structure's western-style windows.

His slippers stepping on shards of glass that glistened in the moonlight, crushing them under his soles.

"HEY! Thin Man! Where are you? Are you still alive?" called out Yahiko, referring to the V.I.P. he was guarding.

Tatsuya Minakata, the banker son of the famous hatamoto-class samurai oligarchs of both the Shogunate and the Meiji Government, the Minakata Family.

One of the heirs of the huge Minakata Zaibatsu (Conglomerate), Tatsuya was next in line to inherit his family's vast fortune after his mother kicks the bucket. Or so Myojin heard.

He was followed by his younger brother the lawyer and their swordsman nephew, the former member of the Shogunate's special guard.

These people were so filthy rich, they'd make Chizuru Raikouji's family look poor. Or the drug dealer Kanryu Takeda look downright middle class. Or fellow oligarch Jusanro Tani quaint.

'Wonder what that's like,' thought Yahiko with a smirk and a head-shake, repressing memories of him pick-pocketing for the mob to help pay for his family's debts.

Even just one of the trinkets or heirlooms here, like a painting or a suit of armor, would've been enough to pay for his parents' debt with the yakuza. Maybe. It looked like they wanted to have him for keeps.

He maneuvered his sandaled feet through the glass shards like he were walking on eggshells. Shiny, sharp, painful eggshells.

He found Tatsuya in the nick of time. He lay there but not in a pool of his own blood, though he did receive several cuts from going through the window.

"Whew. Thank goodness I found you before The Faceless could get you, Thin Man," said Yahiko, his voice barely above a whisper. "…Uh, Tatsuya-san? You okay, bud?"

"…Y-You're fired," groaned Tatsuya. "I'm going to have my brother sue you for the injuries I've sustained, you teenaged brat!"

Myojin sighed in both relief and exasperation. "Yeah, you're welcome. Save your life? No prob. Think nothing of it."

"Save my life? My assassin just threw me through a window! I almost died!" yelped Kinta's uncle.

Yahiko then barely had time to parry and back away from the attacking Faceless in his next breath, its tip clipping his clavicle, drawing blood.

He cursed under his breath. If John Rathbone could get away with it, he'd kill him with a thousand cuts.

"You didn't kill Minakata Tatsuya yet?" accused Yahiko. "You had every chance to do so."

"I like to play with my prey," answered The Faceless, who now wore a different mask than before. "Half the fun of my assassination missions is the thrill of the hunt and triggering the primal instincts of my victims. Fight or flight."

Yahiko groaned, realizing he now had to deal with this pantomiming foreign invader with a mask shtick worse than the late Hannya from the Oniwabanshu (Castle Guardians).

Tatsuya himself said to The Faceless, "Forget the kid. Whatever your sponsor is paying to assassinate our family, I'll double it! Triple it, even! Stay and become our bodyguard and you could earn a fortune!"

"Watch your filthy mouth, my little piggy bank," said the master fencer. "Once the kid dies, I have no reason to let you live either."

"What a coincidence. I feel the same way about you, Faceless," said Yahiko, surprising even himself with the boldness of his words.

The Faceless smirked. "O-ho. You wouldn't care to translate that feeling into action, would you?"

"I might be tempted," the Son of Tokyo Samurai said.

"Would you, now?" The Faceless proceeded to put his right sword arm forward, pointing his rapier at Yahiko's face while his other hand rested on his hip, his left arm bent on its elbow.

He also had his right leg bent forward, his lead foot pointed at his opponent while his left rear leg and foot pointed to his left side.

The Faceless—who now decided to refer to himself as John Rathbone instead of Fabian La Cerca—told the samurai kid, "Didn't realize you brought your friends along. I miss my dagger. Now I can't show off Fabian's sword and dagger technique."

'Good,' thought the teenager, resisting the urge to stick his tongue out at the fencer lest he cut it out. 'I can barely land a hit on you with that dagger around as is. Thanks, Minoe.'

As the moonlight touched the naked blade of Yahiko's inherited sakabatou, The Faceless remarked, "What is with that sword of yours? Is it a sickle you're wielding or a sword? The blade is on the wrong side. You can't cut someone down like that."

Yahiko then said, "It's not for cutting down people. It's for saving people. It's the sword of life."

***

Kinta Minakata didn't mean to retreat. He got forced to do so.

Like sheep being herded back to their corral by a farm dog. Or a pack of wolves picking the herd apart for lunch.

Was he really luring his half-brother to a trap or was he being herded by him instead? It depended on which one of them would ultimately survive this encounter.

He'd actually been waiting for a counter opportunity that never came. Instead, he faced constant, unrelenting pressure from his supposed half-brother.

The literal Minakata bastard.

He didn't know what to think about it. His mind whirled of memories of being bullied and made fun of by his peers for having his father cuckolded or invaded by a foreigner, stealing away his wife who birthed a bastard.

The child whose father ruined his parents' marriage and led his own father to commit sepukku (ritual suicide) by hara-kiri (disembowelment) and later decapitation.

This devilish blond man was like all that past trauma of his personified. This son of a bitch.

No, wait. He'd never call him that. He'd never shame his mother that way.

Rather, he was a son of a gun by the truest sense of the term. A "gun" referred to a foreign military person, he believed. Sons of guns tended to be children of navy sailors.

The phrase potentially originated in a Royal Navy direction that pregnant women aboard smaller naval vessels had to give birth in the space between the broadside guns to keep the gangways and crew decks clear.

He would've pondered on this more had his relentless half-brother gave him enough breathing room and time for his brain to process this bombshell of a revelation.

He'd nailed several counters at Lucas already but he wouldn't go down. As if him attacking while already bleeding and injured by Zan was a lie or ruse to get Kinta's guard down.

The man's stamina was impressive. Unlike his stamina, which was the complete opposite.

Lucas had been fighting, beating, and killing bodyguards left and right for what felt like hours and there he was, fresh like a daisy.

Or rather, the presence of blood seemed to sharpen his senses, activating his fight-or-flight instincts. Or a shark going into a feeding frenzy. Even if it was his own blood.

Luke's wild, beastly eyes shone in the dark, lit by a sliver of moonlight. Like the eyes of an animal ready to pounce. To prove that sometimes even the savviest of humans had to let nature take its course and succumb to getting mauled by a lion or bear.

Cunning and careful planning could only take you so far in the wild.

Kinta also had one serious problem. Try as he might, he couldn't bring himself to hate this stranger who tried his best to kill the entire Minakata Family.

He shouldn't feel this way, especially against such a dangerous man who already murdered so many of his family's elite guards as well as several of the Sanada Ninjas.

Everyone's lives were at stake against the Brigands Guild of assassins and mercenaries.

***

Yahiko remembered Kaoru's words like it was yesterday.

"The Kamiya Kasshin Ryu is a sword style that my father developed during the Meiji Era after surviving the turbulence of the Bakumatsu."

Her father and the founder of the Kamiya Dojo, Koshijiro Kamiya, didn't approve of murderous swords. With the ambition for swords that gave life, Koshijiro and his daughter Kaoru gave this sword style everything they had for 10 years.

"The sakabatou is a sword that gives life instead of takes it. A life-giving sword," said Yahiko, echoing what Kaoru and even Kenshin had told him in the past on why they chose to teach him Kamiya Kasshin Ryu instead of Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu.

"A life-giving sword? What utter hogwash is that? Next you'll tell me you want a healing gun, or a bomb that puts your limbs back together!" mocked The Faceless.

"You're lucky because I follow a non-killing sword style. Even though I want to kill you to avenge the people you've killed, I'll settle on defeating you," said Yahiko while falling into his Water Stance.

He inwardly cringed at his audacity for saying those words but knew deep down that even though he didn't share Kenshin's past regrets, he also wasn't too keen to spill blood himself.

He promised both Kenshin and Kaoru he wouldn't. Let the endless murders end with the Bakumatsu, they said.

"You are aware that this is a duel to the death, child. I'm under no obligation to spare your life even if you're foolish enough to spare mine," said The Faceless.

"A sword is made to kill. Let me teach you that painful lesson, boy."

"Spare me the speech. I've heard it all before.  'Swords are weapons.' 'Swordsmanship is the art of killing.' But even if you think I'm sugarcoating the truth, I can and will show you what a life-giving sword is all about."

Myojin wondered if he could back up his bluster or if he wasn't merely bluffing. A sword that gave life instead of taking it away was patently ridiculous and totally contradictory.

What pushed him to say such things? What made him choose to believe Kaoru's flowery words and her father's idealistic beliefs like Kenshin did when they first met?

"Heh. Is that so? Spoken like a child who has never gotten blood in your hands," harrumphed the masked Faceless, his mask-covered nose seemingly upturned at Yahiko.. "You're a child."

"Yeah, and? So what?" said Yahiko. "I'd like to keep it that way. I don't want to be a murderer. I just want to beat you."

Yahiko did a Simple Attack from the Jodan-no-Kamae (Fire Stance) of having the sakabatou raised high up over his head, his muscles tense and his shuffling footwork gauging the distance by feel.

Whether it was a slash or a thrust after a miss from any of the eight directions as shown in the Kuzu Ryu Sen, it didn't matter.

He expected the Parry Riposte to happen and was actually baiting him to strike to do a combination strike or Compound Attack (attacks with feints) or even a Counter Attack (responding in a way that avoided the riposte while landing the counter).

Patiently, Rathbone's riposte turned into another circular parry as he danced around Yahiko's probing swings and answered with blocks and deflection, as though figuring out the kid wasn't committing fully to the strikes enough to land an effective counter to the counter or Counter Time.

Yahiko did more feints to draw out a possible counterattack from John Rathbone that he could counter or do his own Counter Time. Or he even countered an obvious feint from Rathbone, hoping to react fast enough to counter the resulting Counter Time with his own Feint in Time or a feinted counterattack.

'So he's another samurai who knows the Tactical Wheel,' thought Rathbone. 'Fascinating. Kenjutsu isn't the primitive, ineffective martial art I thought it was.'

The Faceless then read and parried all his feints until he found an angle where he could do an off-time riposte before Yahiko could react.

The thrust didn't stab the teenager in the heart, but only because John slashed at the last second to avoid Myojin's Hadachi (Sword Catch) technique.

"You're a funny fellow, kid," said Rathbone with a chuckle while wiping Yahiko's blood from his triangular blade. He then turned towards the injured Minakata and declared, "You have a champion with you, Minakata Tatsuya. And what a champion."

For his part, Tatsuya Minakata managed to crawl to the nearest boxes and rest his back there, sitting away from these two dueling fools.

He'd give a king's ransom to have both of these dangerous idiots beheaded.

***

Judging by the additional wounds Kinta Minakata gave his bastard brother, the gulf in skill between the two was apparent.

So why didn't it matter? Why didn't the long-lost "Takuto Minakata" crumple down and die from his strikes?

Did he really need to cut him through the bone, lop off his limbs, or decapitate him to kill him? Otherwise, he wouldn't die?

He still kept standing. Biding his time. Parrying endlessly, like his (presumably) sword master The Faceless would, in order to find an opening.

Luke's defense was practically nonexistent compared to Rathbone. However, he more than made up for it with his limitless stamina and out-of-this-world resiliency.

In comparison, the only blood staining Kinta's clothes were that of his brother's or any of the Brigands Guild he'd faced off against so far.

And yet a he felt a sense of gloom at the back of his head. He had to keep his guard up as long as Lucas kept moving.

The blonde foreign devil looked injured but to be honest, none of his bleeding wounds were fatal. They were just flesh wounds.

Also, Lucas noticed that he hadn't landed a significant strike on his brother for quite some time. Injured and bleeding, Luke charged forward, cutting the distance between them and making it harder to land full-strength counters.

Like he'd been prolonging this fight to memorize his older brother's tempo, range, tells, tactics, techniques, tendencies, and rhythm. As though a war of attrition favored him the most.

Now every time Kinta attempted a Full Moon Slash, Luke braced himself to block the strike with a two-handed parry before it could reach its apex.

He also sidestepped the slash with a blade deflection. He even minimized the impact of an unblocked or belatedly blocked technique by hopping backwards and letting the arcing slash push him away.

And just like that, Kinta's ultimate attack had been sealed. He couldn't even do a Blue Moon Slash anymore because Lucas wouldn't let him even land one Full Moon Slash.

On his part, Luke didn't relent on any of his attacks either, with every slash, stab, and chop of his with the potential to maim, bisect, dissect, draw, or quarter anyone it hit.

Again, Minakata felt like a helpless child dodging carriages or a stamped of spooked horses in open traffic.

His brother really swung for the fences. And even if his full commitment to his strikes left him wide open, he was more than willing to take a shallow slash to land a deeper one.

How very Japanese of him for a gaijin. He embodied the very definition of the Japanese saying, "Let them cut your flesh, and you will break their bones."

***

By the age of fifteen, Yahiko had become a national champion level swordsman feared and revered in Tokyo as "The Catcher of a Thousand Blades" thanks to his shirahadori (blade catching) mastery.

At that time, he had also mastered Kamiya Kasshin Ryu, proving as much with the feat of stopping the first five attacks from Kenshin's Kuzu Ryu Sen (Nine-Headed Dragon Flash) technique once.

Nevertheless, Myojin grit his teeth as he faced off against The Faceless' comparatively tamer yet more methodical attacks.

Having to deal with an elusive opponent who picked his spots, took his sweet time to attack, you couldn't hit, could read all of your attacks and feints felt like pulling teeth.

Or a thousand paper cuts while submerged in a lemon bath. These little nicks that were shallower than a wound yet somehow felt worse, like you'd been set on fire.

The difference between death and torture, even.

"We have a hero with us," mocked Rathbone, daring Yahiko to strike all the way with circular parries and inviting thrusts. "I'll gladly play the role of the villain now. Don't disappoint me, hero."

John Rathbone really was the spirit and image of Yutaro Tsukayama's fencing-like kenjutsu, right down to slowing the pace to a crawl in order to peck and prick the enemy to death.

Or at least anger an opponent enough to make him charge recklessly and commit with full bone-cutting slashes then make him pay for his recklessness.

'…How did this gaijin defeat the echolocation ninja anyway?' Yahiko thought as they again exchanged parries and dodges. 'A ninja who could detect and react to him instantly. And could mess with his rhythm. What is his secret to solving those problems?'

Yahiko observed that no matter how hard he feinted or attempted to interrupt The Faceless' rhythm, he'd find a way to recover, parry, or dodge then reset the assault or counter off any of the samurai teen's attempts at charging.

He had a safety zone he could shell up into or retreat towards to cover up any gaps or openings in his stance or his actions.

Even when the Sanada Demon interrupted his rhythm, he could still counter off any openings presented to him by a charging opponent.

He always set the pace and countered at more flexible or awkward angles compared to the comparatively frigid stances of kenjutsu.

He was one step ahead every time and did mind games on what he'd do next. His wait-and-see strategy also allowed him to adapt and counter any tactics thrown at him.

Just like Yutaro's modus operandi.

Because of his injured hand, Tsukayama relied more on an overall strategy that used his opponent's strengths against them instead of relying on tactics and discovering his opponent's weaknesses throughout the course of the battle.

However, this persistent sense of déjà vu (French for "already dreamed") merely pushed Yahiko further, his curved sword clashing in sparking flashes with Faceless' thin straight blade with endless probing parries to find openings or to create them.  

Fortunately, Yahiko's newly acquired skills of dodging, blocking, parrying, and cutting the distance from a retreating opponent limiting the amount of thrusts and ripostes from John.

His endless drills with May Brooks/Satsuki Sakaguchi had paid dividends. Otherwise, he would've been skewered by the Faceless long ago.

The Kamiya Kasshin Ryu master also remembered why he went into his Musha Shugyo (Warrior's Pilgrimage) in the first place. To defeat his rival, Yutaro, and his defensive kendo skills.

***

You shouldn't let his crimson mask of blood deceive you. Lucas Grant was more dangerous now than he was before he started bleeding.

It could be that Lucas was stronger and more durable than Kinta the same way Luke's bastard sword could break the samurai's katana because of its higher grade, carbon-rich steel.

However, it didn't necessarily matter.

Kinta was no mere injured animal fighting tooth and nail for his life by letting his base instincts take over either.

The Mimawarigumi Battousai was as dangerous to his fellow men as men were to animals.

Humans were weaker than most animals yet they somehow ended up becoming the dominant species in the world.

Kinta was no mere beast. He was more than a lion. He was a man. A hunter. The human animal that was on top of the food chain. The apex predator of apex predators.

Granted, a human wasn't faster than a cheetah. Nor stronger than a gorilla. Nor more brutal than a tiger or lion. His nails weren't as sharp as bear claws. Without clothes, he was as exposed as a naked mole rat or a chick that fell off its nest.

By all accounts, in the animal kingdom, a human should be prey instead of the apex predator.

However, humans weren't as weak as one would think.

They had opposable thumbs like apes and monkeys, allowing them the ability to make tools and tightly grip sharp weapons to make up for their lack of claws and raw strength.

They were long-distance endurance runners. While animals could outrun any human at any given time, a human was adept at stalking and tiring such animals down with unrelenting determination.

Any animal could beat humans in a race but they'd tire out trying to outpace a human in a marathon race.

Humans could also sweat, which allowed them to efficiently cool down and prevent themselves from overheating due to activity.

Most animals did not have as effective of a cooling system as humans, so any exertion of commensurate effort on their part, like fleeing or fighting for their life, will leave them more exhausted compared to the self-cooling human.

However, the weapon Kinta had in between his ears was what made him the most dangerous.

The human weapon of intelligence.

A human was able to plan, work with groups of other humans, and make tools. He was no mere animal acting on instinct.

The most intelligent and methodical of humans could turn hunters like any of the big cats into the hunted by springing traps on them or using projectiles against them, from rocks to spears.

Humans could also communicate with each other through language. They could take down even huge animals like elephants, rhinoceroses, and hippopotamuses by tactics, traps, subterfuge, and cooperation.

Even as Lucas pressured Kinta to retreat from an endless barrage of decapitating strikes—knowing his large chunk of steel he called a sword could withstand a strike better than the thinner though sharper katana—the samurai conserved his energy.

He'd memorized Luke's tactics, which kept him safe from even the wildest strikes through pattern recognition. Like a human stalking his prey and memorizing their movement and habits before going in for the kill.

Even as Kinta panted and sweated from the effort, his intelligence kept him from succumbing to wild beasts like his reckless brother.

Even as he tasted the rusty tang of his own blood in his mouth after clearing his throat, his brother still could barely touch him.

Alas, his brother was no mere beast either. Lucas also resembled the human animal, particularly in terms of his tireless stamina, quick recovery, hand-eye coordination, and ability to outlast his prey like an ancient hunter-gatherer.

A modern human with caveman-like strength and instincts.

***

"…In the next attack, I'll parry thrice then do a riposte," said The Faceless all of a sudden, alarming Yahiko. "Pay attention now."

Was he going to really do it? Was he going to tell him his next attack and still land, confident that Myojin couldn't come up with a counter? Or was he lying about doing that and he'd counter a different way?

And so Yahiko attempted to fly and bash Faceless on the noggin, only for him to get parried.

He then attempted to break the sword with the Tsui Gami (God Hammer), with got neutralized with two parries, followed by a riposte that he tried to counter with the Shippu Jinrai Dotou no Ken (Gale Thunderclap Billow Sword) to the wrist.

However, the riposte ripped through regardless, with Rathbone turning his wrist to parry the blow with his elongated sword handle.  He was landing at will now.

Damn you, Cat Eyes. Oh wait, this wasn't Cat Eyes. This was The Faceless.

Rathbone said, "Wipe yourself, kiddo. You're bleeding."

"…I needed that scratch to awaken me!" responded Yahiko.

Fine. Whatever. He'd been planning to use this technique against Yutaro but… what the hell. He might as well use it on this mirror image of Yutaro's kenjutsu.

Yutaro's swordsmanship was such that it didn't matter if you used your best techniques at him, he'd use your strengths as your weakness with a strategy that figured the whole essence of your own kenjutsu out.

Yahiko was different. He was the Yang to Yutaro's Yin. Or vice-versa.

Instead of figuring out a strategy to take out an opponent, he'd rather wing it or improvise, like when he figured out the weakness of the high-flying Hennya Kariwa was someone who could fly like him.

Any strategy Yahiko exhibited was purely incidental. He was more a think-on-your-feet kind of guy who relied on gut instinct to think up new tactics on the fly.

And his gut instinct told him that The Faceless had the same fundamental weakness as Yutaro.

"Next we'll do a Beat Parry Riposte," bragged Rathbone, only for him to frown when Yahiko charged at him. Like an enraged bull annoyed by all the cape waving of the matador.

'Huh. Fine. If he wants to play to my strengths, I'll indulge him,' thought John, preparing to do a Beat Parry Riposte regardless of what attack, counterattack, or feint Myojin had in mind.

Yahiko instead responded with a Counter Time. So it was a feint.

'No problem, time to adjust…?!' thought John before getting blindsided by a simple head strike, the blunt end of the sakabatou hammering his noggin and leaving a crack on his mask.

To himself, Rathbone wondered, 'What just happened?'

"Maybe next time, you'd have the common sense to not tell me what you're about to do next, old man," the petulant teenager answered back.

***

Back after The Faceless recently faced-off against Kinta Minakata, he relayed the following information to Lucas Grant.

"...I didn't notice it at first since I'm no a spring chicken myself, but Minakata Kinta has stamina problems. He slows down the longer you prolong a fight. Just like me, because of my age. Your youth will win out as long as you can withstand his extensive swordsman experience."

"Does he now?" Luke had asked with a twinkle in his blue eyes. "That's fascinating. Tell me more about Niisan (Big Brother)."

"Make your duel into a war of attrition. I haven't met anyone who has ever outlasted you in a fight. Turn it into a brawl. Throw away all technique. Don't bother outthinking him, just keep on striking. Take him into deep waters. Drown him. Show him how you've survived after all these years."

And thus Lucas did just that. Running high on adrenalin and testing the limits of his monstrous stamina, Luke kept his breathing low to conserve his energy.

He kept his frenetic pace by taking breaks while Kinta second guessed his next move and using twitch reflexes to counter or respond without thought in the middle of his rest period.

Boy, was his big brother a tough nut to crack. Most other swordsmen would've succumbed to him by now. However, the Minakata boys were apparently built different.

He'd thrown everything at him but a kitchen sink, and all he had to show for it were minor scratches and bruises.

Like he'd merely been roughhousing him on the playground like his childhood bully instead of doing his best to assassinate him then and there.

He'd poured the pressure on him, each of his full-power strikes killing blows in their own right, but the high-ranking hatamoto samurai remained cool under pressure. He had ice water in his veins.

The plan was to push his half-brother to his limits and run him ragged, knowing full well that he had respiratory problems stemming from his time with Hidden Christian rebels.

However, the red-faced Luke himself ached all over. He had a splitting headache as well. He underestimated the toll of exerting himself so much, yet he ended up swinging at nothing but air every time.

That cunning bastard. Even as Grant attempted to tire Minakata out, Minakata turned the tables on him and tired him out instead with all his missed swings and over-exertion.

His threshold for pain might be high, but he was testing its limits with all the cuts and lacerations he kept barely blocking from the Mimawarigumi Battousai.

He was also left to wonder: Was Kinta's deadpan face the look of someone out of breath and dying from his effort? He couldn't tell.

Kinta looked like he just went through a light jog. He'd broken a sweat, finally, but what of it? Did it compare to the buckets of blood Luke had already spilled?

Which one of them really was the more tired of the two?

Luke gulped hard, bracing himself for a long volley of attacks to come just to break apart his half-brother's clam shell defense and counters.

He had to do this though. Kinta Minakata was the biggest hurdle towards him getting his revenge against the family that abandoned him and his mother. That turned his life into a living hell.

Even with The Faceless' cunning strategy in mind, everything was still going to go down to the wire. Survival of the fittest.

'No hard feelings, Big Brother.'

***

Yahiko fell into his neutral Water Stance once again.

A basic kendo stance that invited all sorts of fencing attacks or counters at every corner from the more mobile sword style.

The Faceless' sword arm swung like a pendulum again, ready to parry, slash, or thrust at a moment's notice, with it serving as his means of gauging his opponent's next…!

The floor buckled beneath him. In a second, Yahiko had struck the ground with a Dou Gami (God on Earth).

Dammit. That technique had a wide berth and swing! Why couldn't Rathbone anticipate it this time?

Caught flatfooted, John Rathbone hopped to stable ground, away from the sudden explosion of rubble and debris, his sword ready to preemptively attack or counterattack.

Yahiko emerged from the smoke with a running start. Rathbone did a counter thrust that turned into a parry at the last second.

They ended up pushing off against each other with the strength of their swings, John's rapier trembling from Myojin's attempt at a blade-breaking Tsui Gami.

"The Faceless's blade is not so firm," the samurai kid said in jest.

The Brigands Guild member answered, "Still firm enough to run you through."

"Is that right? Make sure to keep your wrists safe from harm, then."

"What…?"

While Myojin was initially intimidated by The Faceless calling out his attacks, he realized it was no different from kendo matches calling out the part of the armor they hit when they were having formal matches.

It was up to the opponent to register what was said and respond. And respond he did.

"KOTE! DOUTOU NO KEN!"

As Yahiko's original signature move as a child—the Gale Thunderclap Billow Sword—landed on Rathbone's wrist, disarming him, the samurai teen inwardly grinned.

That was the weakness of The Faceless. Same as Yutaro Tsukayama.

When push came to shove, they'd wait for an opportunity to counter rather than attack 9 times out of 10.

Even when they attacked, they tended to bait a counterattack first to make their attack a counterattack.

The only time they attacked was when they had run out of options, but at that point they become vulnerable to counterattacks themselves.

Timing a Counter Time right in a way that they didn't see it coming was the key to success.

To John's chagrin, he heard Tatsuya holler at him. "Well, well, well. The fencing master has met his equal."

'My equal, you say?' thought the indignant Faceless while rubbing his wrists. 'Excuse me? Him? My equal? Balderdash.'

***

From the high-pace exchange of slashes and parries, the fight between blood brothers ground to almost a halt.

They paced themselves equally, with Luke pushing for the action while Kinta defended and kept an eye out for counter opportunities.

Their breathing was heavy. They panted like tired dogs in the middle of a summer heat wave. Their fight that lasted minutes felt like hours of nonstop trench war.

Neither willing to give ground. One fought to salvage his honor. The other fought to enact revenge upon the family who abandoned him.

On one hand, there was Kinta Minakata. He glistened with light perspiration from the effort and a couple of cuts and bruises, but his breathing was as ragged as his half-brother's.

The only blood on him was his brother's, among others. As expected of the sole Mimawarigumi survivor given the same moniker as the Ishin Shishi's own Battousai.  

His wheezing and occasional coughing belied his pristine condition. He also looked paler, perhaps even bluer, then usual.

On the other hand, there was Lucas Grant. He was supposed to be named Takuto Minakata, but his blond hair and blue eyes after he was born gave him away.

He looked like he'd gone from hell and back after taking on two of three Sanada Demons. However, his movements looked somehow sharper and livelier than his brother from another father.

For someone who looked like he was tortured, there remained a spring in his step. As though the blood on him was not his own. Or perhaps bleeding somehow invigorated him.

Which one of them was more exhausted? Which one of them was on the verge of death? The one who looked like he was almost dead or the one who sounded like he was almost dead?

Those were the thoughts filling Lieutenant Satoru Sakaguchi as he cradled his daughter near him while warily giving the side eye on the other remaining Brigands Guild member.

For his part, Kai Hidaka himself watched the bullfight of a match between fellow brigand Lucas and his brother, Kinta. If he were unmasked, perhaps he'd show an agape mouth.

Neither of the three moved from their positions as tensions rose between the panting, gasping Minakata Brothers.

The heavy breathing and groaning soon relaxed and slowed until they stopped altogether.

The two Minakata Brothers then stood up at the same time. They had saved up all their strength for this last salvo.

They controlled their breath and measured the distance between them by eyesight. They seemed to breathe almost in cadence with one another.

Slowly but surely, Kinta sheathed his blade. Meanwhile, Lucas kept his hunk of sharpened iron stabbed into the ground, waiting for the right moment to pull it out and lift it for an attack.

***

Yahiko thought about running after or even stomping on Rathbone's rapier on the factory floor to break it apart, but its owner had already dove to get a hold of it.

Oh well. Thusly, the Tokyo Samurai Descendant said, "For my next trick, I'll break that sword of yours apart."

John harrumphed. So now the kid was calling his shot as well? "You dare use my own gimmick against me, Myojin Yahiko?"

"Yessir. I sure do dare." The Tokyo Samurai Descendant fell back to his familiar Water Stance.

Rathbone himself fell into his En Garde fencing stance in kind, bouncing on his heels and measuring the distance with probing rapier thrusts.

Knowing what would happen next. They both knew, actually.

Rathbone had figured out how Yahiko was landing his strikes. The samurai kid used the same preparatory stance to initiate all of his offense, transitioning suddenly to other stances from the basic kendo stance if he had to.

This way, he gave no "tell" or "signal" to what he was about to do next. His stance remained neutral at every exchange.

All of his techniques, from the Revisal Techniques to the original Kamiya Kasshin Ryu and even his imitation Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu moves could be done from the Chudan-no-Kamae.

Making Rathbone second-guess which attack to counter allowed Yahiko to react to his belated counters in time and do the appropriate Counter Time.

In this scenario, even a "telegraphed" attack like Dou Gami could land, because if John were to notice it in time and counter, Yahiko had enough time to react and turn the strike into a feint and Counter Time.

"Genei Gami (Phantom God)," Myojin whispered.

Hiding all his techniques' preparatory movements from the neutral stance to better read his opponent was the next step of his Revisal Techniques.

And as the blocked Dou Gami finally gave Yahiko enough room to execute the Tsui Gami, Rathbone's rapier finally broke into two pieces.

Alas, this was what Rathbone bet on.

With a gloved hand, he grabbed hold of one piece of the broken sword and dual wielded the blades, blocking the samurai kid's follow-up strike with the bottom half and stabbing him in the shoulder with the top half.

"My equal? Really? ¡Qué huevá más grande! (What an annoyance!)" said John Rathbone, who'd transformed into the Spaniard Fabian La Cerca at the last second upon finding a way to turn his rapier into his favored sword and dagger weapons.

"AUGH!" said Yahiko, who had gripped The Faceless' wrist in time to keep the rapier from reaching his vital organs, his face twisted in anguish.

"You're 100 years too early to be facing me, child."

***

To Lucas's surprise, it was Kinta who spoke first after his katana slid to its scabbard with a click. He had one question for him.

"What happened to Mother?" asked the heir to the Minakata Zaibatsu fortune.

"She's dead," said the Prodigal Son matter-of-factly. "Your family killed her. Called her a traitor to her nation. A whore to the gaijin invaders. Disowned her. Cast her aside. Banished her as their black sheep. Forgot about her altogether, like she didn't exist. Does that answer your question, Big Brother?"

"…."

Despite himself, Satoru murmured, "So the rumors were true. Damn."

Beside him, the officer's daughter stirred, pretending to be asleep but clearly hearing what Kinta's yonger brother said.

Azuma Minakata committed ritual suicide after his wife slept with a foreigner and bore their bastard son. Afterwards, Aoi Minakata was never heard from again.

The Minakatas pretended she never existed and thus she didn't. Until now.

The two finally addressed the elephant in the proverbial room, clearing the air between them.

It was the very thing that held them back and kept them from going all out. It left them wondering what they were even fighting for.

Now they know. The Minakatas committed an unforgivable sin and their unknown grandchild had come to collect.

Also, like cowards, they used their precious heir to the throne to defend themselves against retribution, making him implicit to their crimes. An accessory to murder.

Lucas would've rather drawn and quartered his cowardly Uncle Kaneda. Or tortured the pride out of his arrogant Uncle Tatsuya before beheading him.

Maybe even mercy-kill his Grandmother Mieko. Then piss on the grave of his late Grandfather Toshiro.

Luke had been disguising himself as their bodyguard all this time for a reason. To gauge whether they deserved retribution or if they changed from their evil ways. What he saw of them steeled his resolve. Most of them deserved what was coming to them.

Alas, their honorable nephew or grandson Kinta was in his way from committing justified familicide.

It couldn't be helped. They were both victims of circumstance.

The two then charged at each other, Kinta waiting for the right moment to draw his Akatsuki (Red Moon) katana and Lucas preparing a full two-handed swing of his bastard sword.

***

The Faceless's body stood up in attention, as though preparing to march. He then shifted to his fencing stance, his free arm settling on his hips, his jousting or fencing hand moving in circles in front of him.

Yahiko was now faced with two problems. One, his shoulder got injured, so his reaction time had been physically diminished.  

Two, The Faceless was back to using two swords, so even the Genei Gami's ability to hide which attack he was using could not overcome Fabian La Cerca merely blocking or parrying with his other arm.

They were back to square one. Only this time, the game of cat and mouse was over. The cat won and the mouse ended up too injured to still play with.

The cat was about to eat him now.

'Oh yeah? Well screw that!'

Throwing caution to the wind, Yahiko shifted to the offensive Fire Stance this time. His true signature stance—an all-offense one focused on striking at the precise moment.

He feinted and baited the dual-wielding fencing master for all he was worth.

However, he couldn't land a counter-counterstrike this time because Faceless had one other trick up his sleeve other than the broken tip of his rapier. He also broke his rhythm.

He stopped. Paused. Avoided committing into a regular tempo or pattern to allow himself to react even at the last second in case he again misread an attack or feint from Yahiko's Phantom God.

He shifted from fast to slow at irregular intervals, like the clumsiest and drunkest dance partner determined to step on your feet at every turn.

For, unbeknownst to Myojin, this was how La Cerca ultimately beat the tempo-altering, echolocating techniques of the bat ninja Baku.

Furthermore, La Cerca could shift between attacking and defending with either sword arm. He could turn his swords into dual shields or shift between sword and shield on either hand at a moment's notice, depending on the exchange.

The Faceless outclassed the injured and slower samurai in every single way.

However, before the fencer could finish the samurai off with another stab or even an arterial cut to make him bleed so much he'd pass out and die, he had to deflect shuriken from out of the blue and retreat.

A certain ninjutsu master just came back from retrieving the horses and carriage that got spooked earlier by paid Chinese mercenaries.

The steadfast ninja arrived just in time and almost blinded La Cerca with twin kunai to the two exposed eye slits on his mask.

"Kinta! I mean, Kaita!" said Yahiko, mixing up the names of these people he only recently met. "You came back! I thought you abandoned us!"

"Of course I did," said Kaita with a shrug. "I still have a mission to complete, Yojimbo (Bodyguard)."

"Where's the carriage?" asked Myojin.

"It's parked near an open field. The horses are tied there," answered the shinobi. "I originally wanted to run The Faceless over, but then you entered this building."

"A shadow dares defeat me?" said Fabian, his chuckle echoing from underneath his plain white face mask. "Mierda (Shit). The only shadow allowed to defeat me is the Kagemusha (Shadow Warrior)."

Kaita looked at Yahiko then at La Cerca. "You're right. I am but a mere shadow. And that's how we'll defeat you."

The next thing they knew, like a magic trick, Tatsuya had disappeared, prompting The Faceless to action. He had no choice, they took away his bargaining chip.

***

Just like with Yahiko and his Genei Gami, Kaita's invisibility trick made it tough to predict the trajectory of his projectiles.

Thusly, Kaita disappeared from their midst, melting into the darkness of the already dimly lit building in order to attack in the shadows like the coward that he was.

Such was the deviousness of these so-called oriental assassins. They were the yellow peril for a reason, or so Fabian thought.

Either warrior proved tricky for The Faceless to handle on their own, but now they'd decided to join forces, they were double the trouble.

Fine. He'd take them both on at the same time, if need be.

Yahiko and La Cerca clashed blades once more, only this time the kid samurai wielded his iron sheathe like a second blunt sword but with a reverse grip to counteract Fabian's sword-and-dagger technique, just like before in the narrow alleyway.

Interesting. But what about The Faceless' broken rhythm?

Yahiko answered the baits to counterattack by simply attack. He didn't need to dance to the broken rhythm of Faceless' tempo. He'd rather force Faceless to move to his own beat or get smacked  by a wayward strike.

A Simple Attack. Or a series of simple attacks. No Compound Attacks. No feints. No parries.  No counters. Nothing fancy. Just pure relentlessness.

His offense was his defense (along with occasional dodges and whiffs).

However, it wasn't all predictable. He swung for the fences using slashes that changed levels from high to low. Head to body. Or even hips, thighs, and knees.

His adrenalin rush allowed him to persevere, his shoulder throbbing from the stab earlier.

"Good effort, Faceless-san," said Yahiko with a smirk after Fabian countered another God Hammer with a crisscrossing double-bladed block.

The Faceless answered, "My next will be even better, my fancy clown."

Yahiko's unrelenting attacks and chase down then became unintentional counterattacks because he wasn't timing them to counter any responses from La Cerca.

He merely overwhelmed him with his own responses, like a talkative person talking over and silencing someone else with his endless stream of words. He did multiple Dou Gami blasts on the floor to mess with his footwork or Tsui Gami attempts to break or disarm what was left of his rapier.

The Faceless couldn't even parry anymore due to rough state Yahiko's sword-breaking techniques left his swords at. However, Fabian couldn't be easily overwhelmed.

He reestablished his broken tempo by finding counter opportunities from Yahiko's own overwhelming offense. Like slipping in side comments or sarcastic quips here and there that silenced even the chattiest fellow.

He also upped his reaction time, knowing he was basically taking on a tiring one-armed young man, before figuring out his tempo and countering the attacks in kind but stopping short from getting baited into a Counter Time.

He also bided his time, knowing full well Yahiko had to exert more effort to land his strikes than he did, who in contrast merely had to react to him and his frenetic pace.

"Are you tiring, Yojimbo?" asked Kaita from the shadows.

"Just sit tight and I'll take you on in a moment!" retorted Yahiko with a bloody grin.

To himself, he wondered if this was how a duel with "Cat Eyes" Tsukayama would've unfolded at this point. A tug of war between timing and tempo.

The Faceless, on his part, had also been dodging shuriken, spikes, nails, and other projectiles from the shadow ninja's guerilla tactics and assistance to slow him down and give Yahiko more opportunities to strike.

His broken rhythm that saved him from even Baku's screaming tempo-dictation technique and Zan's echolocation accuracy also made him a reactive mobile target that avoided both Yahiko and Kaita's shared attempts at swatting him down.

For an attack to land, it needed timing and positioning. The purely instinctual Yahiko made up for missed or whiffed strikes with even more strikes or follow-throughs.

Combinations on top of combinations to the head and torso that forced Fabian on the defensive in an endless series of parries and blocks.

'Ah. He fights just like Luke,' The Faceless realized. 'An endless stream of follow-through attacks and recoveries.'

It really was feast or famine with this child. No middle ground.

Hesitation was what increased the effectiveness of La Cerca's broken rhythm. Yahiko counteracted that by not caring if he missed and simply striking in bunches, using the misses to adjust his range from the target better and correct the miss with successive blows.

However, the untouchable Fabian La Cerca started figuring Yahiko's tempo out while avoiding or parrying Kaita's shuriken from the background with his makeshift dagger like it was an afterthought.

He danced around both Myojin's close-quarter strikes and the Sanada Ninja's long-range projectiles, while sneaking in cutting counters that stopped the samurai kid's charge cold.

Like with Baku, La Cerca assimilated and countered off of his opponent's rhythm completely while dodging their attacks and counters at the same time.

Everyone had their own rhythm. However, everyone else couldn't counter The Faceless in kind because of his own broken rhythm that changed in accordance to the circumstances.

Unrelenting offense was no solution to his broken rhythm because it only made the attacker vulnerable to his counters.

Their dance of parries and thrusts continued as Fabian swooped in for the kill, with him completely memorizing Yahiko's tempo and countering at every turn.

Beat. Parry. Beat. Parry. Parry. Dodge. Counter. Over and over. Predictable. How utterly predictable.

Yahiko started looking pretty rough, like the bloody Lucas did after facing off against Zan.

The kid's tight mini dodges, constant head movement, sword-stealing attempts, and his own school's cross-armed parry and riposte (Hadome and Hawatari) kept him in the match, though.

Yahiko, Kaita, and even Fabian noticed a small window of vulnerability whenever he shifted from defending against the ninja's projectiles and the samurai's swings from his sword and sheathe.

A fraction of a fraction of a second. It was a small window, but the Tsui Gami also used a small window of reverberation to strike the same point three times fast. It was in Yahiko's bag.

Confident he was landing his sharp counters and ripostes at will at this point, Fabian went ham and stopped hesitating.

He indulged in continuous counterattacks without fear of any traps or counter times from Yahiko while having that vulnerability in his mind. Determined to do a parry and riposte if that happened.

A shuriken flew from overhead instead of straight-on to La Cerca's head, which he deflected by reflex. For that split-second, his timing was predictable. Yahiko thusly attacked.

However, expecting this, The Faceless feinted a counter (Feint in Time), only to get smacked in the head with a simple attack. His knees buckling slightly, he sidestepped a follow-through and did a riposte.

He knew Yahiko's pattern by heart now, errant attacks that slipped through aside.

However, his every riposte and counter got blocked and parried themselves with the Kamiya Kasshin Ryu succession technique, the Hadome (Sword Halt) and Hawatari (Sword Crossing).

Myojin couldn't time him while he was waiting for a counterattack, so he baited him with a predictable pattern while spring-loading his own counter time.

It took his shuffling feet and upper-body movement to get out of range of Yahiko's counters and ripostes, with him figuring out that the kid had timed him by baiting him and drawing out his counters.

Thusly, he paused and waited to see if it was bait or a real attack.

Kaita attacked again at that moment, triggering La Cerca's reflex. At the same time, Yahiko attacked again.

On this toss-up, he predicted another bait-and-switch from Yahiko and got a face-full of sakabatou for his trouble.

He then defended again with his footwork and mindless stab to keep the kid off of him, only for his dagger to get stuck inside the samurai's waiting sheathe.

Yahiko pulled the fencer towards him within his range and then wrenched out the dagger from his hands.

Meanwhile, La Cerca himself smiled behind his cracked mask. He couldn't remember the last time he'd been this excited to complete a mission. Who was this Yahiko Myojin character anyway?

If it were up to him, he would've devised a proper plan to take him out, just like with Kinta Minakata. The boy proved himself a formidable foe in his own right.

The fencer dodged, slipped, parried, riposted, and countered Yahiko's strikes even at close range, bewildering him.

Then everything went dark, his mask shattering from a concussive Tsui Gami to the side of his temple. Perhaps his skull might've cracked as well.

He fell in a boneless heap at the scratched-up and bleeding Yahiko's feet, his vision swimming as if underwater.

What just happened?

***

To Be Continued...

The dialog between Yahiko and The Faceless is based on the banter between Captain Esteban Pasquale (played by Basil Rathbone) and Diego Vega/Zorro (played by Tyrone Power) during their duel in the movie "The Mark of Zorro (1940)".

Also, naturally, all this shadow talk is based on Tetsuya Kuroko. In my mind, I've transformed the original Kaita from the Rurouni Kenshin Black Knight filler arc into a Kuroko-like ninja.

Danke, Abdiel

[gabriel-gabdiel]

【Draft】 Rurouni Yahiko Chapter 57: The Chinese Parade

Finally got a bit of momentum back at writing. It really does feel cathartic to write again. Plus, there's a new Rurouni Kenshin anime coming very soon, which is neat.

Pardon the bad formatting, typos, and run-on sentences. it’s the roughest of drafts. 

Back at the exterior facade of the Minakata moneychanger office building…

Three things happened within the span of five seconds.

Five long seconds that seemingly went into slow motion for all those concerned.

As Kai Hidaka of the Fuuma Ninja Clan forcefully pulled at the speared Satoru Sakaguchi, he intended to either use him as an anchor to leap away from the attacking Kinta Minakata or as a meat shield if the lieutenant got dragged towards him instead.

Lieutenant Sakaguchi, thinking quickly, opted to allow Hidaka to pull at him instead to prevent his escape from Kinta.

The policeman charged and went into iaijutsu (quick-draw) position, intending to attack the rope-slinging brigand rather than be used as a pawn or collateral damage against Minakata.

Kinta now had no choice but to halt his momentum to prevent himself from slashing both Satoru and Kai apart with the Mangetsu O Tsuku Nari (Full Moon Slash).

That was the leeway Kai needed as he timed a jump at the last second before Lieutenant Sakaguchi could release his blade for a Half Moon Slash, his saber clashing against Minakata's Akatsuki (Red Moon) sword at the location where Hidaka stood a split second earlier.

By the time the Fuuma Clan Ninja reached the apex of his jump, he'd twisted and wrapped his body around a rope spear he'd shot into the ground below him.

Then he twisted towards the other direction, releasing all the potential energy he'd stored from coiling himself up like a mummy into kinetic motion.

***

Rurouni Yahiko

A Rurouni Kenshin Continuation Fan Fiction Story by Chester Castañeda

The Brigands are closing in on their Minakata V.I.P. targets. Can Yahiko and the Sakaguchis do anything against them?

Disclaimer: All characters used in this fanfic (save some others) are the rightful property of Nobuhiro Watsuki, Shueisha, Shonen Jump, Viz, Sony Studios, Fuji TV, Studio Gallup, Studio Deen, and ADV. This disclaimer also covers all the other copyrighted materials that are far too many to mention here. Don't sue me please, I'm very poor.

***

Chapter 57: The Chinese Parade

***

Kai Hidaka twirled like a top that'd been released from being bound-up in rope or string, intending to kill two birds with one stone with the whirling dervish that was him and his dual-wielded blades.

Only for Minakata to shift his weight on his lead foot to pivot, lift his back foot, and turn to avoid Satoru altogether.

His back foot then turned into his lead foot after doing his initial pivot, giving him the leverage he needed to continue his Tsunami's supersonic strikes, intentionally missing as though practicing an iaijutsu kata (quick-draw form).

From there, he moved past Lieutenant Sakaguchi and charged at the spinning Kai, barely losing any of his momentum. He then adjusted the trajectory of his sword to slash at Kai's revolving blades without missing a beat.

As though he turned his missed swings into an intentional part of his kata until he recovered enough to actually hit his target.

'Kinta-kun…!' thought Satoru, who himself turned to witness the Mimawarigumi Battousai clashi blades with the Brigand's resident ninja.

Kai scowled. Dammit. The Kagemusha (Shadow Warrior) did it again. He found a way to win.

Regardless, Hidaka used the recoil from his blades after they clashed hard against Kinta's Full Moon Slash to rebound back to the sky and avoid the Blue Moon Slash he knew was coming.

He then did a pirouette to redirect the trajectory of his body and land behind Satoru, using him as his human shield against Kinta like he had originally intended.

"DIE, SEIRYU CLAN!" Kai cried out, which surprised both Kinta and Satoru.

'Seiryu Clan…?' they thought in unison.

Hmmm. They were the Seiryu Clan, weren't they? Both of them knew the Brigands Guild member had a point. The name had a nice ring to it too.

Their clan indeed involved the partnership between high-ranked hatamoto samurais who only answered to the daimyo and low-ranked subordinate samurais under them.

Kai Hidaka had intended for Minakata to use up the last of his stamina to make himself easy pickings for himself or for Kinta's half-brother, Lucas Grant (the man who proposed that their guild take this dangerous mission in the first place).

A mission close to Lucas's heart. For the Prodigal Son, this time it was personal.

Then again, Kai also saw it as a personal mission in a certain point of view.

Hidaka then noticed that Satoru fell into the infamous Waning Stance. The defensive stance of Musou Madden Ryu where the user faced away from the opponent instead of forward.

As usual. How typical of the cowardly Lieutenant Satoru Sakaguchi. The sidekick of Kinta. The Kagemusha of the Kagemusha.

An ordinary police officer stuck into extraordinary circumstances. A family man with a wife and daughter to boot. Or an about-to-be widow and her daughter, at any rate.

Hidaka figured out that the Waning Stance was simply the Waxing Stance seen from behind.

Attacks happened much slower from the Waning Stance because the point of release happened from the front of the quick-draw swordsman and they had to loop around in a circle care of the resulting follow-through.

This defensive stance hid the trajectory of the sword, allowing for a 360-degree quick-draw slash that depended more on timing than speed to work.

Regardless, Kai had almost stabbed through Satoru to get to Kinta and injure him. Or at least distract him enough to the point of making a mistake.

Well, almost.

***

At the front door of the Minakata moneychanger office building…

A banker, a ninja, and a samurai all gathered at the front porch of the Minakata moneychanger building. No, that wasn't the start of a joke.

However, the ridiculous circumstances did push them to the brink of hilarity in the point of view of situational irony.

Thusly, none of them understood the resulting punch line.

Regardless, the thick wooden doors before them burst open long after they had closed them earlier, as though demanding they come back inside.

The jaws of Yahiko Myojin, Kaita of the Sanada Ninja Clan, and Tatsuya Minakata figuratively dropped on the floor at the sight before them. A sight to cause sore eyes on the part of Tatsuya, for sure.

Despite their best efforts, The Faceless—also known as Seth Merrick, John Rathbone, or even Fabian La Cerca—had breached through the defenses of the Sanada Ninja that ran interference for them, driving the bloody bat-themed spy through the door with a rapier stab.

Like Hajime Saito would with his fearsome Gatotsu stabbing technique.

"Baku!" exclaimed Kaita, which was the first time Yahiko heard the invisible ninja raise his voice. The master of camouflage seemed more like the quiet type, so the shout surprised the Tokyo Samurai Descendant a tiny bit.

Wide-eyed, Yahiko witnessed the bloodied bat-themed ninja screech and holler a war cry, a haunting noise which made him realize the inhuman screams he heard from before was actually from the shadow warrior all along.

Only for The Faceless to do a Beat, Parry, and Riposte to counter him, driving him to the ground and turning him into a human plow.

"Ahhh! Monsters! They're all MONSTERS!" screamed the horseman they found who was supposed to drive the carriage.

He then ran away on foot at the frightening sight of The Faceless painting the front porch with Baku's blood.  

"Come back, you coward!" demanded Tatsuya, who had half the mind to shoot the driver to put him away from his misery.

"SHIT!" cursed Yahiko while Kaita also did so, but under his breath. Then again, good thing the carriage driver didn't end up driving away with their getaway vehicle.

Aloud, the teenaged samurai asked Kaita, "The ninja uses screams to mess with his target somehow, right? Like maybe burst his eardrums or give him vertigo?"

He based this on his experience with Kenshin Himura fighting Enishi Yukishiro. Kenshin defeated Enishi's "Nerves of Insanity" by the supersonic sheathing of his sword that burst the wattoujutsu expert's eardrum with a high-pitched sound.

From behind Yahiko, Kaita said, "You're on the right track. Baku's screams disrupts a swordsman's ability to read kenki (swordsman presence) and sakki (bloodlust) by using infrasound vibrations."

Indeed, Yahiko couldn't clearly get a read on the intentions of Baku even from that distance, his bloodlust and swordsman presence masked with distracting supersonic screeches.

Like how the Kekkai no Mori (Sealing Forest) sealed away Kenshin's ability to detect bloodlust by the strange magnetic field surrounding it when he faced off against the Yaminobu Ninjas.

Kaita frowned, his kunai at the ready. Originally, Baku used his shrieks in order to strike fear in his targets and echolocate them from a distance or even in pitch-black darkness like bats would.

Baku trained for years to turn his screams into kenki disruptors, getting him on equal footing with the likes of the sharpshooter ninja Zan.

"However, the foreigner's swordsmanship style probably doesn't sense bloodlust the way Japanese swordsmen do, so Baku instead used his infrasound screams to disrupt his rhythm," Kaita surmised.

"He can do that?" said Yahiko in wonder.

Kaita nodded. "But his expertise only somehow woke up a sleeping giant. That man, The Faceless, is dangerous."

'You don't have to tell me twice,' thought Myojin, remembering how hard it was to hit or penetrate through the parries of the expert fencer who was always two steps ahead of him.

"Once you nitwits are done congratulating my assassin for a job well done, can you please save my life, if you don't mind?!" demanded the gaunt Minakata uncle, Tatsuya.

Fabian La Cerca did one flick of his sword in order to fling the blood on the ground. "Now where were we? Ah yes. Minakata Tatsuya. Prepare to die."

"AH! Don't come near me, you freak!" cried the banker, his pistol at the ready.

Both Yahiko and Kaita acted quickly, hoping they had the same idea in saving Tatsuya from harm. Or that their ideas didn't clash against each other.

Thusly, Kaita disappeared from view, like an apparition in twilight.

'Godammit,' thought Myojin, hoping against hope that the Minakata Family's ninja didn't just abandon them like their horse carriage driver did.

He then swung at the ground at full force to do an explosive "Dou Gami! (God on Earth)", only for him to shift quickly into a "DOU RYU SEN! (EARTH DRAGON FLASH!)" as soon as the fencer assassin dodged to the side to redirect all that loosened earth towards the direction of his dodge.

Yahiko then grit his teeth when Fabian also slipped, slid, parried, and deflected the resulting landslide of rocks and debris as though doing a fencing duel with it.

What was up with this guy?!

Then, just in time, Kaita the Ninja drove the carriage in front of Yahiko and Tatsuya, beckoning them to get in. He actually fetched their getaway car in time before The Faceless could get to them.

"Get in," beckoned the ninja, who threw kunai at La Cerca even as he dodged the rock shards and debris Yahiko flung at him earlier. "Lord Minakata. Yojimbo (Bodyguard). Let's go."

"Whew, I thought you abandoned us for a second there!" confessed Yahiko, who wiped the sweat off his brow.

"Not to worry. I'll stick with you like I'm your shadow," the Sanada Ninja reassured.

"Hmmm," grunted The Faceless because by the time he realized what had happened, his target and his guards had gotten away. "Touché, Minakata Tatsuya. Your bodyguards have impressed me."

***

Back at the exterior facade of the Minakata moneychanger office building…

Hidaka had anticipated the Full Moon Slash from the Waning Stance of Satoru, so he countered with a stab instead of a slash since that was the quicker attack.

However, Kai merely clipped the turning back of the policeman. As expected, contact with the ninja's blade made the lieutenant move like a booby trap that had been tripped.

The acrobatic Fuuma ninja sidestepped the resulting slash by reflex as soon as he saw the glinting blade appear in the moonlight, figuring out its trajectory by sight.

Hidaka then attacked with another lunging stab, knowing full well that Satoru was no Kinta Minakata and thusly wasn't capable of the Blue Moon Slash (or Double Full Moon Slash).

The shadow warrior now had leverage against Kinta and his supersonic slashes—i.e., an injured Officer Sakaguchi—while also buying himself time until Lucas arrived.

'What…?! Impossible!' thought Hidaka, who almost got bisected into two halves with a follow-up Full Moon Slash.

'A Double Full Moon Slash? A Blue Moon Slash?! That mere copper was capable of this advanced technique?!'

Unbeknownst to him though, Satoru Sakaguchi had one more trick up his sleeve.

Instead of doing the Full Moon Slash twice, Satoru instead did the Waning Gibbous Moon Slash, allowing him a slightly faster recovery time to execute a Pseudo Blue Moon Slash.

Even though Satoru couldn't do a Blue Moon Slash like Kinta could, he could fake the technique by instead doing a Waning Gibbous Slash that resembled a Full Moon Slash, allowing him a quick enough follow through to unleash a real Full Moon Slash soon after.

Thus, the opening that the Fuuma ninja thought was there got him slashed apart instead with an actual Full Moon Slash.

Such was the power of the Suigetsu O Tsuku Nari (Water Moon Slash or Illusion Moon Slash).

Like the reflection of the moon on the water, Satoru fooled Kai into thinking his Waning Gibbous Moon Slash and Full Moon Slash combo was the Blue Moon Slash.

It took advantage of the fact that the preparatory motion for all the slashes of Musou Madden Ryu appeared the same until release.

Hidaka fell for the Illusion Moon Slash hook, line, and sinker.

***

In the middle of Yokohama's Chinatown...

They were home-free. The two bodyguards, the samurai and the ninja, fulfilled their mission of protecting Kinta Minakata's uncle, Tatsuya.

Kaita, though with some difficulty due to lack of horse-riding experience, took he reins of the horses of the horse-drawn carriage that served as their getaway ride.

Yahiko bought them enough time to stave off the advance of The Faceless, the gaijin (foreign outsider) partner of the Minakata Family's Prodigal Son, Lucas Grant, in time to escape.

So why did they feel like something was amiss? Like something horrible was about to happen?

They slowed down to a crawl instead of riding straight through the streets of Yokohama's Chinatown in order to get back to one of many Minakata Zaibatsu mansions.

They ended up stuck with other carriages as a parade of dancing Chinese and Japanese folk as well as their half-Chinese, half-Japanese offspring went through the streets in celebratory fashion.

"What's going on? Why aren't we moving?" demanded Tatsuya, looking like a carved bronze statue of himself sitting on cushioned carriage seats.

"Relax, Minakata-dono," reassured Kaita. "There's just a parade happening. For some sort of Chinese holiday or festival."

"Ah, the Dongzhi Festival, huh?" Tatsuya allowed his tense shoulders to relax, his back finally slumping down on his seat's cushioned backrest. He'd previously been as stiff as a board this entire time.

As a local of Yokohama, he was familiar with the customs of the area. "Fine. Let's wait it out and find the nearest shortcut. I want to be hundreds of kilometers away from those maniacs."

The Dongzhi Festival or Winter Solstice Festival was celebrated during the Dongzhi solar term (winter solstice), during any day from December 21 to December 23. It was supposedly celebrated to ensure good yin-and-yang balance for the coming season.

After the celebration, it was believed the days would have longer daylight hours and more positive energy flowing in.

Different cultures celebrated the Chinese holiday in different ways, with them eating anything from glutinous tangyuan (rice balls) or dongzhi (dumplings) and quhan jiaoer tang (hot dumpling soup that expelled the cold).

Perhaps they were just being paranoid.

'Like hell we are…!' thought the antsy Yahiko as he scanned their surroundings, his hand clasping the hilt of the Hitokiri Battousai's sakabatou (reverse-edged blade).

"Wait a second," began Tatsuya. Something was amiss.

The Minakata banker then reminded his two bodyguards that it wasn't December 21st, 22nd, or 23rd today. The correct dates for the Winter Solstice Festival.

Also, the Dongzhi Festival wasn't celebrated with a parade of uproarious people in the streets and a Chinese lion mascot dance like it was the Chinese New Year. Families ate dumplings, sticky rice balls, or soup instead.

Kaita attempted to turn the carriage around in order to find a better avenue for their escape, but soon they ended up surrounded by the suspicious merrymakers.

Also, the lion mascot doing the Chinese lion dance—a southern lion mascot, Tatsuya informed them—started approaching them.

***

Back at the exterior facade of the Minakata moneychanger office building…

God damn it. Damn it all to hell.  Once again, that damnable Satoru Sakaguchi got in Kai Hidaka's way. Once again, the Fuuma ninja underestimated his childhood rival.

He swore to every Japanese god known to man, he'd make that son of a bitch pay.

As Kai fell to the ground in a spray of crimson, everyone present heard a loud crash from the wall facing them, which drowned out the wet splat of his own painful drop.

The ninja scrambled up to his feet in anticipation, ignoring the sting of Satoru's saber on his person.

If he had somehow made it out of the offices of the Minakatas, then the Brigands Guild still had a chance to complete the mission to finish off the strongest Minakata.

And as if on cue, Lucas Grant emerged from the dust clouds, smoke, wood, and plaster he plowed through like so much cardboard and tinder.

The blood then drained from Kai's face when he saw the bloody state that the Prodigal Son was in. He looked like a pincushion, with all sorts of darts, shuriken, knives, and other sharp objects stuck on his person.

For his part, Lucas walked like a drunkard, his clothes stained red from all the blood he lost.

'What the hell happened?!' Hidaka thought, his mind going a mile a minute while his own blood pooled from underneath him.

"Goddamn you, Sanada Demon!" cursed Luke. "Come back here, coward! Stand still and fight like a man, Zan!"

'Demon…?' thought Kai. 'I guess he is a demon.'

The Sanada Demon known as Zan then appeared from behind Kinta, startling the swordsman. His demonic red Noh mask, devilish garb, and oversized war fork would give anyone a fright.

"I've softened him up for you, Minakata-dono," said the strongest of the Sanada Demons as he bowed to his lord. "He's ripe for the kill."

"…." was what Kinta had to say about that.

'Who the hell is this?' thought Kai. 'We weren't briefed about the Minakatas having these other ninjas under their employment! Our scouts only spotted at least two ninja bodyguards, with the rest acting more like liaisons than warriors!'

"We can take him on together, m'lord. Now's our chance," Zan said to Kinta while both shielded Lieutenant Satoru from the rest of the brigands as the officer tended to his daughter's injuries. "We must strike iron while it's hot, before he recovers!"

Kai grabbed his head, forgetting he had a mask on that kept him from tearing his hair out.

'DAH! That was our plan! Lucas and I were supposed to converge on the Kagemusha then have The Faceless finish him off! Everything's going south for us!'  

"Keh. Fine by me," boasted, perhaps bluffed, the woozy Lucas. "Two against one, huh? As expected of you sneaky orientals. I can take both of you gutless cowards on!"

The Mimawarigumi Battousai shook his head at Zan, which prompted the ninja to complain, "Please, listen to reason, m'lord! Now is not the time to treat the enemy with honor. We must be practical and pragmatic about this. I know he's your brother, but…!"

Kinta turned towards Zan and shook his head. "I refuse to gang up against an injured man."

This took Lucas aback. "Bloody hell. What's this now? Japanese honor? The code of the samurai? I told'ya I'm good with you two going up against me at the same time! Come at me, big brother!"

"…Understood, m'lord," said Zan with a sigh and a bow to Kinta before he struck his war fork on the ground, making it tremble and shake once more. "As you wish, Minakata-sama. I'll finish him off myself."

Sneering, Lucas then said, "I wouldn't do that if I were you. Don't make my life difficult and I won't make your life short."

***

In the middle of the Chinese parade...

A northern lion mascot had a fiercer face, painted-on eyes, boxier jaw, and visible sharp teeth. A southern lion mascot has pouted fish lips, blinking eyes, and a moveable jaw.

So it felt surreal to have the adorable fish-lipped lion mascot staring back at Tatsuya, Yahiko, and Kaita, filling them with dread and uncertainty.

The lion dance was developed to scare away evil spirits and bring luck to the audience participating in it. It involved the lion mascot eating cabbages then spitting it out the audience as a sign of good fortune.

Legend had it that the lion dance started because a monster once would attack a village once a year to eat all the food or even the babies of the villagers. Until one day, a monk came to the village and tamed the monster by tying a red ribbon on its horn.

Afterwards, the monster acted as the village guardian, protecting everyone instead of eating their babies and some such.

Other stories alleged that the gods cut the monster's head off, but Guan Yin (The Chinese Goddess of Mercy) brought it back to life, which also turned it into a village guardian.

Thusly, the Lion Guardian of Yokohama Chinatown peered straight at them with blinking (puppet) eyes.

They were left in a conundrum. Should they go out of the carriage and move by foot? Or should they stay there trapped like rats in the middle of a slow-moving parade?

If this was all part of the Brigands Guild plan, they were screwed either way.

"Go out and see what it wants," Tatsuya ordered Yahiko as though he were his butler telling  him to see who was at his door.

"ME? Why me? Why not your personal ninja?" balked Myojin.

The Elder Minakata said, "He's not my ninja, he's Kinta's. Also, he's driving the coach so he's staying here with me."  

The teenaged samurai rolled his eyes. "All right. Fine. I'll go out. You two stay here."

"Oh yeah. Don't give the lion something white to eat," said Tatsuya. "It hates that."

"That's weird," said Yahiko. "Why is that?"

"It's Chinese superstition, you nincompoop," said the banker.

'Ugh. What an asshole.' Resisting the urge to throw Kinta's uncle to the proverbial wolves, Yahiko exited the vehicle and stood guard in front of it, his sword at the ready.

The lion dance mascot took one look at the samurai kid, spewed bits of cabbage at him, and then left him alone.

Huh. Yahiko then remembered Tatsuya telling them that, as part of the lion dance, the lion mascot pretended to eat lettuce and cabbages offered to it before it spat it out back to the business owners and audience.

This symbolized blessing them with wealth and prosperity in the coming year.

After merely ten seconds, Yahiko realized the danger he, Minakata, and Kaita faced.

What if the parade of merrymakers were real and filled with actual Chinatown residents, but mixed with the mercenaries hired by the Brigands Guild to do their bidding?

A crowd was the perfect place to kidnap dignitaries and assassinate V.I.P.s Bodyguards would have a hard time telling which was friend or foe. Normal citizens or actual assassins.

"Is the coast clear? Let me out. I'm going back to my mansion on foot, if I have to!" complained Tatsuya, who swung open the carriage door only for Yahiko to shut it close and shush him. "Wha…? How DARE you shush me, Bodyguard!"

"Please keep quiet, you ghoul," hissed Yahiko.

"Gh-Ghoul?! How dare you…!" hissed Tatsuya in return, only to get shushed further.

"We're being watched. They want you to get out of the carriage and get lost in the crowd."

Although he grumbled, Kinta's uncle shut the door of the carriage and did what he was told.

"Ninja, take care of Kinta's uncle while you're in there, okay?" said Yahiko, to which Kaita nodded in agreement.

Meanwhile, on his part, Myojin remained at the entrance of the carriage and focused. He remembered his training with Kaoru and Kenshin.

He trained mostly in Kamiya Kasshin Ryu and partly in Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu (mostly self-taught), specifically in the art of reading the air. Reading intentions before anyone even acted upon them.

Spreading his swordsman's presence to feel the ripples and detect the malice and blood thirst of those around him.

A couple of stray leaves snapped and popped before the Tokyo Samurai Descendant.

Yahiko snatched the hand of a man with a knife and twisted it. He then did a judo throw to him, also taught to him by Kaoru. This scared the person away.

Without looking, he batted away what might've been a poison dart, and then blocked a cleaver attack with the iron scabbard of the sakabatou.

Most of the sneak attacks on Yahiko's person, he stopped by gutting them with the hilt or tip of the reverse sword, with him not needing to draw its naked blade.

All these attempts at violence by rank-amateur mercenaries paled in comparison to dealing with the long-distance shots of the likes of May Brooks and her naginatajutsu.

He could dodge, counter, and manhandle everyone all day

However, Myojin actually fell for the Brigands Guild's Plan B. While he busied himself staving the attacks of disguised assassins and hired hitmen at one door, the lion mascot snuck to the other side of the carriage.

"Yojimbo! Myojin Yahiko, the other door…!" warned Kaita, his kunai at the ready while he reined in the neighing horses to calm them down.

Awakened from his trance-like flow state, Yahiko forced open the carriage in time to see the southern lion mascot "eat" (as in open its puppet jaws and grab hold with multiple hands) the person he was supposed to be protecting, Tatsuya, unto itself.

Afterwards, the giant mascot blasted cabbages at the horses like from a canon or a firework, spooking them and forcing Kaita to hold on for dear life and they all went buck wild.

Ironically, for the first time, the slow-moving parade finally gave way for the carriage to go through.

What the hell just happened?

***

Back at the exterior facade of the Minakata moneychanger office building…

"Daughter! Daughter! Kyoko, are you all right?" called out the worried Satoru, who cradled his little girl's head while pain still emanated all over her body from her attempt at a Full Moon Slash.

"I-I'm all right, Daddy. Thank you for saving both me and Kinta-sama."

Her vision cleared, and the first thing she saw was her father's worried face. Afterwards, her eyes traveled to Kinta, who stood perfectly still, looking none the worse for wear save for him looking sweatier than usual.

Dimly, she marveled at how her father and Kinta could continuously due such straining techniques in the heat of battle. Boys sure were made of sterner stuff.

However, this also had her worried. She now knew firsthand the incredible strength, agility, physical fitness, and skill to pull off those dangerous moves.

Even with their training and physical strength, they were both only human. Even they might end up like her, with pulled muscles or ripped tendons from the effort of performing Musou Madden Ryu techniques.  

She also saw the hateful Kai on all fours, crawling in a pool of his own blood. Served him right.

She wasn't a violent person by nature and she hated the sight of blood, but in the case of that creep, she made an exception.

Her eyes then settled unto Kinta Minakata's tall, blond, and handsome attacker, charging through a hailstorm of knives and daggers while swiping his European longsword at one of Kinta's ninja bodyguards.

Even though the bloodied blond devil's longsword had quite the reach itself, the devilish masked ninja had an even longer weapon he used like a lance, with every strike making it vibrate and hum the drone of a million hornets.

If she could hazard a guess, she'd bet there was some sort of trick that the ninja was using in order for him to accurately and unerringly strike down the gaijin assassin like target practice.

The war fork's vibrations and droning sound could be simulating the way swordsmen sense the intent of their opponents.

Like ripples from a disturbed pond bouncing back at anything that got in their way, revealing their shape and location.

Like a swordsman's kenki (swordsman ki) reacting to the sakki (bloodlust) of nearby opponents.

By all accounts, the fight was all over. They'd won. Kinta was safe. His assassins were struggling.

However, Kyoko's female intuition screamed at her to keep her eyes peeled. And her hands on her sword's handle.

But maybe she was just being paranoid.

Kinta was strong enough to do the Full Moon Slash without straining or injuring himself like she did.

His assassin was on the verge of being defeated without her or her father's help. They only needed to wait a little longer. Then they could go home and forget all this.

She swallowed down the lump of fear and panic in her throat and watched someone get stabbed to death bit by bit.

She forced herself to watch the grisly affair to prove her persistent feeling of dread wrong.

***

Back in the streets of the Yokohama Chinatown…

Yahiko couldn't tell if the parade was a premeditated ruse to lure any escaping Minakatas into a death trap or if the Brigands timed their assassination plot in the middle of a parade.

Regardless, he was in the thick of it and it seemed like he was taking out thousands of mercenaries in disguise one after another.

He couldn't tell friend from foe or bystander from hired merc and that was probably the whole idea of this Chinese parade "finger trap".

After all, he wasn't totally sure they were sneaky mercenaries with hidden knives or clumsy and drunk parade goers.  

Thusly, he did his best to avoid hurting innocent bystanders by doing things like making his attackers slip and fall or snatching their weapons away with his shirahadori (barehanded blade blocking) techniques.

The pacifistic Kenshin would probably approve of Yahiko's attempts to minimize any potential collateral damage in the middle of a skirmish, at least.

He chased the lion dance mascot all the way into a crowded wet market, and the parade's jolly dancers seemingly made their way there as well.

However, every time Myojin got near, he got bombarded by kicks and punches hidden underneath the flowing costume of the lion mascot. They essentially used hit and run tactics to escape their swordsman pursuer.

He had to contend with hidden mercenaries at every corner and martial artists trained in kung fu wearing a gigantic lion costume every step of the way.

The kendoist herded the multi-feet, caterpillar-like mascot puppet into the nearest, narrowest corner alleyway he could find, their shoes muddied by splashing puddles as he pushed them towards a dead end.

"Let the Thin Man go, bastards! He ain't my cup of tea either, but I won't let you kidnap him! Much less kill him! DOU…!"

It was then that Yahiko realized where they'd ended up at. Back near the Minakata moneychanger office building. Right into the waiting hands of The Faceless.

"I've already seen that attack before. Has your bag of tricks run out?" Fabian La Cerca asked Yahiko Myojin.

Meanwhile, the samurai kid's attempt at another God on Earth got blocked hard by Fabian's sharp and thick rapier, the clang of the blades making the sakabatou vibrate like a tuning fork. Or Zan's war fork.

"Faceless!" said Yahiko, remembering the name Kaita gave the, for lack of a better term, gaijin ninja. "Uh, fancy meeting you here…?"

"Quiet, you popinjay," said the smug La Cerca. "You've fallen right into our trap. Our Chinese mercenaries serve as our insurance policy against any unforeseen hindrances. Now hand over the Kagemusha's relative this instant!"

Yahiko had figuratively ended up between a rock and a hard place, facing off against a multi-limbed kung fu pseudo-lion and a sword-wielding maniac with no face.

***

Kai Hidaka had seen enough.

Styles made fights and obviously, Lucas Grant was no match against the long-distance projectile thrower with a war fork.

Had Zan and the Kagemusha joined forces to defeat Lucas, it would've been all over already.

However, as it was, the red devil ninja was more than enough to take care of the novice mercenary.

Where the hell was The Faceless anyway? He was supposed to be the veteran leader of the Brigands Guild. Their organizer. Their finisher.

Ever since joining the ranks of the Brigands Guild like a soldier in the foreign legion, Kai imagined he'd die someday due to some mission in faraway lands like Constantinople, Hindustan, Siam, Burma, Zaire, or Holland.

Never in his wildest dreams did he fathom he'd die back in his homeland of Japan.  

All the same, the goggled warrior picked himself up from the pavement and willed himself to go once more unto the breach.

If he was going to die anyway then he'd do so like a man.

Then maybe he'd haunt that idiot Faceless and his multiple personalities (or disguises) for good measure! He was nowhere to be found when they needed him the most!

Zan the daredevil ninja saw Kai approach and thusly shot him full of blades and projectiles, intending to turn him into a pincushion for multiple blades like Lucas Grant.

Or like Musashibo Benkei who died standing while shot full of arrows or Julius Caesar and his body stabbed by multiple senatorial daggers.  

However, much to Kai Hidaka's surprise, Kinta Minakata charged alongside him.

Kinta headed straight towards Lucas as soon as Kai decided to act as the distraction for Zan.

What was the Mimawarigumi Battousai doing? Was he finally willing to fight his half-brother now that it was a one-on-one battle or a much fairer fight than before?

Kinta and Lucas were face-to-face once again—The Prodigal Son versus The Minakata Heir.

"Hello, brother," said Lucas with a bloody grin. "Have you changed your mind? Or do you now feel like this is more of a fair fight, Mr. Samurai?"

Kinta kept quiet as he fell into the Waning Stance, his back turned on his bastard brother and his bastard sword.

'What's going on?' Hidaka wondered before dodging and slicing the flying knives and shuriken thrown at him by the sharpshooter ninja.

***

Back at a narrow alleyway in the Yokohama Chinatown near the Minakata moneychanger offices…

"I'll make this duel short to save you fatigue," said La Cerca to Yahiko, who fell into his fencing En Garde stance and did probing stabs at the samurai kid's defense. With both his rapier and his dagger.

"Duel?! You're ganging up on me, you masked coward!" came Myojin's retort, which in no way helped him against The Faceless' riposte.  

The troublesome dagger served as both his extra shield and extra weapon, with him shifting defense and offense between rapier and dagger.

Meanwhile, at the same time from behind him, an oversized, ridiculous lion puppet kept snapping its jaws at him with camouflaged fists and brass knuckles as well as kicks with hidden shoe blades.

It hardly seemed fair. It was like two against one. Or more like eleven against one.

Up to ten people could fit inside the lion mascot, although Yahiko wondered if Tatsuya was forced to serve as the eleventh person inside the puppet, so technically it was twelve against one.

Regardless, the poor kid got bludgeoned by kicks and punches from a lion mascot and wounded by stabs and slashes by the masked fencer.

Wiping the trickle of blood from his busted lip, Yahiko realized he could barely counter any of the attacks because whatever openings either opponent had was taken care of by the other's offensive, forcing him to remain on the defensive.

Dammit. He got beat up at every front, drowning in the winding rapids full of fists, feet, and sword stabs. Like he'd fallen from a waterfall directly into a swamp filled with man-eating gators.

Normally, fighting against The Faceless felt like fighting against a ghost. The Tokyo Samurai Descendant could throw confetti at him and none of them would land.

Now, it felt impossible to take him on with his guard lion running interference for him, wearing his defense down and keeping his offense limited.

The lion dance mascot clamped its puppet jaws at the reversed blade of Yahiko's sakabatou, which forced the kid to use his metal scabbard to block and parry La Cerca's resulting attacks instead.

Laughing like an unhinged lunatic, Fabian declared, "¡Ya me tienes harto! ¡Vete a la chingada! (I'm done with you! Go fuck yourself!)", and of course Myojin couldn't understand a word he said.

The lion mascot then wrenched Kenshin's sword away from Yahiko's lead hand at the same time as The Faceless disarmed his rear hand of his iron sheathe.

He was now weaponless. Unarmed.

***

Back at the exterior facade of the Minakata moneychanger office building…

Hidaka's twitch reflexes allowed him to dodge the flying sharp objects headed towards him at bullet speed much better than his teammate Lucas, who weathered such a storm of steel like a human meat shield. Or a sitting duck.

"Missed me," mocked Kai.

"Impressive," admitted Zan. "You're a harder target to hit than the Prodigal Son."

Like a knight in heavy armor and a gigantic shield, but he lacked both of those as he let Zan turn him into target practice. 'What an idiot.'

The ninja had figured out the secret behind the sharpshooter's unerring accuracy. Zan could somehow detect the sound waves from his war fork and used it like bats would for echolocation.

He also wisely circled around and tested the area of effect of Zan's vibrating war fork, crawling across its perimeter to make the demonic ninja miss his mark.

He winced at the effort, the laceration given to him by Officer Satoru made his chest feel like it was set ablaze.

His high-flying acrobatic ninjutsu had saved his life countless times in countless missions overseas. However, most of those he faced weren't familiar with the way of the ninja at all.

This time, he confronted one of his own right in his motherland. The birthplace of ninjas.  

The darkness was not Kai's ally. Zan grew up in that same darkness. Molded by it. They both didn't see the light until they were men.

They were cut from the same cloth. They were the same kind of animal in a violent dogfight, biting and clawing at each other for in a fight for survival.

He flew across the dome-like area that served as Zan's tripwire to fling his projectiles.

In other words, the outer fringe of Zan's echolocation chamber was where his aim was the least accurate, so Kai could dodge the easiest from there.

From within the sonar dome, the spidery ninja then deployed three-dimensional movement with grappling hooks and ropes that included jumps and flying in midair to dodge while his whirling blades deflected any projectile he couldn't avoid in time.

Going airborne allowed Hidaka to get in the mid-range of the Sanada Demon's war fork sound waves while still being able to dodge in X, Y, and Z-axis despite Zan's heightened echolocation senses.

Hidaka wasn't only dodging from left or right. He also had the freedom to jump ahead or even twist in midair, his twin rotating blades also serving as his means to parry any incoming projectile.

"Missed me again," said Kai.

For his part, Zan acknowledged, "Yes. Not for long, though."

The Fuuma Ninja threw his own rope projectiles at the Sanada Demon to bind and hogtie him, but Zan himself dodged those easily.

Now was the moment of truth.

***

Back at a narrow alleyway in the Yokohama Chinatown near the Minakata moneychanger offices…

Thinking fast, Yahiko ran towards the strangely adorable lion mascot, aware that from behind him, The Faceless was hot off his heels.

The Son of Tokyo Samurai then threw something at the gap between the lion's slightly ajar jaws (it "bit" on his sword, after all), which it received by reflex. Like the cabbage fed to it during the parade.

The mascot then opened the jaw up and "choked out" the white streamer that Yahiko pick-pocketed earlier to the ground, along with the sakabatou.

The boy remembered what Tatsuya said about the Chinese superstition of never "feeding" the lion dance mascot anything that was colored white because that was bad luck.

The silly superstition made the hardened kung fu mercenaries panic and "spew" the streamer out, which gave the unarmed Myojin the opportunity to snatch back his stolen sakabatou from the ground and enter the lion costume from the agape mouth.

He had finally entered the belly of the beast.

From there, chaos ensued.

Fabian La Cerca could only stare, his own mouth agape but hidden behind a plain white mask, as an armed Yahiko beat up his hired hitmen from inside their battle puppet.

From inside the costume, the teenager used his bloodlust detection training he did with Satsuki to bludgeon the wriggling mass of humanity within the costume. Attacking like a virus or bacterial infection.

Like a cape or a curtain, the lion costume unfurled, revealing a triumphant Myojin and a sweaty Elder Minakata who slumped on the kid's shoulders.

Yahiko took a long gasp of air that looked like a yawn. Man, did it stink inside that lion suit!

"I thought I was going to DIE!" said the gasping and wheezing Tatsuya. He slapped his bodyguard upside the head, but he lacked strength, so it came off as more of a nudge.

"Ow! Hey, what was that for?" asked Yahiko. What an ingrate.

"Th-That's for getting me captured in the first place, idiot! Y-You e-even made us run all the way here!" wheezed Minakata, who while nabbed by the lion costume operators, was forced to move in cadence with them at knifepoint.

"Yeah, you're welcome for saving your life," muttered Myojin with an eye roll while considering throwing the V.I.P. back to his kidnappers or to The Faceless.

Unbelievable. The samurai boy took out all those men by himself using finesse and creativity. He was cunning as a fox. Or perhaps he was a fellow thief like himself…?

Who was this interloper anyway?

With a harrumph, the masked assassin said, "Fine. I'll just finish you both off from here. It's like killing two birds with one stone."

Yahiko yelped, who had no choice but to let go of the tired Tatsuya as he fell into his Chudan-no-Kamae (Water Stance) and parried the lunging fencer's rapier before him.

***

Back at the exterior facade of the Minakata moneychanger office building…

"Can't catch me," taunted Kai.

"I've missed every shot so far. But I'm getting closer," said Zan.

"Is that a threat?" asked Kai.

Zan answered, "No, it's a promise."

The Fuuma Ninja used every dodge, parry, and block he could muster to get near the Sanada Ninja and his echolocation. He avoided projectiles on the ground from far away.

He leaped and used midair three-dimensional movement to avoid more blades and darts from midrange. He even threw his own rope darts and grappling hooks at Zan for good measure.

In a mere second, he got clipped on the shoulder by a blade, followed by stabbed on the lead foot with a shuriken and sliced on the rear thigh by the vibrating warfork.

"Almost there," taunted Zan.

He'd charged too close to dodge the sharp-shooting Zan. It was now or never.

Ignoring the screaming, burning pain from the severed nerve endings of his growing list of injuries, Kai Hidaka spun like a top with his twin blades serving as the razor tips of his human shuriken impression.

His blades rotated like the rotors of a windmill, the fins of a pinwheel, or the spokes of a wheel.

He intended to cut through every last projectile at a distance so close, Zan's primitive sonar abilities wouldn't matter anymore.

However, all Zan did was block the rotating Fuuma Ninja's blades with his war fork, which made it vibrate enough to give him enough echolocation sound waves to stab him multiple times with multiple knives with unerring accuracy.

"OH SHI—!"

Zan himself managed to avoid the rotating blades and stick knives into Kai's body between every rotation.

Zan then hissed, "Bull's eye."

Dammit. It didn't work.

Desperate, the Fuuma Ninja wrapped the war fork with one of his rope darts to stop it from vibrating then attempted to decapitate Zan from behind with a whirling dervish of an attack.

The Sanada Demon avoided that too by eyesight instead of by echolocation, ducking in time and countering with his war fork. He was too good and too strong to fall for that as well.

It was all over.

Hidaka wasn't able to land one slash. And now Lucas faced off against his half-brother while injured himself.

The goggled ninja's spent body crumpled to the ground, exhausted beyond belief and bleeding from several more stab wounds.

"Well? What are you waiting for, Sanada Demon? Finish me off."

***

Back at a narrow alleyway in the Yokohama Chinatown near the Minakata moneychanger offices…

'I thought he was a fellow thief, but he's nothing more than a pickpocket,' thought Fabian, who carved Yahiko up like a wooden toy knickknack. 'A petty thief against a criminal mastermind.'

On his part, the samurai kid couldn't penetrate the dual defense of La Cerca's double blades.

The rapier probed at Myojin's range at a comfortable distance and when he forced his way to more closed-quarter combat, the dagger served as both The Faceless' shield and auxiliary blade.

Just like before.

However, unbeknownst to the master fencer, the kendo master had actually pushed the battle towards the area where he'd lost the iron sheathe.

He then secretly picked up his scabbard with his sleight of hand like the pickpocket that he was when he worked with the yakuza.

He then used the same scabbard to block the dagger as he did a circular parry of the rapier and finally landed a rib-cracking body shot at The Faceless.

Coughing blood, even the doubled-over Fabian had to admit, "Magnifico, hijo. (Magnificent, kid.) How much farther can you push me, I wonder? Don't disappoint me now."

Yahiko cringed. "Why won't you go down, Old Man?"

The veteran duelist then moved in for the kill, baiting counter after counter that wore on the dual-wielding samurai's defense.

The Tokyo Samurai Descendant avoided the bait, but this forced him to second-guess his offensive, leaving him to mostly focus on parrying and moving to the preferred cadence of The Faceless.

"Hit him, dammit! He's right in front of you! What am I paying you for?!" demanded the disheveled Tatsuya.

'You do it,' thought the samurai kid, who feinted a strike to draw out Fabian's counter, only to get his counter to the counter blocked by that damnable dagger, leaving him wide open to a barely dodged riposte.

"Almost," said the masked man, his tone dripping with an implied smirk from behind the mask. Like a cat playing with his prey.

Wait. This feeling of frustration felt quite familiar.

Where had Yahiko felt this before? This was the first time he'd ever faced off against the foreign sword style of fencing, so why did this duel feel like he'd been through it before?

He felt a feeling of déjà vu.

From the corner of his eyes, Myojin then saw the mercenaries he beat up regain consciousness and start picking up the parts of their lion costume again. 'Oh, shi…!'

"Stand back! Stand back or I'll shoot!" screamed Tatsuya, scrambling for his pistol, but then he realized he'd lost his gun from the scuffle earlier.

The two realized that one of the mercenaries had stolen the Minakata uncle's firearm and aimed it at them, which backed them into a corner.

Things went from bad to worse.

***

Lucas Grant wiped the blood on his leaking forehead to his hair, dyeing it red. He then licked his hand. "That Sanada Demon of yours was a pretty impressive fighter. I'm not going to lie."

Kinta Minakata remained silent, his body coiled and ready to strike with a iaijutsu slash.

"You're not very chatty today, are you, Big Brother?" said Luke with a nonchalant shrug while tapping his bloody bastard sword from behind his head.

The Mimawarigumi Battousai and the Prodigal Son then picked up where they left off.

The surgeon versus the butcher.

The surgeon remained pristine and precise with his cuts. The butcher kept hacking and slashing right into the bone of the meat.

"You know, I went undercover as your bodyguard to do some research of my own on the Seiryu Clan. The Minakatas. The family that rejected me and my mother," said Lucas with the same inelegant strikes that wore down the snake man ninja Ren.

The Kagemusha, for his part, dodged Luke's fencing strikes and European swordplay, remembering the training he got from his grandfather, the sage and worldly Toshiro Minakata, on how to handle swordsmanship from across the globe.

This allowed him to defend against unconventional tactics he didn't witness from his time in the Mimawarigumi, like using the pommel of a bastard sword to bash the head in.

As brusque, simple, messy, and savage as Grant's swordsmanship looked, it was also pragmatic and effective. Like bashing any living thing with the sharpest blunt object you could find into minced meat.

"Every one of your family is full of bastard. Even bigger rat bastards than I am, the literal bastard," continued Lucas, happily chopping away at the surgical Kinta's defense, his sword slashes coming closer. And closer.

Like in the middle of a stampede of carriages or even chariots, Minakata kept avoiding those strikes, each one swung with great strength and killing intent. Each one enough to finish him off.

Disturbingly, every accurate cut Kinta landed on Luke, the foreigner didn't even register. He didn't even bat an eye. They might as well have been paper cuts. Or cat scratches.

It was as if they were too shallow for him. Flesh wounds weren't enough to take him down, as proven by Zan earlier. His brother dared him to commit to every strike and cut right through his bone.

Easier said than done. It felt like one wrong move from him would result in certain death.

Kinta didn't break a sweat earlier, but now he was really sweating on a December.

Also, it was naïve of him to refuse Zan's proposal to fight his bastard brother together, thinking it was dishonorable to fight an injured man.

This creature before him did not act like an injured man. He was more like a wounded animal whose fight or flight instincts had been activated.

But that wasn't quite right either. He acted to lackadaisical for someone so bloody. It was as if he became stronger and more relaxed the more injured he got...?

What an utterly ridiculous man he'd grown up to become.

***

Back at a narrow alleyway in the Yokohama Chinatown near the Minakata moneychanger offices…

Something in the periphery smashed the hand holding Tatsuya's pistol. A tetsubo (metal bat), to be exact.

"…Gan!" gasped Yahiko while Tatsuya used him as a shield against the lion dance mascot. "You came! I didn't think you'd come here!"

Sure enough, the Great Gan started swinging his weapon against the overgrown puppet before him. "You owe us part of that reward money, Yoshi-boy!"

"Don't call me that," said Myojin with a smirk, almost unthinkingly. He didn't really care what Gan called him at that point.

The thuggish ruffian walloped the multi-legged lion mascot before him, with him swinging for the fences with bone-shattering swipes.

Damn. Yahiko heard several sickening crunches from Gan's blunt force approach.

He then had to do a split-second cross-armed Hadome parry on short notice as Fabian suddenly lunged his rapier's tip at his face, intending to turn him and Kinta's uncle into shish-kebab.

However, before he could transition into the disarming Hawatari, the boy realized his fatal mistake, unable to backpedal in time to avoid the dagger to his heart, with both his arms leaving his chest wide open.

To both the shock of La Cerca and Yahiko, a dual-bladed block kept the dagger from puncturing the spiky-haired boy's chest just in time.

It was Munenori Minoe's Cancer Stance: Scissor Grip technique.

"…Minoe!" said Yahiko with a smile and a half-laugh. His allies had come to his rescue in the nick of time.

"Mochiron (But of course)," said Minoe before squeezing his two swords hard enough to bend and break The Faceless's dagger.

***

Hidaka winced at the forked stab that never came.

What was the Sanada Demon waiting for? The Chinese New Year? Tanabata (The Star Festival)? He should finish him off and get it over with.

"Hey, Demon. Quit playing games," said Kai, only for him to realize something important.

The mask wearing youkai (ghoul) ninja that reminded him of The Faceless the most had stopped moving.  

Like Musashibo Benkei who died standing while shot full of arrows or Julius Caesar and his body stabbed by multiple senatorial daggers.  

However, unlike them, he had no arrows or knives stuck on his body. Did he have a random heart attack and died then and there, smote by the gods?

What the hell just happened?

The ninja exhaled, releasing the breath he just realized he'd been holding all this time. He took stock of his surroundings, awakening to self-awareness with several eye blinks.

He felt like he'd just escaped death with the skin of his teeth. Or like he got sideswiped by a runaway carriage, saving himself from becoming roadkill.

He sat there, dripping in blood, his eyes searching for any wound or slash he landed unto Zan.

At first glance, it looked like Zan was the victor and Hidaka awaited death.

Kai's brain scrambled for a reason behind his sudden victory. Was it when he wrapped the war fork and muffled its reverberating sound waves, allowing him to land a hit?

However, his blades—as sharp as they were—didn't draw blood or felt like they even hit the red devil ninja at all. No impact or resistant.

Hidaka then noticed the drip of blood not his own.

Little drops of blood formed on the slumped form of Zan.

Wait a goddamn second.

Kai thought the pincushion look of the bloody Lucas meant that he'd been pushed to the limit by the devilish ninja.

What if Zan's red costume hid that he'd been wounded all along?

What if the blood on Lucas wasn't (only) his own, but someone else's blood?

Or, if that wasn't enough outward bleeding to incapacitate him, what if Zan had been internally bleeding all this time?

That last burst of effort to avoid Kai's blades must've been the straw that broke the camel's back.

Kai chuckled, which then turned into a full-blown cackle.

That damn Lucas had him worried for nothing.

***

Meanwhile, elsewhere in Chinatown…

With ragged breaths, a tired and sweaty May "Satsuki" Brooks pushed the blunt edge of her naginata down while she herself leaned on it like a cane.

She had actually went ahead and tailed the Minakata party even before the surviving bodyguards sounded the alarm of another assassination attempt, only for her to get intercepted by a Chinese assassins hiding behind a Chinese parade.

Like with Yahiko, random strangers pretending to be merrymakers attacked her, which she took out in short order thanks to her naginatajutsu.

She'd been training along with Yahiko to hone her sixth sense in battle, after all.

Only for her to get blindsided when the lion dance mascot also ambushed her for good measure.

And now there they were, with her taking on a surprisingly lion-like mascot puppet with the fierceness of its choreographed group attacks with military efficiency.

"Arigathanks for the workout," the tired blonde bluffed, not realizing she was code-switching between two languages and mixing up words together in her exhaustion. "Sorrymasen for the mess though. But I've got to go."

She brushed her matted hair, revealing a black eye. Her face and body had various bruises from the beating she got from the lion-head disguise of the Brigands' hired hitmen.

She'd actually been fighting against another lion mascot all this time, this time of the northern lion design with its painted on face and much sharper teeth.

It used less puppetry like moveable jaws and eyelids, but like the other southern lion mascot, it was controlled by Shaolin-trained kung fu masters hired by the Brigands Guild for their assassination mission.

With a sneer, Satsuki whirled her bladed polearm above her head and told the approaching lion dance mascot. "This is your final warning! Yamete kudastop…!"

The lion's sharp half-open jaw clamped upon the blade of the naginata while its worm-like body wrapped itself around May's body with wriggling hands and shuffling feet.

'Just you wait, Joshua-kun (Yahiko-kun)! Kyoko-chan! Satsuki-oneesan is here to save you!' she thought through grit teeth as she struggled against the mascot monster.

***

To Be Continued...

Beware of those Chinese parades, man. They're a riot.

As for the Sanada Demons, Baku is based on Batman from D.C. with supersonic shrieking powers like Banshee from Marvel. Ren wears snake armor reminiscent of Serpentor from G.I. Joe but has resonant destruction powers like Avalanche from Marvel.

Finally, Zan uses sonar-like echolocation (through his tuning war fork) like Daredevil from Marvel, but his accurate projectile hurling is more reminiscent of Daredevil's arch-nemesis Bullseye.  

Danke, Abdiel

[gabriel-gabdiel]

Fantasy of Evolution Chapter 6: It Wasn't All Just a Dream…?

Wait. What if it wasn’t all a dream? What will Florante do now?

You can also find more chapters of my original fiction here. Please enjoy.

First | Previous | Next

Back in Fatima High School's science laboratory…

The Biology teacher of Florante Galang and Isaiah Pascual—the soft-spoken Miss Isabelle Del Mundo, known by the faculty by her nickname "Belle" a la the protagonist of Disney's "Beauty and the Beast"—looked over their shoulders to glance at their laboratory work.

After staring intently to check their answers, Ms. Belle Del Mundo said to Florante, "Mr. Galang, don't you think Mr. Pascual should get a chance at looking into the microscope?"

The two former best friends exchanged glances. Pascual was the first to speak.

"We're just about to finish up, Ms. Del Mundo," he said to the soft-spoken teacher before taking the last slide and putting it onto the microscope so he could peer at it.

"Well," she said after a moment of deliberation, "then go ahead, boys. Remember, this is a cooperative exercise between lab partners, okay?" She then walked away.

After she left, Florante began doodling on his notebook.

"Florante," said Isaiah in an almost whiny manner. "I don't know what I'm looking at. Help."

With a sigh, Florante whispered, "The last two we haven't found are prometaphase and telaphase. Telaphase is easy because it's the cell splitting into two. If it's not split into two, it's probably prometaphase."

"How do you spell that, bro?"

"Come on, man."

The two exchanged glances again.

"I'm just kidding, Florante."

"Haha. Funny stuff. Can you spell it or not?"

"Yeah, of course. It's something like 'Pro' as in 'Pro-wrestling', 'Meta' as in 'Metal', and then P-H-A-S-E for 'Phase', right?"

"Yeah, something like that."

"The slide I got is probably the pro-something one, by the way. The cell hasn't split."

"Gotcha," said Florante as he took the slide out to label it. "The last one's probably telaphase but look at it just in case."

"Yep, it's a split cell," Isaiah confirmed after changing microscope slides. "You saved my bacon, bro. Thanks," he added.

Florante harrumphed. "I saved the both of us. You're not going to drag my grade down with you."

And, just as Galang was about to wave off how Pascual talked about his fever dream as his imagination running wild, his imagination apparently chose that moment to run wild again.

"You remember killing me, don't you?" said the pokerfaced Pascual in a deadpan monotone. "You blew my head off. You did all sorts of nasty things to our classmates too."

Isaiah sounded like something out of a horror story. Thusly, Florante resisted the urge to scream, his blood running cold once again.

Was Galang going mad? This wasn't happening, was it? Or was he in a dream again? He hadn't gone off the deep end yet, had he?

He should check out his dream journal when he got home, just in case. It helped him differentiate when something was a dream and wasn't.

It was his sole tether to sanity and objective reality at this point.

***

Fantasy of Evolution

An Urban Fantasy Story by Abdiel

Who keeps dream journals of their nonsensical dreams as though they have any bearing with reality? Florante does, but his is a special case.

Disclaimer: This work may reference copyrighted material, the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. It is believed that this constitutes a fair use of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law. All copyrighted material referred to in this work belongs to their respective owners. All rights reserved.

***

Chapter 6: It Wasn't All Just a Dream…?

***

Sometimes, Florante Galang wondered if he got bullied because he deserved it.

Nine times out of ten, he'd say no. Like that one dentist who didn't recommend this or that brand of toothpaste even though nine others did.

No one deserved to be bullied the way he got bullied. However, one of those ten times he might reconsider that maybe he got what was coming to him because he did something wrong.

His feeling of inadequacy and insecurity haunted him. Maybe he had it coming. Maybe he was asking for it.

Maybe nines times out of ten, he had a brief moment of self-awareness. He got bullied because he committed the grave sin of social ineptitude.

Maybe he just needed to fit in with his classmates better. Maybe, even though they were mean to him, they were mostly excellent to one another, so there must've been something wrong with him instead.

Maybe he should be the one to adjust to them instead of the other way around.

Was he victim-blaming himself? Maybe. Or maybe he was a narcissist manipulating others to his will only to face karma from his bad behavior.

Maybe a large portion of his life leading up to this moment was a series of huge mistakes of which he learned nothing.

Maybe he should emulate their behavior except for the part where they were being jerks to him.  

Or maybe he should be a jerk to other weirdoes while imitating the manly behavior exhibited by the jocks and tough guys in his class. Find someone weaker than him to pick on so he wouldn't be the one picked on by everyone.

Maybe he simply needed to fit in with his bullies and coexist with them in the social food chain. Maybe he merely needed to grow up like his asshole classmates, who themselves were already having hookups, parties, and girlfriends.

Meanwhile, like a child, he couldn't even hold a romantic conversation with a girl his age, with him stuck in the Friend Zone for all of the girls he was actually in good terms with. Or worse.

He might even have the E.Q. (emotional quotient) of a child too, or at least that was what his mother and teachers kept telling him. Arrested development, if you would.

Outside the Dead Kids, he simply couldn't find a clique to belong with in Fatima School and its roughly 800 high school students, specifically the 200 or so students in the same year.  

He rationalized that he couldn't relate to people his age. Despite what his mother suggested, he was friendlier towards people who were older than him, like college-aged students, teachers, or other grownups.

However, even then he wasn't really all that close to anyone in school. Perhaps the truth of the matter was that he couldn't relate to people period and he was a gigantic weirdo, dork, or wimp.

A wimpy kid with no friends.

Anyway, at least he had an okay I.Q. (intelligence quotient). He sometimes made it to the Top 10 of the class. Sometimes. Bottom three of ten, usually. So at least he wasn't completely pathetic academically.

He was back to his usual ritual of barely eating lunch and finding ways and places to hide himself inside the school every recess and lunch break so he wouldn't look like (more of) a total loser to his peers.

He'd end up eating alone outside the cafeteria, near the boiler room, or under the mango trees with the circular concrete seats surrounding them time and time again. Or reading in the library until his hunger passed.

He was skin and bones practically. The wimpiest of kids. Certain sporty girls in the varsity team could probably outdo him in athletics, he was so pathetic.

So it was probably this insecurity that led him to dream the dreams he dreamt. He had also called them nightmares because it involved him murdering his bullies.

However, if it were proverbial rather than literal murder—like him imagining their murder to let off some steam from their bullying without ever daring to murder them for real—he'd understand how these dreams could be considered as the power fantasies of the powerless.

Like parents tempted to kill their misbehaving children without really meaning it.

Or maybe his being a terrible person who deserved all the bullying he ever got was just the dose of self-awareness he needed.

Maybe he should stop being so dependent on what other people thought. As long as he followed his own moral compass, they had no business dictating how he lived his life!

If he left them alone then they should leave him alone too. Right?

As long as he didn't hurt anyone else—so again, he crossed his fingers that his dream murders were nothing more than dreams—he didn't need anyone's approval.

***

As the class returned from the lab to the classroom to further discuss cell mitosis or whatever, Pascual played catch-up with Galang, walking beside him and asking him how he'd been doing.

Or more like Isaiah talked and Florante half-listened, waiting for the other shoe to drop in regards to them sharing memories of something that only happened in his, well, their dreams.

Maybe Florante misheard him the first time? And the second time? He didn't know. Isaiah didn't press the matter.

He merely asked him for the time instead, wishing to change the subject. "What time is it?"

"Let me see. It's skin thirty," Pascual said with a straight face while pointing to his bare wrist.

It took Florante a minute to get it.

"Oh."

They then both shared a hearty laugh, with Florante laughing in spite of himself. A cathartic laugh from all the stress he felt.

Dammit, Galang kind of missed this. He missed talking to his former best friend like this.

Too bad their friendship went south in the end.

Pascual then told Florante about the rumors he heard about him. How Florante had ended up joining the infamous Dead Kids of Fatima High.

How he finally got his bullies to let up with their bullying by listing their names and sending them to his teacher. A teacher that actually did something after catching Florante's bullies in the act.

How he started wooing(!?) their classmate Jennifer Tolentino.

"I wasn't wooing anyone, don't be weird," Florante told Pascual off. "I just want to be better friends with her, that's all."

Or be friends again at all. They were supposed to be friends when they first met during the first day of school, but they then drifted apart. Kind of like the situation between Pascual and him, to be honest.

Florante avoided eye contact with Isaiah all this time out of embarrassment of being told loads of gossip, rumors, and half-truths about himself.

At the same time, he had to also avoid getting caught stealing glances at Jenny from time to time as she walked on ahead of them alongside Laura Reyes.

Her bespectacled face was such a distraction that he tried not to look at her as much as possible, only to end up staring back at Pascual and his nonsense.

It didn't help that Laura was there too. They still had an awkward air about them when they were near one another.

He didn't know where to look. The floor, perhaps? Or how about the ceiling?

There he was again, falling in love with another girl who gave him an ounce of attention. Or kissed him in his dreams.

On second thought, yeah. He was dreaming, wasn't he?

Once they were back in the classroom, Florante returned to his seat and tried to listen to the rest of Ms. Del Mundo's lecture, who used an overhead projector to project transparencies onto the blackboard with the windows and shades closed.

He couldn't manage his thoughts. Was he hearing things with Pascual? Did he really say what he thought he heard him say?

***

For a change, as the bell rung and Biology class ended, Pascual continued talking to Galang. Usually, no one bothered to do so in their class.

As of late, before she went absent for a week, it had been Jenny who talked to him, but only sometimes.  

"Jenny seems friendlier to you now than before," was the icebreaker Isaiah went with. "You even had lunch with her and your gang."

'Humph. My gang, huh?' Florante thought, with Pascual avoiding calling them by their infamous name of "Dead Kids".

To Isaiah, Galang went with, "Yeah, I guess," while also wondering aloud, "I wonder why she was absent for so long."

"There's been a cold bug spreading. Must've been the change in weather."

"Yeah, that must be it."

Florante frowned, though it felt more to him like the petulant pout of a child. He looked away while resisting the urge to stick his tongue out childishly at Isaiah for good measure.

He couldn't focus on his former best friend's chatter as they grabbed their bags with their P.E. (Physical Education) uniforms and proceeded to have P.E. class at the gymnasium.  

Mixed-gender volleyball at the gym didn't catch much of Florante's attention either. He ended up playing with Pascual and his friends though, which was a relief for him.

Usually, their P.E. teacher had to force one of the multiple cliques or groups in Section St. Francis to include Florante with them. Or he ended up with the rest of the social outcasts who couldn't find a group to team up with.

He was always left out whenever the gym coach instructs the class to group themselves into four or five people.

After doing warm-up exercises and partner drills, they had a simultaneous mini-tournament of sorts. Multiple five-member teams ended up doing a set of games until the end of P.E. period.

Florante ended up in a team composed of four guys—two of them Isaiah and Florante himself—and one girl up against a team of three guys and two girls.

Naturally, Florante Galang sucked at P.E. in general and volleyball in particular.

Most of his volleyball returns resulted in shots that went outside the court, so his teammates covered his position so he wouldn't bungle more shots.

However, strangely enough, both Isaiah and even Jenny (who played against another team at an adjacent court) cheered him on, leading him to surprise himself by serving the volleyball decently, even scoring an ace or two.

Sure, their team lost in the end, but at least the unathletic Florante was able to somewhat contribute when normally he couldn't.

Well then. The day ended up better than he expected!

***

Inside the boys' locker room, while the class either changed back to their regular uniforms or just gathered their belongings to head out of the school for dismissal time, Pascual continued talking to Florante, making him self-conscious.

The introvert felt tired from all that talking—well, half-listening and barely answering—he did for so long. His social "health bar" was spent.

To explain, introverts tended to shy away from social gatherings because being in such situations took a toll on their energy. They could only take so much before becoming anxious or nervous wrecks.

Even though Pascual and Florante were having mostly one-on-one (or rather, one-sided) conversations instead of a more open social encounter with multiple people, Pascual's sudden over-friendliness after they'd acted like strangers for so long had depleted Florante's tolerance for the social situation.

"…Oh, I remember that one time, in the grade school playground, you were playing alone, pretending to be Rambo or something, tying an imaginary bandanna on your forehead…!"

"All right, ALL RIGHT! That's enough," said Florante, who now focused his full attention on his ex-friend Pascual. "I get the picture."

By the way, his bullies had caught him playing alone as a high school kid, since he spent his grade school in Makati.

"Sorry," apologized Isaiah. "You're not going to zap my brain to mush again like before, are you?"

This jolted Florante awake from any more random thoughts. He hoped the earlier declarations from Pascual was just his imagination, but no such luck.

He'd been actually delaying any potential confrontation as long as he could.

Galang's eyebrows knit together in concentration for the first time the whole day, like he had just suddenly noticed that the things happening around him didn't make sense because he was merely dreaming.

Like someone between the verge of sleepiness and wakefulness.

He then exhaled, mumbled, "Susmaryosep," under his breath, and said, "No. I only have those powers when I'm dreaming, not in real life."

The daydreaming asthmatic didn't want to look like a fool and attempt to shoot nonexistent laser bullets at one of his bullies, thank you very much.

Isaiah gave him a quizzical look. "You can totally shoot your power beams or whatever right now."

Florante scoffed at the idea. "No, I can't. That's not how this works. I need to be dreaming in order for me to use those powers. Because none of it is real."

Pascual raised an eyebrow at that. "You sure about that?"

Galang also raised an eyebrow in kind. "What do you mean?"

So Isaiah clarified. "You don't need to dream to use your powers."

What. Now hold on a minute there! "No, I can't. That wasn't real. That was just a dream," Florante dismissed the very notion until something else occurred to him.

"Hey, Pascual. How'd you know what happened in my dreams?"

Although Isaiah had been talking up a storm since Biology class, Florante just now noticed his ex-friend's hands gripping the edge of the bench they sat on in the locker with immense tension.

Like a squashed bed spring ready to uncoil.

Had Isaiah been acting this nervous around him this entire time, unbeknownst to him? Was he talking nonstop to help calm his nerves?

Why was he so afraid of him…? Oh. Right. The murders.

No, please. Not this again. Not him questioning whether his dream happened or not again! Anything but that!

"Florante Galang," Isaiah Pascual said. "That wasn't a dream. You really did kill us all."

No. NO. That couldn't be. No, no, no. Shut up, Pascual.

Pascual continued. "Was that how you were able to cope with what happened? You waved off everything as a dream? You avoided accountability that way?"

"NO! What happened was a dream!" exclaimed Florante.

"You always had the power. To destroy. To kill. It's as plain as the nose on your face," said Isaiah.

"But you can't see the nose on your face unless you look in a mirror," said Galang.

"Then let me be that mirror to your face. Let me prove it wasn't a dream," said Pascual.

Florante productively released his anger, malice, and frustrations in that dream because he was powerless in real life! Also, who had superpowers in real life? How absurd!

"Just because you were somehow able to reset everything back to the way things were doesn't mean you've completely undone what you did."

"SHUT UP!"

It was then that Florante noticed how Isaiah hadn't taken off his P.E. uniform yet even as the introvert immediately took those clothes off and changed into his school uniform.

"We remember everything. I remember everything you've done. And what a monster you were back then."

No no no nonono. Florante was not the monster Mammon accused him of! None of it was real! This wasn't real either! He was dreaming again, wasn't he?

His fever dream was supposed to be catharsis so he could successfully avoid committing a murder in real life! Or at least wish-fulfillment because he was never a violent or particularly powerful person either!

The bullies in his life had always silenced him but the one time he struck back and silenced them instead, he was the bad guy?

How was that fair? He was solely responsible for losing control? They could do whatever they wanted with him but he couldn't to them in turn?

Before the asthmatic could let out a wheezy exhale, Isaiah disappeared from view.

Then the whole world became a blur.

***

The drizzle had become mist by the time they ended up suddenly in the streets, leaving a trail of devastation behind them.

It took a minute before a bleeding Florante Galang realized that Isaiah Pascual had just pushed him from the gym lockers all the way through the soccer field, right past part of the high school building, to the back of the school wall, right into open traffic, with one hand to his chest.

They busted through wall, brick, concrete, and plaster like a bulldozer through Styrofoam.

It all happened within a second. Or a fraction of a second. Before Galang's eyes could even blink or his mind could register what had happened.

Wait. So Pascual was actually an angel too? Or maybe even a demon? An Ophanim or a Minion? Like the spaghetti monster or the maelstrom man?

The impact should've caved Florante's chest in. Not to mention broke and dislocated his bones in 30 different places.

He might've even ended up like roadkill too, if not for his Ophanim halo that served as his shield.

Thankfully, a combination of light energy and gale winds formed a protective vacuum cocoon around Galang's body that kept him safe from harm. His own halo effect, if you would.

Isaiah just looked at the (mostly) untouched Florante, his palm outstretched, his jaw agape, before he gave him a sheepish grin. "Hehehe. Didn't expect that, did you?"

"You have superpowers too?"

"Yep. See? And so do you… AH! Please don't blow my brains out!"

Isaiah flinched or perhaps even overreacted at Florante stepping towards him, with him unleashing a flurry of punches.

"I wasn't! OW! Stop punching me!" One of the fists hit Florante's nose before he could summon his light wind dome again to block the rest of the blows.

Something else then dawned to Florante as he surveyed how far they went out. "You… you almost killed me!" He considered taking a swing at his former friend, but settled with attempting to catch him.

However, Isaiah disappeared the instant Galang tried grabbing his arm. Like a fly disappearing before the fly swatter could hit it.

By instinct, Florante jumped back into the sidewalk as a car beeped at him.

He then looked around. Several onlookers began gathering around the scene of devastation, particularly near what was left of what was once a wall and a planter's box.

Isaiah ran away and Florante was about to chase him when he felt something coming at him from behind. 'What…?'

Instead of multiple supersonic punches, Galang got hit by a single spine-tingling punch that actually blew away his halo shield and rattled him to the bones.

Then it hit him again. And again.

"…Catch me if you can, Slowpoke!"

Multiple Pascuals kept appearing and disappearing, punching his weakening halo shield with supersonic punches that came at Florante stronger and faster by the second.

What was this? In spite of his panic, Florante figured what Isaiah did. He ran in a tight circle at supersonic speeds and incrementally increased the momentum of his punch until it reached an irresistible power at an unstoppable level.

Sneaky bastard.

Pascual ran at the supersonic speed of a racecar going through a racetrack, crashing through Galang's halo shield bit by bit.

The more time passed, the faster the momentous punch got and the harder it was for Florante's halo aura to resist it. Isaiah might actually break through his hallowed field. What was he supposed to do now?

"…Lightning BOLT!"

Florante thusly summoned lightning from the drizzling overcast skies just as the infinite mass punch shattered his halo vacuum field, which electrocuted Pascual while energized Galang.

This jolted and froze Pascual, but his forward momentum remained, which prompted Florante to finally dodge one of the continuous punches.

The resulting blockbuster explosion blasted both of them thirty or so feet clear into the gray heavens.

***

The next thing Florante knew, he'd landed on the roof(?!) of the Fatima High School Building.

What the hell.

He looked around him to see where he was. He felt a tingling sensation travel across his extremities. His acrophobia (fear of heights) had acted up again.

Or maybe that was the millions of volts of electricity he'd just absorbed before making the electrocuted Isaiah miss, resulting in a blast from his massive punch that jettisoned them from the streets of Mandaluyong to the rooftops of Fatima High.

It was times like this that convinced him that the time when he jumped from rooftop to rooftop in order to experiment upon using his powers was just a dream. An acrophobic would never do anything as crazy as that for real. Also, he had superpowers. Of course it was all a crazy dream.

He looked around to make sure he was indeed where he was. That was when he noticed the still figure of Isaiah Pascual beside him.

Huh. He survived the fall too, huh?

"Dammit, you weren't this powerful before," was what Florante thought Pascual murmured under his breath.

'Before…?' thought Florante. What did he mean by that?

However, as Galang braced himself for another assault, he realized Pascual's stiff body still hadn't recovered from the electrocution.

Also, because they were on the roof deck of the building, his former best friend has less running room for his supersonic punch.

Most importantly, Florante still had enough energy left from absorbing the millions of volts of electricity from the lightning strike. Perhaps 1.21 gigawatts of power. Perhaps even more than that.

A billion joules of electricity. Enough to power dozens of homes for a day. Or 10 million light bulbs at the same time. Maybe even a flux capacitor on a time-traveling DeLorean.

Should he do it? Should he test out whether this was a dream or not?

Should he hit him with his five-fingered Light Array bullets, which was now practically his finishing move? Or he could use both hands and fire all ten shots?

Nah. That was overkill. Instead, he elected to focus his accumulated power on one closed fist, cocked his arm back, and then shouted, "Thunder BOLT…!"

It made sense. Even though the high school building had a narrow roof deck, Isaiah could still dodge. So Florante might as well shoot his thread-thin concentrated laser that cut through the air and produced a powerful "thunder" or "sonic boom" shockwaves with a wider destructive area.

However, he hesitated at the last minute when he heard Pascual ask, "Thunder Bolt? So what's different between that and the Lightning Bolt you shot earlier?"

Florante couldn't help himself. It had been his pet peeve ever since he saw "Thunder Bolt" and "Lightning Bolt" used interchangeably in anime, manga, action games, and RPGs.

"…Well, obviously, a Lightning Bolt is the bolt of electricity. The thunder comes after the lightning bolt, correct? It's the rumbling sound from the shockwaves of a sonic boom. So to me Thunder Bolt is basically just a sonic boom."

"Oh, I see. I never thought of it that way."

The two then just stared at each other for a hot minute, with Galang allowing the rivulets of electric might fade away as he relaxed his shoulders and stopped cocking back his fist.

Pascual himself relaxed as well, the paralyzing effects of Florante's electric shocks finally wearing off.

***

The two former best friends sat down on the roof deck overlooking Fatima High while the rest of the world stood still.

The damage they'd wrought on the rooms, walls, and streets earlier slowly but surely disappeared, as though they didn't even touch anything.

Curious. Then again, this only affirmed Florante's stance that his supernatural actions originated from dreams. Perhaps extra-lucid dreams than normal, but dreams nonetheless.

Florante sat beside Pascual, with both doing the "Indian sit" or "Indian style" sitting position with their legs crossed underneath them, which was often linked to stereotypical portrayals of Native Americans.

It was also believed to be rooted on a meditation or yoga pose from India known as the "Lotus Position".

They shared a hearty laugh, with Isaiah stating, "Of course only you can come up with something as nerdy as making a Thunder Bolt be different from  a Lightning Bolt!"

Meanwhile, Florante himself protested, "You're the one to speak! You were the one who gave me the idea!"

Pascual blinked three times then tilted his head to the side. "I did? I don't remember."

"You totally did! That's why I made it a point to use a different kind of attack when doing a Thunder Bolt and Lightning Bolt!" said a grinning, nostalgic Galang. "You once brought the topic up to me."

"Maaan, I can't believe you've grown this strong already," said a wistful Isaiah while scratching his cheek. "I guess I should've expected it. You were among the first to awaken, weren't you?"

"…I guess? What do you mean by awaken, though?" Florante asked.

"Just what like it sounds like," Pascual said. "It's when you awaken your powers."

Oh right. It wasn't just him who awakened. There was also Gerry Jacinto. And Laura Reyes. And now, Isaiah Pascual. They all "awakened" to having their own superpowers along with Florante.

"Hey, Pascual," Florante called out, "you're an angel too, aren't you?"

"…Angel?" Isaiah repeated.

"That's what Jenny Tolentino called us," Galang continued, brushing his damp hair bangs back and heaving a heavy, asthmatic wheeze. "Angels. Demons. Either or."

"Demons, huh?" Pascual rubbed his shoulder. "Yeah, I guess you can call her that. Maybe even a monster."

"…Her?"

Pascual hesitated from revealing anything more. "Sooo how does Jenny know about all this?"

Florante replied, "She's one of us. She's also an angel."

Pascual smirked. "Isn't that just your crush on her talking?"

"What? No," Florante denied, but he has second thoughts. So far, everything tracked. Jenny confirmed they were angels then they fought against multiple demons.

She was telling him the truth, right? She must've told them the truth. He trusted her.

"I meant she has powers like ours and she awakened her powers long before we have, so I gave her the benefit of the doubt," said Florante.

Why shouldn't he trust the girl whose (alleged) back story of being much older than she looked, he found out for himself, without her prompting? He already did the background check himself!

A second later, he asked, "Wait, she hasn't talked to you about it?"

"No, it's the first time I've even learned she even has powers like us," said Pascual.

"That's strange," said Florante. "So you didn't know we're angels and demons?"

"Not a clue," said Pascual. "For all I know, we've become like the X-Men or something. Mutants who've awakened our superpowers, you know?"

"That also makes sense," said a wistful Galang. "We might be the next evolution of man. Deities. Or gods. Or heroes."

"Or villains. Or demons. Or monsters…" Isaiah trailed off.

"What happened?" Florante asked, sensing Pascual's foul mood. "Is something wrong?"

"I-It's nothing," Isaiah said, but then exhaled and shrugged. "It's about Regina…"

"Regina Mariano?" Florante repeated, remembering the girl as the one who said he had fetal alcohol syndrome.

He also remembered blasting her until she turned to ash in his fever dream.

"What happened to her?"

***

By the time Florante and Isaiah left the rooftop (via the staircase), everything went back to normal.

No hole in the wall. No broken glass windows. No interrupted traffic outside of the school. It was if they'd never fought.

Another reset or "Ctrl + Z" had happened, which made Galang presume that his fever dream was one of those resets. Nevertheless, he had to face facts.

He unfortunately did kill his classmates, but something occurred to "undo" the event, making it fade away like a dream. Was this the power of angels in action again?

Regardless, Isaiah gave Florante the lowdown on what happened to Regina. She had awakened her powers like Isaiah, Jennifer, and Florante did.

Long story short, Regina transformed into a mindless Ophanim or perhaps even a Minion. Like the crawling chaos or the spaghetti monster from before, she ended up becoming an out of control monster that Isaiah couldn't stop.

Come to think of it, Florante left out that little detail of him visiting Jenny's apartment in his dreams after seeing her name-alike in a yearbook at the library.

However, because of recent events, he had an inkling suspicion that his visit to the Tolentino abode actually happened. Like how his brief battle with Isaiah actually happened before their collective lucid fantasy disappeared right in their very eyes.  

God dammit all to hell. So he really did kill his classmates. He really did kill Laura.

He felt terrified and confused, but mostly ashamed by the fact.

A wave of guilt washed over him. What he thought was him releasing pent-up stress harmlessly was actually him harming his bullies as revenge. Like a school shooter run amok.

If everything hadn't reset back to normal with everyone still living and their school left in one piece, he'd be no better than the bullies he so hated.

No, he'd be worse than them. He'd be a murderer.

He turned what was supposed to be an eye for an eye revenge plot and instead took an arm and a leg as payment for his social humiliation.

Never mind, "An eye for an eye makes the world go blind". The term, "An eye for an eye" was created with people like him in mind: Vengeance seekers who went overboard with their revenge.

He didn't know what to feel.

On one hand, he felt horrified, guilty, and ashamed after realizing he had hurt his classmates for real.

On the other hand, shamed as he was to admit it, he felt a measure of Schadenfreude or catharsis for mostly, um, unleashing his frustrations on his tormentors back to them.

However, he wanted to crawl under a rock and die over the realization that he really did kill his former crush, Laura Reyes, as collateral damage for his mad killing spree. Ditto his teacher who merely got in his way.

They didn't deserve to die like his bullies. However, did even his bullies deserve death over humiliating him in school? Why couldn't he simply humiliate them in return? An eye for an eye?

Sure, everything went back to normal and everyone ended up alive, but he still felt dirty realizing he really did all those things. He wasn't so innocent after all.

No wonder Jenny kept acting so guarded and awkward around him. On top of him stalking her. Damn, he needed to have more self-awareness!

The more he thought about things, the more he realized he was screwed.

What he originally thought was harmless stress relief was now considered something beyond the pale. He felt like someone pulled the rug from under him.

What if he had no reset button? What if they stayed dead? He would have ruined their lives, the lives of their loved ones, and his own life forever.

He didn't mean to. He just wanted them to leave him alone. Even if they didn't end up friends or acquaintances in the end, just let him be. Let bygones be bygones, dammit.

***

The next day…

That breakfast, Florante ate his sandwich and drank his orange juice in a hurry.

For once, he felt somewhat excited to go to school. Not because he was some nerd looking forward to tests and quizzes or something.

He certainly didn't go there to meet up with any friends save for his Dead Kids acquaintances. No, if he was being honest with himself, he knew his eagerness to get to school was to see Jennifer Tolentino again.

No, no. Well, yes. He did want to see his crush again.

But aside from that, he was looking forward to using his powers for good instead of evil.

For once, he would used his dream abilities to help a (former) best friend in need save his new girl friend (not girlfriend, a friend who was a girl, Isaiah insisted) from herself.

If anything, this was his way of alleviating his guilt and shame over actually killing his classmates for real. He owed it to all the bullies he killed, even though they didn't stay dead.

Hmmm.

So if memory (of his vague dreams) served him correct, the angels who'd been chosen as candidates for the position of Archangel Gabriel was Florante, Isaiah, Regina, Gerry, and  Laura.

Maybe also Mark Zuniga? No, no. Mark only stabbed Florante. Gerry was the one who awakened his own powers, followed by Laura. In his "fever dream" that wasn't really a dream.

***

Back at Fatima High…

Regina Mariano appeared normal enough when she got to school. However, as Isaiah Pascual would explain later, she'd actually gotten mixed up with a "bad crowd".

If Florante could hazard a guess, she must've ended up being manipulated by another full-fledged demon avatar like Mammon.

They all attended classes like usual, with Isaiah giving Florante looks here and there to remind him of their plans to, uh, "save" Regina after school.

From how Isaiah described her transformation, her Ophanim/Minion form or biblically accurate angel/demon body was reminiscent of a geometric polygon. Or pyramids glued together at the bottom.

An object instead of an organism. An abstraction instead of something living.

Isaiah admitted he was no match against her and her growing power, but he thought that maybe with Florante's power and help, they could beat the sense back into his estranged girl friend.

Galang then told Pascual about how Ophanims were actually awakened with the purpose of becoming avatars of famous angels or demons like Gabriel or Raphael.

However, it hadn't quite sunk in that Isaiah, Regina, and Florante were bound to fight for the position of Gabriel's avatar sooner or later.

Florante wasn't too clear on how this avatar business worked himself. He made a mental footnote on asking Jennifer more about it later.

Oh right. Jenny. Should Florante end up facing off against her too? She was already the Raphael avatar, so it should be okay.

However, he ended up breaking his promise to her to forget about this angel and demon business.

He felt at times that Jenny acted too guarded around him. Even hostile at times. Seeing that he had every intention of breaking his promise to her, maybe her behavior was warranted.

No. He had to do this favor to Isaiah. To make it up for what he did to his bullies.

He'd apologize to Jenny later. For now, he had to concentrate on Isaiah's friend Regina.

Sure, Regina wasn't the most pleasant of classmates to Florante himself, but he really wanted to make up for the sins he committed that haven't actually been erased.

Some of his bullies actually remembered him killing them. Remembered his past sins.

His sins that actually happened and were real, despite them disappearing from reality like forgotten dreams.

***

After dismissal time…

It rained particularly hard that afternoon, such that it took every ounce of the clumsy Florante's concentration to make it out of school without slipping on a puddle or getting the hem of his pants wet from wayward splashes.

He even managed to cling to the nearby chain-link fence of the school's entrance and exit to save himself from falling.

He shook his head, wishing the ground would swallow him whole. As amazing as he and Pascual probably looked earlier with their superhuman feats, he looked downright pathetic without his powers and with his actual clumsiness.

If he were a girl, perhaps he'd look more endearing instead of pathetic, like a cute klutz. As it was, he felt less of a man for being an uncoordinated goof with not a single athletic bone in his body.

It was times like this that made him doubt (perhaps hope) that his imagined sins or dark fantasies against his classmates remained as such.

Not that hoping for their misfortune subconsciously was any better, but at least it didn't really happen.

Anyway, Regina Mariano had been hanging out with these shady people after dismissal time and her friend circle—of which Isaiah was a part of—was getting worried about it.

Appropriately enough, she seemed like the poster child for an after-school special on wayward kids who hang out with the wrong crowd.

As typical of such specials, Regina was your average tomboyish girl next door who wore a ponytail haircut and sported a dyed brunette hair that stood out from her tan skin.

Regardless, Pascual insisted that her meetings with these questionable and suspicious persons had something to do with both him and her awakening their angelic powers.

So what was Regina's deal? Pascual alleged she got into contact with some talent agency and they were going to make her into a star. However, they instead awakened her angel self and turned her into an outright monster with their schemes.

Pascual attempted to save her, with the stress of her awakening also triggering his own angelic transformation, but she proved too powerful for him.

As her guy best friend, Isaiah followed her to their talent offices, feeling that something was afoot. From what Florante could surmise, Regina was a bit of a naïve country bumpkin and the agency was taking advantage of her and various other talents.

That was news to Florante, who only knew Regina for her mean girl antics with him whenever they came across each other.

Then things got weird from there.

For his part, Galang could only wonder if his other encounters with Ophanims or Minions involved such schemes.

The spaghetti monster seemed to fly out of nowhere at the school parking lot. Meanwhile, the indefinable shadow man was someone he and Jenny detected along with Mammon in the middle of Makati.

Jeez. Florante could only shake his head.

That American(?) white guy in a formal attire was Mammon? The infamous demon Mammon? Or at least an avatar of his. Wild. And Florante himself was supposed to be the avatar of the world-famous Archangel Gabriel to boot.

Or he would become Gabriel's avatar once he went past being an Ophanim and evolved into a Cherubim then a Seraphim.

Regardless, Florante skipped his school service ride home to (again) commute elsewhere, this time with Isaiah, to Ortigas on Isaiah's dime.

They considered using their powers to get there, but they decided against it to conserve their energy and use their powers on saving Regina instead.

***

The duo sneaked (snuck?) around the conference hall leading to an amphitheater where a seeming talent show took place. Some were on stage singing and dancing. Others served as the audience.

On the front row were some well-dressed judges, including a drop-dead gorgeous Caucasian lady who had the looks of a Hollywood actress.

She had blonde hair complimented by her blue eyes. She also wore a flashy blue gown and shoes that matched her dress yet seemingly decorated a closed heart.

At the back of the stage were various contestants with numbered sashes, among them was Regina herself.

What was all this now? A talent show? Star Search? Tanghalan ng Kampeon (Contest of Champions)?

Or perhaps it was a beauty pageant like Miss Universe or Binibining Pilipinas (Miss Philippines)? No, there were dudes there too.

'What are they planning?' Florante wondered. The setup seemed far too elaborate just to awaken the angel (or demon) within Regina. What was this supposed to accomplish?

Using Pascual's teleportation-like speed, they both got passed through the security guards and ended up at the back of the conference room's audience, with all of them none the wiser.

It was actually pretty packed in there. Standing room only. So Isaiah and Galang stood and observed what was happening.

In front of them was an ordinary talent show. They witnessed acts like an amazing male singer who sung a Whitney Houston song while sounding nearly exactly like Whitney with his impressive falsetto or female "head voice" range.

A minute later, there was a group of break dancers on stage. From there, a long-haired musician with an electric guitar did a three-minute guitar solo. Afterwards, another singer, a girl who was classically trained in opera, sung an operatic version of Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody".

They even featured drag shows with male cross-dressers who could pass for women.

The pair of classmates stood there, mesmerized by the amount of talent before them. Applauding along with the rest of the audience.

Then it happened. Just like with Mammon's Minion, both Florante and Pascual felt the presence of their fellow angel. Or demon. Celestial being, perhaps.

The curtains parted and then they saw Regina arrive on stage. It was apparently her turn to sing in the talent show. However, instead of singing, she instead began to transform.

They then heard a high-pitched screech, like metal crunching on metal, that became fast and painfully loud.

Startled, Florante looked around him. He saw several things at the same time.

Nothing moved in slow motion the way it did in movies. Rather, his brain felt like it worked overtime due to an adrenalin rush, allowing him to absorb multiple scenes and have them register in his brain at once.

Maybe it wasn't the same case with the speedster beside him who stared at what happened before him with dilated eyes and an unhinged jaw. Florante couldn't tell.

Regina obviously stood out from the sea of faces staring back at her since she was at center stage in this talent show and all, with them wearing the same faces of horror that Pascual did. That Florante probably did as well.

The contestants of the talent show then glowed, as though they themselves had a halo of aura like angels would.

The tendrils of this bright energy got sucked into Regina's body, who herself begun singing a Regine Velasquez song that Florante couldn't quite place.

He also idly wondered if Regina was named after Regine, a famous Filipina singer.

Florante feared that the violently winding soundwaves from Regina's song would converge into a climactic ante, like rapids to a huge waterfall, but then it became a calm lake  that only produced ripples.

Just the purest song.

The fainter variegated spirit energy from the audience swirled along with the more vibrant multicolored auras of the contestants, all converging together into Regina's aura.

This made everyone act lethargic, with the seated viewers slumping down on their seats and the standing contestants plus stage crew crumpling down on the floor in a dead faint.

All of them did so except the two angels at the back—Regina's classmates—and the judges near the front of the stage. Particularly the pretty woman who looked like a Tinsel Town goddess.

"…Pascual?" Regina said, waking from her reverie and breathing into her microphone.

Her eyebrows then furrowed as she squinted and focused them on the person beside Pascual. "Wait. Is that… Florante Galang? Why is he with you, Isaiah?"

"Ay palaka! (Frogdammit!) She caught on to us! The jig is up!" exclaimed Pascual, which only pissed Florante off.

"Susmaryosep, Pascual! What's the plan now?" complained Galang. "You do have a plan just in case she noticed us, don't you?"

"I didn't think things through! Sue me!" said Isaiah. "Just… help me rescue her, okay?! Use your powers or something!"

The Hollywood beauty took a cursory look at the two high school students in uniform and then asked Regina, "Friends of yours?"

Regina stared back and forth between the svelte woman and her classmates then nodded, "They're my classmates, Miss Spelvin," she said aloud, through the microphone.

"Please. Call me Georgia," Georgia Spelvin do declared.

It was then that Florante realized that Miss Spelvin didn't open her mouth when speaking. Like with Mammon, she communicated telepathically. On a frequency only fellow angels and demons could listen to.

Daring to be brave and remembering his former best friend's request to save Regina from the influence of literal demons, Galang shot a Thunderbolt at Georgia instead of his other bully classmate.

The spellbinding Spelvin swatted the Thunderbolt away, which created an ear-splitting sonic boom that made the whole place rumble.

For his part, Florante had already covered his ears, but soon Pascual and even Regina followed suit and did the same.

The three then bore witness to Spelvin changing form from a beautiful blue-eyed blonde in a blue dress to a sultry red-skinned demoness with bat wings, fingernail claws, the wild hair of a harridan, and a black dress seemingly made of the darkest starless night.

An improvement from Mammon's squat gremlin form that Florante and Jenny got exposed to back in Guadalupe Church for sure, but still! Her true form was a She-Devil?

Georgia Spelvin's lips curved into a knowing smile. "Now who told you that's my true form, li'l boy?"

"Wait, you and Jenny fought another demon like her?" asked Isaiah, startling Galang. This telepathic communication between fellow angels and demons was more trouble than it was worth!

As Spelvin strode towards Regina, the two judges beside her turned to dust, which made the hairs at the back of Florante's neck stand on end while beside him, Isaiah turned blue in horror.

Georgia then told Regina telepathically without regard to the two angels who'd overhear, "Now's your chance to use the power you've absorbed from everyone in this talent show to take control of your Minion form."

And soon both Galang and Pascual saw clear as day the literal talent flow like neon tendrils of spiritual energy from the unconscious contestants to Spelvin's hand into a floating sphere of energy. Like an aurora borealis.

The demons had weaponized their passion and used it to their abusive advantage. How devilish of them to do so, but that was to be expected.

Quite a bit of the metaphysical ball of talent then got transferred unto Regina in the form of a seeming solar flare.

Then, like a ghost, the demonic Spelvin vanished and faded into existence.  

From there, Regina opened her mouth, resisted the urge to transform into her geometric self, and sung a song to end the world.

***

Dammit.

Why did it feel like the world was always at stake when Florante dealt with an awakening angel? Or demon?

Regina sang a lyricless hymn of the damned that warped their perception of reality. The sound waves from the song kept Florante's attempts at shooting her down with projectiles from hitting her. They kept missing or dissipating around her.

Meanwhile, on Isaiah's part, he didn't know what to do. He didn't want to hurt his friend and classmate. He certainly didn't wish to use that momentum-filled punch on her.

However, she might become even more powerful now than she was when she went berserk with her first awakening.

So Mr. Pascual bravely ran away.

…What?

Regina took a break from her singing that rendered every energy projectile Florante shot at her into harmless heat and light. "What are you doing even here, you fetal alcohol syndrome baby?"  

"AH! You called me that again! Even after I told the teacher on you for bullying me!" exclaimed Florante, who doubled his efforts by shooting Lightning Bolts at himself and storing enough power inside his body to resist Regina's repellant sound waves.

"You're such a li'l snitch, you dork," Regina said with a roll of her eyes. "You're a wimp and a coward to boot. Shame on you."

She then started humming at a specific frequency that resonated with the rest of the building.

Florante considered asking her if she remembered him killing her in his fever dream, but he pushed such thoughts away before they could fully form into words in his head, fearing she'd overhear him telepathically.

The sound waves from her voice came at a shorter-wave vibrato, almost like a bird's trill, which echoed across the amphitheater then transmitted unto the rest of the structure, making its very foundations shake and dance to the beat of her wordless song.

And so the room and the building started to rumble and shake from the droning hum of Regina's powerful singing pipes.

Soon, all the glass panes and mirrors nearby broke or went on the verge of shattering. Deep faults and hairline cracks appeared from the windows to the plaster walls while the floor below them and the ceiling above them trembled like scared children.

Florante hesitated, with him second-guessing himself now that he realized his past dreams weren't dreams and he and everyone else could die for real if the whole building were to collapse upon them.

However, just in the nick of time, Pascual returned, blasting through the wall from behind Miss Mariano instead and pushing—not punching or striking—her forward.

It took the next second for Florante to realize Pascual might've probably run the entire block or even globe and back to produce enough kinetic energy to penetrate through Regina's melodic defenses with supersonic might.

Regardless, that momentous push did the trick. It stopped the building from crumbling to dust just in time.

However, to Pascual's horror, he went overboard and built up enough momentum to push Mariano away with the strength of a freight train.

"AAHH…! Pascual…!?"

"Oh no! GINA…! I'm SORRY!"

For a split-second, the sonic siren changed into the geometric object Isaiah described from before. She was hard to miss, with her occupying most of the amphitheater.

She probably shifted into that form for self-preservation's sake. Otherwise, she would've turned into a messy red stain of blood and guts on the ceiling and walls.  

Florante couldn't believe what he just saw. He also couldn't react in time before the geometric fallen angel did a banshee shriek that blew him away and shattered his eardrums.

"AUGH!" Galang cried out, and when he gnashed his teeth in pain, he felt the enamel on them crack as well, thus worsening his agony.

The supersonic screech of her Minion self lacked the controlled nuance of her human form's song for sure.

However, for Pascual's part, he couldn't be happier. He grinned and exhaled in relief. "Oh, thank goodness, Gina! You're not dea… URK?!"

Regina Mariano finally shifted back to her human form, her hands throttling Isaiah by his neck. "You almost killed me, you jerk!"

"Wait (cough), I-I didn't mean to…!" Isaiah choked out.

"Whatever. I'm going to control this power and become queen of this world. Just you wait and see," she said, dropping Pascual to the floor before she picked up the microphone and began singing again, her heel firmly stepping on Isaiah's face.

A half-conscious Florante thought, "Rule the world…?"

Huh. Why didn't he think of doing that when he first got his powers?

He was too shortsighted with this angel and demon avatar thing that he didn't realize the full implication of his gifts. He'd rather pettily get back at his bullies than aim at something higher. Like world domination.

But to be honest, why would he want to conquer the world? What good would that do? So he'd become President of Earth? A clueless teenager like him should have that responsibility?

Meanwhile, the compromised position Pascual had with him getting stepped on by Regina also made Galang's cheeks warm up.

Mariano kept Isaiah pinned down to the ground by stepping on his face, huh? Florante wished it were him instead.

He shook his head to wave off such sordid thoughts. He needed to set his priorities straight.

Galang attempted to get up and move, but the ground started shaking again. The building creaked and swayed, like a house of cards about to topple over.

What was he supposed to do now? Her singing served as her shield against 100 percent of Florante's myriad of projectiles. His own halo shield couldn't block off Regina's sound waves either. He was a sitting duck.

Also, if he didn't feel like killing the crawling chaos Minion from before, that went double or even triple for his classmate. Not that he could at this rate, but he definitely didn't want to.

Whatever rage he felt for his bullies back in his fever dream had faded away, replaced with shame and embarrassment after he realized he killed them for real back then.

He could only helplessly stare as the ceiling plaster cracked and buckled while bits of dust, rock shards, and debris fell on the unconscious contestants and audience.

They were about to serve as more collateral damage from the awakening of yet another (fallen) angel. Just like Laura Reyes.

According to Pascual, the people who died when he first tried stopping Regina's rampage the first time she awoke remained dead.

They didn't revert back to normal like with what happened when Jenny and Florante defeated the spaghetti monster and the living maelstrom.

Where was Florante's great power and creativity in using them when saving lives? Was he only useful against helpless people, like his powerless bullies before some of them discovered they too had powers?

He was so helpless against Regina that he might as well turn into an Ophanim himself to battle her full force. He didn't remember his monstrous gyroscopic and multi-eyed form having ears, after all. Just endless revolving eyes on fire.

"Wait, you have an monster form too?!" said Isaiah without thinking after hearing Florante's thoughts, as though forgetting (or not believing) Florante claiming they were angels with alternate, monstrous "true" forms.

Oh, right. Angels and demons could sense and communicate telepathically with one another. Florante should keep his thoughts to himself. Isaiah accidentally overheard his thoughts again.

Hold on a minute. He could project his thoughts to those two, couldn't he?

He got it all wrong. He had his priorities straight from the start!

So he stared and focused on his classmates while making his concrete thoughts known to them even as he, a socially awkward teenager, would normally have trouble expressing himself.

The two seemed unaware of how they looked, what with Regina stepping on Isaiah but hesitating to hurt him or finish him off while Isaiah himself didn't seem to mind it one bit.

Also, from the angle where Pascual lay, he could totally look up from under Regina's dress.

The two received the message loud and clear.

Regina screamed and covered herself up while an apologetic Isaiah reassured it wasn't what it looked like.

Mariano did a swift stomp at Isaiah's head that would've squashed it like a watermelon had he not stood up in time. "Manyakis ka! (You pervert!)" she exclaimed. "You're both perverts!"

"You really are a snitch, Florante!" shouted Pascual at his former best friend while backpedaling deftly across multiple unconscious contestants and audience members.

For that fraction of a second though, Regina left herself wide open. So Florante shot her full of light bullets to force her to change into her Ophanim/Minion form.

"LIGHT ARRAY!"

All ten of Florante's energy projectiles hit their target, with each going off like the electromagnetic pulse version of blockbuster bombs.

It wasn't the most honorable tactic, but it worked.

Also, Galang had the presence of mind to envelop himself in his electric wind halo sphere and push Regina backwards from the stadium through several walls up until they were outside the building to save the unconscious people inside the amphitheater from harm.

"Ah! Florante, you bastard…!" the backpedaling Pascual, uh, forward-pedaled towards the pair. "What do you think you're doing?!"

"What do you think I'm doing? I'm saving everyone before… AH!"

Then, from outside the venue, right in the middle of Ortigas, Regina Mariano began to change and shift forms herself. Like with the flying spaghetti monster, Regina's true angel/demon form towered over Florante and Isaiah like a gigantic geometric monument.

A floating blue pyramid that might as well be an alien ship. Or a tinted Star Destroyer from Star Wars.

'Now what?' thought Florante, which only made Pascual scream at him harder. 'Oh right. You can still hear me, huh?'

"Now it's you who hasn't thought things through!?" Isaiah screeched. He then saw images from Galang's memory flash before his eyes.

Of Florante killing both him and Regina.

She actually forced him to act because she was about to kill all those people back in the amphitheater herself.

With misty eyes and a sniffle, Florante said, "I don't want to kill her again, Pascual. Or hurt her any further."

***

To Be Continued…

The first incarnation of "Fantasy of Evolution" in my mind back in the early 2000s  involved Gabriel De Angeles (currently Florante Galang) ending up seeing his best friend J.D. (reminiscent of Isaiah Pascual) dying because of the War of Angels and Demons.

Also, yes. The Ophanim/Minion form of Regina Mariano is reminiscent of Ramiel the Geometric Angel from Neon Genesis Evangelion.

Fascinating how stories and creations change as you yourself develop into a person and as an author, huh?

Farewell, Abdiel

[gabriel-gabdiel]

【Draft】 Fantasy of Evolution Chapter 6: The Dream Journal of a Wimpy Kid

Man, this took quite long to write. Had to adjust my time table to accommodate this. 

I’ll still trying to get the hang of writing original characters as opposed to already established templates when I write fanfic.

This can make them nebulous in characterization. I also have to remember what I’ve established previously before adding anything to their history. 

You can also find more chapters of my original fiction here. Please enjoy.

Back in Fatima High School's science laboratory…

The Biology teacher of Florante Galang and Isaiah Pascual—the soft-spoken Miss Isabelle Del Mundo, known by the faculty by her nickname "Belle" a la the protagonist of Disney's "Beauty and the Beast"—looked over their shoulders to glance and their laboratory work.

After staring intently to check their answers, Ms. Belle Del Mundo said to Florante, "Mr. Galang, don't you think Mr. Pascual should get a chance at looking into the microscope?"

The two former best friends exchanged glances. Pascual was the first to speak.

"We're just about to finish up, Ms. Del Mundo," he said before taking the last slide and putting it onto the microscope so he could peer at it.

"Well," she said after a moment of deliberation, "then go ahead, boys. Remember, this is a cooperative exercise between lab partners, okay?"

She then walked away.

After she left, Florante began doodling on his notebook.

"Florante," said Isaiah in an almost whiny voice. "I don't know what I'm looking at. Help."

With a sigh, Florante whispered, "The last two we haven't found are prometaphase and telaphase. Telaphase is easy because it's the cell splitting into two. If it's not split into two, it's probably prometaphase."

"How do you spell that, bro?"

"Come on, man."

The two exchanged glances again.

"I'm just kidding, Florante."

"Haha. Funny stuff. Can you spell it or not?"

"Yeah, of course. It's something like 'Pro' as in 'Pro-wrestling', 'Meta' as in 'Metabolic', and then P-H-A-S-E for 'Phase', right?"

"Yeah, something like that."

"The slide I got is probably the pro-something one, by the way. The cell hasn't split."

"Gotcha," said Florante as he took the slide and labeled it. "The last one's probably telaphase but look at it just in case."

"Yep, it's a split cell," Isaiah confirmed after changing microscope slides. "You saved my bacon, bro. Thanks," he added.

Florante harrumphed. "I saved the both of us. You're not going to drag my grade down with you."

And, just as Galang was about to wave off him hearing Pascual talk earlier about his fever dream of massacring students as his imagination running wild, his imagination apparently chose that moment to run wild again.

"You remember killing me, don't you?" said the pokerfaced Pascual in a deadpan monotone. "You blew my head off and did all sorts of nasty things to our other classmates."

Isaiah sounded like something out of a horror story. Thusly, Florante resisted the urge to scream, his blood running cold once again.

Was Galang going mad? This wasn't happening, was it? Or was he in a dream again? He hadn't gone off the deep end yet, had he?

He should check out his dream journal when he got home, just in case. It helped him differentiate when something was a dream and wasn't.

It was his sole tether to sanity and objective reality at this point.

***

Fantasy of Evolution

An Urban Fantasy Story by Abdiel

Who keeps dream journals of their nonsensical dreams as though they have any bearing with reality? Florante does, but his is a special case.

Disclaimer: This work may reference copyrighted material, the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. It is believed that this constitutes a fair use of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law. All copyrighted material referred to in this work belongs to their respective owners. All rights reserved.

***

Chapter 6: The Dream Journal of a Wimpy Kid

***

Sometimes, Florante Galang wondered if he got bullied because he deserved it.

Nine times out of ten, he'd say no. No one deserved to be bullied the way he got bullied. However, one of those ten times he might reconsider that maybe he got what he deserved because he did something wrong.

Like that one dentist who didn't recommend this or that brand of toothpaste even though nine others did.

His feeling of inadequacy and insecurity haunted him. Maybe he had it coming. Maybe he was asking for it.

Maybe nines times out of ten, he had a brief moment of self-awareness. He got bullied because he committed the grave sin of social ineptitude.

Maybe he just needed to fit in with his classmates better. Maybe even though they were mean to him, they were mostly excellent to one another, so maybe there was wrong something with him instead.

Maybe he should be the one to adjust to them instead of the other way around.

Maybe a large portion of his life leading up to this moment was a series of huge mistakes of which he learned nothing.

Maybe he should emulate their behavior except the part where they were being jerks to him.  

Or maybe he should be a jerk to other weirdoes while rewarding manly behavior exhibited the jocks and tough guys in his class. Find someone weaker than him to pick on so he wouldn't be the one picked on by everyone.

Maybe he simply needed to fit in with his bullies. Maybe he merely needed to grow up like his asshole classmates, who themselves were already having hookups, parties, and girlfriends.

Meanwhile, like a child, he couldn't even hold a romantic conversation with a girl his age, with him stuck in the Friend Zone for all of the girls he was actually in good terms with.

He might even have the E.Q. (emotional quotient) of a child too, or at least that was what his mother and teachers kept telling him. Arrested development, if you would.

Outside the Dead Kids, he simply couldn't find a niche or clique in Fatima School and its roughly 800 high school students, specifically the 200 or so students in his year.  

He rationalized that he couldn't relate to people his age. Despite what his mother suggested, he was friendlier towards people who were older than him, like college-aged students, teachers, or grownups.

However, even then he wasn't really all that close to anyone in school. Perhaps the truth of the matter was that he couldn't relate to people period and he was a gigantic weirdo or doofus.

He'd end up eating alone outside the cafeteria, near the boiler room, or under the mango trees with the circular concrete seats surrounding them again.

Anyway, at least he had an okay I.Q. (intelligence quotient). He sometimes made it to the Top 10 of the class. Sometimes. Bottom three, usually. So at least he wasn't completely pathetic academically.

He was back to his usual ritual of barely eating lunch and finding ways and places to hide himself in the school every recess and lunch break so he wouldn't look like (more of) a total loser to his peers.

Like eating inside the boy's bathroom or spending time at the computer lab or library instead of eating.

This was probably why Mark Zuniga—one of Gerry Jacinto's closest friends and right-hand man, also one of the guys Florante had difficulty killing in his oft-referenced nightmare—had always teased him of having the figure of a 9-year-old girl instead of a 14-year-old boy.

He was skin and bones practically. The wimpiest of kids. Certain girls in the varsity team could probably outdo him in athletics, he was so pathetic.

So it was probably this insecurity that led him to dream the dreams he dreamt. He had also called them nightmares because it involved him murdering his bullies.

However, if it were proverbial rather than literal murder—like him imagining their murder in his hands to let off some steam from their bullying without ever daring to do it for real—he'd understand how these dreams could be considered as the power fantasies of the powerless.

Like parents wanting to kill their misbehaving children without really meaning it.

Or maybe his being a terrible person who deserved all the bullying he ever got was just the dose of self-awareness he needed.

Maybe he should stop being so dependent on what other people thought. As long as he followed his own moral compass, they had no business dictating how he lived his life!

If he left them alone then they should leave him alone. Right?

As long as he didn't hurt anyone else (so again, he crossed his fingers that his dream murders were nothing more than dreams), he didn't need anyone's approval.

***

As the class returned from the lab to further discuss cell mitosis or whatever, Pascual played catch-up with Galang, walking beside him and asking him how he'd been doing.

Or more like Isaiah talked and Florante half-listened, waiting for the other shoe to drop in regards to them sharing memories of something that only happened in his, well, their dreams.

Maybe Florante misheard him the first time? He didn't know. He merely asked him for the time instead, wishing to change the subject.

"What time is it?" said Florante, who forgot to wear his watch.

"Let me see. It's skin thirty," Pascual said with a straight face while pointing at his bare wrist.

It took Florante a minute to "get it".

"Oh."

They then both shared a hearty laugh, with Florante laughing in spite of himself.

Dammit, Galang missed this. He missed talking his former best friend; this endearing guy and his sharp wit. Too bad their friendship went south in the end.

Pascual then told him about the rumors he heard about him.

How Florante had ended up with the infamous Dead Kids of the Fatima High School campus.

How he finally got his bullies to let up with their bullying by listing their names and sending them to his teacher. (A teacher actually did something after catching Florante's bullies in the act).

How he started wooing(!?) their classmate Jennifer Tolentino.

"I wasn't wooing anyone, don't be weird," Florante told Pascual off. "I just want to be better friends with her, that's all."

Or be friends again at all. They were supposed to be friends when they first met during the first day of school, but they then drifted apart. Kind of like the situation between Pascual and him, to be honest.

Florante avoided looking Isaiah in eye all this time out of embarrassment of being told a multitude of gossip, rumors, and half-truths about himself.

At the same time, he had to also avoid getting caught stealing glances at Jenny from time to time as she walked on ahead of them alongside Laura.

Her bespectacled face was such a distraction that he tried not to look at her as much as possible too, only to end up staring back at Pascual and his nonsense.

He didn't know where to look. The floor, perhaps? Or how about the ceiling?

There he was again, falling in love with another girl who gave him an ounce of attention. Or kissed him in his dreams.

Once back in the classroom, Florante returned to his seat and tried to listen to Ms. Del Mundo's lecture, who used an overhead projector to project transparencies onto the blackboard with the windows and shades closed.

He couldn't manage his thoughts. Was he hearing things with Pascual? Did he really say what he thought he heard him say?

***

For a change, as the bell rung and Biology class ended, Pascual continued talking to Galang. Usually, no one bothered to in their class.

As of late, before she went absent for a week, it had been Jenny, but only sometimes.  

"Jenny seems friendlier to you now than before," was the icebreaker he went with. "You even had lunch with her with your gang."

'Humph. My gang, huh?' Florante thought, with Pascual avoiding calling them their infamous name of "Dead Kids".

To Isaiah, Galang went with, "Yeah, I guess," while also wondering aloud, "I wonder why she was absent for so long."

"There's been a cold bug spreading. Must've been the change in weather."

"Yeah, that must be it."

Florante frowned, though it felt more like the petulant pout of a child. He looked away while resisting the urge to stick his tongue out childishly at Isaiah for good measure.

He couldn't focus on his former best friend's chatter as they grabbed their bags with their P.E. (Physical Education) uniforms and proceeded to P.E. class at the gymnasium.  

Mixed-gender volleyball at the gym didn't catch much of Florante's attention either. He ended up playing with Pascual and his friends though, which was a relief.

Usually, their P.E. teacher had to force one of the cliques or groups in Section St. Francis to include Florante with them.

Or he ended up with the rest of the social outcasts who couldn't find a group to team up with.

After doing warm-up exercises and partner drills, they had a simultaneous mini-tournament of sorts. Multiple five-member teams ended up doing a set of games until P.E. period was over.

Florante was in a team composed of four guys—two of them Isaiah and Florante himself—and one girl up against a team of three guys and two girls.

Naturally, Florante Galang sucked at P.E. in general and volleyball in particular.

His volleyball returns resulted in shots that went outside and teammates that covered his position so he wouldn't bungle the shot.

However, strangely enough, both Isaiah and even Jenny (who played against another team at an adjacent net) cheered him on, leading him to surprise himself by serving the volleyball decently, even scoring an ace or two.

Sure, their team lost in the end, but at least the unathletic Florante was able to somewhat contribute when normally he couldn't.

Well then. The day ended up better than he expected!

***

At the locker room, while the class either changed back to their regular uniforms or just gathered their belongings to head out of the school for dismissal time, Pascual continued talking to Florante, making him self-conscious.

The introvert felt tired from all the talking—well, half-listening—he did for so long. His social "health bar" was spent.

To explain, introverts tended to shy away from social gatherings because being in such situations took a toll on their energy. They could only take so much before becoming anxious or nervous wrecks.

Even though Pascual and Florante were having mostly one-on-one (or rather, one-sided) conversations instead of a more open social encounter with multiple people, Pascual's sudden over-friendliness after they'd acted like strangers for so long had depleted Florante's tolerance for this very social situation.

"…Oh, I remember that one time, in the grade school playground, you were playing alone, pretending to be Rambo or something, tying a bandanna on your forehead…!"

"All right, ALL RIGHT! That's enough," said Florante, who now focused his full attention on his ex-friend Pascual. "I get the picture."  

By the way, his bullies caught him playing alone as a high school kid, since he spent his grade school in Makati.

"Sorry," apologized Isaiah. "You're not going to zap my brain to mush again, are you?"

This jolted Florante awake from any more random thoughts. He was hoping the earlier declaration from Pascual was just his imagination, but no such luck.

Galang's eyebrows knit together in concentration for the first time the whole day, like he just suddenly noticed that the things happening around him didn't make sense because he was merely dreaming.

Like someone between the verge of sleepiness and wakefulness.

He then exhaled, mumbled, "Susmaryosep," under his breath, and said, "No. I only have those powers when I'm dreaming, not in real life."

The daydreaming asthmatic didn't want to look like a fool and shoot nonexistent laser bullets at one of his bullies, thank you very much.

Isaiah gave him a quizzical look. "You can totally shoot your power beams or whatever right now."

Florante scoffed at the idea. "No, I can't. That's not how this works. I need to be dreaming in order for me to use those powers. Because none of it is real."

Pascual raised an eyebrow at that. "You sure about that?"

Galang also raised an eyebrow in kind. "What do you mean?"

So Isaiah clarified. "You don't need to dream to use your powers."

What. Now hold on a minute there!

"No, I can't. That wasn't real. That was just a dream," Florante dismissed the very notion until something else occurred to him.

"Hey, Pascual. How'd you know about my dreams?"

Although Isaiah had been talking up a storm since Biology class, Florante could now notice his hands gripping the edge of the bench they sat on in the locker with immense tension.

Like a squashed bed spring ready to uncoil.

Had Isaiah been acting this nervous around him this entire time? Was he talking nonstop to help calm his nerves?

Why was he so afraid of him…? Oh.

No please. Not this again. Not Florante questioning whether his dream happened or not again! Anything but that!

"Florante Galang," Isaiah Pascual said. "That wasn't a dream. You really did kill us all."

No. NO. That couldn't be. No, no, no. Shut up, Pascual.

Pascual continued. "Was that how you were able to cope with what happened? You waved off everything as a dream?"

"NO! What happened was a dream!" said Florante.

"You always had the power. It's as plain as the nose on your face," said Isaiah.

"But you can't see the nose on your face unless you look in a mirror," said Galang.

"Then let me be that mirror on your face. It wasn't a dream," said Pascual.

Florante was a good person. Or so he told himself. He didn't really kill all his bullies. He only imagined he did using the silliest and most childish of fantasies.

"Just because you were somehow able to reset everything back to the way things were doesn't mean you've completely undone what you did."

"SHUT UP!" Florante productively released his anger, malice, and frustrations in that dream because he was powerless in real life! Also, who had superpowers in real life? How absurd!

It was then that Florante noticed that Isaiah hadn't taken off his P.E. uniform yet even as the introvert himself immediately took those clothes off and changed into his school uniform.

"We remember everything. I remember everything you've done. And what a monster you were back then."

No no no nonono. Florante was not the monster Mammon accused him of! None of it was real! This wasn't real either! He was dreaming again, wasn't he?

Florante was bullied all his life and had never stood up for himself because he was scared that he'd get humiliated emotionally, tortured mentally, ostracized socially, or beat up physically.

The bullies in his life had always silenced him but the one time he struck back and silenced them instead, he was the bad guy?

How was that fair? He was solely responsible for losing control? For going werewolf? They could do whatever they wanted with him?

Before the asthmatic could let out a wheezy exhale, Isaiah disappeared from view then the whole world became a blur.

***

The drizzle of rain had become mist by the time they ended up suddenly in the streets, leaving a trail of devastation behind them.

It took a minute before Florante Galang realized that Isaiah Pascual had just pushed him from the gym lockers all the way through the soccer field, right past part of the high school building, to the back of the school wall, right into open traffic, with one hand to his chest.

They busted through wall, brick, concrete, and plaster like a bulldozer.

It all happened within a second. Or a fraction of a second. Before Galang's eyes could even blink or his mind could register what had happened.

Wait. So Pascual was actually an angel too? Or maybe even a demon? An Ophanim or a Minion? Like the spaghetti monster or the maelstrom man?

The impact should've caved in Florante's chest. Not to mention his bones broken and dislocated in 30 different places.

He might've even ended up like roadkill too, if not for his Ophanim halo that he learned to control back when he faced against the eldritch shadow man.

Thankfully, a combination of light energy and gale winds formed a protective vacuum cocoon around Galang's body that kept him safe from harm. His own halo effect, if you would.

Isaiah just looked at the untouched Florante, his palm outstretched, his jaw agape, before he gave him a sheepish grin. "Hehehe. Didn't expect that, did you?"

"You have superpowers?"

"Yep. See? And so do you… AH! Please don't blow my brains out!"

Isaiah flinched or perhaps even overreacted at Florante stepping towards him, with him unleashing a flurry of blows.

"I wasn't! OW! Stop punching me!" One of the fists hit Florante's nose before he could summon his light wind dome again and blocked the rest of the blows.

Something else then dawned to Florante as he surveyed how far they went out. "You… you almost killed me!"

He considered taking a swing at his former friend, but settled with attempting to catch him.

However, Isaiah disappeared the instant Galang tried grabbing his arm. Like a fly disappearing before the fly swatter could hit it.

By instinct, Florante jumped back into the sidewalk as a car beeped at him.

He then looked around. Several onlookers began gathering around the scene of devastation, particularly near what was left of what was once a wall and a planter's box.

Isaiah ran away and Florante was about to follow suit when he felt something coming at him from behind. 'What…?'

Instead of multiple supersonic punches, Galang got hit by a single spine-tingling punch that actually dented his halo shield and rattled him to the bones.

Then it hit him again. And again.

",..Can't catch me, Slowpoke!"

Multiple Pascuals kept appearing and disappearing, punching his weakening halo shield with a punch that came at Florante stronger and faster by the second.

What was this? In his panic, Florante figured what Isaiah did. He ran in a tight circle at supersonic speeds and incrementally increased the momentum of his punch until it reached an irresistible power at an unstoppable level.

Sneaky bastard.

The more time passed, the faster the momentous punch got and the harder it was for Florante's halo to resist it. Isaiah might actually break through his hallowed field. What was he supposed to do?

"…Lightning BOLT!"

Florante thusly summoned lightning from the drizzling skies just as the infinite mass punch shattered his halo vacuum field, which electrocuted Pascual while energized Galang.

This jolted and froze Pascual, but his forward momentum remained, which prompted Florante to finally dodge one of the continuous punches with the speed of racecar going through a racetrack that he'd been absorbing all that time with his halo.

The resulting blockbuster explosion blasted both of them thirty or so feet clear into the gray skies.

***

The next thing Florante knew, he'd landed on the roof(?!) of the Fatima High School Building. What the hell.

He looked around him to see where he was. He felt a tingling sensation travel across his extremities. His acrophobia (fear of heights) acted up again.

Or maybe that was the millions of volts of electricity he'd just absorbed before making Isaiah miss, resulting in a blast from his massive punch that jettisoned them from the streets of Mandaluyong to the rooftops of Fatima High.

It was times like this that convinced him that the time when he jumped from rooftop to rooftop in order to experiment upon his powers was just a dream.

An acrophobic would never do anything as crazy as that for real. Also, he had superpowers. Of course it was a crazy dream.

He looked around to make sure he was indeed where he was. That was when he noticed the still figure of Isaiah Pascual.

"Dammit, you weren't this powerful before," was what Florante thought Pascual murmured under his breath.

'Before…?' thought Florante. What did he mean by that?

However, as Galang braced himself for another assault, he realized Pascual's body still hadn't recovered from the electrocution.

Also, because they were on the roof deck of the building, his former best friend has less running room for his running punch.

Most importantly, Florante still had enough energy left from absorbing the millions of volts of electricity from the lightning strike. Perhaps 1.21 gigawatts of power. Perhaps even more than that.

A billion joules of electricity. Enough to power dozens of homes for a day. Or 10 million light bulbs at the same time. Maybe even a flux capacitor on a time-traveling DeLorean.

Should he do it? Should he test out whether this was a dream or not?

Should he hit him with his five-fingered Light Array bullets, which was now practically his finishing move? Or he could use both hands and fire all ten shots?

Nah. That was overkill. Instead, he elected to focus his accumulated power on one closed fist, cocked his arm back, and then shouted, "Thunder BOLT…!"

It made sense. Even though the high school building had a narrow roof deck, Isaiah could still dodge. So Florante might as well shoot his thread-thin concentrated laser that cut through the air and produced a powerful "thunder" or "sonic boom" shockwaves with a wider destructive area.

However, he hesitated at the last minute when he heard Pascual ask, "Thunder Bolt? So what's different between that and that Lightning Bolt you shot earlier?"

Florante couldn't help himself. It had been his pet peeve ever since he saw "Thunder Bolt" and "Lightning Bolt" used interchangeably in anime, manga, action games, and RPGs.

"Well, obviously, a Lightning Bolt is the bolt of electricity. The thunder comes after the lightning bolt, correct? It's the rumbling sound from the shockwaves of a sonic boom. So to me Thunder Bolt is basically just making creating a sonic boom."

"Oh, I see. I never thought of it that way."

The two then just stared at each other for a hot minute, with Galang allowing his rivulets of electric might from his fist fade away as he relaxed his shoulders and stopped cocking back his fist.

Pascual himself finally relaxed his own stance, which looked like a runner who was ready to turn and bolt out of there.

***

The two former best friends sat down on the roof deck overlooking Fatima High.

Florante sat down beside Pascual, with both doing the "Indian sit" or "Indian style" sitting position with their legs crossed underneath them, which was often linked to stereotypical portrayals of Native Americans.

It was believed to be rooted on a meditation or yoga pose from India known as the "Lotus Position".

They had shared a hearty laugh, with Isaiah stating, "Of course only you can come up with something as nerdy as that!" while Florante himself protested, "You're the one to speak! You were the one who brought that up to me!"

Pascual blinked three times then tilted his head to the side. "I did? I don't remember."

"You totally did! That's why I made it a point to use a different kind of attack when doing a Thunder Bolt and Lightning Bolt!" said a grinning, nostalgic Galang.

The two pals then sat down while the rest of the world stood still. The damage they'd wrought on the rooms, walls, and streets earlier slowly but surely disappeared, as though they didn't even touch anything.

Curious. Then again, this only affirmed Florante's stance that his actions were from dreams. Perhaps extra-lucid dreams than normal, but dreams nonetheless.

"Maaan, I can't believe you've grown this strong already," said Isaiah with a scratch of his cheek. "I guess I should've expected it. You were among the first to awaken, weren't you?"

"I guess? What do you mean by awaken, though?" he asked.

"Just what like it sounds like," Pascual said. "It's when you wake up your powers."

So it wasn't just him. It was also Gerry Jacinto. And Laura Reyes. And now, Isaiah Pascual. They all "awakened" to having their own superpowers along with Florante.

"Hey, Pascual," Florante called out, "you're an angel too, aren't you?"

"…Angel?" Isaiah said.

"That's what Jenny Tolentino called us," Galang continued, brushing his damp hair bangs back and heaving a heavy, asthmatic wheeze. "Angels. Demons. Either or."

"Demons, huh?" Pascual rubbed his shoulder. "Yeah, I guess you can call her that. Maybe even monster."

"…Her?"

Pascual hesitated from revealing anything more. "Sooo how does Jenny know all this?"

Florante replied, "She's one of us. She's also an angel."

Pascual smirked. "Isn't that just your crush on her talking?"

"What? No," Florante denied, but he has second thoughts. So far, everything tracked. Jenny confirmed they were angels then they fought against multiple demons.

She was telling him the truth, right? But then again, Pascual seemed unaware of the origins of their powers as he was before he met up with Jennifer.

She must've told them the truth. He trusted her.

"Wait, she hasn't talked to you about it?" asked Florante.

"No, it's the first time I learned she even has powers like us," said Pascual.

"That's strange," said Florante. "So you didn't know we're angels and demons?"

"Not a clue," said Pascual. "For all I know, we've become like the X-Men or something. Mutants who've awakened our superpowers, you know?"

"That makes sense," said a wistful Galang. "We might be the next evolution of man. Deities. Or gods. Or heroes."

"Or villains. Or demons. Or monsters…" Isaiah trailed off.

"What happened?" Florante asked.

"I-It's nothing," Isaiah said, but then exhaled and shrugged. "It's about Regina…"

"Regina Mariano?" Florante repeated, remembering the girl as the one who said he had fetal alcohol syndrome. He also remembered blasting her until she turned to ash in his fever dream. "What happened to her?"

***

By the time Florante and Isaiah jumped out of the rooftop, everything went back to normal. No hole in the wall. No broken glass windows. No interrupted traffic outside of the school. It was if they'd never fought.

Another reset had happened, which made Galang presume that his fever dream was one of those resets. Nevertheless, he had to face facts.

He unfortunately did kill his classmates, but something happened so that it never happened and faded away like a dream.

Regardless, Isaiah gave Florante the lowdown on what happened to Regina.

She had awakened her powers like Isaiah, Jennifer, and Florante did. In Jenny's case, she awoke as an angel avatar many decades ago, in the 1960s.

Long story short, Regina had awakened as a mindless Ophanim or perhaps even a Minion. Like the crawling chaos or the spaghetti monster from before, she ended up becoming an out of control monster that Isaiah couldn't stop.

Come to think of it, Florante left out that little detail of him visiting Jenny's apartment in his dreams after seeing her name-alike in a yearbook at the library.

However, because of the nature of their powers, he had an inkling suspicion that his visit to the Tolentino abode actually happened.

Like how his brief battle with Isaiah actually happened before their collective lucid fantasy disappeared right in their own eyes.

God dammit all to hell. So he really did kill his classmates. He really did kill Laura.

A wave of shame washed over him. What he thought was him releasing pent-up stress harmlessly was him actually harming his bullies as revenge. Like a school shooter run amok.

If everything hadn't reset to normal with everyone living and their school left in one piece, he'd be no better than the bullies he so hated.

No, he'd be worse than them. He turned what was supposed to be an eye for an eye revenge and took an arm and a leg as payment for his social humiliation instead.

Never mind, "An eye for an eye makes the world go blind". The term, "An eye for an eye" was created with people like him in mind, who went overboard with their revenge.

He didn't know what to feel. On one hand, he felt horrified, guilty, and ashamed after realizing he had hurt his classmates for real. On the other hand, shamed as he was to admit it, he felt a measure of schadenfreude for mostly, um, unleashing his frustrations on his tormentors.

However, he wanted to crawl under a rock and die over the realization that he really did kill his former crush, Laura Reyes, as collateral damage for his mad killing spree. Ditto his teacher who merely got in his way.

Everything went back to normal and everyone ended up alive, but he still felt dirty realizing he really did all those things. He wasn't so innocent after all.

No wonder Jenny kept acting so guarded around him. On top of him stalking her! He needed to have more self-awareness!

The more he thought about it, the more he realized he was screwed.

What he originally thought was harmless was now considered beyond the pale. He felt like someone pulled the rug from under him.

What if there was no reset button? What if they stayed dead? He'd have ruined their lives and his own life forever.

He didn't mean to. He just wanted them to leave him alone. Even if they didn't end up friends or acquaintances, just let him be. Let bygones be bygones, dammit.

That breakfast, he ate his sandwich and drank his orange juice in a hurry. For once, he felt somewhat excited to go to school. Not because he was some nerd looking forward to tests and quizzes or something.

He certainly didn't go there to meet up with any friends save for his Dead Kids acquaintances. No, if he was being honest with himself, he knew he was eager to get to school to see Jennifer Tolentino again.

No, no. Well, yes. He did want to see his crush again. But aside from that, he was looking forward to using his powers for good for once—to help a (former) best friend in need save his new girl friend (not girlfriend) from herself.

If anything, it was his way of alleviating his guilt over actually killing his classmates for real! He owed it to all the bullies he killed.

Hmmm. So if memory served him correct, the angels who'd been chosen as candidates on the position of Archangel Gabriel was Florante, Isaiah, Regina, Gerry, and  Laura.

Maybe also Mark Zuniga? No, no. Mark only stabbed Florante. Gerry was the one who awakened his own powers, followed by Laura. In his "fever dream" that wasn't really a dream.

***

Regina Mariano appeared normal enough when she got to school. However, as Isaiah Pascual would explain later, she'd actually gotten mixed up with a "bad crowd".

If Florante could hazard a guess, she must've ended up being manipulated by another full-fledged demon avatar like Mammon.

They all attended classes like usual, with Isaiah giving Florante looks here and there to remind him of their plans to, "save" Regina after school.

From how Isaiah described her, her Ophanim/Minion form or biblically accurate angel/demon form was reminiscent of a geometric form. An object instead of an organism. An abstraction instead of something concrete.

Isaiah admitted he was no match against her and her growing power, but he thought that maybe with Florante's help, they could beat the sense out of his friend.

Galang told Pascual about how Ophanims were actually awakened with the purpose of becoming avatars of famous angels or demons like Gabriel or Raphael. However, it hadn't sunk in that Isaiah, Regina, and Florante were bound to fight for the position of Gabriel's avatar.

Florante wasn't too clear on how this avatar business worked himself. He made a mental footnote on asking Jennifer more about it later.

Oh right. Jennifer. Should Florante end up facing off with her too? He ended up breaking his promise to her to forget about this angel and demon business.

He felt at times that Jenny seemed so guarded around him. Even hostile at times. Seeing that he had every intention of breaking his promise to her, maybe her behavior was warranted.

No. He had to do this favor to Isaiah. To make it up for killing two of his bullies for real in his fever dream.

He hadn't quite figured out how their powers worked or why things went back to normal after one of them was defeated, but… he was totally doing this right now.

He'd apologize to Jenny later. For now, he had to concentrate on Isaiah's friend Regina.

Sure, Regina wasn't the most pleasant of classmates to Florante, but he really wanted to make up for the sins he committed that haven't actually been erased.

Some of his bullies actually remembered him killing them. Remembered his sins.

His sins that actually happened and were real, despite them disappearing from reality like forgotten dreams.

***

After dismissal time…

It rained particularly heavily that afternoon, such that it took every ounce of the clumsy Florante's concentration to make it out of the school without slipping on a puddle or getting his pants wet from wayward splashes.

He even managed to cling to the nearby chain-link fence of the school's entrance and exit to save himself from falling.

He shook his head, wishing the ground would swallow him whole. As amazing as he and Pascual probably looked earlier with their superhuman feats, he looked downright pathetic with his actual clumsiness.

If he were a girl, perhaps he'd perhaps look more endearing instead of pathetic, like a damsel in distress even. As it was, he felt less of a man for being an uncoordinated klutz with not a single athletic bone in his body.

It was times like this that made him doubt (perhaps hope) that his imagined sins or dark fantasies against his classmates remained as such.

Not that hoping for their misfortune subconsciously was any better but at least it didn't really happen.

Regina Mariano had been hanging out with these shady people after dismissal time and her friend circle—of which Isaiah was a part of—was getting worried about it.

Appropriately enough, she seemed like the poster child for an after-school special on wayward kids who hang out with the wrong crowd.

As typical of such specials, Regina was your average tomboyish girl next door who wore a ponytail haircut and sported a dyed brunette hair that stood out from her tan skin.

Regardless, Pascual insisted that her meetings with these questionable and suspicious persons had something to do with both him and her awakening with their angelic powers.

So what was Regina's deal? Pascual alleged she got into contact with some talent agency and they were going to make her into a star.

However, they instead awakened her angel self and turned her into an outright monster with their schemes.

Pascual attempted to save her, with the stress also triggering his own angel self, but she proved too powerful for him.

As her guy best friend, Isaiah followed her to their offices, feeling that something was afoot. From what Florante could surmise, Regina was a bit of a naïve country bumpkin and the agency was taking advantage of her and various other girls.

That was news to Florante, who only knew Regina for her mean girl antics with him whenever they came across each other.

Then things got weird from there.

For his part, Galang could only wonder if his other encounters with Ophanims or Minions involved such schemes.

The spaghetti monster seemed to fly out of nowhere at the school parking lot. Meanwhile, the undefinable tall shadow man was someone he and Jenny detected along with Mammon in the middle of Makati.

Jeez. Florante could only shake his head. That American-looking white guy was Mammon? The Mammon? Or at least an avatar of his. And Florante himself was supposed to be the avatar of the Archangel Gabriel to boot.

Or he would once he went past being an Ophanim and evolved into Cherubim and Seraphim.

Regardless, Florante skipped his school service ride home in order to commute with Isaiah to somewhere in Ortigas on Isaiah's dime.

They considered using their powers to get there, but they decided to save their energy and use it on saving Regina from herself instead.

***

The duo sneaked (snuck?) around the conference hall where a seeming talent show took place. Some were on stage singing and dancing. Others served as the audience.

On the front row were some well-dressed judges, including a drop-dead gorgeous Caucasian lady who had the looks of a Hollywood actress.

She had blonde hair complimented by her blue eyes. She also wore a flashy gown and shoes that matched her shoes yet seemingly decorated a closed heart.

At the back of the stage were various contestants with numbered sashes, among them was Regina herself.

What was all this now? A talent show? Star Search? Tanghalan ng Kampeon (Contest of Champions)? Or perhaps a beauty pageant like Miss Universe or Binibining Pilipinas (Miss Philippines)?

'What are they planning?' Florante wondered. The setup seemed far too elaborate just to awaken the angel (or demon) within Regina. What was this supposed to accomplish?

Using Pascual's teleportation-like speed, they got through the security guards and ended up at the back of the conference room's audience, with them none the wiser.

It was actually pretty packed in there. Standing room only. So Isaiah and Galang stood and observed what was happening.

In front of them was an ordinary talent show. Like an amazing male singer who sung a Whitney Houston song while sounding nearly exactly like Whitney Houston with his impressive falsetto or female "head voice" range.

A minute later, there was a group of break dancers on stage. From there, a long-haired rocket with an electric guitar did a three-minute guitar solo. Afterwards, another singer, a girl, who was classically trained in opera and sung an operatic version of Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody".

The pair of classmates stood there, mesmerized by the amount of talent before them. Applauding along with the rest of the audience.

Then it happened. Just like with Mammon's Minion, both Florante and Pascual felt the presence of their fellow angel. Or demon. Celestial being, perhaps.

The curtains opened and they saw Regina arrive on stage. It was apparently her turn to sing. However, instead of singing, she instead began to transform.

They then heard a high-pitched screech, like metal crunching on metal, that became fast and painfully loud. Started, Florante looked up, startled.

Galang saw several things at the same time.

Nothing moved in slow motion the way it did in films. Rather, his brain felt like it worked overtime due to an adrenalin rush, allowing him to absorb multiple scenes register in his brain at once.

Maybe it wasn't the same case with the speedster beside him who stared at what happened before him with wide eyes and an unhinged jaw. He couldn't tell.

Regina obviously stood out from the sea of faces staring back at her since she was center stage in this talent show and all, with them wearing the same faces of horror that Pascual did. That Florante probably did as well.

The contestants of the talent show started glowing, as though they themselves had a halo of aura like angels would.

The tendrils of this glowing energy then got sucked around Regina, who herself begun singing a Regine Velasquez song that Florante couldn't quite place.

Florante thought the violently winding soundwaves from Regina's song would converge into a climactic ante, like rapids to a huge waterfall, but then it became a calm lake  that only produced ripples. Just the purest song.

The energies from the audience swirled along with the brightness of the auras of the contestants, but they were weaker comparatively weaker.

This made everyone act lethargic, with the seated viewers slumping down on their chairs and the people standing crumple down on the floor in a dead faint.

All of them did so except the two angels at the back—Regina's classmates—and the judges near the front of the stage. Particularly the pretty woman who looked like Hollywood actress.

"…Pascual?" Regina said, waking from her reverie and breathing into her microphone. Her eyebrows then furrowed as she squinted and focused her eyes on the person beside Pascual. "Wait. Is that… Florante Galang? Why is he with you, Isaiah?"

"Ay palaka! (Ah frog!) She caught on to us! The jig is up!" exclaimed Pascual, which only pissed Florante off.

"Susmaryosep, Pascual! What's the plan now?" complained Galang. "You do have a plan just in case she noticed us, don't you?"

"I didn't think things through! Sue me!" said Isaiah. "Just… help me with her, okay?! Use your powers!"

The Hollywood beauty took a cursory look at the two high school students in uniform and asked Regina, "Friends of yours?"

Regina stared back and forth between the svelte woman and her classmates then nodded, "They're my classmates, Miss Spelvin," she said aloud, through the microphone.

"Please. Call me Georgina," Miss Spelvin do declared.

It was then that Florante and Pascual realized that Miss Spelvin didn't open her mouth when she spoke. Like with Mammon, she communicated telepathically. On a frequency only fellow angels and demons could listen to.

Daring to be brave and remembering his former best friend's request to save Regina from the influence of literal demons, Galang shot a Thunderbolt at Miss Spelvin instead of his other bully classmate.

The spellbinding Spelvin swatted the Thunderbolt away, which created an ear-splitting sonic boom that made the whole place rumble.

For his part, Florante had already covered his ears, but soon Pascual and even Regina followed suit in covering their ears as well.

The three then bore witness to Spelvin changing form from a beautiful blue-eyed blonde Hollywood actress in a blue dress to a a sultry red-skinned demoness with wings, fingernail claws, the wild hair of a harridan, and a black dress seemingly made of the darkest starless night.

An improvement from Mammon's fat gremlin form that Florante and Jenny exposed back in Guadalupe Church for sure, but still. Her true form was a She-Devil?

Georgina Spelvin's lips curved into a knowing smile. "Now who told you that's my true form, li'l boy?"

"Wait, you and Jenny fought another demon like her?" said Isaiah, startling Galang.

This telepathic communication between fellow angels and demons was more trouble than it was worth!

As Spelvin strode towards Regina, the judges beside her turned to dust, which made the hairs at the back of Florante's neck stand on end while beside him, Isaiah turned blue in horror.

She then told her telepathically without regard to the two angels who'd overhear, "Now's your chance to use the power you've absorbed from this talent show to take control of your Minion form."

And soon both Galang and Pascual saw clear as day the literal talent flow like neon tendrils of spiritual energy from the unconscious contestants to Spelvin's hand into a floating sphere of power.

They'd weaponized their passion and used their love to their abusive advantage. How devilish of them to do so, but that was to be expected.

Quite a bit of the metaphysical ball of talent then got transferred unto Regina in the form of a seeming solar flare.

Then, like a ghost, Spelvin vanished. Fading into existence.  

From there, Regina opened her mouth, resisted the urge to transform into her geometric self, and sung a song to end the world.

***

Dammit.

Why did it feel like the world was always at stake when Florante dealt with an awakening angel? Or demon?

Regina sang a lyricless hymn of the damn that warped their perception of reality. The sound waves from the song kept Florante's attempts at shooting her down with projectiles from hitting her.

Meanwhile, on Isaiah's part, he didn't know what to do. He didn't want to hurt his friend and classmate. He certainly didn't wish to do that momentum-filled punch on her.

However, she might even be more powerful now than she was when she went berserk with her first awakening.

So Pascual ran away.

…What?

Regina took a break from her singing that rendered every energy projectile Florante shot at her into harmless heat and light. "What are you doing even here, you fetal alcohol syndrome baby?"  

"AH! You called me that again! Even after I told the teacher on you for bullying!" exclaimed Florante, who doubled his efforts by shooting Lightning  Bolts at himself and holding enough power inside his body to resist Regina's repellant sound waves.

"You're such a li'l snitch, you dork," Regina said with a roll of her eyes. She then started humming with a specific frequency that resonated with the rest of the building.

Florante considered asking her if she remembered him killing her in his fever dream,  but he pushed his thoughts away before they could fully form into words in his head.

The sound waves from her voice came at shorter-wave vibrato, almost like a bird's trill, which echoed across the amphitheater room then transmitted to the rest of the structure, making its very foundations shake and dance to the beat of her wordless song.

And so the room and the building started to rumble and shake from the droning hum from Regina's powerful singing pipes.

Soon, all the glass panes and mirrors on the amphitheater cracked and went on the verge of shattering. Hairline cracks appeared everywhere while the floor below them and the ceiling above them moved.

Florante hesitated, with him second-guessing himself now that he realized his past dreams weren't dreams and he and everyone else could die for real if the whole building were to collapse on them.

However, just in the nick of time, Pascual returned, blasting through the wall from behind Miss Mariano and pushing, not punching or striking, her forward.

It took the next second for Florante to realize Pascual might've probably run the entire globe and back to produce enough kinetic energy to penetrate through Regina's melodic defenses with supersonic might.

Regardless, that momentous push did the trick. It stopped the building from crumbling just in time.

However, to Pascual's horror, he went overboard and built up enough momentum to push Mariano away with the strength of a freight train.

"AAHH…! Pascual…!?"

"Oh no! GINA…! I'm SORRY!"

For a split-second, the sonic siren changed into the geometric object Isaiah described her as. She was hard to miss, with her occupying most of the amphitheater.

She probably shifted into that form for self-preservation's sake. Otherwise, she would've turned into a messy red stain of blood and guts on the ceiling and walls.  

Florante couldn't believe what he just saw. He also couldn't react in time before the geometric fallen angel did a banshee shriek that blew him away and shattered his eardrums.

"AUGH!" Galang cried out, and when he gnashed his teeth, he felt the enamel on them crack as well, thus worsening his pain.

The supersonic screech of her Minion self lacked the controlled nuance of her human form's song for sure.

However, for Pascual's part, he couldn't be happier. He grinned and exhaled in relief. "Oh, thank goodness, Gina! You're not dea… URK?!"

Regina Mariano finally shifted back to her human self, her hands throttling Isaiah by his neck. "You almost killed me, you jerk!"

"Wait (cough), I-I didn't mean to…!" Isaiah choked out.

"Whatever. I'm going to control this power and become queen of this world. Just you wait and see," she said, dropping Pascual to the floor before she picked up the microphone and began singing again, her heel firmly stepping on Isaiah's face.

A half-conscious Florante thought, "Rule the world…?" Huh. Why didn't he think of doing that when he first got his powers?

The compromised position Pascual had, with him getting stepped on by Regina also made Galang's cheeks warm. Mariano kept Isaiah pinned down to the ground by stepping on his face, huh? He wished it were him instead.

He shook his head to wave off such sordid thoughts. He needed to set his priorities straight.

He was too shortsighted with this angel and demon avatar thing that he didn't realize the full implication of his gifts. He'd rather pettily get back at his bullies than aim at something higher.

But to be honest, why would he want to conquer the world? What good would that do? So he'd become President of Earth? A clueless student like him would have more responsibility? Who'd want that?

Galang attempted to get up and move, but the ground started shaking again. The building creaked and swayed, like a house of cards about to topple over.

What was he supposed to do now? Her singing served as her shield against 100 percent of Florante's myriad of projectiles. His own halo shield couldn't block off Regina's sound waves either. He was a sitting duck.

Also, if he didn't feel like killing the crawling chaos Minion from before, that went double or even triple for his classmate. Not that he could at this rate, but he definitely didn't want to.

Whatever rage he felt for his bullies back in his fever dream faded away, replaced with shame and embarrassment after he realized he killed them for real back then.

He could only helplessly stare as the ceiling plaster cracked and buckle while bits of dust and debris fell on the unconscious contestants and audience.

They were about to serve as more collateral damage from the awakening of yet another (fallen) angel.

According to Pascual, the people who died when he first tried stopping Regina's rampage the first time she awoke remained dead.

They didn't revert back to living like with what happened when Jenny and Florante defeated the spaghetti monster and the living maelstrom.  

Where was his power and creativity when saving lives? Was he only useful against helpless people, like his bullies before some of them discovered they too had powers?

He was so helpless against Regina that he might as well turn into an Ophanim himself to battle her with full force. He didn't remember his monstrous gyroscopic and multi-eyed form having ears, after all. Just endless revolving eyes.

"Wait, you have an monster form too?!" said Isaiah without thinking after hearing Florante's thoughts, as though forgetting (or not believing) Florante claiming they were angels with alternate, monstrous "true" forms.

Oh, right. Angels and demons could sense and communicate telepathically with one another. Florante should keep his thoughts to himself. Isaiah accidentally overheard his thoughts.

Hold on a minute. He could project his thoughts to those two, couldn't he?

He got it all wrong. He had his priorities straight from the start.

So he stared and focused on his classmates while making his concrete thoughts known to them even when he, a socially awkward teenager, would normally have trouble expressing himself.

The two seemed unaware of how they looked, what with Regina stepping on Isaiah but hesitating to hurt him or finish him off while Isaiah himself didn't seem to mind it one bit.

Also, from the angle where Pascual lay, he could actually look up from under Regina's dress.

The two received the message loud and clear.

Regina screamed and covered herself up while an apologetic Isaiah reassured it wasn't what it looked like.

Mariano did a swift stomp at Isaiah's head that would've squashed it like a watermelon had he not stood up in time. "Manyakis ka! (You pervert!)" she exclaimed. "You're both perverts!"

"You really are a snitch, Florante!" shouted Pascual at his former best friend while backpedaling deftly across multiple unconscious contestants and audience members.

For that fraction of a second though, Regina left herself wide open. So Florante shot her full of light bullets to force her to change into her Ophanim/Minion form.

"LIGHT ARRAY!"

All ten of Florante's Light Bullets hit their target, with each going off like the electromagnetic pulse version of blockbuster bombs.

Also, Galang had the presence of mind to envelop himself in his electric wind halo and push Regina backwards from the stadium through several walls up until they were outside the building to save the unconscious people inside the amphitheater from harm.

"Ah! Florante, you bastard…!" the backpedaling Pascual, uh, forward-pedaled towards the pair. "What do you think you're doing?!"

"What do you think I'm doing? I'm saving everyone before… AH!"

Then, from outside the venue, right in the middle of Mandaluyong, Regina Mariano began to change and shift forms.

Like with the flying spaghetti monster, Regina's true angel/demon form towered over Florante and Isaiah like a gigantic geometric monument. A floating blue pyramid that might as well be an alien ship. Or a tinted Star Destroyer from Star Wars.

'Now what?' thought Florante, which only made Pascual scream at him harder. 'Oh right. You can still hear me, huh?'

"Now its you who didn't think things through!?" Isaiah screeched. He then saw images from Galang's memory flash before his eyes.

Of Florante killing both him and Regina.

With misty eyes and a sniffle, Florante said, "I don't want to kill her again. Or hurt her any further."

She actually forced him to act because she was about to kill all those people back in the amphitheater herself.

"Florante, look out!" a voice from behind them said.

Their world went topsy-turvy again, and Galang wasn't sure if the Minion form of the demonic and geometric pyramid Regina was responsible.

The next thing he knew, he saw darkness just before he heard the shattering crunch of a car folding around a truck bed. He then realized he'd been wrapped in a cocoon of vines from head to toe.

The green tendrils receded from his person before he attempted breaking free of them. He then got up in time to see Jennifer Tolentino entangling Pascual with those same vines, a trickle of blood flowing from her forehead, her signature glasses missing.

"Jenny…!" blurted out a confused Florante, not knowing what to say.

"You broke your promise, Flor," whispered Jenny, the words filling Galang with shame. "We'll talk about this later."

Then, from right beside them, Florante saw double. Two Pascuals.

"Wha…?" Galang trailed off, at a loss for words. The second Pascual, he realized, was the one who asked him to watch out. So who was the first Pascual…?

The vine-entangled Isaiah Pascual smirked and changed back to the Hollywood beauty from before. Miss Georgina Spelvin, if Florante recalled correctly.

He didn't have the chance to notice anything else when he realized a van was headed their way. The geometric form of Regina had started singing again, and things beyond Galang's ken started happening all around them.

The vehicle spun and slid, on the verge of colliding with them all—Florante, Jenny, and the two Pascuals.

Without looking, Jenny

"Asmodeus," was what Jenny called the Pascual imposter instead. The imposter who could do somehow also mimicked the real deal's abilities.

The fake Isaiah cackled then shifted form back to the gorgeous blue-eyed blonde from before. "Raphael. I've heard you're in town from Mammon."

"What are you doing with my classmates?" Jenny the Raphael avatar demanded.

Spelvin smirked a spellbinding sneer. "I'm doing to them what you should've done a long time ago. I'm rousing them from their slumber, Raphael."

One thing was for sure. It was about time Florante took a second look at that dream journal of his.

***

To Be Continued…

The first incarnation of "Fantasy of Evolution" in my mind back in the early 2000s  involved Gabriel De Angeles (currently Florante Galang) ending up seeing his best friend J.D. (reminiscent of Isaiah Pascual) dying because of the War of Angels and Demons.

Also, yes. The Ophanim/Minion form of Regina Mariano is reminiscent of Ramiel the Geometric Angel from Neon Genesis Evangelion.

Fascinating how stories and creations change as you yourself develop into a person and as an author, huh?

Farewell, Abdiel

[gabriel-gabdiel]

Fantasy of Evolution Chapter 5: Press Ctrl-Z to Undo

If only it were as easy as pressing Ctrl + Z in order to undo the mistakes you’ve done in your life.

At any rate, Florante is about to deal with his personal Judas Iscariot. His former best friend, Isaiah. 

You can also find more chapters of my original fiction here. Please enjoy.

First | Previous | Next

Back in Fatima High, after Florante Galang dreamed another one of his strange dreams…

In his latest dream, Florante "stalked" his classmate's apartment then they fought as a pair against a shadow monster at Makati's Guadalupe Church.

In the end, although he wasn't hero material even in his daydreams (or night dreams), he still managed to find a way to do something that he could be proud of.

He stopped Mammon's Minion and undid that reality where multiple innocents died, thus saving their lives all at once.

Or maybe he didn't and it was all in his imagination.

Florante Galang shut his eyes and exhaled. Whoopty-doo. He did something heroic in his dreams. The thought made him cringe.

Still, even if it was a dream, the feelings he felt for the dream version of Jenny still made his knees weak. It all felt so real.

If only reality could evolve and match his fantasy. Alas, reality killed such whimsical notions faster than it helped him defeat the immortal crawling chaos.

But it wasn't real. It was all just a dream. It didn't really happen.

Had he really been traumatized by his bullies to the point where he used his fantasies and daydreams to cope with his daily reality of social suicide? Yeah, probably.

If only his dreams were real, then he would've asked Jenny out for a date by now. No, no. He meant he would've asked her more about Mammon.

What was that American(?) white man foreigner's deal anyway? Why'd he sic his Minion at them?

Oh, right. Jenny.

He pressed his fingers on his forehead, remembering that imagined kiss from the bespectacled beauty that was Jennifer Tolentino. The girl next door.

He let out another deep sigh. He really did have it bad for her now, didn't he?

However, he had to remind himself of the obvious. The dream version of Jenny was nothing like the real-life version of her. They hadn't interacted that way at all.

No more stalking of her. Get rid of that photocopy of her number in the yellow pages and that girl that had the same name as her from that yearbook from the 1960s or whatever.

The Mammon from his dream was right about one thing, though. Florante did act like a creep by tracking down Jenny's phone number and address from the phonebook instead of asking her about it like a normal person.

What was he thinking?

Still, once he could write and draw these ideas into an actual novel or comic book though, then that could make his strange dreams worth his while. They were compiled inside his dream journal already. So maybe.

Regardless, he woke up from the… third(?) strange dream/nightmare he'd had as of late. 'I think.'

Once again, the reset button had been pushed. Or the shortcut to "Undo" your last change on the document, "Ctrl + Z" (pushing the "Control" key and the "Z" key on the keyboard at the same time).

So everything went back to normal. No harm, no foul, right?

Still, he should really grow up by now. Abandon his idle, childish thoughts and turn his life around for real.

Soon, it'd be his fifteenth birthday.

He had no girlfriend on sight, no social life to speak of, barely any friends, but life went on, right? Right.

***

Fantasy of Evolution

An Urban Fantasy Story by Abdiel

When you press Ctrl + Z on your Windows machine, you could undo the last action you've done.

Disclaimer: This work may reference copyrighted material, the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. It is believed that this constitutes a fair use of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law. All copyrighted material referred to in this work belongs to their respective owners. All rights reserved.

***

Chapter 5: Press Ctrl-Z to Undo

***

It was around dismissal time again, and Florante had time to kill before his school jeepney service came around to pick him up.

He spotted his acquaintances, the Dead Kids, from a distance walking the opposite way as him.

Florante couldn't tell because they usually wore the same uniforms, but whenever it was Casual Fridays at Fatima (when the students were allowed to wear casualwear instead of their daily uniforms), the Dead Kids wore clothes that subtly hinted of designer origins.

By the way, the Fatima High uniform for boys was brown khaki pants, a button-down white collared dress shirt with short sleeves, ankle-high socks, and black leather shoes.

For girls, it was a white blouse with a collar, sash, tie, and pleated knee-high skirt bearing the same checkerboard black-and-white pattern as well as ankle-high socks and black dress shoes.

Not that the "fashion senseless" Florante was any authority on the subject or anything. Sometimes, even on Fridays, he kept wearing his school uniform composed of the button-down polo shirt and long khaki pants with black leather shoes over black socks.

He also had a backpack full of his school books, notebooks, pencils, and ballpoint pens. Like the nerd that he was. However, even he with his bad taste in clothes could tell the Dead Kids were dressed to the nines that matched their remarkably good looks.

Then again, their mesmerizing faces looked so dashing they could've worn dishrags and pulled it off. Nevertheless, it seemed rather appropriate they'd have both money and looks.

The fact that they were unable to mix with the rest of the student body like Florante did somewhat boggled his mind, though. Many of their "haters" called them pompous pretenders at best or braggadocious snobs at worst.

They were mostly called weirdoes, to be honest.

On one hand, their richness didn't afford them any acceptance in Fatima High. Like celebrities being bullied in college by their jealous classmates because they exuded an aura of superiority that rubbed them all the wrong way.

On the other hand, Florante didn't fully believe that the lack of acceptance was circumstantial. The way their group acted indicated that they desired isolation. He just couldn't imagine how any door could remain closed by their halo of beauty.

Meanwhile, although the group of Alonzo Estanislao, Kalantiaw and Dalisay Hidalgo, Jacob Benjamin, and Francisco Celestino did wave back at himwhen they spotted him (though it was mostly Lonzo and Dalisay who did the waving), he himself opted to go alone to the nearby walking-distance mall.

Nirvana Plaza wasn't far from Fatima High. Just walk from one of the rear exits of the school towards the rear entrance near the local Nationwide Bookstore branch and you're good to go.

He felt relaxed going there even though he barely had any money himself to buy anything there, whether it was comic books or food.

He had no allowance to speak of and he had packed lunches more often than not inside recycled ice cream containers turned into makeshift lunchboxes.

He wasn't poor or anything, it was just that he wasn't rich either and private school tuition was expensive.

It was fine. He loved window shopping on an empty stomach. Well, not really, but the mall did serve as his safe haven from his droll and friendless school existence.

He remembered when he first ventured alone into the mall instead of going straight home from his school service. Trips to the mall for his family used to be special events. They had to go to all the way from Pasig to Cubao to eat out, get groceries, or watch a movie.

Now, he could hang out in places like arcades or peek at a few pages of comic books at bookstores to his heart's content instead of staring blankly at a wall, waiting for the school service to pick him up and take him home. Daydreaming of adventures with the Ninja Turtles or the X-Men.

If he could get extra money from his parents, like spare change from buying art supplies or home economics requirements, he could give himself the occasional mall treat.

An ice cream cone here. A doughnut there. Maybe even some supermarket turon (caramelized fried banana rapped in spring roll wrapper).

Or maybe a few rounds of the latest iteration of Street Fighter, with him usually succumbing to the third character during a one-player game. He sucked at versus mode since he couldn't practice at the arcades for too long.

This was what a friendless dork like him had to look forward to, honestly.

Maybe one day, once he had a job and his own money, he'd have a fun-filled day buying comic books, playing games at the arcade, or going to the movies in his lonesome. However, as a student with barely any allowance, this setup wasn't bad at all.

It sounded depressing, but only if he had to share his experiences with anyone else. He actually loved going to Nirvana Shopping Plaza in his lonesome.

However, today, he couldn't shake the feeling that someone kept an eye over him, which made him feel paranoid.

Did his bullies spot him again, like the last time? That one asshole with his girlfriend clinging unto him once smugly asked him if he was on a date after spotting him walking alone near the food court. What a bastard.

He couldn't spot any of his usual tormentors right now though, who had opted nowadays to go with the more passive-aggressive approach to bullying him.

After a few more minutes of being a listless mallrat, he went back to the parking lot and spotted his ride back home, which was his designated school service jeepney.

***

On the eastern border of Metro Manila, the highly urbanized city of Pasig City existed under the cover of smog clouds and the infamously polluted Pasig River, which it shared its name with.

To its south, it was bordered by the cosmopolitan center of Makati. To its north was Marikina. To its west was Mandaluyong and Quezon City (where Fatima High was). To its east were the municipalities of Taytay and Cainta in the Rizal Province.

Pasig was also known for its raging floods during typhoon season, by which it could've gotten its name from. The city had floods that were "Mapagsik" or "Mabagsik" (in English, it meant "Raging", "Fierce", or "Aggressive") which eventually evolved into "Pagsik" or "Pasig".

Usually, the private jeepney service fetched Florante and a couple of others from their private school so they could go home safe and sound on behalf of all their parents, who paid them a monthly fee for the convenience.

However, the jeepney's open-air windows also gave them to get a good whiff of Metro Manila pollution for good measure.

Florante covered his mouth with a handkerchief. No point in getting sick and triggering his asthma again.

The sky remained hazy, its blueness sporting an ashen tinge to it as though muted by the city smog. The wind in his face thankfully disappeared as they went to a standstill.

The classic late afternoon traffic jam in the metro. Only the Bangkok Jam could rival its ubiquitousness in Metro Manila.

His new school was about 4 miles or about an hour away from his home in Pasig City. His former school, which only offered classes up until Grade 6, was instead 13 minutes away or about a mile away.

Thusly, it felt like it took the jeep forever to get him home.

As they sluggish traffic wore on, Florante's mind started wandering.

His mother was the typical strict Filipina mother. Domineering, almost. He could never talk to her about anything. Their relationship was complicated. She wasn't the hugging or healing type of mother. She kind of scared him most of the time, actually.

Sure, she perhaps had her own things to worry about, like how he kept on hearing about her own domineering mother-in-law—his grandmother from his father's side—but he dreaded her wrath as much as she detested his grandma.

His mother also for the most part looked like her sisters or his aunts... of course... while Florante himself looked like one of his cousins or uncles when they were younger. They all shared the same almond skin, black hair, and sharp, dark brown eyes.

She was in stark contrast of his father, her husband, who looked somewhat like he was of Chinese or Japanese (East Asian) descent but was actually a Filipino himself. As strict and boisterous as she was, his father was the exact opposite.

A relaxed and chill engineer who tinkered a lot around the house, doing quick fixes from their pipes to their ceiling to save them thousands of pesos from having plumbers and electricians do their work for them.

By the time the jeepney school service arrived at his home, there was a drizzle of rain. It soon became a downpour when he got inside the house. Just in time.

It was already June, after all. Rainy season. Also, the month of Florante's birthday.

He'd have another birthday spent with his family. He had no friends to invite over the house for dinner. No parties with his compatriots drinking beer either. He never even tried beer.

He had heard that taking in too much alcohol could compromise his breathing as an asthmatic. Not that he'd ever tried.

Besides, he was a minor. Even though he had heard of several of his classmates drinking a bit of the bubbly themselves.

He was used to having a simple feast of spaghetti and a liter of Coca-Cola as his only birthday splurge. Tuition for his private school was expensive and in the Philippines, the school year started in June.

So his birthday had to be as simple as possible during tuition month, which was also his birthday month.

***

After Florante got home to the Galang Residence in Pasig, he went straight to the television set to catch the tail-end of whichever anime was airing in the afternoon.

He hated how as a kid, when "Thundercats" was a big deal, he always ended up seeing the end credits whenever he tried catching it on TV.

Ditto with "Rainbow Brite".

When he finished with that attempt at entertaining himself, he took his bag and went to his room.

Before doing his homework, he changed into a shirt and baggy shorts as popularized by the G.O.A.T. (Greatest of All Time) of 1990s basketball, Michael Jordan. He also read a bit of "Paradise Lost" by 17th Century English poet John Milton for good measure.

And when that gave him a headache, what with his short attention span and the hard-to-read long-form poetry, he had the Cliffnotes version help him summarize and analyze each passage.

At the back of his mind, he chided himself to do as much effort on his math homework as he did with his "extracurricular reading" of this book for the sake of creating his own comic book story.

Nevertheless, while he was wandering around the mall earlier, alone in his thoughts, he thought about Mammon's intentions in his dreams.

As a demon, he obviously tried to tempt him to go all out and transform into an Ophanim, perhaps to the point of becoming a fallen angel and turning into a Minion.

However, for what purpose? To add him to their demon horde? Their "Pandemonium"? What were they trying to achieve, awakening Ophanims and corrupting them to become Minions?

The thought kind of excited him a little bit. He'd been struggling to come up with a plot for his comic book or original story, only for his strange dreams full of his male power fantasies and coping mechanisms to hand him such a plot on a silver platter.

He should really make more detailed accounts of his dreams in his dream journal from now on.

While also making sure never to allow his classmates, especially his mostly male bullies, to know he was keeping a dream journal like a 6-year-old girl still having tea parties with her dollies.

The rest of the afternoon and evening became a blur.

His Dad got home after fetching his two elder sisters from college at the University of Sto. Tomas. Then it was dinnertime. They ate his Mom's specialty of pork adobo (meat simmered in a mixture of garlic, soy sauce, and vinegar).

He couldn't bring up the fact that he was getting bullied at school to his parents, which apparently was typical of bullied kids.

No one wanted to be a victim of bullying or admit to being one.

What would they do to help fix it anyway? Knowing his Mom, she might even blame him for the bullying, bringing up that he was a disrespectful child.

His Mom, bless her heart, was such as stereotypical strict Asian parent. He was also petrified of her more often than not—more than his bullies—particularly when he came home with bad grades.

He didn't get beat up for them or anything, but he did get an earful of lectures from her. The beatings came when he answered back or "disrespected" her somehow, as she put it.

She had quite the fiery temper. Her arsenal of weapons included tsinelas (flip-flops), the nearest wooden spoon, a walis tingting (broom made from the thin midribs of palm leaves), or a walis tambo (broom made from the flower stalks of Tiger grass).

Had he mentioned that he had a complicated relationship with his mother? Because he did. Confessing to her that he was being bullied was the last thing on his mind.

She might somehow make it about him disrespecting her or something. No way did he want to trigger that ass-whupping if he could help it.

In contrast, Dad was more of a congenial fellow. The good cop to his Mom's bad cop. He never hit him and Florante couldn't remember the last time his father became angry or lashed out at him.

He could have heart-to-heart talks with him. It was much easier with him than with his contentious Mom that reminded him more of Cinderella's Stepmother whenever she got into one of her "moods".

However, he also couldn't outright confess to him about the bullying. It was too embarrassing. Shameful. Like he was too old to still not have friends or to still get teased by the boys in his class.

He did mention to him about having to deal with the jerks in class though. So he subtly told him about the bullying without telling him he was being bullied. If that made sense.

***

After dinner at the Galang Residence…

Once everyone in the family settled down and went their separate ways, with his parents going to their room, one sister going to the TV, and another sister going to the phone, Florante planned his approach to his father carefully.

After chancing upon Dad going to the kitchen to fetch a container of cold water to drink, Florante asked his question.

No, not about bullying. It was about the Dead Kids.

"Dad, do you know anyone named Celestino in Pasig? Or Hidalgo…?"

His father blinked at that. "Can't say that I have. I don't even have coworkers named like that. Hidalgo is the national artist, right?"

By the way, Florante's father was a mechanical engineer who worked at a factory for a multinational company. And he meant "Felix Hidalgo" by national Filipino artist and painter.

"How about Benjamin? Estanislao?" Florante pressed. "Back in Makati, did we know of any Tolentinos?"

"Whoa, whoa. Settle down there, kid."

Dad scratched his the freshly shaved stubble that would've formed into a beard.

"I might've had a classmate named Benjamin, but that's his first name. I've heard of Father Estanislao who marched with Jose Rizal during his final walk before his execution. There are too many Tolentinos around to say that I know the same Tolentinos you know."

Florante sighed then smiled. "Thanks, Dad." His father always obliged or humored even the silliest of his questions. He answered them the best he could. 'He really is the best.'

"Why are you asking me this? Are they the names of your friends or something?"

The son awkwardly laughed. "Yeah, something like that."

Dad ruffled Florante's head. "That's good. Make more friends in school, son."

The heartwarming exchange made Florante divulge something he normally wouldn't. "They… the kids… they're a little different. They don't seem to fit in at school." Unsaid, he added, 'Like I do.'

His Dad pulled a seat and sat with him, setting aside the cold water bottle he fetched from the refrigerator for now.

"Did I ever tell you about how your cousin punched a kid who was messing with him at Fatima? He got suspended and the school faculty even called your uncle to the principal's office. But the kid never messed with him ever again."

'If only I had the guts to do that,' Florante thought. He said, "I don't think they'll ever fight back or anything, but it's messed up that they don't fit in. They did nothing wrong. Who cares if they're a little weird?"

Dad nodded. "When it comes to bullies, it's best that you show them who's boss from the start. The more you let them get to you the more they'll mess with you."

Florante then realized his father was subtly giving advice for his own bullying after bringing up his friends.

However, he was so pathetic he could only dream of blasting his bullies to kingdom come, which was even more messed up. Now that he had considered the consequences of such actions, he'd rather just embarrass them a little bit. Like his cousin did to his bully.

Punch them once to have them leave you alone for good. Or even pull a prank. No need to kill them or anything!

Good thing it was all just a dream. Once it ended, he faced no consequences for his actions. Or so he kept telling himself.

Like he'd just hit the reset button on his game console to go back to the main menu or the first level. Or hit the Ctrl + Z shortcut on the family's personal computer, undoing his mistakes on the MS Word document or MS Paint bitmap.

If only he could hit "Undo" all the way to the first day of his freshman year at Fatima, then that would be peachy. Alas, reality didn't work that way.

Backpedaling a bit while also denying he was being bullied, Florante said, "Those guys seemed nice enough to me. I just noticed they kept to themselves more often than not. Some of them are my classmates in the Art Club, even."

"So they act just like you, huh?" said Florante's father. "You also keep to yourself a lot. Which is perfectly fine, son. It's a good thing you've found friends who match your personality, Florante."

"Yeah, I guess, Dad. Birds of a feather, am I right?" he said, now wishing to change the subject.

They lapsed into silence before Dad got up, grabbed his water bottle, and said to him, "Good night, son."

He in turn said, "Good night, Dad."

After a little while, Florante himself got up from his seat and went to the TV to watch whatever it was his sister was watching.

He was already sleepy by the time he started on his math homework, which he considered finishing while traveling to school on his school service jeepney.

***

The rest of the week proved uneventful. No new fucked-up dreams about him murdering classmates or battling eldritch abominations with his newest crush, Jenny Tolentino.

No Mammon. No Minions. No Ophanims. Just… vibes. These alien concepts all started fading in his subconscious like dreams and nightmares were supposed to.

He got used to the routine of his classes and being at least civil around classmates that tolerated him at best while whispering devilish rumors about him behind his back.

Oh well. He did promise the Jenny from his dreams to forget all about the angel and demon nonsense to live out his normal life.

However, try as he might, he couldn't forget those fever dreams where he moved as swiftly as the wind and destroyed everything in his path like a U.S. missile strike.

In reality, during P.E. (Physical Education) class, the classmates he got paired up with learned not to pass him the basketball and to step quickly in front of him if the other team attempted to exploit his unathletic asthmatic self as their weakest link.

Florante did his best to get out of their way or serve as an extra body to clog passing lanes when he wasn't being benched for other, more skilful basketball players.

However, he noticed something was amiss.

Jennifer Tolentino hadn't come back to school since the last time he got into contact with her.

It had been a week since he last talked to Jenny. On the phone in real life and at Guadalupe Church in his dreams. Or did both things happen in his dreams?

Every day, he watched anxiously for any sign of her. The hawk-sized butterflies at the pit of his stomach made him wonder if she wasn't able to revive from her untimely demise in his last dream.

Only for him to mentally slap himself and chide that his daydreams or nighttime dreams had no effect on reality. Jenny was probably absent for some other reason.

He'd been hanging out with the Dead Kids again lately, acting as their gopher. Nevertheless, he couldn't get Jenny out of his mind. How could he? She was gone!

It'd be much easier for him to follow her advice and forget about this Ophanim business had she continued going to Fatima High and acting normal herself.

Then he could at least pretend that his psychotic massacre of his classmates and failed attempts at heroism against fallen angels or demons hadn't really happened.

In English class—as headed by the no-nonsense Mr. Benigno "Noy" Borabo—Florante took his accustomed seat at the back of the class, near the windows overlooking the streets outside.

They got a pop quiz on English grammar involving Subject, Predicate, Object of the Preposition, and so forth, which only made him wish they'd do more required reading.

He'd at least watched the film/TV/animated versions of "Tom Sawyer", "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn", "The Odyssey", "To Kill a Mockingbird", "The Great Gatsby", "Lord of the Flies", "Animal Farm", or "Of Mice and Men".

Or read the CliffsNotes versions of such and many other classics. Reviewing grammar rules was as boring as reading the phone book.

Regardless, he felt more comfortable with school lately than ever before.

He had reached some sort of closure or homeostasis (thanks, Ms. Del Mundo's Biology Class) with his nightmares involving classmate murder and choosing between becoming an angel or a demon.

Ha. Closure. He sounded like the family of a missing person that finally found out the grisly fate of their beloved.

In regards to his real-life bullying situation, he had instead reached ennui (thanks, Webster's Dictionary). A feeling of listlessness and dissatisfaction arising from a lack of occupation or excitement.

Maybe it was this lack of catharsis and boredom—from the impasse he and his bullies had reached since he decided to bite the bullet and snitch on them—that led him to dream such horrid dreams.

By Friday, he wondered about whether or not he should give Jenny a call. He had her number for real, after all.

For all he knew, she had already dropped out of school.

He tried not thinking about the nerdy girl, but he couldn't completely suppress his anxiousness that he'd been somehow responsible for her absence, as absurd of a thought as that was.

Florante Galang slept a dreamless sleep over the weekend due to the soft June rain and even softer thoughts of the bespectacled Jenny.

He might've finished his weekend homework by then but he neglected to read up on Social Studies, leading him to cram at the last minute for the upcoming quiz while riding his jeepney service to school that fateful Monday.

It felt a bit nippy outside so early in the morning at 7:30 AM or so, before the school assembly started.

He got cursory acknowledgements of his existence from several classmates by Monday morning, after getting off his school service ride and making a beeline towards his classroom.

He also dealt with small talk on whether or not he was able to finish the homework before they proceeded to talk to their own actual friends and ignore him in his lonesome.

The morning was cold but at least it wasn't raining. The school assembly proved uneventful. Still no sign of Jennifer though. Was she absent again?

The different classes then headed to back to their respective classrooms in order to proceed with the first subject of the day.

***

Another day, another boring class.

Florante had Araling Panlipunan (Social Studies) for today, as covered by Mr. Neil Nepumoceno. Neil was the jokey type of teacher with a strange goofy charisma to him whose signature outburst was "Aye Caramba!"

Yeah, like Bart Simpson's catchphrase from The Simpsons. Quite the character. Mr. Nepumoceno encouraged debate and rapport with his students during every topic he covered, from the Philippine Revolution against Spain to World War II.

Florante's blood ran cold as he remembered something.

Neil was the teacher that got in his way during his dream massacre of his classmates from First Year St. Francis.

Oh yeah. Galang had turned Mr. Nepumoceno into a splatter on the wall. Like something out of a horror B-movie. Or a Mortal Kombat "Fatality".

He pushed such dark thoughts deep into his subconscious mind. He promised the dream version of Jenny that he'd forget about that dream. Or all his dreams since then. So he would.

With that said, a certain someone—a classmate of his—still didn't give him the time of day. Not that any of them did, but this particular one hurt him the most when it happened.

Galang still felt awkward being around Laura Reyes, but that was to be expected.

His first high school crush remained upset about that "nude drawing" incident when he didn't actually draw her nude! He was using a rough sketch and shapes to construct her body before adding details and clothes, dammit!

He had hoped he wasn't as subconsciously psychotic as he suspected he was, what with him dreaming about killing Laura (albeit in a moment of duress) just because she didn't return his affection and all.

For weeks since the incident, they avoided each other like the plague even though they were classmates. It even got to the point where Florante could've sworn Laura got bothered by him avoiding her before she could avoid him.

Yes, it was ridiculous, not to mention egotistical, to think that he could affect anyone that strongly. It was impossible, even. And yet he couldn't stop worrying that it was true. At the time, anyway.

That little twinge of annoyance from her gave him a small spark of hope that he still occupied Laura's mind somehow, even in the form of a pest.

Better that than be ignored altogether.

However, now Laura was but an afterthought compared to the glasses-wearing girl in Florante's literal dreams.

Florante held his breath at the door, peering here and there of any sign of Jennifer Tolentino, but it seemed she wasn't around. He exhaled and went to his seat.

Jenny then followed him from behind, talking about yearbooks and phone calls or something.

Wait a minute.

"Jenny?" he blurted out.

"Flor!" she said in return. "Oops, you told me to not call you that! Sorry!"

"No, it's all right. I don't mind," he reassured. "What was that about phone books?"

"Oh, I was just askin' why you called me from my house last time," she said with the sweetest smile as she brushed a single lock of hair from her face.

He gulped and explained himself, saying he found it interesting that he found another Jennifer Tolentino in an older Fatima High yearbook, stuttering all the while.

At the back of his mind, he told himself to calm down. This wasn't unusual. Jennifer had talked to him before. She didn't cut all communication from him like Laura did. She'd always been friendly to everyone.

She wasn't friendly beyond logic like the dream version of her that invited him into her apartment after finding out he essentially stalked her though.

Still, he couldn't remember one person where she had beef or drama with in their class.

She lingered by his desk till the bell rang, which left his heart aflutter. She then went to sit by her actual seat while Mr. Nepumoceno finally arrived to start the class.

He considered hanging out with Jenny some more but thought the better of it.

This wasn't the Manic Pixie Dream Girl Jenny. Even a nice girl like the real Jenny might lack tact to let him down gently if ever he became one of those overly friendly boys that hung around the girls a bit too much.

However, as class began, Florante realized he had another problem in his hands.

He couldn't stop staring at Jenny. He tried to be slick about it too, but he knew she knew he was watching her. This made him overcompensate and avoid gazing at her ever for fear for him creeping her out.

What was wrong with him? Dammit. He pulled the same thing the first time Laura rejected him over that misunderstanding with the drawing. With him not staring at her and all. Or ignoring her beyond reason.

Susmaryosep. He wouldn't be surprised if Jenny started avoiding him too.

Anyway, he should pay more attention to class. They were covering the Martial Law years or something. He hoped he crammed about the right topic for the quiz later.

The good news was that Jenny, the real Jenny, had begun talking to him more, like she used to before his unfortunate falling out with her group due to Laura thinking he was a creep.

The bad news, if it could be considered bad news, was that he kind of missed having memorable dreams and fighting against nightmarish monsters beyond human comprehension.

He could deal with those dreams better than his awkward reality of teenage infatuation.

***

Much later, during lunchtime…

As Florante walked out of class along with the rest of his classmates as the lunch bell rang, the air glistened with a light rain. The cold wind bit at his nose. His cheeks.

A light sprinkle fell from hesitantly overcast skies that still shone of daylight. Silvery slivers of water reflected bits of rainbow sunshine as a result.

Dammit. He should've brought an umbrella with him but he forgot again.

Meanwhile, his head got lost in those clouds, wondering how to best approach Jennifer while a part of him screamed at himself to stop making a fool of himself over his newest crush.

Sometimes, discretion was the better part of valor. Sometimes, the only way to win the game was not to play.

"I'll see you at lunch, okay?" Florante heard someone from behind him say, which he soon realized was Alonzo Estanislao. Huh.

Florante smiled and began to nod, but he then hesitated and said, "We'll see. I might skip lunch."

Lonzo kept walking as he spoke. "Sure. No prob. Still waiting for your girlfriend to get back?" he teased.

"Shut up. She's not my girlfriend. Stop being weird," Florante hissed at Lonzo, looking around him for any sign of his classmates. They might overhear and spread rumors again about his crush, just like with Laura.

"Okay, okay. I'm just kidding," reassured Alonzo. "So did anything good happen? You're smiling more."

Gah. Was he that obvious?

"She's back already," Galang murmured it so softly it sounded like an afterthought, hoping Lonzo would miss what he'd say, only for him to cringe when he heard, "Congrats, man."

The drizzle became a squall, and Florante's mood became as soggy as a wet sock The more it rained the soggier it got and the worse his unease grew.

He considered locking himself in the library again on an empty stomach instead of eating with the so-called Dead Kids like the social outcast that they were.

He checked his wallet. He had enough spare change for a soda, at least. And maybe a bag of chips.

He entered the cafeteria, which was on a basement level of a building separate from their high school building. The grade school and high school buildings shared the same cafeteria.

The sun flooded daylight inside the cafeteria basement through a series of chain-link fences that served as the wall that separated the area from the nearby park and the grassy soccer field.

The soft squall made the grass glisten in the sun. During downpours, whole islands were formed on the field amidst the flood of puddles, mud, and sludge. Like a miniature archipelago.

Florante scanned for the Dead Kids' table in the corner of the cafeteria out of habit. Then he froze where he stood.

There were six people at the table now. Excluding Florante, because he hadn't reached there yet.

Huh. Six people.

The usual five were there: Alonzo "Lonzo" Estanislao, Kalantiaw "Kal" Hidalgo and his sister Dalisay, Jacob "Benjo" Benjamin, and Francisco "Kiko" Celestino.

The sixth one was a familiar face, though. It was Jennifer "Jenny" Tolentino.

Florante took out his asthma inhaler and took a puff as soon as he started making those familiar wheezing sounds.

***

Alonzo Estanislao called after Florante Galang after spotting him.

"Yo, Flor!" Lonzo said, which made "Flor" wince. "What are you standing around for? Come over here!"

As Florante did just that, he wondered what was Jenny doing over there.

She'd finally got to school after a week of being absent, but what was she doing with the Dead Kids' table?

Galang looked down and away from the table as soon as Jenny stared at his direction. His ears felt hot. He told himself he had no reason to feel self-conscious. It wasn't as if he did anything wrong, after all.

"What's with Florante?" Florante heard Dalisay ask, which made him finally pick up his pace towards the table before he embarrassed himself any further in front of the one group in the school that hung out with him.

The dainty Dalisay asked once he got there, "You okay, Florante? Do you need to go to the clinic or something?"

Benjo sniggered and needled, "Maybe he's constipated. He needs to take a massive dump!" which prompted Lonzo to smack him upside the head while in the background, Kal harrumphed and called them both idiots.

"You're so gross, Benjo," admonished Dalisay.

He felt his body jolt when he heard Jenny ask, "It's not your asthma acting up, is it?"

Galang reassured her that it wasn't the case, revealing his handy inhaler in his pocket. "Not asthma." He shook his head vigorously. "I'm fine," he reassured, scratching the back of his head. His wheezy breathing belying his reassurances.  

Once his eyes met with Jennifer, he muttered, "H-Hey. Fancy meeting you here."

Jenny smiled and brushed her hair back from her face. "Likewise, Flor. I'm back, I guess?"

Florante smiled in spite of himself. Laughing nervously, he changed the suhject. "I think I'll get a soda today. Any of you need anything?"

"Just soda?" asked Jenny. "It's lunch, not recess. Eat something."

"Aren't you hungry, Florante?" chimed in Dalisay.

"Actually, maybe I do feel a little sick," Florante said, looking at the floor and his dirty shoes. "Um. I mean, I don't have an appetite right now."

Lonzo, who now looked scuffed up from his roughhousing with Benjo, grabbed Florante by the shoulders and sat him down the bench of the lunch table. "Then sit this one out. I'll fetch everyone their lunch and buy your soda."

Florante gulped and nodded his thanks while handing the money to Lonzo, who elected to be the group's gopher for today.

Jacob and Kalantiaw also volunteered to come with him to help out holding the lunch trays.

***

Florante waited for the trio to get their food along with the usually studious Kiko, the wallflower Goth Queen Dalisay, and, well, his classmate Jenny, whom he ended up sitting beside with thanks to Lonzo's prompting.

Damn that Lonzo.

He had nowhere to look and he somehow didn't feel like talking at length to Jenny right now.

Also, when he looked up across the table, he ended up staring at a stern-looking Celestino who looked more like a teacher or a college student than someone from high school.

The studious Kiko barely talked at all, even though he was viewed by the rest of the school campus as the leader of the Dead Kids.

His batch's likeliest Valedictorian or even Salutatorian was this socially awkward nerd. Who knew?

Francisco hadn't even gone to college yet and Florante could already swear he'd become the Summa Cum Laude, if not at least the Magna Cum Laude of his year of college graduates with ease. He just exuded that kind of academically superior aura.

"What is it?" asked Kiko, his eyes meeting with Florante's as he looked up from what he was reading (Advanced Calculus).

"HUH? Oh, nothing!" said Florante. The last thing he wanted was small talk with Mr. Battle of the Brains himself. "Sorry for staring."

For a student supposedly only 3 years older than him, Celestino gave Galang the vibes of a someone much older. Like a college professor. Or a CEO. Or a high-priced attorney. Any full-grown adult with loads of money, power, worldly experience, or influence.

With a raised eyebrow, Celestino returned to his book and commented, "Take the hint, kid."

'Take the hint…?' Florante thought, only for him to realize that Alonzo probably already talked to Francisco to about him and Jenny.

Dammit, you guys. It wasn't that serious! He didn't even remember telling any of them about his feelings for Jenny either! How'd they figure things out?

Minutes later, he got his soda, which he sipped slowly. Or maybe he should sip it faster so that he could excuse himself and leave.

He could even play his asthma up and escape to the clinic for the next hour.

However, he told himself to get a hold of, well, himself. Why should he run away?

To make way for their lunch trays and lunches, Florante took the opportunity to move away and give room to the rest of the Dead Kids, with him sitting on a separate table with his soda.

Eventually, he decided to permit himself to glance beside him. If Jenny glared at him for staring, he'd have the resolve to go to the nurse's office and skip class for the rest of the afternoon.

Or complain about the upset stomach he was literally feeling right now. Like the coward he was.He wouldn't be lying either. He had butterflies in his stomach the size of eagles, it felt like.

He looked up in time to see Dalisay and Jenny laughing at Benjo's antics with Lonzo.

This reminded him of how the Dead Kids charmed him into their group in the first place, actually. They were social outcasts like him, but they chose to be so. They showed him it was okay to be different.

They liked keeping to themselves and didn't care how they looked to others, which Florante respected a lot.

The most abuse Florante got from them was them using him as their gopher or getting his name wrong. Even Benjo, their one member that reminded Galang of his classmate bulies, never went the extra mile when teasing him.

He never felt like any of them dehumanized or degraded him. Or treated him like the "other".

They didn't treat him particularly well or superbly, but even their mere tolerance of him was leagues better than the treatment he got from his own classmates as the resident weirdo of the class.

Florante heaved a relieved sigh at Jenny getting along with the rest of his so-called friends. Or even acquaintances.

His heart twinged with jealousy at the sight too. Made him wish he was closer with both the Dead Kids and Jennifer.

What was he even worried about again?

That he'd ruin another friendship because he caught feelings with Jenny like he did with Laura, so he'd start acting all awkward and creepy around her?

Nah. He had no need to fear. He simply just had to deny his silly crush with Jennifer so they wouldn't end up cold and distant like him and Laura Reyes did.

Even if this was good as it got, he'd be fine with it.

This was his path of least regrets.

If there was an event he wouldn't "Undo" with a magical "Ctrl + Z" command, then it would be him meeting his friendships/acquaintances, the Dead Kids.

***

Aside from the playfulness and banter, something seemed different between the Dead Kids and Jenny Tolentino from the rest of Florante's classmates that he couldn't quite put his finger on.

Their infectious positivity seemed like something out of a commercial for menthol cigarettes or saltine crackers, thought the bemused Florante.

No wait. Mentos. They acted like they were in a Mentos commercial!

Something about them seemed almost surreal. Or unreal. Like a performance.

He examined Jenny the most. Not because he was enamored by her, of course. Well, maybe because of that too.

Jenny's glasses glinted in the daylight of the open cafeteria. Her skin was pale, but it looked practically tanned when near the porcelain or marble statue skin of Dalisay, who truly lived up to her name. In Tagalog, "Dalisay" meant "Pure".

Hell, compared to her, Florante's skin was practically wood-colored.

Florante averted his eyes from Kal's sister by reflex, knowing full-well of how extreme Dalisay's overprotective brother behaved around people who stared at her or even tried to talk to her (like Lonzo, who was supposed to be their friend).

Meanwhile, Jenny's pink lips pursed into a cute pout as she and Dalisay teased each other over… something. Her hazel eyes sparkled with her flushed, blushing face.

What was about her that seemed strange to him? Was it his imagination? He pondered, staring at Jenny, trying to isolate any changes in her expression.

At the back of his mind, he idly wondered if this Jenny had the same memories as the Jenny in his dreams. The one that saved his life twice. The literal girl of his dreams. Did reality match his fantasy?

"What are you staring at, Flor?" asked Lonzo with a snicker, and Florante knew that the cheeky bastard already knew the answer to his own damn question.

At that moment, Jenny's eyes flashed to meet Florante's.

Instead of merely looking curious, she gave him a harsh stare. Like a warning of some sort. Her sharp eyes belying the smile on her face.

Florante dropped his head, letting his curtain of hair bangs cover his face. During the instant that their eyes met, he could've sworn.

"Flor…?" Lonzo beckoned again.

Florante could've sworn that she recognized him. No, wait. That didn't make any sense. Of course she'd recognize him. He was her classmate, Florante.

No, no. What he meant was that her eyes glowed the same way it did in his dreams.

Her look of recognition wasn't because she recognized him as Florante. It was because she recognized him as Archangel Gabriel.

He had promised in his last dream that he'd forget about everything, but here he was breaking that promise once more. Even though honestly, he couldn't help it.

How Florante surmised all that from a simple glare, he couldn't tell you.

Or maybe he was just in denial. His constant staring must've finally got on Jenny's nerves, leading to her glaring at him.

Lonzo whispered, "Is your girlfriend staring back at you too?"

Florante palmed his face. His cheeks felt hot to the touch. "She doesn't look angry or anything, does she?"

"I don't know," came Estanislao's unhelpful answer. "Maybe stop being a weirdo and talk to her like a normal person?"

"Stop calling her my girlfriend then," Florante begged. "She's probably the only friend I got in class. You'll just weird her out."

"Sure thing, buddy. I'm just teasing," relented Alonzo.

"…So she's not angry?"

"Ask her yourself, dumbass!" Lonzo put Florante in a headlock and rubbed his knuckles over the top of his noggin. "Jeez, no wonder you're bullied so much! Grow a spine!"

***

Mustering up the courage to talk to Jenny, Florante sat beside her and talked. Like the good ol' days when he, her, and Laura first met.

He asked Jenny without looking at her, "Where have you been?"

She thought for a minute. "Oh, around."

The coy answer made him second-guess himself. If he referenced his dreams about her in any way, would she confirm them as real?

No, that was stupid. "Were you sick?" he asked.

"Maybe a little. Like you. I'm fine now, thank you for asking," she answered.

"Oh. That's good to hear. I'm glad," he said.

"It's been cold lately, hasn't it?" she said. "No wonder everyone is getting sick nowadays."

"Yeah. But sunny other times. Like the weather's bipolar or something," he said.

"I know, right? Like it couldn't make up its mind," she said.

"Did you get contacts?" he then blurted out unthinkingly.

Puzzled by his unexpected question, she answered, "No. I'm wearing glasses."

"Oh yeah," he mumbled, wishing the earth would part and swallow him whole. "I thought there was something different about your eyes."

She shrugged with a confused smile. "It's the same eyes I've always had."

Man, what was this conversation even about? Talk about awkward.

After a slight pause, Jenny asked, "…Sooo were the rumors true? Did you or didn't you draw Laura Reyes nude?" while adjusting her large, bug-like spectacles in a way that honestly only she could pull off.

"What? NO! I didn't…" Florante raised his voice, but he then trailed off lamely. His voice sounded sad, even to him.

He soldiered on though, pleading his innocence. "I-I was doing a rough sketch! Can you tell her that it wasn't a nude sketch but a rough sketch? The guys who told her it was nude were just messing with me!"

"Really? Show me," she said before taking out a pencil and notebook from out of her purse.

"What? You mean right now?" he asked.

"Why not?" she countered.

Why not indeed. So Florante recalled the anatomy lessons of Art Class and did rough sketches of what initially looked like a naked woman. He then added details like a blouse, skirt, glasses, and shoes to the full-body sketch.

"See? It was all a big misunderstanding!" he said, only for his jaw to go slack as a blushing Jennifer beside him told him, "I didn't realize you were going to use me as an example!"

He looked down and sure enough, he ended up drawing Jenny. "I-I can explain…!"

"I'm just glad you didn't turn it into a nude portrait! My boobs aren't that big!"

"OF COURSE NOT! To do that is sexual harassment!" he yelped, which made Jenny laugh.

He felt his heart twinge at the sight for sore eyes. Her giggles sounded soft and enchanting. Like wind chimes on a gentle summer breeze.

"I was joking, Flor!" She looked at his sketch of her. "Wow. Not bad."

"Eh, it looks a bit cartoony," he said, criticizing his own sketch. "Like an anime sketch. I could've done better."

"Just accept the compliment, you dork!" she chided.

Florante chuckled at that. "You know what? You're an okay gal, Jenny."

This made the both of them go silent. That line was what he said to Jenny before he proceeded to massacre the rest of his classmates.

"You're an okay gal, Jenny. Don't go to school today. For your own good."

A flood of memories—well, false memories that didn't happen anywhere else but his dream—almost overwhelmed Florante.

Him becoming a roaring typhoon of vengeance against his bullies before facing off against an angelic Laura. His tandem fight with Jenny against a spaghetti monster, where he discovered she was also an angel.

His visit to her apartment. Their confrontation with Mammon. Him managing to defeat the crawling chaos. None of that happened yet Florante remembered them all as if they did.

***

The group went their separate ways. Florante was about to head off to the library himself, killing time like always until the late afternoon bell rung for their next class.

However, what Jenny told him before he went off gave him pause.

She looked him in the eye and said, "You promised."

…What?

Before he could speak, she invaded his personal space and said, "Don't break your promise."

She then turned around and left, as though she didn't just say something cryptic and disturbing to him.

"Jenny…!"

"Hmmm? What is it, Flor?"

He hesitated answering. Did he just imagine her say, "Don't break your promise"? Was she gaslighting him? He then said, "I'm okay with it."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm okay with you calling me Flor."

Jenny tilted her head to the side and smiled. "Okay."

His mind spun from confusion. Had he made up the whole exchange before just now? She acted perfectly polite. Like the conversation they had about promises and breaking them never happened.

Or maybe she meant some other promise he couldn't remember breaking?

He had half the mind to believe that the entire exchange was from his own imagination. It was his subconscious mind taking the form of Jenny, warning him not to pursue the madness that was his questionable dreams.

Because the minute he started believing that everything he'd dreamed up until that point was real, that was when Jennifer would give him the same disgusted stare Laura gave him when she had rejected him.

Maybe he really was going out of his mind, dreaming up scenarios where Jenny was his Damsel in Distress and he served as her super-powered Knight in Shining Armor, rescuing her from eldritch abominations and whatnot.

Just like Mammon said. Maybe Mammon was no demon. Instead, Mammon was his common sense. What was left of his sanity.

On one hand, he should be glad all this murder, mayhem, and destruction using fantastical or cosmic powers happened merely in his dreams instead of irreversible reality.

They served as his own Ctrl + Z or Magic Slate that undid what could've been permanent mistakes.

On the other hand, he also wished he'd have dreamed up being a social pariah and the butt of everyone's jokes in Fatima High. He wanted to redo that part of his life as well.

Then maybe once he woke up every morning, he'd instead be greeted with friends and cheers as well as belong in a social circle not rejected by the rest of the school campus.

Undoing the destruction of a shadow monster or sentient Italian dish wasn't a problem Florante could relate to. His inability to form healthy relationships with his peers was.

Hell, if only he could Ctrl + Z his entire childhood. Now that was an even cooler superpower than the Light Array.

"…Galang? Florante Galang?" someone called out to him in the middle of his introspection, thus interrupting his inner monologue.

Who was it? Who dared interrupt the great and powerful avatar of Archangel Gabriel?

Oh. It was him. One of his bullies. Not one of his worst bullies, mind you, but one of his bullies nonetheless.

His bully that used to be his friend before he went with the flow of the rest of the class.

His personal Judas Iscariot. The Brutus to his Julius Caesar: Isaiah Pascual.

The guy whose head Florante blew apart in the murderous fever dream, to be exact.

***

The two former friends kept talking and walking as they went to their late afternoon class.

"Florante," said a sweaty Isaiah, who rubbed his hands together.

"Pascual," said Florante, who wrinkled his nose.

"Hey, buddy. Been a while since we've talked, right?" said Pascual with a hesitant, crooked smile.

"Yeah, I guess." Galang shrugged, eyeing the door to the classroom. "What do you want?"

On the asthmatic's part, he probably smiled the same disingenuous smile as well to keep up appearances of politeness. What did this snake in the grass want anyway?

Florante vaguely remembered Isaiah as one of his few classmates that stood by him when he was being teased by his bullies.

Up until it Isaiah started getting teased himself, so he threw Florante under the bus to save himself.

Galang's first impression of Pascual when they were still cool with each other was that he had the vibes of a Golden Retriever. Or maybe even a sea otter, with that big nose of his.

Once inside the classroom, Florante went straight to his table, with half the mind to ignore Isaiah altogether. He merely half-listened to him at any rate.

"…Look, maybe we can continue this later. Okay, bro?"

"Sure. Whatever."

Grimacing, Galang remembered the swift kick to the testicles that Pascual gave him in his dream, thus "forcing" him to blow his head apart with his dream powers.

Should Florante condemn the guy for something he did in a dream though? No, he condemned Isaiah more for his betrayal of him in real life.

Regardless, the students settled down for Biology class for their section's Science subject that afternoon.

His Science teacher was a chirpy twenty-something named Ms. Isabelle "Belle" Del Mundo. The tall, slim teacher had a signature faint, singsong voice that was hard to miss. She sounded like a character straight from "Sesame  Street". Or "Batibot".

Ms. Del Mundo walked around the room, took attendance, and then had them move single file to the laboratory room at the second floor.

From there, Pascual kept following Florante.

"Gerry and the others finally let up on you, huh?" was the topic he chose to break the ice with. Goodness gracious.

Florante grunted. "More or less."

"Glad to hear it, bro."

'Uh-huh. I bet,' Florante thought, resisting the urge to roll his eyes.

Galang ended up with the reputation of being a snitch in exchange for his bullies to leave him alone, but at least now their bullying wasn't as bad as it could've been. He didn't appreciate the passive-aggressive digs though.

He also didn't want to have this talk with Isaiah. He instead wished he could've paired up with Jenny as lab partners. To talk to her more.

To ensure to her that he wasn't going to break his promise. No wait, the real Jenny didn't care about that. It was the Jenny in his insane mind that told him to lay off the daydreams and fever dreams once and for all.

When they got to the lab, Ms. Del Mundo had them separate themselves in pairs.

This was usually Florante's worst nightmare since nobody in class wanted to pair up with him, the social pariah. However, he hoped after his interactions with the real Jenny that they'd pair up this time.

However, instead, he got stuck with Isaiah, who insisted on being his lab partner for the day. What was up with him today?

Their Biology teacher then proceeded to distribute a microscope and a box of slides on each table. The room buzzed with conversation as they prepared the materials.

As Florante and Isaiah worked as lab partners like the good ol' days, when they were still buddies, the latter continued his small talk.

For his part, Galang kept his eyes away from the lab doors, doodling all sorts of sketches on the back of his Science notebook. Like a short comic of Freeza and Goku battling it out at Planet Namek.

"Wow. You just sketched all that out without thinking, huh?" said Isaiah.

"Yep. Just like before," said Florante without looking up from his notebook.

"You never change," said Pascual, which almost offended Galang.

Florante groaned. Instead of hearing the musical voice of Jenny, he instead got stuck with his former best friend's nasally whine. Stuck with the backstabber who saved himself from a social suicide pact and got himself new friends.

Well, maybe his new friends could help him out with whatever problem he was having!

In the corner of his eye, he saw that Jenny and Laura had actually paired up as lab partners instead, with them seated to the desk right in front of the teacher's table.

Laura looked stunning as usual—a showstopper for sure—but Jenny stole the show as far as being the apple of Florante's eye was concerned.

Her side profile remained friendly and open even when looked at from behind, her mouth open with a slight smile on her flawless lips.

Her glasses framed her dazzling features beautifully, like there'd be something missing without them.

She had a pretty nice figure from Florante's vantage point too. Both she and Laura had shapely hips, thin waists, and uh, wide hips that couldn't be hidden even by the folds of their checkered skirts.

He palmed his red face at having such lewd thoughts about his classmates.

"Ah, so you've moved on from Laura Reyes to Jenny Tolentino, huh?" asked Pascual, which got on Galang's nerves.

"Shut up," he murmured, which made Isaiah laugh.

"Bingo! I was right, wasn't I?"

Florante sighed. "…Is it that obvious?"

"Bro, you couldn't stop staring at her empty desk when she was absent last week and now you couldn't stop staring at her when she finally got back."

Jeez. Florante should be more careful and not wear his heart on his sleeve.

If his other bullies caught wind of this, he'd never hear the end of it. Or maybe they already knew and were biding their time to use this info against him. Dammit.

Thankfully, the soft-spoken Ms. Del Mundo began class at that very moment.

Florante tried to focus on her words as she explained to the class what they'd be doing today in the lab.

The slides inside the box were out of order. The lab partners had to separate the slides of onion root tip cells into the different mitosis phases they represented then label them one by one.

They couldn't use their Biology books. In 20 minutes, she'll be coming around to check who got everything right.

Galang already studied (crammed on) this topic and Pascual, if memory served him correctly, had the lower grades and lazier study ethic (work ethic for studying) between the two of them.

So by his calculations, he'd be doing most of the work while his partner did most of the talking.

"Prophase," said Florante after studying one of the slides he magnified to 40X via the microscope briefly.

"Say, Florante…"

"What? Just down 'Prophase' for the first slide, Pascual," he ordered as he slid another slide under the microscope.

Isaiah did what he was told, letting Galang do most of the work. He didn't even bother double-checking.

"How much do you remember about that stormy night?"

"Anaphase," Florante murmured. "What stormy night? I don't remember any storms."

"How to you spell that?" Pascual asked, and Florante obliged him.

"A-N-A-P-H-A-S-E. Anaphase."

"Okay, thanks."

"No problem."

After a brief pause, Pascual's voice went even quieter than before when he continued speaking. "The storm you caused. The one where you ran amok. You don't remember any of it?"

Florante blinked at that. Did he hear him right? No, he must not have. "Third slide please."

Pascual handed Florante the third slide and sighed. "So you don't remember, huh? I should've figured as much."

"What are you talking about?" asked Florante, feigning ignorance while his heart beat began rising in his chest. He then said, "Interphase," after glancing for a few seconds at the microscope.

"Enterphase?" asked Isaiah.

"No, 'Interphase' with a Letter 'I'. Still spelled with a 'phase'. P-H-A-S-E," clarified Florante, before probing, "…Well?"

Pascual wrote down the label and said, "It doesn't really matter if you don't remember." He chuckled. "Would you believe you blasted my face off with light bullets a few days ago? Like something out of a Sci-Fi or martial arts movie, man!"

Florante took his eye off of the microscope and snapped his head in attention towards Isaiah. He felt lightheaded after doing so.

The two were about done with the activity. At the corner of Florante's eye, he could see both Laura and Jenny were already finished with their own slides minutes ago.

The color from Pascual's own face drained the same way it did when facing off against an angrier Florante in his fever dream.

"Oh shit. You do remember, don't you?"

'No. No way. There's no way my dreams are real. There's no way I literally killed my bullies in my dreams, only to press 'Ctrl + Z' and 'Undo' what I did!'

"Susmaryosep," Florante Galang murmured under his breath, wishing he could "Ctrl + Z" this exchange just now.

***

To Be Continued…

Everyone wants to be able to just press Ctrl + Z on their proverbial keyboards in order to undo any careless mistake they've made, whether it's an errant brush stroke on MS Paint or a typographical error on MS Word.

However, reality doesn't work like that. You can't take back what a careless thing you've said a few seconds ago that may or may not end friendships or break bonds. You can unbreak a dropped mug. You can't unspill spilled milk, no matter how hard you cry.

Farewell, Abdiel

[gabriel-gabdiel]

Fantasy of Evolution Chapter 4: Manic Pixie Dream Girl

Florante is having trouble telling reality from fantasy at this point. Does he even want to be involved with Jenny’s angel and demon nonsense? 

Which side should he choose? You’d think the angels’ side is the right path, but he has enough darkness in him to go demon too.

You can also find more chapters of my original fiction here. Please enjoy.

First | Previous | Next

Dismissal time came and went.

The friendless, listless Florante Galang shuffled towards his school service—a public utility jeepney (PUJ) turned private vehicle—in order to repeat the Groundhog's Day loop of him going home from class, waking up again to return to the same class, and having no one to talk to as he ended up scoring mediocre grades on his quizzes and quarterly exams.

Oh joy. It was like he was stuck in Groundhog's Day. The same day repeating over and over.

But the same could be said of every other student in Fatima School of Mandaluyong. He couldn't really complain.

He was neither the first nor last kid to be bored of the repetitiveness of school. Socially awkward kids were born every day.

Also, it wasn't as if the Philippines had its own version of the Groundhog's Day holiday either. Florante just liked that particular Bill Murray movie enough to reference it in his mind monologue; it was his closest point of comparison.

The only other metaphor he could think of was the eternal afterlife punishment of the Grecian mythological figure Sisyphus endlessly rolling a rock up a hill only for it to roll back down by the end of the day so he had to roll it back up again the next day. Forever.

He looked up. The ominous skies were in a dark mood, with the gloomy clouds looking particular dense and opaque. However, at least it hadn't wept out a dreary downpour.

He felt his spine tingle as he walked inside a parking lot that, just yesterday, served as a battleground against an indescribable floating monstrosity. The stuff that nightmares were made of.

He reassured himself that it didn't really happen anyway. It was all just a dream. Like him killing his bullies with special powers and whatnot.

Florante Galang pushed his idle musings of his friendless existence to the back of his mind as he skipped going to his school service and decided to ride the UV Express Toyota Tamaraw FX (a metered taxi) from Mandaluyong to Makati instead.

His body moving on its own.

***

Fantasy of Evolution

An Urban Fantasy Story by Abdiel

How far will Florante's delusions take him this time?

Disclaimer: This work may reference copyrighted material, the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. It is believed that this constitutes a fair use of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law. All copyrighted material referred to in this work belongs to their respective owners. All rights reserved.

***

Chapter 4: Manic Pixie Dream Girl

***

As the Philippines' financial center, Makati served as the city with the highest concentration of local and multinational companies in the nation. It was filled to the brim with banks, department stores, malls, and corporate offices as well as foreign embassies galore.

In particular, Makati's Ayala  Avenue contained the Philippine Stock Exchange's biggest trading floor. The city also ended up becoming Metro Manila's major entertainment and cultural hub for good measure.

As far as Florante Galang knew, Makati was the city of rich kids, business people, and trust-fund babies. Their biggest problem there was finding parking for their cars, since most of its residents owned their own car and rarely used public transportation (mostly taxis and buses).

Galang exited the FX and ended up wandering around the streets of Makati, with only one particular destination in mind.

His own gut feelings or instincts guided him through the unfamiliar labyrinth of an urban jungle.

Dully, with his body on autopilot, he asked around for the street where Jennifer Tolentino or the Tolentino Family lived. Remembering the first time he met her, with her telling him she lived in Makati.

He talked to tricycle drivers, passersby, and security guards in private subdivisions, asking where Jenny's address was (as indicated by a Post-It note he found in his bag), stopping to eat at the local 7-Eleven as a light squall of rain made the pavement glisten from neon lights.

Before Florante knew what had happened, he ended up in front of Jennifer's apartment in Makati again.

Like he sleepwalked over there. Or rather, commuted there instead of went straight back to his home.

Wait, again? Was he there before…? How did he even know it was Jenny's apartment?

Jeez. What was wrong with him?

***

Florante's blurry eyes cleared, only for him to see an apparition of the glasses-wearing girl in the horizon, her hair blowing from an unseen wind.

"Flor," she beckoned him after reaching him, holding a plastic bag containing what he presumed was her dinner.

"It's Florante," he said without thinking.

"I don't care," she answered back with a pout before smirking. "You look like a 'Flor' to me. Be mad. I'm still gonna call you Flor from now on."

"O-Okay." He felt his cheeks grow warm in spite of himself. Yeah, she did kind look cute in this light, didn't she?

He pushed back such nonsensical thoughts, with him trying to remember why he went there in the first place.

"So what brings you here? How'd you know my address? Or my phone number? Did you ask one of our classmates for it?" she asked, which made him become defensive.

Oh right. He called her first before going there. Right? Did he or didn't he…?

"No, no! It's not what it looks like! I mean, I…!" he stammered before blurting out how he found out about the address, not knowing how else to broach the subject of him seeing her name and face on all those older yearbooks in the library.

He became a stuttering mess. Their meeting didn't pan out as smoothly as it would've on T.V. and the movies, with them coming to a mutual understanding of what had happened after the jig was up.

She didn't even bring up how he told her that he remembered their fight with the spaghetti monster. This further convinced him that his fever dream of murdering his classmates was actually just that. A dream.

A bad dream. A nightmare. A power fantasy. That was just him blowing off steam from being bullied by using his own imagination.

His real self could never do such a thing. Right?

Oh wait, why'd he go there at Jenny's place in the first place? He had to explain himself!

He unzipped his bag then produced the photocopies of the yearbooks he got a hold of. One was her graduating in the 1960s. Another was her address from the yellow pages. Another, a Post-It note of her same address.

"I didn't believe the dreams I had were just dreams until I saw this," he said, finding the courage to speak and confront Jenny about his recent discovery, his mind a white haze.

Jennifer palmed her face. "I sure hope you realize just how bad this looks, right? You got my address and phone number from the yellow pages without me knowing then you went to my apartment unannounced."

"…I-I'm sooo sorry," he apologized profusely.

"…You just won't leave things well enough alone, can you?" Jenny said with a resigned sigh. "Come with me, then. Let's talk."

***

She led him to her apartment. They took the stairs instead of the elevator to get there since it was just located on the third floor.

He panted from the effort of climbing stairs but put up a brave front.

He kept his asthmatic wheezing to a minimum after realizing something that sent shockwaves to his whole body.

Florante's heart skipped a beat. This was his first time going to a girl's home.

Or even a classmate's home, to be honest. He didn't have any friends to speak of back in Fatima High, after all.

Florante entered the small rental apartment Jennifer Tolentino lived in, thinking it was about twice the size or more of his bedroom.

He excused himself as he stepped within the threshold of the apartment, looking around for Jenny's parents. However, they weren't there.

'Where are her parents?' he wondered. Were they away on a business trip? Was she sent to live in Makati to get her closer to school? Or maybe she was living with an aunt and uncle? A guardian?

Did her family live in the province? Did she live alone? Were they alone right now…?!

Florante gulped hard before he became aware of his wheezy breathing again. He took out the asthma inhaler inside his bag and took a puff. He then started breathing manually to calm himself down.

'Relax,' he told himself.

Oh boy. What'd he gotten himself into? At the back of his mind, he vaguely wondered if any of what was happening was normal. Wasn't he stalking her by doing this? She mentioned that was the impression he gave.

He then remembered he didn't really call her. That was also a daydream. Why did she somehow expect him to get there…?

Déjà vu filled him inside to the brim. Did he somehow end up here in her apartment because he went there before or something?

"Gabriel," she called out, which awoke him from his stupor.

Gabriel? Oh, right! That was what she called him back in his dream. Or was it a dream? Or was he dreaming right now?

Like he did when he wrote her address on a Post-It note and jumped on the roofs of houses and buildings from Pasig to Makati like he was Spider-Man? Wait, did that even happen?

He struggled to speak and stumbled upon his words.

"Gabriel? As in the Archangel Gabriel?" he asked her without thinking. "Why are you calling me by that name? Isn't he a legendary angel?"

Had he asked the same question before?

Jenny shook her head and patiently smiled, motioning for Florante to sit on the couch of her living room while she made some tea. "You're so picky with names. You don't want to be called Flor or Gabriel. But you're the same guy, in the end."

It was easier to hold a conversation with her in his imagination because in reality he was usually alone and barely talked to anyone.

He went straight to the point, saying things that would've embarrassed him in real life.

"I saw you in my dreams lately."

An awkward pause passed between them, making him regret saying anything.

"Oh. Is that so?" she asked, her lips as flat as a line as she blinked at him several times. Or she was batting her eyelashes at him?

He presumed she had just teased him with a nice dollop of sarcasm. Damn his inability to read social cues!

"Um, I didn't mean it like that," he clarified, feeling his cheeks grow warmer by the minute. "I mean, uh... I'm having déjà vu all over again. I've seen this dream before. We've talked inside your apartment before."

"Really now," she said, taking a sip of the tea she had laid out for the two of them on the table, her hazelnut eyes penetrating through him like the concentrated beam of sunlight from her magnifying lenses for glasses.

Florante turned away, his hand covering his mouth. His face on seeming fire.

A few weeks or months ago, he'd think his capricious feelings for Jenny was a betrayal of his crush on Laura Reyes, the prettiest girl in their class. However, that ship had long ago sailed.

Perhaps him moving on from Laura to Jenny was why he "saved" Jenny from his wrath in his other dream/nightmare where he murdered all his bullies with magical/supernatural powers?

Or maybe he should stop being so shallow? Honestly, falling in love with any pretty girl that treated him nice was pathetic. Ah, who knew? He should get his head out of the gutter. What was he doing there anyway?

More importantly, did they really just fight a gigantic spaghetti monster using elemental superpowers and, uh, super-fast germinating moss?

"Why'd you visit me from out of the blue, Flor?" Jenny asked, with her using that irksome nickname again. However, Florante ignored it.

"…Y-You're much older than you look, right?" he blurted out.

She raised an eyebrow at that statement. "Pardon me? What do you mean?" she asked, adding, "Don't you know it's rude to ask a girl her real age?"

'Only if you're talking to a middle-aged woman,' he thought to himself. However, he could feel the onset of a wheeze in his asthmatic breathing.

"It's true, isn't it? You're not a real teenager."

She dwelled on his words. "What if I'm not?" she asked gently, her voice barely above a whisper. Her dulcet tones sent tingles down his spine.

"So how old are you really? Was that really you in the 1960s yearbook? Are you an immortal? Am I an immortal too?"

"You could say that," she said, to his surprise. "Yes, that is a picture of me. I'm amazed I was able to get away with enrolling in the same school too, but the registrar never bothered checking who the other Jenny Tolentino is."

He shivered in spite of himself.

"They must've thought it's just a funny coincidence. Or that she was a relative of mine with the same name. Or they simply don't remember," Jenny explained.

Florante then asked, "Am I like you? Since you called me an Ophanim back then. I knew that wasn't a dream! You really did pretend to be a high school teen! We're both…!"

He gasped then let out a long exhale to prevent himself from hyperventilating.

"Did what happen the other day… yesterday… whenever it happened, really happen? You remember it too, right? The spaghetti monster?" he dared ask.

She must've known. She just said she received his call, even though he could've sworn he only called her in his dreams. He didn't have the courage to call her for real! Or visit her apartment for real. But here he was now.

Unless this wasn't real either.

Florante racked his brain of vague, forgotten memories of his past dreams, unsure of he was inside yet another dream, only this time more lucid. How lucid was he anyway?

Him mentioning the spaghetti monster incident made her snap back into attention, which jolted him backwards and made him murmur an apology by reflex.Was it something he said?

"So you remember me calling you an Ophanim, huh?" she asked.

He nodded slowly, with him not quite looking at her while he recalled their last significant interaction with one another.

"What's an Ophanim again? A wingless angel, was it? Is it that monster I transformed into where I could see everywhere because I had a hundred eyes or something? Just like that spaghetti monster we fought?"

He tugged at his collar, squirming in his seat at the intense gaze Jennifer gave him. Like fawn shrinking back at the headlights of a speeding truck.

Was he not supposed to carry on their conversation from last time? Did he do something wrong?

She softened her stare, the glint from her glasses disappearing, revealing her almond eyes. "That's right. You and the monster we fought are both Ophanim, Gabriel."

"There you go again," he said. "My name isn't Gabriel. Or Flor. It's Florante. And who are you supposed to be? Michael? Uriel? Or maybe…?"

"I'm Raphael," she said, confirming his suspicions.

"The ninja turtle?" he joked, but he then bowed his head and looked away when he saw her deadpan poker face, murmnring an apology for his lame joke.

"Well, that's… cute," she said of the joke, then asked, "What do you want, Gabriel?"

"…What do you mean?" he asked, inching away from her.

Instead of answering his question, she took another sip of her tea. "Fine. What else do you remember, Florante?"

Her using his full name caught his attention. He answered her question after a deep breath, sensing that she was testing him somehow.

So he told her everything.

***

Florante told Jennifer that he remembered his fever dream of murdering his whole class and destroying most of the school before facing off against Laura Reyes, who also somehow also got her own angelic powers.

This made him idly wonder if she were a wingless angel too. Wait, she had wings, right? She might even be a winged angel instead. He also recalled that Geronimo "Gerry" Jacinto faced off against him with his own superpowers too.

Gerry couldn't be an angel. He was more of a devil. A monster. A demon. His bully and daily tormentor being a holy being of light and goodness just didn't sit well with Florante.

Wait, didn't Jenny refer to the spaghetti creature as a demon instead of an angel…?

Then he talked about how he and Jenny ended up fighting against the tentacled monster from out of nowhere at the school parking lot, with her killing it with enchanted(?) moldy bread with mold that spread across its body like gangrene.

He then finished with him dreaming about going to her place before he ended up doing so anyway at the spur of the moment, resulting in déjà vu.

He left off the part where he wasn't sure if what he saw right then was itself a lucid dream or reality. Maybe because he feared this would result in the dream ending like before, so he kept that last bit to himself.

Let him dream this particular dream of him talking to a girl and being alone with her in her apartment for a little while longer.

"Well…?" he asked. She'd been listening in silence the entire time, with only occasional nods and sips of tea to break his long monologue. "What do you think? Did what happen the other day… yesterday… whenever, really happen? You remember it too, right?"

She then told him, "I'll be honest. I'm not sure if you're Gabriel just yet."

What she just said made Florante even more confused than before; like he was talking some sort of oral exam and happened upon a trick question.

"Pardon me? What do you mean?"

"I suspected you're Gabriel but I'm not yet sure because you're just an Ophanim right now."

He pondered her words. "Meaning?"

With steepled hands, she said, "You're a newborn angel. We call newborn angels Ophanim or Thrones. Your multi-eyed self is your true form for now."

"What do you mean true form? Stop joking! Am I Gabriel or not?"

"Newborn angels don't necessarily have famous identities. However, the truly exceptional ones might graduate to Cherubim or Seraphim level. Based on what you've accomplished before, I suspected you've become the newest avatar of Archangel Gabriel."

Her answer gave him a headache. "So you think I'm Gabriel but you're not sure?"

She shrugged. "You may or may not be the Archangel Gabriel. Right now, you're just a wingless Ophanim who could use your angelic powers while in human form. An egg but not quite the chicken."

"…And you're not an Ophanim yourself?" he asked.

"I've already gotten my wings," she answered with a shrug and a wink. "You still need to earn yours."

"…So what are we exactly?" he dared ask. "What are angels supposed to be?"

Jenny took her time sipping her tea. Since she was about to proverbially spill it.

"Angels. Demons. Devils. Monsters. Deities. Demiurges. Higher beings. Celestials. Different cultures call us different names. We might even be considered gods. Or superheroes."

"Really? Superheroes?"

"…Nah."

"Oh."

Jenny took another sip of her tea with a small smile. She murmured something under her breath that Florante couldn’t quite catch.

"What was that, Jenny?" he asked.

"So did you really intend to kill your classmates back then?" The bespectacled girl asked, the hair on her head starting to dance and twirl from an unseen gust of wind. Weird. "Even if it was a dream, no person normally dreams of something so grisly."

"This again? It's not my fault! It was the dream me that killed Laura! And the rest of our classmates! I would never do that in real life! Stop blaming me for something I subconsciously did!"

"Is that so?" she asked with a raised eyebrow.

"I swear if I knew my dreams had real consequences, I wouldn't even imagine doing that to anyone," he said. "Look at me. I'm pathetic. I wouldn't even hurt a fly or a cockroach."

She sighed and let the awkward silence linger between them for five minutes that felt like eternity.

Not that the squirming, gulping Galang counted the seconds or anything.

"Fine. Screw it. It's my turn to tell you everything. Florante Galang, you're a candidate to becoming the Archangel Gabriel. Congratulations."

***

From a distance, Florante heard the rumble of thunder. He shuddered, but it felt like the rest of the room shuddered with him, which made him wonder if he had just felt an earthquake as well… or was it just him? He couldn't tell.

Did the drizzle outside become a downpour? Oh my. He should've brought an umbrella with him.

"A candidate?" Galang repeated. "Like a presidential candidate? I could be Gabriel or not?"

"Or you could be Schrodinger's Gabriel," Jenny said, giggling. "You're Gabriel and not Gabriel at the same time!"

"Shredder… what?" he asked, unfamiliar with the reference.

She cleared her throat. "Never mind."

"N-No. Tell me what you meant!" he insisted.

"I mean, just read about Schrodinger's Cat from a trivia book, man," she said. "Anyway, we're getting off-topic. Yes, you're a candidate. An avatar. You could become Gabriel. Or some other famous angel. And Ophanim like you can become Gabriel too."

Florante clasped his hands in front of him, seemingly deep in thought. "In my dreams, several of my classmates manifested powers of their own. Are they also angels? Or Ophanims?"

"Very good, Florante," she said, which made him frown at her condescension. "Yes, they're also wingless angels. They're also candidates to becoming Gabriel. If they develop their powers correctly, they could end up awakening as Gabriel themselves, if not other angels, gods, or deities of history."

"Wait, wait, wait. Aside from Gabriel, they… we could become famous angels like Michael, Raphael, or Uriel? Also, by gods and goddesses, do you mean Greek or Roman ones? An Ophanim could become Zeus or Jupiter? How about the Norse All-Father Odin?" Florante queried.

"More or less," came "Raphael's" unhelpful answer.

"And what makes you so sure I'm a Gabriel candidate?"

Jenny shrugged. "I can tell. Or at least the Raphael within me can recognize him from inside you. Whether or not you're worthy to bear his name shall be seen later on."  

The thunderous rumblings arouind them grew louder and harsher, producing a droning sound. However, for some reason, the two both ignored the rampaging elephant in the room.

"Wait," Florante said, his mind going a mile a minute but his mouth still stuck at the starting line. "What must I do to win the, uh, candidacy?"

"Evolve from an Ophanim to a Cherubim and then a Seraphim," Jenny replied. "You must evolve the right way to, or else…"

"…Or else the other candidates will end up winning? Is that it?" he finished her sentence for her. "So how do I evolve to become Gabriel?"

As he said the words, he wondered if he even wanted to become the avatar of an ancient archangel in the first place.

To himself, he wondered, 'Do I even want to be Gabriel?'

It sounded like so much responsibility to live up to the Archangel Gabriel.

Another thing occurred to him. He asked, "And that spaghetti monster you called a demon. Can he become a candidate for Gabriel too? Or is he supposed to be the avatar for Satan, Lucifer, or whoever instead?"

"Ah. You figured that one out too, huh?" she said with a sage nod. "You're quick on the uptake, kid."

"So…?" Florante urged.

Jenny said, "W-ell, in the case of that spaghetti monster, he might've been an Ophanim at one point, but because he let his powers control him instead of the other way around, he ended up becoming demonic instead. A Minion instead of a Throne."

"Minion?" Florante repeated. He didn't like the sound of that. "What the hell are minions? Wait, don't tell me. They're like Ophanims. They're baby demons!"

"That's exactly what they are," confirmed Jenny, who got up from her seat in excitement. "Good call. So there you go. You have the potential to become either a demon or an angel. An Ophanim or a Minion."

Galang then asked, "How can you even tell when, um, someone is an Ophanim or Minion? A demon or angel? They're both monstruous, to be honest."

He also got up from his seat, which made him stumble and grab hold of the nearest furniture to steady himself. Was it vertigo or did the room spun on its own?

He didn't know what was going on.

To be quite frank, his head throbbed with the information overload. So he was an angel that could also be a devil? What? Or rather, the avatar of biblical angels who somehow ended up here in the Philippines? Really?

"I guess that's the point?" Jenny said with a shrug. "A demon is just a fallen angel, after all. Whether they have bird wings or bat wings. Halos or ox horns."

"…Monsters by any other name, am I right?" they heard someone say, like it had access to the P.A. system in their minds.

The two shuddered, feeling a chill deep down their spine. They looked at each other, realizing they both felt and heard the same thing.

"Did you hear that?" asked Jenny.

"Yeah," acknowledged Florante. "What was that?"

Jennifer looked him straight in the eyes. "A demon."

They felt the presence of another. Another one of them. Or perhaps more than one? They couldn't tell.

Unbeckoned, they stood up and headed out of the room, following that dreadful feeling from its source.

***

Just like in Florante Galang's nightmare of decimating Fatima High School and killing all of his bullies—or fellow Gabriel candidates (which included collateral damage like Laura Reyes)—the skies grew dark once more.

As the cliché went, it was a dark and stormy night.

The rain fell in torrents—except at occasional intervals, when it got checked by a violent gust of wind that swept up the streets—rattling along the apartments, condos, and housetops, and fiercely agitating the fluorescent bulbs of the lamps that struggled against the ominous darkness, its fuses ready to burst.

The two angel avatars also heard rumblings from the epicenter from which people on foot and inside vehicles as well as vermin like mice and roaches avoided, resulting in a chaotic mess of a traffic jam and a fleeing crowd on the verge of a stampede.

"Let's go," said Jennifer Tolentino, who took hold of Florante Galang's hand to accompany him towards the horrible something that had caught their attention.

The demonic presence that acted like the source or fault line of an earthquake that shook the world itself right at its core.

Rather than get repelled by the negative vibrations that reverberated into their very bones the closer they got to them like the rest of the living things in flight mode that surrounded them like a sea of humanity or an ocean of life, the two angelic avatars felt somehow magnetized by the dark presence, their heads glowing with an aura unseen by others like ultraviolet light.

An inner brightness spilling over their heads and spreading out from the center like the nuclear fusion of a star, thus making their heads glow with a spherical aura. The corona of the sun. A literal angel halo.

Jennifer's halo glowed a greenish blue hue while Florante's glowed a fluorescent white and sky blue color instead.

This inexplicable aura was what allowed them to part the living sea of mice and men, with people unconsciously or subconsciously avoiding them. This allowed them to make their way to the demonic presence they felt and heard.

To the voice that talked to them right inside their heads.

They ran towards oblivion and uncertainly in an adrenalin rush, but somehow, the virgin Florante couldn't he happier.After all, he was running hand-in-hand with a cute girl. What was there to complain about?

Jenny, whose first impression on Florante was that of a timid mouse, perhaps a talkative gerbil, had always made his heart flutter but in a way that one would find a kitten or puppy adorable.

He wasn't sure what he felt for her now was necessarily a crush.

However, she somehow looked different to him now, with her heaving bosom, glistening face, and reddened cheeks as she brushed her slightly damp hair to the side while running with him.

Like she suddenly transformed into a hot librarian right before his eyes.

In the middle of their sprint, an out-of-breath Florante said from out of the blue, "Thank you."

"…Huh? For what?" Jennifer asked.

"For humoring me and listening to what I have to say," he said in candid honesty. "I appreciate it."

She smiled. "No problem. We're both angel avatars, right? We might as well stick together."

"You bet! I like a girl who understands me but I can confide to as well," he blurted out without thinking, only for him to realize what he just said a little too late. Not knowing how to take it back.

"How am I supposed to respond to that?" asked the sheepish Jenny, who looked away and hid her eyes with the glint of her glasses.

She then stopped running hand-in-hand with him and let go of his hand, which startled him.

However, before he could apologize (again), she beckoned him to keep following her before she began running again, which he did.

He kept trailing her from behind as he resisted the urge to keep looking at her behind.

Soon, they realized there were no longer any people around them. Or any signs of life. No birds. No bugs. No signs of life. Nothing.

The stalls and stores were empty. Completely evacuated. No one dared remain in the exact direction they went: A pulsating pitch blackness.

"Do you feel that?" asked Jenny. "The heat from your face? Your head?"

"Y-Yeah," said Florante, but he had another type of hotness in mind, his eyes avoiding the jiggle of her heaving bosom as she ran towards the black maelstrom.

He had a feeling she had just changed the subject from what they were talking about earlier.

"That's your halo. Your spiritual energy. Your aura. That's where your powers come from as an avatar of Gabriel," she explained. "You weren't able to detect it before, but you can feel it now, right?"

"Yeah, I think I can," he said with a wheeze and a gulp that turned into a coughing fit, unable to meet Jenny's curious gaze.

"It's because you're getting used to your powers now… Wait. We're here."

He then looked up after she stopped from her run. They'd reached their destination: A church.

"Where are we? What church is this?" Florante asked.

"Guadalupe Church," Jenny answered.

The Guadalupe Church or Parish, also known as the Nuestra Señora de Gracia Church, was a Baroque Roman Catholic church located in Makati City, Philippines.

Florante would later learn that the building was once occupied by both the Filipino revolutionaries of the 1890s and American forces of the 1900s during the Philippine-American War. In World War II, it served as the garrison for the Japanese invaders.

It now currently stood as one of Makati's premier tourist attractions as well as one of Metro Manila's most popular wedding destinations. Had Florante learned of this earlier, it would've made his head spin. He certainly envisioned marrying Jenny in the middle of their run.

However, something more noticeable than the church itself caught the pair's attention.

A tornado of blackness, ash, and what could be best described as tendrils of sentient smoke moved between them and the church ruins.

A crawling chaos. A grotesque mockery of reality beyond comprehension.

Again, like before with his confrontation with Laura Reyes or the parking lot spaghetti monster, Florante was at a loss for words describing what was before him.

This new creature was another indescribable eldritch abomination straight out a child's nightmares. Or even man's primal fears.

The formless, mindless disaster then coalesced into what looked like a tall, lean man made of shadow. He, if it were a he, had neither beard nor hair. He was instead an ebony cesspool. The Black Death personified. A humanoid typhoon.

His own tarry aura melted into a shapeless robe made of a heavy dark fabric. Like his aura had become his own clothes that converged unto him into the singularity made from a dying star.

His dense living black hole seemed to drown out and absorb what little light surrounded them, like waves of the Dead Sea or nimbus clouds blocking sunlight or moonlight. This made the comparatively faint halos of "Raphael" and "Gabriel" stand out more.

Although he was as horrible in appearance as an Ophanim, Florante couldn't even begin to imagine describing the shadowy tendril man as anything other than demonic. A Minion.

"H-Hey, you wouldn't happen to have one of those moldy pieces of bread with you by any chance, right?" Florante half-joked, half-expecting himself to need to transform into a Throne to match the power of this Minion before them.

The disembodied voice from before then spoke, but both Jenny and Florante realized somehow that it didn't enamate from the creature before them. Rather, it came from some other source.

"Pardon me, but I can't stand to look at this farce anymore," said a sharp-dressed foreign man—a Caucasian person with a sharp nose, even sharper spectacles,  and auburn hair—in English.

"Who are you?" Florante called out, surprising himself with his own bravery when talking to the scary foreign stranger.

The man in the business suit—formalwear known to Filipinos as an Americana—ignored him, though. This businessperson that looked like a Makati expatriate or even a visiting company CEO addressed Jennifer instead.

"Are you honestly indulging the boy's delusions until now, Raphael? How cruel of you. You know he's no angel. He's actual more of a demon, to be honest. With destructive power like his, he should be on our side."

"Mammon," said Jennifer, naming the demon before them. "Stay out of this. He's mine."

This made Florante jerk his head and stare at Jenny by reflex, his cheeks burning at her bold proclamation. 'I-I'm hers?!' he thought.

Aloud, Galang asked her, "You know him? Wait, his name is mamon (Filipino sponge cake)? Seriously?"

She rolled her eyes. "Not mamon. Mammon. The demon Mammon."

"Tell him the truth about himself already or I will," Mammon threatened with a smirk. "I'm getting impatient."

Thusly, Florante shot a Thunderbolt at Mammon.

A pinprick or lasebeam of light producing a vaccuum of emptiness around it, rendering the surroundings into rubble with a loud sonic boom.

The businessman cackled and stopped the supersonic assault with one hand, transforming to a huge-headed goblin with a long nose, ram horns, and a stogie for the briefest of instances before returning to his avatar's human form.

"Flor!" exclaimed Jenny in spite of herself. "What are you doing? You're no match for him right now!"

"Well now. I see you've convinced the young lad to side with you using your avatar's… feminine charm, Raphael! Bravo. You're quite the devilish temptress, if I do say so myself. Like Jezebel. You'd make a fine demoness yourself.."

Despite being fully clothed, Jennifer covered herself with her hands by reflex and shame after hearing Mammon's remark. "You're such a pig."

"Well of course, I am!" said Mammon with a smug grin. "I'm a demon."

The halo of the Archangel Gabriel's avatar flared like a ring of fire or a celestial ball of gas and plasma, his bright corona traveling all over his body and enveloping him in a white and blue light while he crackled with arcs of electrity.

Finally, the demon Mammon addressed Florante. "I don't blame you for siding with her, kid. Raphael's avatar is a pretty little thing, not going to lie. However, you were born ten thousand years too early to take on the likes of me. I've forgotten more than you can even remember."

With his arms crossed, Mammon floated away. Barely baring his fangs at Florante's best shot. None the worse for wear.

No wait, he hadn't hit him with his absolute best shot yet.

Galang then summoned a bolt of lightning at himself to reenergize his body with millions of volts of electricity while increasing the potency of his offense. Remenbering how to control his powers from his dream of destroying his bullies and taking on a flying spaghetti monster that was apparently an Ophanim/Minion like himself.

A wingless angel or a hornless devil. Good or evil. Those were the two choices for a Throne such as him.

Just then, as suddenly as him shooting a Thunderbolt at Mammon like an arrow, the hornless devil in the form of a personified maelstrom of pulsating darkness diverted its full attention towards Florante and unleashed its irresistable might unto him like an endless deluge.

Unlike Mammon, this shadow man came at him in full force.

'…Oh boy. Here we go.'

He was making the correct choice siding with Jennifer Tolentino, right?

She was an angel. One of the good guys. And the demons were the bad guys every time since the beginnning of time.

Right?

***

The lean, mean shadow man with gangly spider limbs and a pulsating aura that emanated from his head to toe like smog or smoke made strange clicking noises as he shifted positions with his strange jittery dash.

The crawling chaos didn't speak and bore no trace of an expression on his dark face. This belied the whirlpool of bone-crushing force he brought with him as his mere dash forward sent the Gabriel avatar buckling and reeling.

Fortunately, Galang's halo of blue-white light created a dome-shaped wind shield composed of gyroscoping jetstreams and slipstreams that absorbed the brunt of the Minion's force. Vacuum tornadoes ripped apart the church along with blockbuster ligtning strikes.

This tall man whom Florante bore no ill will towards. This Minion of the Archdemon he truly wanted to blast to Kingdom Come, Mammon. This Ophanim. This Minion. This was a fellow… angel/demon avatar. Just like him.

Who was to say he wouldn't end up like him? A mindless beast to be hunted down by angels. A fallen angel. A demon. A devil.

Was this really his war to wage anyway? Did it even matter if he chose the side of the angels or the demons? Was this what he asked for after esentially committing social suicide? Wasn't he biting off more than he could chew, foolishly facing off against devils and demons?

Florante charged bolts of high-voltage lightning on one hand and bolts of thunder-inducing energy bullets on the other hand then hurled them one after another at the tentacled ebony monster.

Biting his lower lip at the frustration of not being able to shoot that manipulative bastard Mammon instead.

Why were they fighting again? To become avatars to millennia-old angels and demons? To become pawns on a chess game they didn't ask to be a  part of?

They were practically just the same pawns, right? It was implied that this crawling chaos was also human before, like him.

If his dream of killing his bullies wasn't a dream—if none of these fantastic events were dreams—then his wish to be helpless no more just came with a heavy caveat. A Monkey's Paw wish, if you would.

Unlike the flying spaghetti monster that could regenerate itself endlessly, the crawling chaos before them and its black pulsating mass of tendrils responded quite differently to Florante's typhoon onslaught.

Even though he showcased denseness as black and bottomless as the ocean depths, his great mass or "halo" of tidal waves that densely compacted themselves into humanoid form remained unmoved by Galang's cyclone winds and plasma blasts.

No wonder Jenny didn't use quick-growing mold spores or an acorn to attack this Minion. How could any of those weaponized plants stand a chance against this force of nature?

Maybe this time, Florante had no choice but to revert to his true Ophanim form and face off against the Minion as force of nature against force of nature. Monster against monster.

"No, Florante! Don't…!" said Raphael's avatar to Gabriel's avatar, her body seemingly pinned to the wall. "Don't change into your Ophanim form and lose yourself! Or you might become a Minion yourself! A mindless beast controlled by your own powers! That's what Mammon wants!"

The bespectacled young (or young-looking) girl's hair ended up toussled by unseen winds or some sort of force of nature like gravity that blew everyone else away like a hurricane.

And indeed, before Florante noticed it, he had started to transform, his human form disappearing and reforming into a gyroscope filled with rings adorned with flaming eyes once more.

"Since Eden, no more could man have wings to bear him to paradise. Henceforth, he walked," said Mammon telepathically to both Jenny and Florante.

The two looked heavenwards at the smug demon watching over them from high above his proverbial pedestal. Right now, he lived in their heads rent-free and they loathed having him invade their thoughts like that.

"However, this man has discovered the path to recovering his lost wings. Will he rise to paradise or be another fallen angel, his feathered bird wings turned into leathery bat wings? His halo turned into horns?"

God dammit. How was Florante supposed to fight against this monster any other way than become a monster himself?

On that note, why shouldn't he be a monster? What was wrong with becoming a Minion over an Ophanim anyway? What was the difference between one monster over another?

Nevertheless, because Jennifer told him not to transform into his Ophanim form, he didn't.

The shadow creature then came upon Galang's dithering, fluctuating form that went from human to Throne and back agaain like a flickering light with his own crashing black waves of dense aura, threatening to swallow Florante under its immense mass compacted within a lean form of a tall humanoid tentacle being.

Galang resisted the irresistable, turning his sky-blue halo into a country-sized pacific storm that made the crawling chaos' oceanic depths roil, churn, and bubble. Like the desperate cyclone howling back at the black sea, which only made its angry waters angrier.

Florante didn't ask for this. He wanted to stop being socially awkward, make friends, and for his bullies to leave him alone, not get new supernatural enemies to fight and deal with the burden of waging someone else's war!

Meanwhile, Mammon again spoke to their minds. Toying with them.

"Asking a woman if she lives nearby is often a predatory tactic. That info can expose so much. If you're around the area a lot, especially alone. Or if you're isolated and from out of town and vulnerable."

Both Florante and Jenny said, "What?" at the same time, their heads turning to look at Mammon again.

"LIGHT ARRAY!"

The embarrassment Florante Galang felt from being called out by the devil himself fueled his halo enough to finally release the much-delayed pinpoint bursts of concentrated pure energy he'd been gathering all that time.

The energy projectiles shot out like explosive bullets from his five fingertips, which finally decimated the humanoid maelstrom off of him.

Unlike with the regenerating spaghetti monster, his Light Array shots actually obliterated the maelstrom of shadows, turning them into stains on the pavement from the purifying brightness of his holy light.

That was Florante's best shot. The special technique he created from scratch to shoot at all his bullies at the same time with a wave of his hands and fingers.

At least now he could use his powers in a less shameful way: To defeat a monster that threatened to destroy the city instead of petty yet deadly revenge against his meanest classmates.

***

Florante screamed to the heavens and the unseen Mammon, "I didn't stalk her! O-Or I didn't mean to! I was following a lead on why I've been dreaming the nightmares I've been dreaming, okay!? Seeing her face on an old yearbook was suspicious! I had no malicious intentions!"

They both couldn't see Mammon at that point—the coward made himself scarce—but they could hear the smirk in his voice. "But I didn't specifically say you stalked Raphael, Ophanim. You came up with that conclusion. Methinks the lady doth protest a bit too much."

Galang's head almost twisted off of his neck like a bottle cap as he shot a glance at an out-of-breath Jenny, her hair a mess and her clothes disheveled. Meanwhile, his own stomach was in knots.

He gulped and muttered, "I meant no harm, Jenny! I didn't want to kill our classmates, believe me. I-I didn't intend to stalk you either! I-It just… came off that way. B-Because I wanted to know more about what's going on with me, and you're the only other person I know who's like me…!"

Mammon then added, "Literally you cannot risk divulging such information to him, Raphael. A man is a threat. A man approaching you alone is a threat. You should've known better. This is a woman's constant reality."

After a deep breath, Jenny adjusted her glasses, which magnified her hazel eyes. She then smiled at Florante and said, "Don't worry, Flor. I understand. You didn't mean any harm, right? It was all a harmless dream to you."

That smile. That damn smile. Florante wanted to protect that smile.

Mammon's disembodied voice then snarled at the pair.

"…You actually believe his lies, Raphael? He thought it was all a dream, so that makes it okay? By now, he should've figured out that it was more than a dream. That it wasn't manslaughter, it was murder with intent. A massacre. He's also a stalker for good measure. Stop excusing his crimes."

"I've just about had enough of you, man! SHUT UP!" said Florante, his fingertips again burning with blue and fluorescent white electric light.

"Stop lying to yourself first, kid. You wanted to kill your classmates. You reveled in every death. Even the ones who weren't your bullies. If you weren't sick in the head, you would've just humiliated them as revenge for them humiliating you. That's why you dreamed that dream. It was the first time in your pathetic life that you felt in control. Give in to that desire and set yourself free!"

"Show yourself, demon!" Just one shot (or five or ten shots) of the Light Array was all he needed. He just wanted to land just one right on Mammon's smug, beak-nosed face.

"Look at you go. You feel brave now, don't you? Like you're Raphael's personal Knight in Shining Armor. Or her lost puppy. But she knows the truth about you. How dangerous you are. So she's telling you everything you want to hear for now."

"Stop being such a pathetic coward and fight!" Florante said. Not really listening to a word Mammon said while he continued to gather energy from his fingertips in concentrated pinpoints of light.

"Kid, you've got it bad for her, don't you? But she's just using you. She'll learn soon enough that you can't have sympathy for the devil. That what you did is unforgivable. Don't you know, kid? We live in a society—" Mammon started.

"No, you live in a society! I live in my meticulously crafted daydream universe that I've been using as a coping mechanism since childhood!" said Florante.

Mammon chuckled. "No. You're a back-of-the-class loser who has gone on a power trip and became mad with power."

Alas, the demon's plan of buying the crawling chaos time to recuperate worked. The shadow man returned in full force. Or rather, the shadow men cometh.

The tall, dark, and devilishly bleak Minion manifested himself into multiple avatars of all shapes and sizes.

When he got aethered by Gabriel's embarrassment-fueled Light Array, he regrouped his atomized particles and spread them across Makati towards the nearest of its fleeing denizens, turning them into his own avatars.

What the crawling chaos lacked in healing powers, he more than made up for his ability to take over the bodies of others like some sort of black lung virus. The black plague made flesh and bone.

Florante willed himself to shoot at the numerous avatars, even though when they got blown apart, they didn't atomize into tendrils but instead burst like sacks of blood and guts.

The Light Array made short work of most of them, but that technique took too long to recharge, so he had to settle for Lightning Strikes, Lightning Bolts, and supersonic Thunderbolts for the rest of the avatar army.

He soon realized he wasn't killing the crawling chaos but innocent people.

These new avatars of the crawling chaos were collateral damage. Men, women, the elderly, and children—entire families—running for their lives up until the humanoid typhoon took over their bodies and turned them into shadow people like him.

They'd been morphed into blackened homunculus or zombies puppeteered by the crawling chaos himself.

At first, dealing with the "infected" avatars of the crawling chaos felt like shooting fish in a barrel, but then they displayed bizarre attributes.

Some flew with hand glider wings. Others crawled into corners like roaches. There were those that merged to form a super muscular shadow avatar that tanked Florante's Light Array, Thunderbolts, and Lightning Bolts.

From there, Florante understood.

This man-shaped maelstrom. This walking void containing the vast cosmos unto himself who could affect mystic energies, both demonic and cosmic, on an undefined level.

As World War II veteran and American civil rights activist Medgar Evers said,  "You can kill a man but you can't kill an idea."

This Minion was as unkillable as an idea. And just as dangerous.

"When a man possesses this much power, he does not seek redemption," said Mammon of the crawling chaos before Florante.

***

"Susmaryosep!"

Florante had just told Mammon he wasn't an intentional murderer (or stalker), but now here he was again, forced to murder innocents to keep this shadowy humanoid typhoon in check.

He clung to the vague hope that like with the flying spaghetti monster incident, everything would go back to normal after the crawling chaos's defeat. That everything could be undone. Like waking from a bad dream. Like all of this wasn't really real.

If he beat the Minion, he could revert everything back to their original state, like it didn't actually happen, and save the people he'd just killed to get to the humanoid typhoon. Or the walking typhoid fever.

However, that was all one big "if".

"Change into your Ophanim form. As you are now, you're no match against the Minion," teased the coward Mammon. "Unleash your full power like he has. I dare you, Gabriel."

"You'd like that, wouldn't you? You dumb bastard," cursed Florante. "You can't fool me! I bet you convinced this poor Ophanim to turn himself into a Minion the exact same way!"

"So?" said the brazen Mammon. "What if I did? The results speak for themselves. You can't even touch him. Face him with your full power or never wake up from this nightmare."

After deftly avoiding hit after hit from the shadow avatars, Galang got clipped by a five-clawed strike. That was all it took. It went downhill from there.

The distraction made him miss several of his shots, which allowed a number of the shape-shifting zombies of darkness to evade his suppressive fire so as to claw, stab, and bite at him.

Desperately, he wielded a lightning bolt like a sword whip, slicing and dicing the nearest of the undead horde of the crawling chaos's hive-minded avatars.

He pushed them back with his halo's electric vacuum shield, only to buckle under the pressure of an outright stampede of shadow creatures. The weight of hundreds felt like the weight of millions due to the densely packed particles of the Minion's cosmic selves.

His panicked wheezes became a full-blown asthma attack as he drowned in black avatars that clawed, grabbed, bit, slashed, stabbed, and lacerated him to helpless shreds.

At this point, even if he willed himself to turn into his "Be Not Afraid, Child!" form of a frightful multi-eyed Ophanim, it'd be too late.

Then, just as Florante was about to get swallowed by the oily tidal wave of inhumanity that the Minion of Maelstrom mind-controlled like individual puppets, a mango tree suddenly grew and blocked their upsurge in a landslide of broken branches, splinters, leaves, and mango fruits.  

Once again, Raphael's human avatar Jennifer Tolentino saved Florante's life.

She jumped and slid across the unbroken branches of the giant mango tree that served as her wooden barrier between them and the Minion's horde of mind-controlled minions (ironic) that he turned into clones of his wriggly dark self.

"Are you okay, Flor?"

"Y-Yeah, th-thanks for saving me. Again."

How shameful. He was supposed to be her Knight in Shining Armor, and here he was serving as her Damsel in Distress instead.

He didn't even have the energy to correct her nickname of him. He might as well be a "Flor". He might as well have that girly name.

She turned towards him, her green halo and her hazel eyes shining like gems full of light, and unfurled two green-feathered bird wings from her back. The thing that caught Florante's eyes though was her smile.

A sad smile that could break anyone's heart in two.

"Flor, don't be a hero. You don't have to force yourself just to make people acknowledge you," she said.

"W-What…?" he trailed off. "B-But I thought that's what I'm supposed to do as an angel! An Ophanim! I'm one of you, right? Why can't I be a hero?"

She shook her head. "When you do that, you end up blaming yourself, blaming other people, and feeling jealous of everyone. But still, it doesn't have to be like that. Even if people don't acknowledge you, you just need to be someone that you can be proud of!"

"I don't understand," he said.

She silenced him with a quick peck on the forehead.

"You don't have to fight. This isn't your war. You have no quarrel with this Minion, don't you? Even with Mammon, you're only picking a fight against him for my sake. Just be a good boy, okay? Maybe this time, when you wake you up from this dream, you'll decide to forget about all this nonsense and move on with your life."

"…." He could only stare at her cherubic, angelic form, dumbfounded into silence. He later realized that her kiss had healed all the wounds he'd sustained from battle and reenergized him at the same time.

Like man-sized termites, the shape-shifting avatars of the crawling chaos scratched, gnawed, masticated, ripped, tore, and outright drilled right into the gigantic mango tree trunk they'd crashed into, turning it into sawdust in their wake.

She then fell like a hatchling from her nest, her green feathers flying everywhere as she let the horde tear her apart in Florante's stead. Cannibalizing her, to his horror.

"NOOOOOOOO!" Galang screamed himself raspy, his eyes flooded with tears, his fingertips glowing with rivulets of bright-blue energy, his halo shining with multiple arcs of electrical power so elaborate they looked like ancient root systems.

***

Florante Galang realized early on that he really was no hero, much less a superhero.

The first chance he got superpowers, he used it for petty revenge against his bullies, his mindless massacre resulting in his high school crush becoming collateral damage.

He really shouldn't be entrusted with destructive abilities like the Light Array, really.

The realization horrified him, but he honestly wouldn't get any real satisfaction from beating a stronger foe like the crawling chaos or the flying spaghetti monster like he did when he killed his bullies in a fever dream.

He was a coward who used his powers against bullies who couldn't fight back as vengeance to how they bullied him into submission when he couldn't fight back either.

He was no better than the bullies who picked on him.

When faced with the prospect of sacrificing life and limb against a monster that threatened the lives of the whole city of Makati, he came up short.

He had no personal stakes on the matter, so he wasn't as motivated to becoming a hero.

This dark creature didn't bully him so he had no quarrel against him. He had no driving force to beat him. They were actually the same—an Ophanim and a Minion thrust into a fight they had no dog in.

Even when the Minion began using innocent bystanders against Florante, this merely horrified the young Ophanim instead of build his heroic resolve.

Ultimately, Galang was a selfish person who only cared about himself. He was an even bigger coward than Mammon, who became a disembodied voice in their heads that mocked them all the while.

Jenny was right. He didn't have to fight. He had no personal stakes here.

However, there was something she said before she did her own heroic sacrifice that stuck with him.

"Even if people don't acknowledge you, you just need to be someone that you can be proud of!"

Someone he could be proud of, huh? How could he do that? How could he become someone he could be proud of even without the acknowledgement of others? Should he become a martyr?

Florante looked down from his perch atop the gigantic "rotting" mango tree that Jenny had used her life and healing factor on to induce its gigantic growth. Saw the avatars eat Jenny so that not even her bones were left.

There it was. There was his personal stakes. With tears in his eyes, his powers began to grow anew. He knew what he must do.

Like a dying typhoon turning into a low pressure area, only to get a second wind and become a super typhoon as it moved into the moisture-rich tropics that enhanced its shower and thunderstorm activity.

He then saw that the avatars that consumed Raphael's avatar had the dark presence of the crawling chaos leave them. Evicted or otherwise exorcised out of them. Her green aura spread across them all, healing them of the Black Plague that infected them.

This maelstrom of darkness then converged into a singular man. The original avatar that served as a candidate for whoever demon wanted to take control of him.  

Before this living, walking shadow creature could get his hands on more avatars, Florante struck at the unkillable thing as immortal as a concept.

How did one kill an idea or a movement before it could spread across the populace like wildfire?

Practical application. A dose of reality.

Ideas never panned out without a hitch in real life. Let it naturally progress and die in absurdity when applied to reality.

"Light Array!"

Thusly, Florante and Jennifer killed the idea of this Minion by not letting its dark influence spread across anymore innocent bystanders and victims then isolating him inside his one avatar, feeding it with energy until it burst.

Like letting a fire burn itself out before it could spread and raze everything in its path.

"Light ARRAY! LIGHT ARRAY! LIIIIIGHT ARRAAAAY!!!"

The blasts of energy chipped away at the concentrated density of the indefinable cosmic mass densely packed into the shape and sentience of a tall, lean man.

The glowing, electrified Florante then pierced through the layers and layers of negative energy in order to scream at the maelstrom, "Who are you? What are you doing? Why are you doing this? Do you really want to hurt all these people? Did Mammon put you up to this?"

The pacific storm that was Florante blasted the nimbus man with lightning and thunder, converging around him like he was the low pressure area about to become a typhoon himself.

"Did you think the same thing I had when we started fighting? Did you also wonder why we're fighting and if it's worth doing this in the first place?"

After blowing through layer upon layer of darkness and density, like a self-contained black hole made flesh, Galang then went face-to-face with… a kid. Just another kid like him. A tall kid, but a kid nonetheless.

They floated there in the eye of the storm that was Hurricane Galang.

A Minion facing an Ophanim, with both of them wondering what exactly was the difference between them.

Florante grinned at the stranger and said, "Let's stop this nightmare, okay? Maybe it's about time you woke up."

The darkness that surrounded them then shattered like glass, revealing an untouched city and a perfectly intact Guadalupe Church. Just like what had happened with the defeat of the spaghetti creature.

…Become a person he could be proud of, huh? Maybe he could try becoming that after all.  

***

Flor awoke outside the village or street where Jenny's apartment was located. He hadn't met up with her yet or gone to her apartment. Everything that had happened so far was just a fantasy.

Dammit. So even that was just a dream? A daydream, this time.

He then remembered the "last time" they ended up in her apartment and what they were talking about before they were cut off.

Oh, did he have one of those lucid dreams again? The ones you could control consciously? Or was he even awake now?

He'd been having all sorts of dreams lately, probably to escape the hell that was his teenage life as a bullied boy.

The dreams were happening more and more often. It was harder and harder to tell what was real and what wasn't until he did so in hindsight.

"Wait. What the hell am I doing?" he said to himself aloud, shook his head, and left without going to Jennifer Tolentino's apartment.

"Susmaryosep," he murmured under his breath, feeling like he'd somehow dodged a bullet for some reason.

***

The next day went on easier than the last, but only because Florante Galang knew what to expect of today this time around.

His classmates would either avoid him like the plague or talk behind his back as he went about his friendless existence in First Year Section St. Francis of Assisi at Fatima High School.

Oh well. At least his fantasies and fever dreams were interesting enough to jut down in a dream journal, right? Even though his reality was as banal as it could be.

Jennifer Tolentino and Laura Reyes used to sit near him in class, but they now sat elsewhere once their homeroom teacher and class advisor rearranged their seats.

He ended up with some dude who never talked to him sitting in front of him.

During recess, he went to the library instead of the cafeteria today because he usually sat in his lonesome these days.

His usual friends… acquaintances perhaps… well, the people he sat with every lunch, the Dead Kids… were off doing their own things separately. Weirdoes being weirdoes.

He should speak though. He went to the library during lunch. He was a weirdo himself.

He also tended to avoid bumping into the group consisting of Laura and her friends or, much worse, Gerry Jacinto and his barkada (gang).

He was used to classmates and the student body at large looking through him as though he weren't there, like he were a ghost.

However, for some reason, he felt like he had eyes all around him today, but whenever he stared back at people instead of the floor or his feet as usual, they ended up looking elsewhere. As if averting his gaze.

Was there something on his face or uniform? He hoped he didn't do anything embarrassing again. However, such concerns left his mind after his trip at the library.

He had one thing in mind. One person. Jenny Tolentino.

Granted, Florante still had his photocopies of the phone book page full of "Tolentinos" and other "T" names as well as the yearbook page featuring a look-alike Jennifer Narcissa Tolentino.

…Man, he was acting really creepy again, wasn't he?

How shallow was his crush on Laura Reyes that he ended up pining for Jenny Tolentino instead? Ah, whatever.

Crushes were supposed to be shallow attraction, right? You needed to really know someone to develop deeper feelings for them. Or so he heard. He didn't believe in love at first sight, although he had his share of, uh, infatuation at first sight.

Florante simply found Jenny cute because he knew her and they shared something in common. Also, she had puppy dog eyes behind those wide-rimmed glasses.

Why hadn't he looked at her that way before? Must be because of Laura. And because she might be a fellow angel.

Or at least his imagination viewed her as such.

Maybe this was him finally giving up on Laura in favor of Jenny. Maybe.

***

To Be Continued…

Florante starts having issues in being able to tell what's real and what's fantasy as he continues to dream up plot scenarios for his comic book and uses it to retreat from how miserable his real life has gotten.

Farewell, Abdiel

[gabriel-gabdiel]

Fantasy of Evolution Chapter 3: The Birth of an Ophanim

Finally got to publish the third chapter on Fiction Press. Man, I suffered Writer’s Block something fierce in getting these last few chapters in order, let me tell you. 

It’s okay now. let’s now talk about what an Ophanim or Throne is. Basically a biblically accurate angel, actually. “Be Not Afraid.” Against the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

You can also find more chapters of my original fiction here. Please enjoy.

First | Previous | Next

Earlier in class, Florante Galang's idle mind had wandered…

Florante's life in Fatima High wasn't always composed of nonstop bullying and socially awkward, cringe-inducing interactions with his classmates.

Some good things happened to him as well, believe it or not.

Once, he had scored a single goal during soccer practice for their P.E. class through a combination of dumb luck, the opposing team underestimating him, and the "steroids" from his asthma medicine kicking in.

He guessed... Do steroids for asthma work the same as anabolic steroids?

Perhaps it was adrenalin or the power of suggestion that pushed him forward. The placebo effect, even.

He certainly didn't do much of anything after scoring that goal, wheezing and sweating profusely as he couldn't get near the soccer ball again.

He remembered the goal but no one else did.

Aside from that one shining moment, he was a clumsy set of gangly, unathletic limbs on the field and he almost always did the exercise warm-ups wrong, to his chagrin and his classmates' amusement.

He remembered the feeling of momentary triumph followed by harsh reality like it was yesterday.

Back then, after he had finished putting on his regular school uniform and storing away his P.E. uniform in his gym bag, he took off to the communal bathroom to answer the call of nature.

He had felt giddy for a few seconds, but that feeling washed away as soon as he looked at his face in the mirror.

He brushed his tangled bowl-cut hair with pointy bangs back, the individual strands dampened by his own sweat. He frowned at how sallow his skin looked. He looked almost sickly.

He had always been slender yet... soft somehow. Embarrassingly so. He was never really athletic and lacked the hand-to-eye coordination required to properly play most sports.

He had narrow shoulders, he looked meeker than a lamb, he sported clothes a few sizes too big for him, but he (thought) he was intelligent.

He ended up in the Top Ten of the class from time to time.

His reflection revealed to him his pallid face and frail, asthmatic body, which forced him to admit the lies he'd been telling himself.

He couldn't fit in with his classmates or any of the students in his same year not only because he lacked athletic ability like the average person would.

He also had the body and face of a 14-year-old girl with a terrible bowl-cut hair.

With that said, like him scoring a goal in that soccer match showed, every dog had his day.

***

Fantasy of Evolution

An Urban Fantasy Story by Abdiel

What is an Ophanim anyway?

Disclaimer: This work may reference copyrighted material, the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. It is believed that this constitutes a fair use of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law. All copyrighted material referred to in this work belongs to their respective owners. All rights reserved.

***

Chapter 3: The Birth of an Ophanim

***

Florante Galang's spindly arms and legs shone with bluish-white electric plasma that formed their own flames and tendrils of power. As he unleashed his otherwise unathletic punches and kicks at the monster, they burned his enemy's own tentacles away into dust.

His punching form wasn't exactly boxer-like but the energy he'd gathered inside him and projected outwards into pure blue energy proved sufficient enough in eradicating this maelstrom of living pasta.

Living pasta, huh? Ridiculous. He must've been dreaming again. No, of course, he was. He got hungry and dreamed of his favorite Italian dish.

He then wielded a lightning bolt that he waved around like a bendable sword to hack and slash at the... giant living spaghetti creature with two enormous eyes glaring back at him. Yikes.

He might as well do this, since this was just a dream, right? An impossibly lucid dream. "When in Rome, do what the Romans do!"

The monster looked that a squid or an octopus mixed with a hearty Italian dish using the machine from the movie "The Fly". An Italian Kraken, if you would. Or seafood spaghetti left out in the open for so long it became sentient.

'What the hell is even going on right now?' he thought. He fought against complete nonsense. A fantasy of a childish mind addled by television and video games.

Regardless, he blasted the monster like he was some sort of superhero with uh, blasty superpowers while at the same time dodging its attacks. Feeling the same way he felt when he made that goal at P.E.

He remained in the "zone", so to speak. Or as he read in the library in a book about positive psychology, his body went through a "flow state".

He fully immersed himself into using his electrical powers by burning, frying, destroying, cutting, and pruning the spreading tendrils of the pasta fungus monster or whatever, feeling energized, focused, involved, and strangely enjoying himself in the activity.

Only when he drew comics with a pencil and paper or made summarized outlines for the stories in his mind did he feel as hyped as he currently felt.

Florante rescued many an elementary child from the clutches of the plant-like monster, his summoned lightning strikes from the sky shielding them from any backlash or counterattacks from the living, breathing pasta dish.

Finally, he reached her.

The girl he spared in his supposed fever dream school massacre. His classmate who just now nearly got strangled to death by this incomprehensible horror.

Jennifer "Jenny" Tolentino.

He saved her like her knight in shining armor. Wow. He finally saved the girl when usually a wimpy boy like him tended to get trampled or eaten by the invading ogre. The bystander that also needed saving by the true hero.

Right now, he felt more motivated than ever before. Empowered by his own righteousness.

Not gonna lie. This was the coolest he'd ever felt in his entire life.

It felt even better than that one soccer goal he accidentally scored during his P.E. class. All the other memories he had was him being an embarrassment.

In his other dream—or perhaps nightmare—where he stood up to his bully for once, it felt disturbingly good to act so badass. But this felt even better.

This time, he wasn't just venting his anger at imagined versions of his mean classmates.

Everyone wanted to strive to be someone better, after all. All humans wanted to be pure at heart. To become dependable.

For once, he was the badass instead of the wimp. Not bad for a 90-pound weakling with a young girl's waistline, right?

As he went deeper and deeper into his flow state, the possibility that this was a dream became the furthest thing on his mind. He wanted to savor the moment without souring it with a disclaimer at the back of his mind. That it wasn't real.

The wimpy kid who kept a dream journal then got caught unawares by the flying (mostly floating) pasta monster's flood of tendrils that stabbed him all over his body before he got rag-dolled and thrown to the roof of a utility vehicle in one fell swoop.

Damn it. Of course things were going too smoothly. It was all too good to be true.

Oh, his hubris. Why would he ever think things would go his way this time when it never did? Stupid, stupid, stupid!

***

From darkness came forth light.

On the verge of death, he awoke a minute later, his most fatal wounds closed up.

Wait, what?

He then realized that the girl he had just rescued proceeded to rescue him in kind.

The damsel saved the knight in distress for a change.

Jenny just healed him with healing energy. She sat in prayer while a gentle halo of light shown from her head, bathing him in its warmth. Like a wilted plant receiving enough water and sunshine to recover and start photosynthesis.

She instantly healed his wounds as though she was one of those healers in role-playing videogames like Final Fantasy. Or in Dungeons and Dragons.

Or even one of those shamans or mystics of myth that magically healed people with touch and prayer. As bogus as those were.

Her bluish green aura flowed formlessly, enveloping Florante's body like a glowing amoeba made of amniotic fluid used to feed a baby, her head bathed in its azure brightness like an ornate, gleaming crown.

Her angelic halo.

Wow. Man, was Jenny always this cute?

Wait a minute. He got ahead of himself again. He had a crush on Laura Reyes, not Jenny Tolentino! How desperate was he?

Then again, Laura had already rejected him, so maybe... Ah! What the hell was he thinking?

More importantly, Jenny seemed just like him. Somehow, she gained powers just as he had. Just like Gerry in their final battle in his previous dream, actually.

'Or was it really a dream?' he thought. Aloud, he exclaimed, "Susmaryosep. You have powers too!"

"Uh... yes," she answered matter-of-factly.

Glibly, he replied in kind, "Well, thanks a lot, Jenny! You're a huge help! Heal me while I stop that gigantic pasta creature with my special attacks!"

"Heal you...? Hey, wait, Gab...! I mean, Flor…!"

Surprising even himself with his brashness, Florante then barked at Jenny, "Don't call me Flor. The name's Florante."

"Wha...?" she started, readjusting her glasses. "Everyone in class calls you Flor."

"I never told them to call me that," said Florante. "That's a girl's name."

He then shook his head and refocused his sights on the abomination before him. He had no time to lose. He had a monster to kill and a school to save.

"...LIGHT ARRAY!"

Wait... Light A-What?" stuttered Jenny, jolting herself up to her feet after seeing Florante do the same thing.

She got her answer to her question soon enough.

The pinpoints of electrical energy that formed on all ten fingertips of Florante's hands allowed him to focus the torrents of lightning and thunder he produced by force of will into energy bullets he could shoot out like with a railgun.

That was the Light Array. An array of "ball lightning" bullets. He based the name off of the main character of the comic book he thought about writing.

Florante's explosive energy bolts initially measured to pinprick size before they shot off and dilated to about the size of bullets, yet every bullet exploded like huge blockbuster bombs.

It barely fazed the monster though. Sure, the attack blasted and burned ten new holes into it.

However, it simply regrew the massive burning damage from the Light Array at a moment's notice, replacing the lost tendrils set aflame like wicks on a candle or the fuse of a stick of dynamite with new ones.

Although Florante made enough leeway in cutting off the spaghetti monster to the pass before crossing the road to get to the nearby hotel or mall where it could victimize more people, he lacked firepower to overwhelm or kill it altogether.

The pasta-enriched eldritch abomination simply kept growing and growing. Unrelenting. Unkillable. Unstoppable.

The skies went grey with electric nimbus clouds as Galang tried to attack again by summoning more bolts of lightning, wielding the arcing plasma that appeared like cracks of light in the sky with his bare hands.

Jenny however dragged him away by his arm before several cars suddenly flew at him, hurled by the organic pasta dish with the intent of turning him into roadkill.

"Ah, wait a minute!" Florante blurted out, half-grateful for the save and half-indignant for the interruption.

Nevertheless, he froze, more because this was the first time a girl had ever held him like this than for any half-baked sense of indignation.

"Jeez, Flor! You're getting ahead of yourself again!" Jenny said as she pushed him for cover in the church nearest the school. Or rather, the church directly connected directly to the religious private school.

"What did I just say?" Florante admonished in spite of himself. "Stop calling me Flor!"

"Fine! Florante!" She sighed with a roll of her eyes. "...I'd hoped it wouldn't come to this."

"Jenny...?" Florante trailed off. "What is it?"

"Listen up, Florante. You're an Ophanim. You're pretty powerful for an Ophanim, but you're just an Ophanim nonetheless."

"...What are you talking about?" he asked. "Orphanim? Are you calling me an orphan? My parents are still alive!"

"No, an Ophanim. That's different. Your true form is actually that of a being composed of giant wheels with a thousand eyes on them."

"...Excuse me? My true form?"

She pinched the knot between her furrowed eyebrows and adjusted her glasses as they both heard a rumble from the distance, like the heavens themselves growling at them through subsequent thunderclaps after the lightning strike.

"Look, it's hard to explain, but you're a wingless angel," she said. "We're both angels. We've both existed for millennia. For multiple lifetimes, living amongst humans."

"Wingless... angel...?" he trailed off. "What are you talking about?"

Jennifer hesitated. Her eyes obscured by the glint of her glasses, she asked, "What do you remember from your last dream?"

"Wait, what? W-What does that have to do with anything?" he asked defensively. "How'd you know about my dreams?"

Jenny looked Florante straight in the eyes. "Just tell me."

With a gulp, he relented. "I-I dreamt that I… had revenge on some of our classmates who bullied me using the same superpowers I have now then Laura turned into an angel somehow to face me down! Then I blanked out when we faced off."

He winced when his eyes met with Jenny's. As though she could tell he had lied by omission.

That he had left out the part where he murdered his classmates in cold blood with his new abilities, thinking it was all a dream as he did so to absolve himself of his sins.

To his surprise, Jenny didn't spare him a condemning or withering look. Instead, she merely looked confused.

"...That's it?" she asked.

Huh. Weird reaction.

"That's all I remember. Oh, and I remember warning you to stay away from school that day. But it's all just a dream, right? I mean, it wasn't real at all, right? Right?"

Yes, it was just a dream. A harmless dream. All the people he killed were still alive when he woke up and went back to school.

Not to mention, didn't he have superpowers in his dream? Imagine. A weakling like him. Having powers fit for a superhero. Preposterous.

"W-Wait, what happened a few days ago? I had a fever back then. I was so sick that I got a fever dream somehow."

"That was no dream. Everything about it was real."

"…What?"

"You heard me."

"N-No way." Florante slumped against the wall. "B-But that can't be! I... I killed our classmates in that dream! In cold blood! It can't be real! That'd make me a murderer! Or a supervillain!"

They stood at the foot of the stairs leading to the church, but were then forced to climb it when the flying/floating/spreading spaghetti monster finally reached them, its slimy tentacles of varying lengths and widths flowing through every nook and cranny of the buildings and vehicles it passed.

Primal fear and adrenalin pushed them towards the safety of the holy sanctuary, unwilling to even entertain the thought of such disgusting noodles filling their every nook and cranny.

As they ran towards—upwards, really—the church's flight of stairs, Jenny asked, "If you truly thought it was a dream, then why were you fantasizing about killing our classmates that day, Florante?"

"Huh?" Florante gulped, not knowing how to answer.

Feeling Jenny's intense glare even while he avoided her gaze, he gave it the ol' college try.

"I wanted to vent, I guess," he replied lamely. "They kept messing with me. Bullying me. So I thought up a dream about me paying them back. To release all my stress from them. It was my way of venting, okay? It wasn't even realistic! I was shooting laser beams at them or something!"

"...What's your problem, man?" she accused. "Get some help."

"WHAT? Hey, it was a harmless dream! A fantasy! I wouldn't do it for real!"

Galang then saw the disgusted look she gave him and turned away bitterly. "Of course, you wouldn't be able to relate, since you're Miss Popularity and all!"

She herself looked away with a cute pout, the glint from her glasses hiding her eyes from view. "That's not it at all."

Meanwhile, the crawling pastafarian mass with one healthy eye... Galang shot the other eye to save Jenny earlier, but that was already healing... had gathered up a fresh batch of people to absorb unto itself.

Florante then wielded a lightning bolt like a shining laser saw blade, flinging it at the entity and cutting through the endless tendrils before they could reach any nearby civilian (or policeman, for that matter).

This electrical bolt could also bend and sway like a jagged whip for good measure.

His efforts still weren't enough. The more tentacles he sliced up with his bolt of lightning or incinerated with his Light Array, twenty more grew back.

Like he was making things worse than better. As though fighting a ridiculous version of the Hydra of Greek lore.

Apparently, he found it easier to kill his powerless classmates than to take down a giant monster by himself.

'Well, duh.'

His great powers couldn't bear the great responsibility of being a hero.

Come to think of it, when Jacinto manifested superpowers like Florante did, the quiet boy barely won that battle as well.

Regardless, he jumped to the fray, shooting Light Array after Light Array while using a lightning bolt like a weed whacker.

"Light Array! Light Array!" he shouted over and over, as though he were performing a spell after every shot of his special technique he came up with himself.

More tendrils approached the pair. He could hear Jenny reproach him from behind him. She told him to retreat and hide.

"You're no match for that monster. Let me handle this!"

"HEY! Wait a second…!"

Jenny proceeded to dodge and run away from the tendrils, using herself as bait. But what could she do with her comparatively lame powers that could possibly hurt the monster? Heal it to death?

She needed help, but nothing he did could affect the living Italian pasta creature.

No. It was unfair.

For once in his life, he had felt in control, only to have such good feelings slip from his fingers as well when the going got tough.

So the one blessing he got from the heavens didn't amount to a hill of beans after all?

'No! It won't end like this! I won't let it!'

***

What happened next was hard to describe. Florante felt his very consciousness extend outwards.

Suddenly, he could see everything around him. He could see a mouth-agape Jenny back away from him from behind him while at the same time staring at the spaghetti monster in front of him.

What. The. Hell. Was he high?

His current point of view reminded him of when he got hurled away by the monster and he spun around, seeing both the sky and the ground alternate in his view every split-second.

He saw a topsy-turvy world. Except he could do so now without spinning.

He could see the dark heavens above him and the concrete ground below him. Like looking at the world through a prism. Or broken glass.

He couldn't feel his arms and legs anymore, almost like when the spaghetti monster almost killed him earlier.

Most importantly, his eyesight was aflame. Like literally set on fire and pulsating with heat at the same time, shining with their own light.

He could see bright flames burst all around him and his eyes. He blinked his eyes yet could still see with them closed.

He then moved, causing everything around him to break. Not unlike the monster before him.

He and the pasta creature clashed and got into an entanglement. It was then that he got a chance to look at himself.

Not through a reflection, but through his own eyes. His multitude of eyes. Encased in endless wheels and rings adorned with eyes set on fire, whirling around each other like a complex gyroscope.

So he was an Ophanim. Just like Jenny said. This was his original form.

Huh.

Oh, right. He remembered now.

He read about Ophanim as he did research for his self-made comics about angels.

Biblical angels were eldritch abominations that rivaled demons, fallen angels themselves, in hideousness. He had decided not to include them in his stories because of how ugly and monstrous they looked.

Most people remember the winged cherubs and seraphs featured in old paintings more than these illogical celestial beings that could make you go mad at the sight of them.

"But what is that thing?!" the frightened humans he had just save screamed at the sight of him and angels like him. "A destructive deity? A beast? Or perhaps a giant demon of darkness?"

Haha. Of course. By bringing forth his Ophanim form, he had also turned into a monster.

A monster who killed his classmates for petty things like teasing, bullying, and pushing him to social suicide, his wishful thinking turned into brutal reality.

All he needed to do to win against the spaghetti monster was to abandon his humanity and become a full-fledged "angel", then.

So he ultimately became a monster to take on a monster, huh? Wasn't there some sort of quote warning against doing just that?

If this wasn't another fever dream, what a way for him to go.

Like Godzilla and King Kong, the two titans battled, with the spaghetti monster drowning the gyroscoping, multi-eyed Ophanim with fiery eyes in noodly membranes like an red and white sea.

***

However, before Florante's Ophanim form could fully merge with the living spaghetti monster, Jenny interfered, blocking the two of them with her own body, her aura surprisingly repelling the both of them away.

"I'm sorry for making you think I don't understand what it's like to be bullied or be an outcast, Florante," she said.

'JENNY!' was what Florante couldn't scream because he had no mouth.

He actually saw her move from behind to in front of him in a human eye blink thanks to his multitude of open eyes.

This prompted him to will himself back to his original human form to avoid crushing her with the combined weight of his Ophanim body and the tentacled abomination's gargantuan mass.

Galang's multi-ocular vision went from 360 degrees all around, up above, and below him to focusing only on the binocular sight of Jenny jumping towards the fleshiest parts of the spaghetti monster, its brain appearing like a pulsating bulk of minced meat.

Jennifer again ended up entangled in the slimy web of appendages, her glasses miraculously still on her face.

She turned her head towards him and when their eyes met, she said, "Don't go berserk like the last time, idiot! I have this all under control."

'Like the last time...?' Florante then sputtered, "The hell you do! You're a healer, not a fighter! You can't kill that creature!"

She smirked and picked up something inside her bag or purse. "That's exactly what I'm going to do."

She ended up holding a moldy ham sandwich inside a plastic bag.

Ew. Gross,

"Have you lost your goddamned mind?" demanded Florante. "Don't throw expired food at that thing! You'll just piss it off!"

But that was exactly what she did, with the moldy sandwich landing right in the middle of the monster's seeming brain matter with a lame splat.

However, Florante soon figured out that she had imbued her healing aura and spiritual essence right into that rotting snack, which made its mold grow. And spread.

In a few seconds, the al dente tentacles of the spaghetti monster started getting bluish stains all over them. In a minute or two, nearly all of the long noodly appendages got filled with cobwebs of mold.

The suffocating spores spread all over the noodles of the pasta abomination, making its noodle tentacles fall off and its meatiest parts rot as though they ended up diseased by the spreading mold spores.

Jennifer's healing factor also promoted bacterial, fungal, and moldy growth, apparently.

Like Florante's Ophanim form, the spaghetti monster could not scream because it had no mouth to scream with even as it wriggled like it were having a seizure. Or like a cockroach flipped belly-up trying to get back on its feet.

Tremors made the few remaining healthy noodle arms vibrate around in frenzy as the creature struggled against the overgrowth and unstoppable spread of the malignant mold spores, with it starting to stink with the smell of a moldy wet basement.

A basement with rotting dead bodies inside it.

Florante felt like he would hurl.

In fifteen minutes, every inch of the creature got covered in grassy mold. It eventually stopped moving altogether a second or two later, with its body turning into bushels of what appeared to be kinky hair or bushy grass but was actually fully grown mold.

The rotting pasta monster got cocooned in cottony, web-like mold. No butterfly emerged from it though. It instead served as its moldy grave.

Instead of using laser blasts or light missiles to bombard the creature to death, Miss Tolentino used her life-giving powers to propagate deadly mold all over the monster's pasta appendages and meaty chunks until it died.

And rotted. And stunk to high heaven of death, bacteria, and mold spores.  

Jenny did in fact just "heal" the monster to death.

The girl harrumphed, pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose, and said to Florante with an upturned nose, "I don't want to hear a mere Ophanim tell me off on how to deal with demons!"

***

Florante gulped hard, feeling kind of lightheaded with what he'd just witnessed.

He then looked at his body to check if he was still human and not a scary set of orbiting fire wheels or rings with fully functional human(?) eyes emblazoned on them.

Yep, still human. Not a sentient biblical angel monster… thing.

His normally brown or tan hands and arms looked quite pale though. A shiver also ran through his spine. His face felt numb. Actually, his whole body did. Was he going into shock?

More importantly, what did he just witness?

Aside from killing a living pasta creature, his whole reality shattered like glass.

'I mean, literally shattered.'

The moldy monster carcass that was once living pasta and meatballs—along with the destroyed buildings and multitude of people caught in its noodle tentacles—crumbled and cracked like so many smashed mirrors or windows, revealing underneath them untouched architecture and unharmed civilians minding their own business.

Like pulling back the curtain of a puppet show, revealing the puppeteer hidden underneath it. Like the whole incident even never happened in the first place.

Oh shit. Was it all a lie? Was he dreaming again? When was he going to wake up?

Not realizing he'd been holding his breath all this time, he exhaled and inhaled again, expecting to gag with the moldy and corpsey smell. Instead, he heard a wheeze.

His asthma acted up again.

With her hands on her hips, Jenny said, "There is no ontological inertia involved when it comes to fights between angels and demons. Once the influence of either is defeated, everything should come back to normal."

"...What?" Florante just stared at her.

"Uh, there's no object permanence with celestial fights. Whether the creation and destruction of something becomes true or false depends on whose will has prevailed."

"…Seriously, Jenny. WHAT?"  What in the world was she talking about?

Jenny pushed her glasses up her nose, smiled, and said, "Long story short, it's like nothing happened here at all."

A flood of new questions flowed inside Florante's brain, but his tiny mouth didn't have the means to expel them, which gave him a headache.

Where should he start?

"Th-That flying spaghetti monster was a demon?" Well, that was a good place to start as any.

"Yeah. I guess you could say that," said Jenny, who stared off into space as though avoiding Florante's own gaze. Like she wanted to be elsewhere. What was with her anyway?

"Why is there a demon at Fatima High? Why am I seeing demons in Metro Manila? What happened to me?!" he demanded, his mind finally unloading question after question.

He gulped and let his voice go down to a whisper after he became aware of himself.

He looked like an insane person saying such things aloud in a lazy afternoon.

Jenny stared back at Florante with glinting eyeglasses, her lips a thin, grim line of an unexpressed emotion.

"W-What is it, Jenny?" Florante asked, gulping. For some reason, his fingertips sizzled with static and electric sparks. Almost by reflex.

Jenny then asked, "When you had revenge on our classmates, what did you mean by that?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Those powers you used just now against the monster. It's the same powers you used against them, remember? The ones you used against Laura too."

"Wha…!?"

Florante felt his face drain of blood. He stared back at his sparkling hands. His complexion became like ash.

Wait, how did she know…?

***

A memory of a hazy dream reemerged from Florante's subconscious…  

Beyond the entrance gates of Fatima School, past the concrete quadrangle and basketball courts of the grade school campus, and right into the high school building stood the girl of Florante's dreams who turned his life into a nightmare.

At first, he didn't recognize her, but then soon identified her as Laura Reyes.

Her hair danced from the unseen breeze like a proud black flag at full mast. Her slim arms showed some muscle definition but not in a bodybuilder sort of way. She was quite the athletic student who also excelled in P.E. as well as academics.  

Florante wondered back in his dream why she was there, only to have the horrifying realization that she wanted revenge because he "killed" her and all their classmates.

Maybe he didn't need those quotation marks even.

All of his bullies. All of the people who made fun of him. Rejected him. Ridiculed him. He damned them all to hell with anime-like energy blasts from his fingers.

The unbidden dream—surely a nightmare for the others—served as his way of coping with his bullies' abuse and the undead corpse that was his social life.

However, for some reason, the visage of the angelic Laura and her transparent water wings then morphed into a bespectacled face of pure indiscernible consternation.

The grim face of Jennifer Tolentino.

Florante had woken up from his flashback to reality. If he could call it reality.

Perhaps he merely awoke from one dream to another. But that couldn't be it. Or else she wouldn't be dreaming the same dream he dreamt!

***

Back at the Fatima High parking lot…

"I-I thought it was a dream…" Florante murmured to himself, the gears inside his head grinding against each other like rusty wheels or rings of eyes from his gyroscopic Ophanim form. "Right? Of course. Otherwise, none of this would make sense! I'm still dreaming, aren't I? I've gone crazy!"

Jenny's features softened for a hot minute because she furrowed her eyebrows again, which wrinkled her forehead even as her eyes remained hidden by her shiny glasses.

She reiterated, "You used those same powers to kill our classmates, Flor."

And so a great sense of shame washed over him. Like him getting caught stealing cookies from the cookie jar. Or masturbating to VHS porn.

But wait a minute, though! This all happened in his dreams! His imagination! It didn't really happen for real even though he thought about it!

Should he be blamed for his subconscious desiring karma or vengeance against all of his worst bully classmates and teachers? Couldn't he have this at least? Couldn't he imagine it because he'd never do it in real life?

His indignation also kicked in, along with confusion. His mind went a mile a minute as he realized two things. One, how did Jenny know about his dream? Two, why couldn't he dream that dream he dreamt?

He even said as much.

"That's unfair!" he choked out as he became of two minds about the broached subject, feeling equal parts indignant and ashamed about it as he withstood the withering bespectacled glare of Jenny's shining glasses.

Defending himself from her unsaid accusations.

"It's a victimless crime, isn't it? At least I didn't kill them for real!"

Instead of passive-aggressively pulling pranks or offering snide remarks to them in real life, he could just… imagine them getting murdered in his hands! With superpowers at that, so it was more goofy than dark for him to do!

Yet Jenny still didn't respond, which further scratched and clawed at his heart. And got on his nerves. Irritating him.

"Would it have been better if I did it for real?" he snapped. "Should I be bullied in my dreams like I'm bullied in real life?"

Even in the comfort of his own mind, he still couldn't win against his own bullies? Even imagining his bullies getting their comeuppance was off-limits? Couldn't he even do at least that? How was that fair?

"What sort of sicko fantasizes about killing his classmates, huh?" she answered back. Finally. Refuting both his words and whatever justification he was thinking about.

So the other shoe finally dropped, and she finally addressed the elephant in the room. Or in the parking lot.

"How did you know about my dreams?" Galang hissed. "Did you read my mind? Or did they all really happen?"

"It's not important. But you're a danger to yourself and others," said Tolentino, who had her hand at the ready while holding some sort of oversized acorn or mistletoe, wielding it like a grenade.

"What's that supposed to mean…?" Florante trailed off, eyeing the plant she wielded warily, remembering what she did with the spaghetti monster using only a moldy sandwich.

"It's not as if I really have superpowers or anything! I was just venting! You know I don't actually have the power to kill my bullies in real life! I'm not even sure if what's happening right now is real either!" he rationalized. Bargained, almost.

Sparks flew. Literally. Electrical arcs of power flowed from his body. He hadn't noticed he'd been getting pressed and heated all this time, which was probably why Jenny felt threatened enough to arm herself with a weaponized plant.

"Why are you blaming me for a dream? Like I can control what I dream about? Don't blame me, blame my subconscious! Blame my goddamn trauma!" he said. He reasoned. That was a reasonable stance, was it not?

"Even if it was a dream, it's still the dream of a psychopath," said Jenny, which made Florante flinch.

Their eyes met. Florante's glistening eyes finally saw the similarly resigned eyes of Jenny, the glare from her glasses gone.

"Flor," she started after a deep breath, "You killed Laura. Why did you kill her? If it were just the bullies, I'd understand, but Laura? What did she do to you?"

She kind of had a point. What drove him to kill his crush along with his bullies? Not that it would've been any better had he only killed his bullies.

Florante went face-to-face with the consequences of his actions from a fever dream he had used to vent his real-life frustrations.

He cringed in horror at what he had done. At what he had fantasized as his coping mechanism.

"...I-I'm so sorry I killed our classmates in my fantasy! I thought it was all a dream! I didn't mean to hurt them for real! Especially Laura…!" he said. He pleaded. He wanted to say that it was just a dream again, but he felt like he was repeating himself.

He cried. He wept openly. And he lied as naturally as he breathed. Or at least half-lied.

He wasn't that sorry about having that dream. Although it hinged on the fact that it was indeed all a dream.

He was only mostly sorry. Not all the way sorry.

Why should he apologize for becoming a monster? Did anyone apologize for making him one?

However, he was indeed sorry that Laura had to die back then. If he could redo everything, he'd avoid harming her.

Why did he kill her again? If he were honest, it was because he got drunk with power. For the first time, he felt in charge after his bullies trampled over him all this time.

He had a short fuse and she ended up collateral damage. However, all of his reasons behind his dreamt actions sounded like lame excuses to him.

He couldn't even explain himself to Jenny without looking like a criminal confessing his crimes even though he still felt indignant about being blamed for what he did in his dreams.

As Florante blinked back his tears, he felt Jenny back away and ready her acorn bomb at him, as though to finish him off once and for all.

"It's best that you forget everything I've said and everything that happened here, Flor," said Jenny. "Let the nightmare pass. Move on with your life from now on. Or else."

The fingertips of his right hand flickered to life with energy in order to zap Jenny away, but he hesitated. Stopped himself cold. He didn't want a repeat of what had happened with Laura Reyes.

With a resigned sigh, his shoulders slumped and the power from his hand faded into the ether. If she wanted to kill him here and now then so be it. Let him pay for his imagined crimes.

"Please, I beg you. This time, forget about what happened once and for all."

The velvet darkness crawled into the edges of his vision before everything became pitch black.

And then he woke up. Even that was a dream.

Everything was a dream. What was even real anymore…?

***

Back at the classroom of First Year Section St. Francis of Assisi)...

A few minutes had already passed after the final bell rung. Dismissal time.

Florante heard the door slam from within the classroom, which awoke him to the realization that he was all alone.

What a weird dream. He'd been having one weird dream after another lately.

Something about Jennifer Tolentino confronting him about his other disturbing dream where he killed all of his classmates.

Granted, it was truly disturbing of him to dream something like that up, but it wasn't as if he had control over the nightmares his bullying induced.

Like he said to her dream self, she should blame his traumatized subconscious instead of him.

Still, he did feel a bit guilty about killing the dream version of Laura, but she did resurrect herself in the same dream, at least.

Ugh. He should learn a better coping mechanism than dreams to deal with his high school life and his ongoing social suicide.

'I'm… I mean, I was an Ophanim in my dream, huh?' he thought. 'Wild. I literally turned into a monster back then. Biblically accurate angels are quite the head trip. No wonder they always say, 'Don't be afraid,' to people, huh? They're freak shows and then some!'

His head then turned after he heard a sudden noise. A savage movement.

Like a deer realizing it had been trapped by hunters. Or headed on a collision course with a truck, the bright headlights mesmerizing it to a standstill.

The door had closed shut with a loud bang.

A minute passed, and he concluded that one of his bullies probably played a passive-aggressive prank on him without revealing their identity.

Probably to avoid ending up on Florante's list of bullies he sent to his teachers like the little snitch that he was.

Yeah, he snitched. It was his only way to make them somewhat ease up on their outright flagrant bullying, only for him to suffer from being ostracized nonetheless.

He pushed such thoughts at the back of his mind.

He didn't want his mind to wander and open up the can of worms full of his bad memories—of humiliation and unchecked abuse that happened to him on a regular basis—while currently suffering through this dreary weather.

He wished he could forget every day. Erase everything and end up with a clean slate every time. Or he wished it was Opposite Day and his bullies would leave him alone.

He didn't even wish they'd suddenly turn into his friends or anything. Just leave him be.

If only.

Most of his days as a freshman, he mostly had no one to talk to. People laughed behind his back. He felt extra self-conscious, afraid of embarrassing himself or doing something cringe-worthy. So he kept to himself.

He'd actually improved from his grade school days of being the butt of everyone's jokes because on top of being socially awkward, he was a crybaby to boot when he was younger.

At least now, he didn't cry as much.

However, he was still a soft-hearted spoiled brat who was a bit of a weirdo. He was quick to anger too. The smallest things could set him off. He wore his heart on his sleeve.

From nursery to kindergarten, he acted particularly terrible. Almost like a toddler.

He even embarrassed himself up on stage when he was assigned to memorize and recite a poem about picking up 50 pesos. He cried after the people up front laughed at his antics.

He must've been about 7 or 8 years old when it happened. Embarrassingly, he had the emotional maturity of a 2-3 year old at the time.

He didn't only cry back then. He bawled. He had a temper tantrum.

Later on, his tantrums in class got so bad that his mother had to be called in.

Naturally, his behavior wasn't conducive to getting friends. His only best friend at the time soon abandoned him for being such a crybaby weirdo and for acting too needy.

In fairness to Florante, he somewhat improved and emotionally matured as he grew older. Instead of bawling, he'd only cry to himself quietly, which was an improvement (kind of).

Soon, he'd only get misty eyed when his emotions got the better of him.

However, the fact that he acted so sensitive for a man made him a prime target for teasing and bullying all throughout his childhood. What was worse was that when he was even younger, he had zero self-awareness.

So by the time he got to his teens, he could only shrug and sigh in resignation as to why no one would become friends with him, why the girls in his school found him gross, and why he was bullied so often by everyone.

He only had himself to blame.

Hindsight was 20/20. A cringe-inducing 20/20.

He could only cringe in remembrance. He swore once he made his debut in high school, he'd never again act like such a huge... er... wimp. Nerd. Loser.

Afterwards, from crying a lot to crying a little, he soon graduated to not crying at all. However, he still had the blues whenever the popular kids and/or his newest bullies called him out on his... eccentricities.

This year's batch of Fatima High  School freshmen had a total of 200 plus boys and girls occupying about 5 classrooms with about 40 or so students each.

Fatima School had its own grade school too, so many of the kids here had grown up together, give or take several students who were "accelerants" who moved from Grade 6 to high school without going through Grade 7 because of their good grades.

The slammed door to the classroom then opened again, startling him. Waking him up from his idle reverie.

A cold wind reminiscent to the typhoon Florante Galang conjured up in his fever dream gusted through the classroom, rustling papers on the desk before swirling his undercut hair around his face, his bangs obscuring his eyes.

The girl who breezed through merely stepped towards the desk, picked up a notebook she probably forgot to retrieve earlier, and walked out again. She was 'What's-her-name,' he couldn't remember at the moment.

Their eyes met, which made Florante turn his attention back to his backpack, pretending to check its contents, all to avoid meeting eyes with the girl who'd just entered.

He felt her stare at him (if she really was staring), which finally made him remember her name. She was Regina. Regina Something-or-Another.

'Regina Mariano.'

He shuddered, the hairs on the back of his neck standing on its ends, with him vaguely remembering the crying and begging for her life on her part during the nightmare he had of her and their other classmates.

She begged for him to spare her.  Unlike Laura, who died instantly and came back to life later.

Regina was one of Florante's bullies and, as a result, he apparently fantasized being responsible for her demise.

Yikes. What was he even thinking? What was wrong with him?

No wonder he had another dream of Jenny telling him off. What a nightmare he had, with him acting like a vengeful school shooter.

And, shamed as he was to admit it, it felt good getting even with his classmates with zero consequences.

Up until he felt guilty doing so. Up until he faced the consequences of such actions.

Even if he only dreamed it, it was still a screwed up thing for him to think about.

Florante then looked up and saw him stand in the doorway, the afternoon sunset bathing him in golden light.

He was Alonzo Estanislao. One of Fatima's infamous Dead Kids.

***

Facing the opposite direction as Galang, Alonzo gave Florante a sidelong glance with a smirk, his round shades that teachers kept telling him to take off while in class (or so Florante heard) glinting in the fading sunlight.

"Hey, kiddo."

"Hey, Lonzo. Long time, no see."

"It has, hasn't it? How you been, buddy?"

They weren't actually classmates. They belonged in separate years. In separate classes.

Estanislao was a sophomore or second year high school student. Galang was a freshman or first year high school student.

If Florante remembered correctly, Alonzo was in Second Year St. Anthony of Padua or something.

Florante smiled at his friend's greeting in spite of himself.

"We've barely been seeing each other in the Art Club," the sophomore said.

The freshman chuckled. "Yeah. I haven't been feeling well. Sorry."

Ah yes. The Dead Kids. They were his only friends in high school, with all of them belonging in different years or different sections. He had no friends in his own class.

He missed them terribly. He'd been having his strange dreams and nightmares ever since they haven't been meeting with each other all that time.

Their Art Club connection got preempted by other school activities like the intramurals, a school play, and so forth. They hadn't gotten together for lunch much either for some reason.

Since they had drifted apart, he only had his empty existence with his bully classmates to deal with for weeks on end.

Lonzo walked inside Florante's classroom, his silhouette highlighted by the afternoon sun, his hands inside his pockets.

His smile then turned into a toothy grin, which signaled Florante to cover his nose and mouth. However, he did so a second too late.

"Ugh. LONZO, YOU'RE DISGUSTING!"

Alonzo cackled like a villain after he crop-dusted the classroom with the deadly fumes of his bloodcurdling fart, fanning them with his hands so they'd waft all over the otherwise empty classroom.

"Your reactions are the best, Flor."

"I told you, don't call me that!" chided Florante, his hands still covering his mouth and nose. He didn't dare inhale one gulp more of Lonzo's methane emission.

"What's that? I can't hear you?" teased Alonzo, which prompted Galang to move away from him with his bag serving as his shield.

"You're such an idiot," shouted Florante from a distance, but his now uncovered mouth betrayed a ghost of a smile.

Sure, even among the Dead Kids, he was the runt of the pack. But at least they treated him with a modicum of respect and their jokes weren't malevolent.

Florante missed them. He missed Alonzo. He missed the Hidalgo Siblings.

He also missed the "rivalry" between Alonzo and Kalantiaw "Kal" Hidalgo even as Lonzo kept hitting on Kal's sister Dalisay.

He even missed Jacob "Benjo" Benjamin, even though his clownish antics reminded him of his own classmate's bullying at times. Come to think of it, Benjo was his least favorite member of the gang.

His fellow outcasts were all led by the biggest weirdo of them all, Francisco "Kiko" Celestino, whom he missed talking to as well.

Kiko was the smartest student of his year filled with mostly jocks, muscle-heads, and athletes.

He got made fun of behind his back for probably being the smartest kid in Fatima High School yet having mostly friends or acquaintances from lower years.

By being the King of the Edgelords, so to speak.

***

The next day, during lunchtime…

The next day was better. And worse.

After quickly eating snacks instead of a whole lunch, Florante ended up in the library in his lonesome.

By his own volition, sheer whimsy, and curious capriciousness, he began his research on the comic book he'd been working on anew, since info about it had been prominently featured in his latest dreams.

His dreams were reminding him of the germ of an idea growing in his head.

He started on the religion section to research more about the term, "Ophanim".

Apparently, "Ophanim" or "ophanim" was a Hebrew word, "אוֹפַנִּים", which meant "wheels", "spheres", or "whirlwinds" in English. It could be alternatively spelled "ofanim" or "auphanim". They were also known as "galgalim".

They were construed as angels by the one of the Dead Sea Scrolls. In the Book of Ezekiel, Ezekiel himself viewed them as wheels in his vision of a chariot.

Ophanim angels could also be referred to as "thrones" and were a class of celestial beings (along with "Seraphim" and "Cherubim") that never slept and stood guard on the Throne of God.

Interesting. His gyroscopic form had a name? Or rather, Florante was an eldritch angel of this level?

No, no. Wait. His dream self was the Ophanim. In real life, he was still human. A nerd with wishful thinking.

Elsewhere in the library, he saw Laura and her friends gather for… research purposes, maybe. By reflex, he hid from her with his Book on Angels and Demons in tow behind one of the tall bookshelves.

Whew. That was close.

It wasn't only because he dreamed about killing her. Or he had a nightmare where he killed her but he'd never do the same thing in real life. No way he'd do so. Nope, nope.

It was also because he flashed back to why they stopped talking to each other in the first place. It was when she saw him sketching her and misconstrued that it was a nude sketch instead of him making a rough sketch of her body.

They'd been awkward around each other ever since. He just couldn't explain himself to her every time.

His stupid bullies who asked him to draw her then told her that he drew her nude didn't help. Although in hindsight, the fact that he was drawing her without permission was kind of creepy of him to do.

As though he was a big enough pervert to actually draw her in the nude. Then again, his bullies figured out long ago that he had a crush on her and used that fact against him.

Anyway, he had other things to attend to. Like the freshman year Algebra homework he considered doing in the library itself before lunchtime was over so that he'd have more free time to draw or plot out his comic at home.

Naturally, like any other normal student (that wasn't an Ophanim, Auphanim, or Galganim in real life), he didn't do his homework and instead decided to fool around.

Of course, only a nerd like him would consider going to the library as fooling around.

He then remembered the living sentient flood of spaghetti he and (dream) Jenny just fought that she claimed to be a demon.

Aside from the creature being utterly ridiculous, it also made him think about his Ophanim form. What difference did his Ophanim self had with the flying, crawling, and unstoppable spaghetti demon?

Weren't angels and demons essentially the same, except demons were just fallen angels that betrayed God?

Even Seraphims and Cherubims had horrible descriptions of their physical forms in scripture. The former was a cluster of wings and the latter was different winged animals spliced together.

Biblical angels were hardly angelic and were somehow as monstrous as their demonic counterparts.

The bored Florante then got hold of a phone book from a nearby shelf to look through the names and phone numbers of different people.

Perhaps he could use some of these real-life names to give names to the so-far nameless characters of his comic book.

At the back of his mind, he remembered the Jenny in his dream saying they were both angels who existed for Millennia. For multiple lifetimes.

Wouldn't it be wild if what that were true? If she and him were immortal somehow, living different lives through the decades?

On a whim, he tried looking for Jennifer Tolentino's name inside the phonebook, and sure enough he got several Jennifers there. Or rather, several people with the same name. It wasn't exactly a unique name.

Besides which, she was about the same age as he was, so he should instead be looking for the name of her mother or father. The parents she was living with.

He then got a hold of an old year book back in the 1970s and 1980s.

He idly flipped through unfamiliar faces and year book quotes, hoping to find something he could use for his comic book as well.

It was harder getting a hold of the older yearbooks because they were so old. He noted that Our Lady of Fatima School of Mandaluyong was founded back in 1959. Many of the yearbooks from the 1960s were missing.

Wait a damn minute.

Florante noticed something amiss from the pile of yearbooks he read.

He found Jennifer Tolentino's name in another yearbook.

Obviously not from their batch of students—they were freshmen and they had three more years to go before they'd get their own yearbook—but one from the 1960s.

'This can't be right.'

The picture staring back at him was the spirit and image of Jennifer "Jenny" Tolentino from 4th Year Saint Patrick of Ireland, the same section Francisco "Kiko" Celestino belonged to.

What the hell was going on here?

Jennifer Narcissa Tolentino or someone named like her who also looked exactly like her was enrolled in Fatima High back in School Year 1962-1963. Or about 30 years ago.  

So the fever dreams—or rather, the nightmares—he'd been having all this time of him murdering all his bullies and confronting an angelic form of his crush or facing off against a giant spaghetti monster were real?!

His world, or perhaps his head, then started spinning.

What was he to do now? All the relief he felt when he awoke from his dream, only for him to see evidence that it was real in his real life! Like he were in the twist ending of a Twilight Zone episode!

***

In a hazed frenzy, Florante had the old yearbook and phone book filled with names under "T" for "Tolentino" Xerox-copied for later reference.

He had no friends to speak of so he couldn't ask around for Jenny's number and address from any of his classmates without arousing their suspicion or making himself looking like a creep.

So he found out which Jenny Tolentino or Tolentino Family on the phone book was the one he shared a class with the hard way.  

He dialed numbers on his parents' landline asking for her, saying it was her classmate, crossing out the numbers who said no or had a different-sounding "Jenny" on the other line.

He found out the name of Jenny's parents from overheard conversations in class when he pretended to be asleep and his classmates pretended he didn't exist.

He half-remembered her saying where she was from Makati while Laura, who was from Antipolo, stayed with relatives in Metro Manila. It was when the three of them first met in class.

Ah. Makati. This info allowed him to shorten his list of Tolentino candidates even further, with him crossing out any phone numbers and addresses listed outside of Makati.

He looked for a girl whose parents were named either Bartholomew or Myra Tolentino or even anyone directly listed as Jenny or Jennifer Tolentino in the Makati area just in case she lived alone.

This went on for days or a little over a week, since he had to hide what his actions from his strict mother who wasn't used to him chatting away on the phone.  

He kept calling and getting wrong numbers until he hit the jackpot.

"Hello…?" said a familiar voice.

Ah. That was her. Jenny, his classmate. Bingo.

Shit, he didn't know what to say.

So he hung up, gathered himself, got a piece of pad paper, and wrote down the topics he wanted to cover. Uh, for posterity.

He had so many things to talk to her about. Like how did he end up becoming an orphan-whatever. That scary angel form that looked like a gyroscope with eyes on its rings.

Or why she said he should forget about his nightmares and live on in blissful ignorance, even though this only made him more curious to discover the world she belonged in.

She was an angel herself, wasn't she? That was how she was able to attend that same high school twice from 30-something years ago yet still look like she hadn't aged a day!

Or maybe she was a vampire. He wasn't sure.

He mustered up the courage to call Jenny again and introduced himself as Florante, her classmate.

"Florante…? How'd you get this number?" she asked. "Did Laura tell you? Wait, that's impossible. You're not even on speaking terms with her."

Ouch. With a sigh, he then told her, "I remember."

"Excuse me?"

"I remember you told me I was an Ophanim. I remember you told me that I killed our classmates. That I killed Laura. I remember everything."

He then hung up his phone, left his home without notifying his parents, and flew towards the address written by him on a Post-It note in order to confront Jenny about their special powers.

Afterwards, he discovered the truth about her. She was an angel herself who'd been living in this world for centuries yet she still looked like a teenaged girl. Like a vampire. Or an immortal.

***

Florante shook his head and woke himself up from his daydream, shutting the yearbook he had just found as the bell for the final period rung, signaling that lunchtime had ended.

'Yeah, right. As if that'd ever happen,' he thought to himself.

Obviously, someone—a relative, maybe—also named Jenny Tolentino attended high school in Fatima High. That was all. Jenny Tolentino wasn't an uncommon name, after all.

Jennifer wasn't an immortal angel or demon or fairy who had been high-school age since the 1960s. Or even earlier. That was just silly of him to believe.

She was an ordinary high school girl whom he subconsciously integrated into his flights of fancy as of late.

He second-guessed himself. Maybe he dreaming about Jenny all this time because he was developing feelings for her. A li'l crush, maybe.

He'd fallen under the same pattern once again. Every time a girl paid the slightest bit of attention to him, he couldn't help but imagine becoming her boyfriend or something.

'So pathetic. Get a hold of yourself, man!' he scolded himself. He almost rolled his eyes at himself but did so inwardly since he'd look weird doing it for real.

He waved his fantasy off and went back to the classroom even though he still photocopied the phone book page for "Tolentino" listings and the 1960s yearbook profile of the Jennifer look-alike and name-alike.

***

To Be Continued...

Whose side is the right side in this conflict? What a silly question! Of course the angels were the good guys and the demons were the bad guys! Right…?

Farewell, Abdiel

[gabriel-gabdiel]

【Draft】 Fantasy of Evolution Chapter 5: Press Ctrl-Z to Undo

We’re finally getting some momentum back with this original work of mine, even if it is in draft form. Chapter 5 came out much faster than Chapter 4, that’s for sure!

You can also find more chapters of my original fiction here. Please enjoy.

Back in Fatima High, after Florante Galang dreamed another one of his strange dreams…

In his latest dream, he "stalked" his classmate's apartment then they fought as a pair against a shadow monster at Guadalupe Church.

In the end, even though he wasn't hero material even in his daydreams or night dreams, he still managed to find a way to do something that he could be proud of.

He stopped Mammon's Minion and undid that reality where multiple innocents died, thus saving their lives all at once.

Florante Galang shut his eyes and sighed. Whoopty-doo. He did something heroic in his dreams. The thought made him cringe.

Still, even if it was a dream, the feelings he felt for the dream version of Jenny still made his knees weak. It all felt so real.

If only reality could match his fantasy. Alas, reality killed such whimsical notions faster than it helped hin defeat the immortal crawling chaos.

But it wasn't real. It was all just a fantasy. It didn't really happen.

Had he really been pushed by his bullies to the point where he used his fantasies and daydreams to cope with his daily reality of social suicide? Yeah, probably.

If only his dreams were real, then he would've asked Jenny by now about Mammon. What was that American(?) white man foreigner's deal anyway? Why'd he sic his Minion at them?

Oh, right. Jenny.

He pressed his fingers on his forehead, remembering that imagined kiss from the bespectacled beauty that was Jennifer Tolentino.

He let out another deep sigh. He really got it bad for her now.

However, he had to remind himself the obvious. The dream version of Jenny was nothing like the real-life version of her.

No more stalking of her. Get rid of that photocopy of her number and that girl that had the same name as her from that yearbook from the 1960s or whatever.

The Mammon from his dream was right about one thing. He acted totally like a creep by tracking down her phone number and address from the phonebook instead of asking her about it.

What was he thinking?

Still, once he could write and draw these ideas into an actual book or comic book though then that would make his strange dreams worth his while. Or maybe even put it on a dream journal…? Maybe.

Regardless, he woke up from the… third(?) strange dream/nightmare he'd had as of late?

Once again, the reset button had been pushed. Or the shortcut to "Undo" your last change on the document, "Ctrl + Z" (pushing the "Control" key and the "Z" key on the keyboard at the same time).

No harm, no foul, right?

Still, he should really grow up by now. Abandon his idle thoughts and turn his life around for real.

Soon, it'd be his fifteenth birthday.

He had no girlfriend on sight, no social life to speak of, barely any friends, but life went on, right?

***

Fantasy of Evolution

An Urban Fantasy Story by Abdiel

When you press Ctrl + Z on your Windows machine, you could undo the last action you've done.

Disclaimer: This work may reference copyrighted material, the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. It is believed that this constitutes a fair use of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law. All copyrighted material referred to in this work belongs to their respective owners. All rights reserved.

***

Chapter 5: Press Ctrl-Z to Undo

***

It was around dismissal time again, and Florante had time to kill before his school jeepney service came around to pick him up.

Florante couldn't tell because they all wore the same uniforms—brown khakis and a button-down polo shirt for boys then a simple white blouse with a collar, sash, and tie with the same checkerboard pattern as the pleated knee-high skirt for the girls.

However, whenever it was Casual Fridays at Fatima (where the students could wear casualwear instead of their daily uniform), the Dead Kids wore clothes that subtly hinted of designer origins.

Not that the "fashion senseless" Florante was any authority on the subject or anything, but even him with his bad taste in clothes could tell they were dressed to the nines that matched their remarkably good looks.

Then again, their mesmerizing faces looked so dashing they could've worn dishrags and pulled it off. Nevertheless, it seemed rather appropriate they'd have both money and looks.

The fact that they were unable to mix with the rest of the student body like Florante somewhat boggled his mind, though. Many of their "haters" called them pompous pretenders at best or braggadocious snobs at worst.

Their richness didn't afford them any acceptance in Fatima High. Like celebrities being bullied in college by their jealous classmates because they exuded an aura of superiority that rubbed them all wrong.

On the other hand, Florante didn't fully believe that the lack of acceptance was circumstantial. The way their group acted indicated that they desired isolation. He just couldn't imagine how any door could remain closed by their halo of beauty.

Meanwhile, although the group of Alonzo Estanislao, Kalantiaw and Dalisay Hidalgo, Jacob Benjamin, and Francisco Celestino did wave back at himwhen they spotted him (though it was mostly Lonzo and Dalisay who did the waving), he opted to go alone to the nearby walking-distance mall.

Nirvana wasn't far from Fatima. Just walk from one of the rear exits of the school towards the entrance near the local Nationwide Bookstore and you're good to go.

He felt relaxed going there even though he barely had any money himself. He had no allowance to speak of, and he had packed lunches more often than not inside recycled ice cream containers turned into makeshift lunchboxes.

It was fine. He loved window shopping on an empty stomach. Well, not really, but the mall did serve as his safe haven from his droll school existence.

He remembered when he first ventured alone to the mall instead of going straight home from his school service. Trips to the mall for his family used to be special events. They had to go to all the way from Pasig to Cubao to eat out, get groceries, or watch a movie.

Now, he could hang out in places like arcades or peek at a few pages of comic books at bookstores to his heart's content instead of staring blankly at a wall, waiting for the school service to pick him up and take him home.

If he could get extra money from his parents, like spare change from buying art supplies or science or home economics requirements, he could give himself the occasional mall treat.

An ice cream cone here. A doughnut there. Maybe even some supermarket turon (caramelized fried banana rapped in spring roll wrapper).

Or maybe a few rounds of the latest iteration of Street Fighter, with him usually succumbing to the third character in a one-player game.

This was what a friendless dork like him had to look forward to.

One day, once he had his own money, he'd have a fun-filled day buying comic books, playing at the arcade, or going to the movies in his lonesome. However, as a student with barely any allowance, this wasn't bad at all.

It sounded depressing, but only if he had to share his experiences with anyone else. He actually loved going to Nirvana Shopping Mall in his lonesome.

However, today, he couldn't shake the feeling that someone was watching over him, which made him feel paranoid.

Did his bullies spot him again, like the last time? That one asshole with his girlfriend clinging to him smugly asked him if he was on a date. Bastard.

He couldn't spot any of his usual tormentors though, who had opted nowadays to go with the more passive-aggressive approach to bullying.

***

On the eastern border of Metro Manila, the highly urbanized city of Pasig City existed under the cover of smog clouds and the infamously polluted Pasig River, which it shared its name with.

To its south, it was bordered by the cosmopolitan center of Makati. To its north was Marikina. To its west was Mandaluyong and Quezon City. To its east were the municipalities of Taytay and Cainta in the Rizal Province.

Pasig was also known for its raging floods during typhoon season, by which it could've been named from. The city had floods that were "Mapagsik" or "Mabagsik" (in English, it meant "Raging", "Fierce", or "Aggressive") which eventually became "Pagsik" or "Pasig".

Usually, the private jeepney "service" fetched Florante and others from their private school so they could go home safe and sound on behalf of all their parents, who paid them a monthly fee for the convenience.

However, the jeepney's open-air windows also gave them to get a good whiff of Metro Manila pollution for good measure.

He covered his mouth with a handkerchief. No point in getting sick and triggering his asthma again.

The sky remained hazy, its blueness sporting an ashen tinge as it was muted by the smog. The wind in his face thankfully disappeared as they went to a standstill.

The classic late afternoon traffic jam in the metro. Only the Bangkok jam could rival its ubiquitousness in Metro Manila.

He wore his school uniform composed of a button-down collared white dress shirt with short sleeves and long khaki brown pants with black leather shoes over black socks. He also had a backpack full of his school books, notebooks, pencils, and ballpoint pens.

His mother was the typical strict Filipina mother. Domineering, almost. He could never talk to her about anything. Their relationship was complicated. She wasn't the hugging type of mother. She kind of scared him most of the time.

Sure, she perhaps had her own things to deal with, like how he kept on hearing about her own domineering mother-in-law, his grandmother, but he dreaded her wrath as much as she detested his grandma.

His mother also for the most part looked like her sisters or his aunts... of course... while Florante himself looked like one of his cousins or uncles when they were younger. They all shared the same almond skin, black hair, and sharp, dark brown eyes.

She was in stark contrast of his father, her husband, who looked somewhat like he was of Chinese or Japanese descent but was actually a Filipino himself. As strict and boisterous as she was, his father was the exact opposite.

A relaxed and chill engineer who tinkered a lot around the house, doing quick fixes from their pipes to their ceiling to save them thousands of pesos from having plumbers and electricians do their work for them.

His new school was about 4 miles or about an hour away from his home in Pasig City. His former school, which only offered classes up until Grade 6, was instead 13 minutes away or about a mile away.

He had reminisced about his old grade school and the embarrassing life he had back then, cringing. He had hoped to turn a new leaf once he stepped unto high school. Hopefully.

His hope was for naught though.

When he arrived at school that fateful morning, there was a drizzle of rain. It soon became a downpour.

It was already June, after all. Rainy season. Also, the month of Florante's birthday.

He'd have another birthday with family. He had no friends to invite over the house for dinner. No parties with his compatriots drinking beer either. He never tried beer and he was asthmatic.

He had heard that taking in too much alcohol could compromise his breathing. Not that he'd ever tried.

Besides, he was a minor. Even though he had heard of several of his classmates drinking a bit of the bubbly themselves.

He was used to having a simple feast of spaghetti and a liter of Coca-Cola as his only birthday splurge. Tuition for his private school was expensive, after all, and in the Philippines the school year started in June.

***

Once Florante got home to the Galang Residence in Pasig, he went straight to the television set to catch the tail-end of whichever anime was airing in the afternoon.

He hated how when Thundercats was a big deal, he always ended up seeing the end credits when he tried catching it on TV. Ditto with Rainbow Brite.

When he finished with that, he took his bag and went to his room.

Before doing his homework, he changed into a shirt and baggy shorts as popularized by the G.O.A.T. (Greatest of All Time) of basketball, Michael Jordan, and read a bit of "Paradise Lost" by 17th Century English poet John Milton.

And when that gave him a headache, what with his short attention span and the long-form poetry, he had the Cliffnotes version help him summarize and analyze each passage.

At the back of his mind, he chided him to do as much effort on his math homework as he did with his "extracurricular reading" of this book for the sake of creating his own comic book story.

Nevertheless, while he was wandering around the mall, alone in his thoughts, he thought about Mammon's intentions. As a demon, he obviously tried to tempt him to go all out and transform into an Ophanim, perhaps to the point of becoming a fallen angel and turning into a Minion.

However, for what purpose? To add him to their demon horde? Their "Pandemonium"? What were they trying to achieve, awakening Ophanims and corrupting them to become Minions?

The thought kind of excited him a little bit. He'd been struggling to come up with a plot for his comic book, only for his strange dreams full of male power fantasy and cope to hand him such a plot on a silver platter.

He should really make more detailed accounts of his dreams in his dream journal from now on.

While also making sure never to allow his classmates, especially his mostly male bullies, to know he was keeping a dream journal like a 6-year-old girl still having tea parties with her dolls.

The rest of the afternoon and evening became a blur.

His Dad got home with his two elder sisters from college at the University of Sto. Tomas. Then it was dinnertime. They had his Mom's specialty of pork adobo (meat simmered in a mixture of garlic, soy sauce, and vinegar).  

He couldn't bring up the fact that he was getting bullied at school to his parents. What would they do? Knowing his Mom, she might even blame him for the bullying, bringing up that he was a disrespectful child.

His Mom, bless her heart, was the typical strict Filipina or Asian parent. He was also petrified of her more often than not, particularly when he came home with bad grades.

He didn't get beat up for that or anything, but he did get an earful of lectures from her. The beatings came when he answered back or disrespected her somehow.

She had quite the fiery temper. Her arsenal of weapons included flipflops, the nearest wooden spoon, a walis tingting (broom made from the thin midribs of palm leaves),  or a walis tambo (broom made from the flower stalks of Tiger grass).

He had a complicated relationship with his mother. Confessing to her that he was being bullied was the last thing on his mind.

She might somehow make it about him disrespecting her or something. No way did he want to trigger that ass-whupping.

In contrast, Dad was more of congenial fellow. He never hit him and Florante couldn't remember the last time his father was angry.

He could have heart-to-heart talks with him. It was much easier with him than with his contentious Mom that reminded him more of Cinderella's Stepmother when she gets into one of her moods.

However, he also couldn't outright confess to him about the bullying. It was too embarassing. Shameful. Like he was too old to still not have friends or to still get teased by the boys in his class.

He did mention them being jerks though. So he subtly told him about the bullying without telling him he was being bullied. No one wanted to be a victim of bullying or admit to being one.

***

Once everyone in the family settled down and went their separate ways, with his parents going to their room, his sister going to the TV, and other sister going to the phone, Florante planned his approach to his father carefully.

After chancing upon Dad going to the kitchen to fetch a container of cold water to drink, Florante asked his question.

"Dad, do you know anyone named Celestino in Pasig? Or Hidalgo…?"

His father blinked at that. "Can't say that I have. I don't even have coworkers named like that. Hidalgo is a national artist, right?"

By the way, Florante's father was a mechanical engineer who worked at a factory for a multinational company.

"How about Benjamin? Estanislao?" Florante pressed. "Back in Makati, did we know of any Tolentinos?"

"Whoa, whoa. Settle down there, kid." Dad scratched his the freshly shaved stubble that would've formed into a beard.

"I might've had a classmate named Benjamin, but that's his first name. I've heard of Father Estanislao who marched with Jose Rizal during his final walk before his execution. There are too many Tolentinos around to say that I know the same Tolentinos you know."

Florante sighed then smiled. "Thanks, Dad." His father always obliged or humored even the silliest of his questions. He answered them the best he could. 'He's the best.'

"Why are you asking me this? Are they the names of your friends or something?"

The son awkwardly laughed. "Yeah, something like that."

Dad ruffled Florante's head. "That's good. Make more friends in school, son."  

The heartwarming exchange made Florante divulge something he normally wouldn't. "They… the kids… they're a little different. They don't seem to fit in at school." Unsaid, he added, 'Like I do.'

His Dad pullled a seat and sat with him, setting aside the cold water bottle he fetched from the refrigerator for now.

"Did I ever tell you about how your cousin punched a kid who was messing with him? The school even called your uncle to the principal's office. But the kid never messed with him ever again."

'If only I had the guts to do that,' Florante thought. He said, "I don't think they'll fight back or anything, but it's messed up that they don't fit in. They did nothing wrong. Who cares if they're a little weird?"

Dad nodded. "When it comes to bullies, it's best that you show them who's boss from the start. The more you let them get to you the more they'll mess with you."

Florante then realized his father was subtly giving advice for his bullying after bringing up his friends, the Dead Kids.

However, he was so pathetic he could only dream of blasting his bullies to kingdom come, which was messed up. Now that he'd considered the consequences of such actions, he'd rather just embarrass them a bit. Like his cousin did to his bully.

Punch them once to have them leave you alone for good. Or even pull a prank. No need to kill them or anything!

Good thing it was all just a dream. Once it ended, he faced no consequences for his actions.

Like he'd just hit the reset button on his game console, in order to play a new game. Or hit the Ctrl + Z shortcut on the family PC, undoing his mistakes on the MS Word document or MS Paint bitmap.

If only he could hit "Undo" all the way to the first day of his freshman year, then that would be peachy. Alas, reality didn't work that way.

Backpedaling a bit while also denying he was being bullied, Florante said, "They seemed nice enough to me. I just noticed they kept to themselves more often than not. Some of them are my classmates in the Art Club, even."

"So they act just like you, huh?" said Florante's father. "You also keep to yourself a lot. Which is perfectly fine. It's a good thing you've found friends who match your personality, Florante."

"Yeah, I guess, Dad. Birds of a feather, am I right?" he said, wishing to change the subject.

They lapsed into silence before Dad got up, grabbed his water bottle, and said to him, "Good night, son."

He in turn said, "Good night, Dad."

After a little while, Florante himself got up from his seat and went to the TV to watch whatever it was his sister was watching.

He was already sleepy by the time he started on his math homework, which he considered finishing while traveling to school on his school service jeepney.

***

The rest of the week proved uneventful. No new fucked up dreams about him murdering classmates or battling eldritch abominations with his newest crush, Jenny Tolentino.

No Mammon. No Minions. No Ophanims. Just… vibes. They all started fading in his subconscious like dreams and nightmares were supposed to.

He got used to the routine of his classes and being at least civil around classmates that tolerated him at best while whispering devilish rumors about him behind his back.

Oh well. He did promise the Jenny from his dreams to forget all about the angel and demon nonsense to live out his normal life.

However, try as he might, he couldn't forget those fever dreams where he moved as swiftly as the wind and destroyed everything in his path like a U.S. missile strike.

In reality, during P.E., the classmates he got paired up with learned not to pass him the basketball and to step quickly in front of him if the other team attempted to exploit the unathletic asthmatic as the weakest link.

Florante did his best to get out of their way or serve as an extra body to clog passing lanes when he wasn't being benched for other players.

However, he noticed something was amiss.

Jennifer Tolentino hadn't come back to school since the last time he got in contact with her.

It had been a week since he last talked to Jenny. On the phone in real life and at Guadalupe Church in his dreams.

Every day, he watched anxiously for any sign of her. The hawk-sized butterflies at the pit of his stomach made him wonder if she wasn't able to revive from her untimely demise in his last dream.

Only for him to mentally slap himself and chide that his daydreams or nighttime dreams had no effect on reality. Jenny was probably absent for some other reason.

He'd been hanging out with the Dead Kids again, acting as their gopher. Nevertheless, he couldn't get Jenny out of his mind.

How could he? She was gone! It'd be much easier for him to follow her advice and forget about this Ophanim business had she continued going to Fatima High.

Then he could at least pretend that his psychotic massacre of his classmates and failed attempts at heroism against fallen angels or demons hadn't really happened.

In English class—as headed by the no-nonsense Mr. Benigno "Noy" Borabo—Florante took his accustomed seat at the back of the class, near the windows overlooking the streets outside.

They got a pop quiz on English grammar involving Subject, Predicate, Object of the Preposition, and so forth, which only made him wish they'd do more required reading.

He'd at least watched the film/TV/animated versions or read the CliffNotes versions of Tom Sawyer, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Odyssey, To Kill a Mockingbird, The Great Gatsby, Lord of the Flies, Animal Farm, or Of Mice and Men.

Regardless, he felt more comfortable now than ever before. He had reached some sort of closure with his nightmares involving classmate murder and choosing between becoming an angel or a demon.

Ha. Closure. He sounded like the family of a missing person that finally found out the grisly fate of their beloved.

In regards to his real-life bullying situation, he had instead reached ennui. A feeling of listlessness and dissatisfaction arising from a lack of occupation or excitement.

Maybe it was this lack of catharsis and boredom from the impasse he and his bullies had reached since he decided to bite the bullet and snitch on them that led him to dream such horrid dreams.

By Friday, he wondered about whethe or not he should give Jenny a call. He had her number  for real, after all.

For all he knew, she had already dropped out of school. He tried not thinking about the nerdy girl, but he couldn't completely suppress his anxiousness that he'd been somehow responsible for her absence, as absurd of a thought that was.

Florante Galang slept a dreamless sleep over the weekend due to the soft June rain. He might've finished his homework but he neglected to read up on Social Studies.

***

It felt a bit nippy outside so early in the morning at 7:30 AM or so, before the school assembly started.

He got cursory acknowledgement from classmates by Monday morning, after getting off his school service and making a beeline towards his classroom.

He also dealt with small talk on whether or not he was able to finish the homework before they proceded to talk to their friends and ignore him in his lonesome.

The morning was cold but it wasn't raining.

Another day, another boring class.

He has Araling Panlipunan (Social Studies) for today, as covered by Mr. Neil Nepumoceno. He was the jokey type of teacher with a strange goofy charisma to him whose signature outburst was "Aye Caramba!"

Quite the character. He encouraged debate and rapport with his students during every topic he covered.

Florante's blood ran cold as he remembered something.

Mr. Nepumoceno was the teacher that got in his way during his dream massacre of his classmates in First Year St. Francis.

Oh yeah. He had turned him into a splatter on the wall. Like something out of the movies. Or a Mortal Kombat "Fatality".

He pushed such dark thoughts from his mind. He promised the dream version of Jenny that he'd forget about that dream. That he'd live a normal life from now on.

With that said, a certain someone—a classmate of his—still didn't give him the time of day. Not that any of them did, but this particular one hurt the most when it happened.

Galang still felt awkward being around Laura Reyes, but that was to be expected.

His first crush in high school remained upset about that "nude drawing" thing when he didn't actually draw her nude, he using a rough sketch and shapes to construct her body before adding details and clothes, dammit!

He had hoped he wasn't as subconsciously psychotic as he suspected he was, what with him dreaming about killing Laura (albeit in a moment of duress) just because she didn't return his feelings and all.

For weeks, they avoided each other even though they were classmates. It even got to the point where Florante could've sworn Laura got bugged by him avoiding her before she avoided him.

Yes, it was ridiculous, not to mention egotistical, to think that he could affect anyone that strongly. It was impossible, even. And yet he couldn't stop worrying that it was true. At the time, anyway.

That little twinge of annoyance gave him a small spark of hope that he still occupied Laura's mind somehow, even in the form of a pest.

Better that than be ignored altogether.

However, now Laura was but an afterthought compared to the girl in Florante's literal dreams.

Florante held his breath at the door, peering here and there of any sign of  Jennifer Tolentino, but it seemed she wasn't around. He exhaled and went to his seat.

Jenny followed him from behind, talking about yearbooks and phone calls or something.

Wait a minute.

"Jenny?" he blurted out.

"Flor!" she said in return. "Oops, you told me to not call you that! Sorry!"

"No, it's all right. I don't mind," he reassured. "What was it about phone books?"

"Oh, I was just askin' why you called me from my house last time," she said with a smile as she brushed a single lock of hair from her face.

He gulped and explained himself, saying he found it interesting that he found another Jennifer Tolentino in an older Fatima High yearbook.

At the back of his mind, he told himself to calm down. This wasn't unusual. Jennifer had talked to him before. She didn't cut all communication from him like Laura did. She'd always been friendly to everyone.

She wasn't friendly beyond logic like the dream version of her that invited him into her apartment after finding out he essentially stalked her.

Still, he couldn't remember one person where she had beef or drama with in their class.

She lingered by his desk till the bell rang, which left his heart aflutter. She then went to sit by a girl with braces and ponytails.

He considered hanging out with Jenny some more but thought the better of it. This wasn't the dream girl Jenny. Even a nice girl like the real Jenny might lack tact to let him down gently if ever he became one of those overly friendly boys around the girls.

However, as class began, Florante realized he had another problem in his hands.

He couldn't stop staring at Jenny. He tried to be slick about it too, but he knew she knew he was watching her.

What was wrong with him? Dammit. He pulled the same thing the first time Laura rejected him over that misunderstanding with the drawing.

With him not staring at her and all. Or ignoring her beyond reason.

Susmaryosep. He wouldn't be surprised if Jenny started avoiding him too.

He should pay more attention to class. They were covering the Martial Law years or something.

The good news was that Jenny had begun talking to him more, like she used to before his unfortunate falling out with her group due to Laura thinking he was a creep.

The bad news, if it could be considered bad news, was that he kind of missed having memorable dreams and fighting against nightmarish monsters beyond human comprehension.

***

As Florante walked out of class along with the rest of his classmates as the lunch bell rang, the air glistened with a light drizzle.

The wind bit at his nose. His cheeks.

A light sprinkle of rain over hesistantly overcast skies that still shone of daylight. Silvery slivers of water reflecting bits of sunshine.

Dammit. He should've brought an umbrella with him but he forgot again.

Meanwhile, he left his head lost in the clouds, wondering how to best approach Jennifer while a part of him screamed at himself to not make a fool of himself over his newest crush.

Sometimes, discretion was the better part of valor. Sometimes, the only way to win the game was not to play.

"I'll see at  lunch, okay?" Florante heard someone from behind him say, which he soon realized was Alonzo Estanislao.

Florante smiled and began to nod, but he then hesitated and said, "We'll see. I might skip lunch."

Lonzo kept walking as he spoke. "Sure. No prob. Still waiting for your girlfriend to get back?" he teased.

"Shut up. She's not my girlfriend. Stop being weird," he hissed at Lonzo, looking around him for any sign of his classmates. They might overhear and spread rumors again, like with Laura.

"She's back already," Florante murmured it so softly it sounded like an afterthought, hoping Lonzo would miss what he'd say, only for him to cringe when he heard, "Congrats, man."

The drizzle became a squall, and Florante's mood became as soggy as a wet sock The more it rained the soggier it got and the worse his unease became.

He considered locking himself in the library again on an empty stomach or eating with the so-called Dead Kids like the social outcast that they were.

Or he was, since even they barely tolerated his presence. Like he was the pariah of pariahs.  

He checked his wallet. He had enough spare change for a soda, at least. And maybe a bag of chips.

He entered the cafeteria, which was on a basement level of a building sepearate from their high school building.

The sun flooded daylight inside through a series of chainlink fence sthat served as the wall that separated the area from the nearby park and the grassy soccer field.

The light squall made the grass glisten in the sun. During downpours, whole islands were formed on the field amidst the flood puddles, mud, and sludge. Like a miniature archipelago.

He scanned for the Dead Kids' table in the corner out of habit. Then he froze where he stood.

There were six people at the table.

Huh. Six people. Excluding Florante, because he hadn't reached there yet.

The usual five were there: Alonzo "Lonzo" Estanislao, Kalantiaw "Kal" Hidalgo and his sister Dalisay, Jacob "Benjo" Benjamin, and Francisco "Kiko" Celestino.

The sixth one was a familiar face, though. It was Jennifer "Jenny" Tolentino.

She'd finally got to school after all those days she was absent, but what was she doing with the Dead Kids?

Lonzo called after Florante. "Yo, Flor!" he said, which made him wince. "What are you standing around for? Come over here!"

Galang looked down and away from the table as soon as Jenny stared at his direction. His ears felt hot. He told himself he had no reason to feel self-conscious. It wasn't as if he did anything wrong, after all.

"What's with Florante?" he heard Dalisay ask, which made him finally move towards the table before he embarrassed himself any further in front of the one group that accepted him.

The dainty Dalisay asked once he got there, "You okay, Florante? Do you need to go to the clinic or something?"

Benjo sniggered and needled, "Maybe he's constipated. He needs to take a massive dump!" which prompted Lonzo to smack him upside the head while in the background, Kal harrumphed and called them idiots.

"You're so gross, Benjo," admonished Dalisay.

He felt his body jolt when he heard Jenny ask, "It's not your asthma acting up, is it?"

Florante reassured it wasn't, revealing his handy inhaler in his pocket. "Not asthma." He shook his head vigorously. "I'm fine," he reassured, scratching the back of his head.

Once his eyes met with Jennifer, he muttered, "H-Hey. Long time, no see."

Jenny smiled and brushed her hair back from her face. "Likewise, Flor. I'm back, I guess?"

Florante smiled in spite of himself. Laughing nervously, he changed the suhject. "I'll get a soda today. Any of you need anything?"

"Just soda?" asked Jenny. "It's lunch, not recess. Eat something."

"Aren't you hungry, Florante?" chimed in Dalisay.

"Actually, maybe I do feel a little sick," Florante said, looking at the floor and his dirty shoes. "Um. I mean, I don't have an appetite right now."

Lonzo, who was a little scuffed up from his roughhousing with Benjo, grabbed Florante by the shoulders and sat him down the bench of the lunchtable. "Then sit this one out. I'll fetch everyone lunch and buy your soda."

Florante gulped and nodded his thanks while handing the money to Lonzo, who elected to be the group's gopher for today. Jacob and Kalantiaw elected to come with him to help out with grabbing the lunch trays.

***

He waited for them to get their food along with the usually studious Kiko, the wallflower Goth Dalisay, and, well, his classmate Jenny, whom he ended up seating beside with thanks to Lonzo's prompting.

Damn that Lonzo.

He had nowhere to look and he somehow didn't feel like talking to Jenny right now. Also, when he looked up across the table, he ended up staring at a stern-looking Celestino who looked more like a teacher or a college student than someone from high school.

He barely talked at all, even though he was viewed as the leader of the Dead Kids. His batch's likeliest Valedictorian or even Salutatorian.

He hadn't even gone to college yet and Florante could already swear he'd become the Summa Cum Laude, if not at least the Magna Cum Laude of his year of college graduates. He just exuded that kind of aura.

"What is it?" asked Kiko, his eyes meeting with Florante's as he looked up from what he was reading (Advanced Calculus).

"HUH? Oh, nothing!" said Florante. The last thing he wanted was small talk with Mr. Battle of the Brains there. "Sorry for staring."

For a student supposedly only 3 years older than him, Celestino gave Galang the vibes of a teacher. Or a CEO. Or a high-priced lawyer. Any full-grown adult with loads of money, power, or influence.  

With a raised eyebrow, Celestino returned to his book and commented, "Take the hint, kid."

'Take the hint…?' he thought, only for him to realize that Lonzo probably already talked to Kiko to about him and Jenny.

Dammit, you guys. It wasn't that serious. He didn't even remember telling any of them about his feelings for Jenny either! How'd they figure things out?

Minutes later, he got his soda, which he sipped slowly. Or maybe he should sip it faster so that he could excuse himself and leave.

He could even play his asthma up and escape to the clinic for the next hour.

However, he told himself to get a hold of himself. Why should he run away?

To make way for their lunch trays and lunches, Florante took the opportunity to move away and give room to the rest of the Dead Kids, with him sitting on a separate table with his soda.

Eventually, he decided to permit himself to glance beside him. If she glared at him, he'd just go to the nurse's office and skip class for the rest of the afternoon.

Complain about the upset stomach he was literally feeling right now. Like the coward he was.

He wouldn't be lying either. He had butterflies in his stomach the size of eagles, it felt like.

He looked up in time to see Dalisay and Jenny laughing at Benjo's antics with Lonzo.

This reminded him of how the Dead Kids charmed him into their group in the first place, actually. They were social outcasts like him, but chose to be so.

They liked keeping to themselves and didn't care how they looked to others, which Florante respected a lot.

The most abuse Florante got from them was acting as their gopher or them getting his name wrong. Even Benjo, their one member that reminded Galang of his bulies, never went the extra mile when teasing him.

He never felt like any of them dehumanized or degraded him. Or treated him like the "other".

They didn't treat him particularly well or superbly, but even their mere tolerance of him was leagues better than the treatment he got from his own classmates as the resident weirdo.

Florante heaved a relieved sigh at Jenny getting along with the rest of his so-called friends. Or even acquaintances.

His heart twinged with jealousy at the sight too. Made him wish he were closer with both the Dead Kids. Or Jennifer.

What was he even worried about again? That he'd ruin another friendship because he caught feelings with Jenny like he did with Laura, so he'd start acting all awkward and weird around her?

Nah. He had no need to fear. He simply just had to deny his silly crush with Jennifer so they wouldn't end up cold and distant like him and Laura Reyes.

Even if this was good as it got, he'd be fine with it.

This was his path of least regrets. If there was an event he wouldn't "Undo" with a magical "Ctrl + Z" command, then it would be him meeting his friendships/acquaintainces, the Dead Kids.

***

Aside from the playfulness and laughter, something seemed different between the Dead Kids and Jenny Tolentino from Florante's classmates that he couldn't quite put his finger on.

Their banter and positivity seemed like something out of a commercial for menthol cigarettes or saltene crackers, thought the bemused Florante.No wait. Menthos. They acted like they were in a menthos commercial!

Something about them seemed almost surreal. Or unreal.

He examined Jenny the most. Not because he was enamored by her, of course. Well, maybe because of that too.

Her skin was pale, but it looked practically tanned when near the porcelain or marble statue skin of Dalisay, who truly lived up to her name. In Tagalog, "Dalisay" meant "Pure".

Hell, compared to her, Florante's skin was practically wood-colored.

Florante averted his eyes from Kal's sister by reflex, knowing full-well of how weird Dalisay's overprotective brother behaved around people who stared at her or even tried to talk to her (like Lonzo, who was supposed to be their friend).

Jenny's glasses glinted in the daylight of the open cafeteria.

Her pink lips pursed into a pout as she and Dalisay giggled over something. Her hazel eyes sparkled with her flushed, blushing face. What was about her that was strange? Was it his imagination?

He pondered, staring at Jenny, trying to isolate any changes in her.

"What are you staring at, Flor?" asked Lonzo with a snicker, and Florante knew that the cheeky bastard already knew the answer to his own damn question.

At that moment, Jenny's eyes flashed to meet Florante's.

Instead of merely looking curious, she gave him a harsh stare. Like a warning of some sort. Her sharp eyes belying the smile on her face.

Florante dropped his head, letting his curtain of hair bangs cover his face. During the instant that their eyes met, he could've sworn.  

"Flor…?" Lonzo beckoned again.

Florante could've sworn that she recognized him. No, wait. That didn't make sense. Of course, she'd recognize him. He was her classmate, Florante.

No, no. What he meant was that her eyes glowed the same way it did in his dreams. Her look of recognition wasn't because she recognized him as Florante. It was because she recognized him as Archangel Gabriel.

He had promised in his last dream that he'd forget about his dreams, but here he was breaking that promise once more. Even though honestly, he couldn't help it.

How Florante surmised all that from a simple glare, he couldn't tell you.

Lonzo whispered, "Is your girlfriend staring back at you too?"

Florante palmed his face. His cheeks felt hot to the touch. "She doesn't look angry or anything, is she?"

"I don't know," came Estanislao's unhelpful answer. "Maybe stop being a weirdo and talk to her like a normal person?"

"Stop calling her my girlfriend," Florante begged. "She's probably the only friend I got in class. You'll weird her out."

"Sure thing, buddy. I'm just teasing," relented Alonzo.

"…So she's not angry?"

"Ask her yourself, dumbass!" Lonzo put Florante in a headlock and rubbed his knuckles over the top of his noggin. "Jeez, no wonder you're bullied so much!"

***

Mustering up the courage to talk to Jenny, Florante sat beside her and talked. Like the good ol' days when he, her, and Laura first met.

He then asked Jenny without looking at her, "Where have you been?"

She thought for a minute. "Oh, around."

The coy answer made him second-guess himself. If he referenced his dreams about her in any way, would she confirm them real? No, that was stupid.

"Were you sick?" he asked.

"Maybe a little. Like you. I'm fine now, thank you for asking," she answered.

"Oh. That's good to hear. I'm glad," he said.

"It's been cold lately, hasn't it?" she said. "No woonder everyone is getting sick."

"Yeah. But sunny other times. Like the weather's bipolar or something," he said.

"I know, right? Like it couldn't make up its mind," she said.

"Did you get contacts?" he then blurted out unthinkingly.

Puzzled by his unexpected question, she answered, "No. I'm wearing glasses."

"Oh yeah," he mumbled, wishing the earth would part and swallow him whole.  "I thought there was something different about your eyes."

She shrugged with a confused smile. "It's the same eyes I've always had."

Man, what was this conversation even about? Talk about awkward.

After a slight pause, Jenny asked, "…Sooo were the rumors true? Did you or didn't you draw Laura Reyes nude?" while adjusting her large, bug-like spectacles in a way that honestly only she could pull off.

"What? NO! I didn't…" Florante raised his voice, but he then trailed off lamely. His voice sounded sad, even to him.

He soldiered on though, pleading his innocence. "I-I was doing a rough sketch! Can you tell her that it wasn't a nude sketch but a rough sketch? The guys who told her it was nude were just messing with me!"

"Really? Show me," she said before taking out a pencil and notebook from out of her purse.

"What? You mean right now?" he asked.

"Why not?" she countered.

Why not indeed. So Florante recalled the lessons of Art Class and did rough sketches of a pose of what looked like a naked woman. He then added details like the blouse, skirt, glasses, and shoes to the full-body sketch.

"See? It was all a big misunderstanding!" he said, only for his jaw to go slack as a blushing Jennifer beside him told him, "I didn't realize you were going to use me as an example!"

He looked down and sure enough, he ended up drawing Jenny. "I-I can explain…!"

"I'm just glad you didn't turn it into a nude portrait! My boobs aren't that big!"

"OF COURSE NOT! That's sexual harassment!" he yelped, which made Jenny laugh.

His heart twinged at the sight for sore eyes. She her giggles were soft and enchanting. Like wind chimes on a gentle summer breeze.

"I was joking, Flor!" She looked at his sketch of her. "Wow. That's pretty good, actually."

"Eh, it looks cartoony," he said. "Like an anime sketch. I could've done better."

"Just accept the compliment, you dork!" she chided.  

Florante chuckled at that. "You know what? You're an okay gal, Jenny."

This made the both of them go silent. That line was what he said to Jenny before he proceeded to massacre the rest of his classmates.

"You're an okay gal, Jenny. Don't go to school today. For your own good."

A flood of memories—well, false memories that didn't happen in anywhere else but his dream—almost overwhelmed Florante.

Him becoming a roaring typhoon of vengeance against his bullies before facing off against an angelic Laura. His tandem fight with the spaghetti monster, where he discovered Jenny was also an angel.

His visit to her apartment. Their confrontation with Mammon. Him managing to defeat the crawling chaos. None of that happened yet Florante remembered them all as if they did.

***

The group went their separate ways. Florante was about to head off to the library himself, killing time like always until the late afternoon bell rung for their next class.

However, what Jenny told him before he went off gave him pause.

She looked him in the eye and said, "You promised."

…What?

Before he could speak, she invaded his personal space and said, "Don't break your promise."

She then turned around and left, as though she didn't just say something cryptic and disturbing to him.

"Jenny…!"

"Hmmm? What is it, Flor?"

He hesitated answering. Did he just imagine her say "Don't break your promise"? Was she gaslighting him? He then said, "I'm okay with it."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm okay with you calling me Flor."

Jenny tilted her head to the side and giggled. "Okay."

His mind spun from confusion. Had he made up the whole exchange before this? She acted perfectly polite now. Like the conversation they had about promises and breaking them never happened.

He had half the mind to believe that the entire exchange was from his own imagination. It was his mind taking the form of Jenny, warning him not to pursue the madness that was his dreams.

Because the minute he started believing that everything he'd dreamed up until that point was real, that was when Jennifer would give him the same disgusted stare Laura gave him when she rejected him.

Maybe he really was going out of his mind, dreaming up scenarios where Jenny was his Damsel in Distress and he served as her super-powered Knight in Shining Armor, rescuing her from eldritch abominations.

Just like Mammon said. Mammon was no demon. Mammon was his common sense. What was left of his sanity.

On one hand, he should be glad all this murder, mayhem, and destruction using fantastical or cosmic powers happened in his dreams. They served as his own Ctrl + Z that undid what could've been irreversible mistakes.

On the other hand, he also wished he'd have dreamed up his being a social pariah and the butt of everyone's jokes in his class.

Then maybe once he woke up every morning, he'd instead be greeted with friends and cheers as well as belong in a social circle not rejected by the rest of the school campus.

Undoing the destruction of a shadow monster or sentient Italian dish wasn't a problem Florante could relate to. His inability to form healthy relationships with his peers was.

If only he could Ctrl + Z his entire childhood. Now that was an even cooler superpower than the Light Array.

"…Galang? Florante Galang?" someone called out to him in the middle of his introspection, thus interrupting his inner monolgue.

Who was it? Who dared interrupt the great and powerful avatar of Archangel Gabriel (in his dreams)?

Oh. It was him. One of his bullies. Not one of his worst bullies, but one of his bullies nonetheless. His bully that used to be his friend before he went with the flow of the rest of the class.

His personal Judas  Iscariot. The Brutus to his Julius Caesar: Isaiah Pascual.

The guy whose head Florante blew apart in the fever dream, to be exact.

***

The two kept talking and walking as they went to their late afternoon class.

"Florante," said a sweaty Isaiah, who rubbed his hands together.

"Pascual," said Florante, who wrinkled his nose.

"Hey, buddy. Been a while since we've talked, right?" said Pascual with a hesitant, crooked smile.

"Yeah, I guess." Galang shrugged, eyeing the door to the classroom. "What do you want?"

On the asthmatic's part, he probably smiled the same disingenuous smile as well to keep up appearances of politeness. What did this snake in the grass want?

Florante vaguely remembered Isaiah as one of the few classmates he had that stood by him when he was being teased by bullies, up until it he started getting teased himself, so he threw him under the bus.

His first impression of Pascual when they were still cool with each other was that he had the vibes of a Golden Retriever. Or maybe even a sea otter, with that nose of his.  

Once inside the classroom, Florante went straight to his table, with half the mind to ignore Isaiah altogether. He merely half-listened to him at any case.

"…Look, maybe we can continue this later. Okay, bro?"

"Sure. Whatever."

Grimacing, Galang remembered the swift kick to the testicles that Pascual gave him in his dream, thus "forcing" him to blow his head apart with his dream powers.

Should he condemn the guy for something he did in a dream though? No, Florante condemned Isaiah more for what the betrayal he did in real life.

Florante Galang walked right into Biology class for their section's Science subject that afternoon.

His Science teacher was a chirpy twenty-something named Ms. Isabelle "Belle" Del Mundo. The tall, slim teacher had a signature faint, singsong voice. Hard to miss.

Ms. Del Mundo walked around the room, took attendance, and had them move to the laboratory room in the second floor.

From there, Pascual kept following Florante.

"Gerry and the others finally let up on you, huh?" was the topic he chose to break the ice with. Oh joy.

Florante grunted. "More or less."

"Glad to hear it, bro."

'Uh-huh. I bet,' Florante thought, resisting the urge to roll his eyes.

He had to get a reputation of being a snitch in exchange for them to leave him alone, but at least now their bullying wasn't as bad as it could've been. He didn't appreciate the passive-aggressive digs though.

He didn't want to have this talk with Isaiah. He instead wished he could pair up with Jenny. To talk to her more.

To ensure her that he wasn't going to break his promise. No wait, the real Jenny didn't care about it. It was the Jenny in his insane mind that told him to lay off the daydreams and fever dreams.

When they got to the lab, Ms. Del Mundo had them separate themselves in pairs.

This was usually Florante's worst nightmare since nobody in class wanted to pair up with him. However, he hoped after his interactions with the real Jenny that they'd pair up this time.

However, instead, he got stuck with Isaiah, who insisted on being his lab partner for the day.

Their Biology teacher then proceeded to distribute a microscope and a box of slides on each table. The room buzzed with conversation as they prepared the materials.

As Florante and Isaiah worked as lab partners like the good ol' days, when they were still buddies, the latter continued the small talk.

For his part, Galang kept his eyes away from the lab doors, doodling all sorts of sketches on the back of his notebook. Like a short comic of Freeza and Goku battling out in Namek.

"Wow. You just sketched all that out without thinking, huh?" said Isaiah.

"Yep. Just like before," said Florante without looking up from his notebook.

"You never change," said Pascual, which almost offended Galang.

Galang groaned. Instead of hearing the musical voice of Jenny, he instead got stuck with his former best friend. The backstabber who saved himself from a social suicide pact and got himself new friends.

Well, maybe his new friends could help him out with whatever problem he was having!

In the corner of his eye, he saw that Jenny and Laura had actually paired up as lab partners instead, setting  to the desk right in front of the teacher's table.

Laura looked stunning as usual, a showstopper for sure, but Jenny stole the show as far as being the apple of Florante's eye was concerned.

Her face remained friendly and open even when looked at from behind, her mouth open with a slight smile on her flawless lips. Her glasses framed her dazzling face beautifully, like there'd be something missing without them.

She had a pretty nice figure from his vantage point too. Both her and Laura had shapely hips, thin waists, and perky posteriors that couldn't be hidden even by the folds of their checkered skirts, come to think of it.

He palmed his red face at having such lewd thoughts about his classmates.

"Ah, so you've moved on from Laura Reyes to Jenny Tolentino, huh?" asked Pascual, which got on Galang's nerves.

"Shut up," he murmured, which made Isaiah laugh.

"Bingo! I was right, wasn't I?"

Florante sighed. "…Is it that obvious?"

"Bro, you couldn't stop staring at her empty desk when she was absent and you couldn't stop staring at her now that she finally came back."

Jeez. Florante should be more careful and not wear his heart on his sleeve.

If his other bullies caught wind of this, he'd never hear the end of it. Or maybe they already knew and were biding their time to use this info against him. Dammit.

Thankfully, the soft-spoken Ms. Del Mundo began class at that moment. Florante tried to focus on her words as she explained to the class what they'd be doing today in the lab.

The slides inside the box were out of order. The lab partners had to separate the slides of onion root tip cells into the different mitosis phases they represented then label them.

They couldn't use their Biology books. In 20 minutes, she'll be coming around to check who got everything right.

Galang already studied this and Pascual, if memory served him correctly, had the lower grades and study ethic (work ethic for studying) between the two of them, so he did most of the work while his partner did most of the talking.  

"Prophase," said Florante after studying one of the slides he magnified to 40X via microscope briefly.

"Say, Florante…"

"What? Put in 'Prophase' for that slide, Pascual," he ordered as he slid another slide under the microscope.

He did what he was told, letting Galang do most of the work. He didn't even bother double-checking.

"How much do you remember about that stormy night?"

"Anaphase," Florante murmured. "What stormy night? I don't remember any storms."

"How to you spell that," Pascual asked, and Florante obliged him.

His voice even quieter than before, he then continued. "The storm you caused. The one where you ran amok. You don't remember any of it?"

Florante blinked at that. Did he hear him right? No, he must not have. "Third slide please."

Pascual handed Florante the third slide and sighed. "So you don't remember, huh? I should've figured as much."

"What are you talking about?" asked Florante, feigning ignorance while his heart beat began rising in his chest. To Pascual, he said, "Interphase."

"Enterphase?" asked Isaiah.

"No, 'Interphase' with an 'I'. Still spelled with a 'phase'. P-H-A-S-E," clarified Florante, before probing, "…Well?"

Pascual wrote down the label and said, "It doesn't really matter if you don't remember." He chuckled. "Would you believe you blasted my face off with light bullets? Like something out of a Sci-Fi movie, man!"

Florante took his eye off of the microscope and snapped his head in attention towards Isaiah. He felt lightheaded after doing so.

The two were about done with the activity. At the corner of Florante's eye, he could see both Laura and Jenny were already finished with their own slides minutes ago.

The color from Pascual's own face drained the same way it did when facing off against an angrier Florante in his fever dream. "Oh shit. You do remember, huh?"

'No. No way. There's no way my dreams are real. There's no way I literally killed my bullies in my dreams, only to press 'Ctrl + Z' and 'Undo' what I did!'

"Susmaryosep," Florante Galang murmured under his breath, wishing he could "Ctrl + Z" this exchange just now.

***

To Be Continued…

Everyone wants to be able to just press Ctrl + Z on their proverbial keyboards in order to undo any careless mistake they've made, whether it's an errant brush stroke on MS Paint or a typographical error on MS Word.

However, reality doesn't work like that. You can't take back what a careless thing you've said a few seconds ago that may or may not end friendships or break bonds. You can unbreak a dropped mug. You can't unspill spilled milk, no matter how hard you cry.

Farewell, Abdiel

[gabriel-gabdiel]

【Draft】 Fantasy of Evolution Chapter 4: Manic Pixie Dream Girl

A Manic Pixie Dream Girl is truly a girl of your dreams. But does she only exist in your dreams?

You can also find more chapters of my original fiction here. Please enjoy.

Dismissal time came and went.

The friendless, listless Florante Galang then shuffled towards his school service—a jeepney—in order to repeat the Groundhog's Day loop of him going home from class, waking up again to return to the same class, and having no one to talk to as he ended up scoring mediocre grades on his quizzes and quarterly exams.

Oh joy.

But the same could be said of every other student in Fatima School of Mandaluyong. He couldn't complain.

Also, it wasn't like the Philippines had the Groundhog's Day holiday too, mind you. He just liked that Bill Murray movie enough to reference it and it was the closest point of comparison.

The only other metaphor he could think of was the eternal afterlife punishment of Sisyphus endlessly rolling a rock up a hill only for it to roll back down by the end of the day so he had to roll it back up again the next day. Forever.

The ominous skies were in a dark mood, with the gloomy clouds looking dense and opaque. However, at least it hadn't wept yet in the form of a dreary downpour.

He felt his spine tingle as he walked inside a parking lot that, just yesterday, served as a battleground against an indescribable floating monstrosity. The stuff that nightmares were made of.

He reassured himself that it didn't really happen anyway. It was all just a dream. Like him killing his bullies with special powers and whatnot.

***

Fantasy of Evolution

An Urban Fantasy Story by Abdiel

How far will Florante's delusions take him this time?

Disclaimer: This work may reference copyrighted material, the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. It is believed that this constitutes a fair use of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law. All copyrighted material referred to in this work belongs to their respective owners. All rights reserved.

***

Chapter 4: Manic Pixie Dream Girl

***

Florante Galang moved his idle musings of his friendless existence at the back of his mind as he skipped going to his school service and decided to ride the UV Express Toyota Tamaraw FX (a metered taxi) from Mandaluyong to Makati instead, his body moving on its own.

As the Philippines' financial center, Makati served as the city with the highest concentration of local and multinational companies in the nation. It got filled to the brim with banks, department stores, malls, and corporate offices as well as foreign embassies galore.

Makati's Ayala  Avenue contained the Philippine Stock Exchange's biggest trading floor. The city also ended up becoming Metro Manila's major entertainment and cultural hub for good measure.

As far as Florante knew, Makati was the city of rich kids, business people, and trust-fund babies. Their biggest problem there was finding parking for their cars, since most of its residents owned their own car instead of use public transportation.

Galang exited the bus and ended up wandering around the streets of Makati, with no particular destination in mind.

His own gut feelings or instincts guided him through the unfamiliar labyrinth of the urban jungle.

Dully, with his body on autopilot, he asked around for the street where Jennifer Tolentino was supposed to live. Remembering the first time he met her, with her telling him she lived in Makati.

He talked to tricycle drivers, passersby, and security guards in private subdivisions where this street or that part of Makati was, stopping to eat at the local 7-Eleven as a light squall of rain made the pavement glisten in neon lights.

Before Florante knew what had happened, he ended up in front of Jennifer's apartment in Makati again.

Like he sleepwalked over there. Or rather, commuted there instead of went straight back to his home.

Wait, again? Was he there before…? How did he even know it was Jenny's apartment?

Jeez. What was wrong with him?

***

Florante's blurry eyes cleared, only for him to see an apparition of the glasses-wearing girl in the horizon, her hair blowing from an unseen wind.

"Flor," she beckoned him after she reached him, holding a plastic bag containing what he presumed was her dinner.

"It's Florante," he said without thinking.

"I don't care," she answered back with a pout before smiling and winking. "You look like a 'Flor' to me. Be mad. I'm still gonna call you Flor from now on."

He felt his cheeks grow warm in spite of himself. Yeah, she did kind look cute, didn't she?

He pushed back such nonsensical thoughts, remembering why he went there in the first place, his body seemingly moving on its own.

"So what brings you here? How'd you know my address? Or my phone number? Did you ask one of our classmates for it?" she asked, which made him become defensive.

"No, no! It's not what it looks like! I mean, I…!" he stammered before blurting out how he found out about the address, not knowing how else to broach the subject of him seeing her name and face on all those older yearbooks in the library.

He became a stuttering mess. This didn't pan out like it would've on T.V. and the movies, with them coming to a mutual understanding of what they were after the jig was up.

She didn't even bring up him telling her that he remembered their fight with the spaghetti monster.

This further convinced him that his fever dream of murdering his classmates was actually just that. A dream.

A bad dream. A nightmare. A power fantasy. That was just him blowing off steam from being bullied by using his own imagination.

His real self could never do such a thing. Right?

Oh wait, why'd he go there at Jenny's place in the first place? He had to explain himself!

He unzipped his bag then produced the photocopies of the yearbooks he got a hold of. One was her graduating in the 1960s. Another was her address from the yellow pages.

"I didn't believe the dreams I had were just dreams until I saw this," he said, finding the courage to speak and confront Jenny about his recent discovery, his mind a white haze.

Jennifer palmed her face. "I sure hope you know just how bad this looks, right? You got my address and phone number from the yellow pages without my permission then you went to my apartment unannounced."

"…I-I'm sorry," he apologized profusely.

"…You just won't leave things well enough alone, can you?" Jenny said with a resigned sigh. "Come with me, then. Let's talk."

***

She led him to her apartment. They took the stairs instead of the elevator to get there as soon as possible.

He panted from the effort of climbing stairs but put up a brave front.

He kept his asthmatic wheezing to a minimum after realizing something that sent shockwaves to his whole body.

Florante's heart skipped a beat. This was his first time going to a girl's home.

Or even a classmate's home, to be honest. He didn't have any friends to speak of back in Fatima High, after all.

Florante entered the small rental apartment Jennifer Tolentino lived in, thinking it was about twice the size or more of his bedroom.

He excused himself in the threshold of the apartment, looking around for Jenny's parents. However, they weren't there.

'Where are her parents?' he wondered. Were they away on a business trip? Was she sent to live in Makati to get her closer to school?

Did her family live in the province? Did she live alone? Were they alone right now…?!

Florante gulped hard before he became aware of his wheezy breathing. He excused himself, took out the asthma inhaler inside his bag, and took a puff.

He then started breathing manually to calm himself down.

'Relax,' he told himself.

Oh boy. What'd he gotten himself into? At the back of his mind, he vaguely wondered if any of this was normal. Wasn't he stalking her?

He then remembered he didn't really call her, that was also a daydream. Why did she somehow expect him to get there?

Déjà vu filled him inside to the brim. Did he somehow end up here in her apartment because he went there before or something?

"Gabriel," she called out, which awoke him from his stupor.

Gabriel? Oh, right! That was what she called him back in his dream. Or was it a dream? Or was he dreaming right now?

Like he did when he wrote on a Post-It note her address and jumped on the roofs of houses and buildings from Pasig to Makati like he was Spider-Man?

He struggled to speak and stumbled upon his words.

"Gabriel? As in the Archangel Gabriel?" he asked her. "Why are you calling me by that name? Isn't he a legendary angel?"

Jenny shook her head and smiled, motioning for Florante to sit on the couch while she made some tea. "You're so picky with names. You don't want to be called Flor or Gabriel. But you're the same guy, in the end."

In his imagination, it was easier to hold a conversation with her, but in reality he usually was alone and barely talked to anyone.

He went straight to the point, saying things that would've embarrassed him in real life.

"I saw you in my dreams lately."

An awkward pause passed between them.

"Oh. Is that so?" she asked with a smirk as she batted her eyelashes at him. He presumed she had just teased him with a nice dollop of sarcasm.

Damn his inability to read social cues!

"Um, I didn't mean it like that," he clarified, feeling his cheeks grow warmer by the minute. He continued. "I mean, uh... I'm having déjà vu all over again. I've seen this dream before. We've talked inside your apartment before."

"Really now," she said, taking a sip of the tea she had laid out for the two of them, her hazelnut eyes penetrating through him like the concentrated beam of sunlight from her magnifying lenses for glasses.

Florante turned away, his hand covering his mouth. His face on seeming fire.

A few weeks or months ago, he'd think his capricious feelings for Jenny was a betrayal of his crush on Laura Reyes, the prettiest girl in their class. However, that ship had long ago sailed.

Perhaps him moving on from Laura to Jenny was why he "saved" Jenny from his wrath in his other dream/nightmare where he murdered all his bullies with magical/supernatural powers?

Or maybe he should stop being so shallow? Honestly, falling in love with any pretty girl that treated him nice was pathetic.

Ah, who knew? He should get his head out of the gutter. What was he doing there anyway?

More importantly, did they really fight a gigantic spaghetti monster using elemental superpowers and, uh, super-fast germinating moss?

"Why'd you visit me from out of the blue, Flor?" Jenny asked, with her using that irksome nickname again. However, Florante ignored it.

"…Y-You're much older than you look, right?" he blurted out.

She raised an eyebrow at that statement.

"What do you mean?" she asked, adding, "Don't you know it's rude to ask a girl her real age?"

He could feel the onset of a wheeze in his asthmatic breathing. "It's true, isn't it? You're not a real teenager."

She dwelled on his words. "What if I'm not?" she asked gently, her voice barely above a whisper.

Her dulcet tones sent tingles right down his spine.

"So how old are you really? Was that really you in the 1960s yearbook? Are you an immortal? Am I an immortal too?"

"You could say that," she said. "Yes, that is a picture of me. I'm amazed I was able to get away with enrolling too, but the registrar never bothered checking who the other Jenny Tolentino is."

He shivered in spite of himself.

"They must've thought it's just a funny coincidence. Or she was a relative of mine with the same name. Or they simply don't remember," Jenny said.

Florante asked, "Am I like you? Since you called me an Ophanim and all! I knew that wasn't a dream! You really did pretend to be a high school teen back then! We're both…!"

He gasped then let out a long exhale to prevent himself from hyperventilating.

"Did what happen the other day… yesterday… whenever it happened, really happen? You remember it too, right? The spaghetti monster?" he dared ask.

She must've known. She just said she received his call, even though he could've sworn he only called her in his dreams. He didn't have the courage to call her for real!

Or visit her apartment for real. But here he was now. Unless this wasn't real either.

Florante racked his brain of his past dreams, unsure of he was in another dream, only this time more lucid. How lucid was he anyway?

Him mentioning the spaghetti monster incident made her snap back into attention, which jolted him backwards and made him murmur an apology by reflex.

Was it something he said?

"So you remember me calling you an Ophanim, huh?" she said.

He nodded slowly, with him not quite looking at her while he recalled their last significant interaction with one another.

"What's an Ophanim again? A wingless angel, was it? Is it that monster form I has where I could see everywhere or something? Just like that spaghetti monster we fought."

He tugged at his collar, squirming in his seat at the intense gaze Jennifer gave him. Like fawn shrinking back at the headlights of a speeding truck.

Was he not supposed to carry on their conversation from last time? Did he do something wrong?

She softened her stare, the glint from her glasses disappearing, revealing her almond eyes. "That's right. You and the monster we fought are both Ophanim, Gabriel."

"There you go again," he said. "My name isn't Gabriel. It's Florante. And who are you supposed to be? Michael? Uriel? Or maybe…?"

"I'm Raphael," she said, confirming his suspicions.

"The ninja turtle?" he joked, but he then bowed his head and looked away when he saw her deadpan face, murmnring an apology for his lame joke.

"Well, that's… cute," she said of the joke, then asked, "What do you want, Gabriel?"

"…What do you mean?" he asked, inching away from her.

Instead of answering his question, she took another sip of her tea. "Fine. What else do you remember, Florante?"

Her using his full name caught his attention. He answered her question with a deep breath, sensing that she was testing him somehow.

So he told her everything.

***

Florante told Jennifer that he remembered his fever dream of murdering his whole class and destroying the school before facing off with Laura Reyes, who also somehow also got her own powers.

This made him idly wonder if she were a wingless angel too. He also recalled that Geronimo Jacinto faced off against him with superpowers too.

Gerry couldn't be an angel. He was more of a devil. A monster. A demon. His bully being a holy being just didn't sit right with him.

Wait, didn't Jenny refer to the spaghetti creature as a demon instead of an angel…?

Then he talked about how he and Jenny ended up fighting against the tentacled monster from out of nowhere, with her killing it with enchanted(?) moldy bread that spread across its body like gangrene.

He then finished with him dreaming about going to her place before he ended up doing so anyway at the moment, resulting in déjà vu.

He left off the part where he wasn't sure if what he saw right then was itself a lucid dream or reality. Maybe because he feared this would result in the dream ending like before, so he kept that last bit to himself.

Let him dream this dream of him talking to a girl and being alone with her in her apartment for a little while longer.

"Well…?" he asked. She'd been listening in silence the entire time, with only occasional nods and sips of tea to break his long monologue. "What do you think? Did what happen the other day… yesterday… whenever, really happen? You remember it too, right?"

She then told him, "I'll be honest. I'm not sure if you're Gabriel just yet."

What she just said made Florante even more confused than before, making him feel like he was talking some sort of oral exam.

"Pardon me? What do you mean?"

"I suspected you'd be Gabriel but I'm not yet sure because you're just an Ophanim."

He pondered her words. "Meaning?"

With steepled hands, she said, "You're a newborn angel. We call newborn angels Ophanim or Thrones. Your multi-eyed self is your true form for now."

"I don't follow."

"Newly born angels don't necessarily have famous identities. However, the truly exceptional ones might graduate to Cherubim or Seraphim level. Based on what you've done before, I suspected you've become the newest avatar of Archangel Gabriel."

Her answer gave him a headache. "So you think I'm Gabriel but you're not sure?"

She shrugged. "You may or may not be the Archangel Gabriel. Right now, you're just a wingless Ophanim who could use your angelic powers in human form. An egg but not quite the chicken."

"…And you're not an Ophanim yourself?" he asked.

"I've already gotten my wings," she answered with a shrug and a smile. "You still need to earn yours."

"…So what are we exactly?" he dared ask. "What are angels supposed to be?"

Jenny took her time sipping her tea. Since she was about to proverbially spill it.

"Angels. Demons. Devils. Monsters. Deities. Demiurges. Different cultures call us different names. We might even be considered gods. Or superheroes."

"Really?"

"…Nah."

"Oh."

Jenny took another sip of her tea with a small smile. She murmured something under her breath that Florante couldn’t quite catch.

"What was that, Jenny?" he asked.

"So did you really intend to kill your classmates back then?" The bespectacled girl asked, the hair on her head starting to dance and twirl from an unseen gust of wind. "Even if it was a dream, no one normally dreams of doing that."

"This again? It's not my fault! The dream me killed Laura! I'd never do that in real life! Stop blaming me for something I subconsciously did!"

"Is that so?" she asked with a raised eyebrow.

"I swear if I knew my dreams had real consequences, I wouldn't even imagine doing that to them," he said. "Look at me. I'm pathetic. I wouldn't even hurt a fly or a cockroach."

She sighed and let the awkward silence hang between them for five minutes that felt like forever.

Not that Galang counted the seconds or anything.

"Fine. Screw it. I'll tell you everything. Florante Galang, you're a candidate to becoming the Archangel Gabriel. Congratulations."

***

From a distance, Florante heard the rumble of thunder. He shuddered, which made him wonder if he had just felt an earthquake as well… or was it just him? He couldn't tell.

Huh. Weird.

Did the drizzle outside become a downpour? Oh my. He should've brought an umbrella with him.

"A candidate?" Galang repeated. "Like a presidential candidate? I could be Gabriel or not?"

"Or you could be Schrodinger's Gabriel," Jenny said, giggling. "Your Gabriel and not Gabriel at the same time!"

"Shredder… what?" he asked.

She cleared her throat. "Never mind."

"N-No. Tell me what you meant!" he insisted.

"I mean, just read about Schrodinger's Cat in the library, man," she said. "Anyway, we're getting off-topic. Yes, you're a candidate. An avatar. You could become Gabriel. Or some other famous angel. And angels like you can become Gabriel too."

Florante clasped his hands in front of him, seemingly deep in thought. "In my dreams, several of my classmates manifested powers of their own. Are they also angels? Or Ophanims?"

"Very good, Florante," she said, which made him frown at her condescension. "Yes, they're also wingless angels. They're also candidates to becoming Gabriel. If they develop their powers correctly, they could end up awakening as Gabriel themselves, if not other angels, gods, or deities of history."

"Wait, wait, wait. Aside from Gabriel, they… we could become famous angels like Michael, Raphael, or Uriel? Also, by gods and goddesses, do you mean Greek or Roman ones? An Ophanim could become Zeus or Jupiter? How about the Norse All-Father Odin?" Florante queried.

"More or less," came "Raphael's" unhelpful answer.

"And what makes you so sure I'm a Gabriel candidate?"

Jenny shrugged. "I can tell. Or at least the Raphael within me can recognize him from inside you. Whether or not you're worthy to bear his name shall be seen later on."  

The thunderous rumblings arouind grew louder, producing a droning sound. However, for some reason, the two both ignored the rampaging elephant in the room.

"Wait," Florante said, his mind going a mile a minute but his mouth still stuck at the starting line. "What must I do to win the candidacy?"

"Evolve from an Ophanim to a Cherubim then a Seraphim," Jenny replied. "You must evolve the right way to, or else…"

"…Or else the other candidates will end up winning? Is that it?" he finished her sentence for her. "So how do I evolve to become Gabriel?"

As he said the words, he wondered if he even wanted to become the avatar of an ancient archangel in the first place. It sounded like so much responsibility to live up to the Archangel Gabriel.

Another thing occurred to him.

He then asked, "And that spaghetti monster you called a demon. Can he become a candidate for Gabriel too? Or is he supposed to be the avatar for Satan instead?"

"Ah. You figured that out, huh?" she said.

"W-ell, in the case of that spaghetti monster, he might be an Ophanim at one point, but because he let his powers control him instead of controlling his powers, he ended up becoming demonic instead. A Minion instead of a Throne."

"Minion?" Florante repeated. He didn't like the sound of that. "What are minions? Wait, don't tell me. They're like Ophanims. They're baby demons!"

"That's exactly what they are," confirmed Jenny. "Good call. So there you go. You have the potential to become either a demon or an angel. An Ophanim or a Minion."

Galang then asked, "How can you even tell when, um, something is an Ophanim or Minion? A demon or angel? They're both monstruous."

He also got up from his seat, which made him stumble and grab hold of the nearest furniture to steady himself. Was it vertigo or did the room spun on its own?

He didn't know what was going on.

To be quite frank, his head throbbed with information overload. So he was an angel that could also be a devil? What? Or rather, the avatar of biblical angels who somehow ended up here in the Philippines? Really?

"I guess that's the point?" Jenny said with a shrug. "A demon is just a fallen angel, after all. Whether they have bird wings or ox horns."

"…Monsters by any other name, am I right?" they heard someone say, like it had access to the P.A. system in their minds.

The two shuddered, feeling a chill deep down their spine. They looked at each other, realizing they both felt the same thing.

"Did you hear that?" asked Jenny.

"Yeah," acknowledged Florante. "What was that?"

Jennifer looked him straight in the eyes. "A demon."

They felt the presence of another. Another one of them. Or perhaps more? They couldn't tell.

Unbeckoned, they stood up and headed out of the room, following that dreadful feeling from its source.

***

Just like in Florante Galang's nightmare of decimating Fatima High School and killing all of his bullies (which included collateral damage like Laura Reyes), the skies grew dark once more.

As the cliché went, it was a dark and stormy night.

The rain fell in torrents—except at occasional intervals, when it got checked by a violent gust of wind that swept up the streets—rattling along the apartments, condos, and housetops, and fiercely agitating the fluorescent bulbs of the lamps that struggled against the darkness, its fuses ready to burst.

The two also heard rumbling from the distance from which people on foot and inside vehicles as well as vermin like mice and roaches avoided, resulting in a chaotic mess of a traffic jam and fleeing crowd on the verge of a riot.

"Let's go," said Jennifer Tolentino, who took hold of Florante's hand in order to run towards the horrible something that caught their attention.

The demonic presence that acted like the epicenter of an earthquake that shook the world itself right at its core.

Rather than get repelled by the demonic vibrations that reverberated right into their very bones the closer they got to it like the rest of the living things in flight mode that surrounded them like a sea of humanity or an ocean of life, the two angelic avatars felt somehow magnetized by the dark presence, their heads glowing with an unseen aura.

An inner light spilling over their heads and spreading out from the center like the nuclear reaction of a star, thus making their heads glow with a spherical aura. The corona of the sun. A literal angel halo.

Jennifer's halo glowed a greenish blue hue while Florante's instead glowed a fluorescent white and sky blue color.

This inexplicable aura was what allowed them to part the living sea of mice and men, with people unconsciously or subconsciously avoiding them, which allowed them to make their way to the demon they felt. To the voice that talked to them right inside their heads.

They ran towards oblivion and uncertainly in an adrenalin rush, but somehow, the virgin Florante couldn't he happier.

After all, he was running hand-in-hand with a cute girl. What was there to complain about?

Jenny, who usually reminded Florante of a mouse, perhaps a gerbil, did make his heart twinge but in a way that one would to a kitten or puppy. He wasn't sure if it was necessarily a crush.

However, she somehow looked different to her now, with her heaving bosom, glistening face, and reddened cheeks as she brushed her slightly damp hair to the side.

Like she suddenly transformed into a hot librarian right before him.

"Thank you," Florante said from out of the blue.

"…Huh? Thanks for what?" Jennifer asked.

"For humoring me and listening to what I have to say," he said in candid honesty. "I appreciate it."

She smiled. "No problem. We're both angel avatars, right? We might as well stick together."

"Thanks a lot. I like a girl who understands me but I can confide to as well," he blurted out without thinking, only for him to realize what he just said a little too late. Not knowing how to take it back.

"How am I supposed to respond to that?" asked Jenny, who looked away and hid her eyes with the glint of her glasses.

She stopped running hand-in-hand with him and let go of his hand, which startled him.

However, before he could apologize, she beckoned him to keep following her before she started running again, which he did.

He kept following her from behind as he resisted the urge to keep looking at her derriere.

Soon, as they kept running, they realized there were no longer any people around them. Or any signs of life. No birds. No bugs. Nothing.

The stalls and stores were empty. Completely evacuated. No one dared remain in the exact direction they were going.

"Do you feel that?" asked Jenny. "The heat from your face? Your head?"

"Y-Yeah," said Florante, but he had another type of hotness in his mind, his eyes avoiding the jiggle of her heaving bosom as she ran towards the black maelstrom while glistening with sweat, her own face flushed.

He had a feeling she was changing the subject from what they were talking about earlier.

"That's your halo. Your spiritual energy. Your aura. That's where your powers come from as an avatar of Gabriel," she explained. "You weren't able to detect it before, but you can feel it now, right?"

"I sure can," he said with a wheeze and a gulp that turned into a coughing fit, unable to meet Jenny's curious gaze.

"It's because you're getting used to your powers now… Wait. We're here."

He then looked up after she stopped from her run. They'd reached their destination. A church.

"Where are we? What church is this?" Florante asked.

"The Guadalupe Church," Jenny answered.

The Guadalupe Church or Parish, also known as the Nuestra Señora de Gracia Church, was a Baroque Roman Catholic church in Makati City, Philippines.

Jenny brought up that the building was occupied by both the Filipino revolutionaries of the 1890s and American forces of the 1900s during the Philippine-American War. In World War II, it served as the garrison by the Japanese.

It now currently served as one of Makati's premier tourist attractions and one of Metro Manila's most popular wedding destinations.

However, something more noticeable than church caught the pair's attention.

A moving tornado blackness and ash of what could be best described as tendrils of humanoid smoke moved between them and the church ruins. A crawling chaos spawned by eldritch abominations.

Again, like before with his confrontation with Laura or the spaghetti monster, he was at a loss for words describing what was before him. This new creature was another indescribable monster straight out a child's nightmares. Or even man's primal fears.

The formless, mindless creature then coalesced into what looked like a tall, lean man made of shadow. He, if it were a he, had neither beard nor hair. He was instead an ebony cesspool. The Black Death personified.

His own tarry aura melted into a shapeless robe made of a heavy dark fabric. Like his aura had become his own clothes that converged unto him like the singularity of a black hole made from a dying star.

His dense living black hole seemed to drown out and absorb what little light surrounded them, like waves of the Dead Sea. This made the comparatively faint halos of "Raphael" and "Gabriel" stand out more.

Although he was as horrible in appearance as an Ophanim, Florante couldn't imagine describing the shadowy tendril man as anything other than demonic. A Minion.

"H-Hey, you wouldn't happen to have one of those moldy pieces of bread with you by any chance, right?" Florante half-joked, half-expecting himself to need to transform into a Throne or Ophanim in order to match the power of this Minion before them.

The disembodied voice from before then spoke, but both Jenny and Florante realize that it didn't enamate from the creature before them. Rather, it came from someone else.

"Pardon me, but I can't stand to look at this farce anymore," said a sharp-dressed foreign man—a Caucasian man with a sharp nose, even sharper spectacles,  and auburn hair—in English.

"Who are you?" Florante called out, surprising himself with his own bravery in talking to that scary foreign stranger.

The man in the business suit—formalwear known to Filipinos as an Americana—ignored him, though. This businessperson that looked like a Makati expatriate or visiting company CEO addressed Jennifer instead.

"Are you honestly indulging the boy's delusions by this much, Raphael? How cruel. You know he's no angel. He's actual more of a demon. With destructive power like his, he should be on our side."

"Mammon," said Jennifer. "Stay out of this. He's mine."

This made Florante jerk his head and stare at Jenny by reflex, his cheeks burning at her bold proclamation. 'I-I'm hers?!' he thought.

Aloud, he asked her, "You know him? Wait, his name is mamon (Filipino sponge cake)? Seriously?"

She rolled her eyes. "Not mamon. Mammon. The demon Mammon."

"Tell him the truth about himself already or I will," Mammon threatened with a smirk. "I'm getting impatient."

Thusly, Florante shot a Thunderbolt at Mammon. A pinprick or lasebeam of light producing a vaccuum tornado around it, rendering the surroundings into rubble.

The businessman cackled and stopped the supersonic assault with one hand, transforming to a huge-headed goblin with a long nose, ram horns, and a stogie for the briefest of instances before returning to his avatar's human or businessman form.

"Flor!" exclaimed Jenny in spite of herself. "What are you doing? You're no match for him right now!"

"Well now. I see you've convinced the young lad to side with you using your avatar's feminine charm, Raphael! Bravo. You're quite the devilish temptress. You'd make a fine demoness yourself."

Despite being fully clothed, Jennifer covered herself with her hands by reflex. "You're such a pig, Mammon."

"Well of course, I am!" said Mammon with a smug grin. "I'm a demon."

The Archangel Gabriel avatar's halo flared like a ring or ball of gas and plasma, his bright aura traveling all over his body and enveloping him in a white and blue light as well as crackling arcs of electrity.

Finally, the demon addressed Florante. "I don't blame you, kid. Raphael's avatar is pretty cute, not going to lie. However, you were born ten thousand years too early to take on the likes of me. I've forgotten more than you can even remember."

With his arms crossed, Mammon floated away. Barely baring his fangs at Florante's best shot. None the worse for wear.

No wait, he hadn't hit him with his best shot yet.

Galang then summoned a Lightning Bolt at himself to reenergize his body with millions of volts of electricity while increasing the potency of his offense. Remenbering how to control his powers from his dream of destroying his bullies and taken on a flying spaghetti monster that was apparently an Ophanim/Minion like him.

A wingless angel or a hornless devil. Good or evil. Those were the two choices for a Throne such as him.

Just then, as suddenly as him shooting a Thunderbolt to Mammon, the hornless devil in the form of a personified malestrom diverted its full attention towards Florante and unleashed its irresistable might unto him like an endless deluge.

'Oh boy. Here we go.'

Was this really his fight anyway? Did it even matter if he chose the side of the angels or the demons? Was this what he asked for after esentially committing social suicide? Wasn't he biting off more than he could chew?

He was making the correct choice siding with Jennifer Tolentino, right?

She was an angel. One of the good guys. And the demons were the bad guys every time since the beginnning of time.

Right?

***

The lean, mean shadow man with gangly spider limbs and a pulsating aura that emanated from his head like smog or smoke made strange clicking noises as he shifted positions with his strange jittery dash.

The crawling chaos didn't speak and bore no trace of an expression on his face. This belied the maelstrom of bone-crushing force he brought with him as his mere dash forward sent the Gabriel avatar reeling.

Fortunately, Galang's halo of blue-white light created a dome-shaped wind shield composed of gyroscoping jetstreams and slipstreams that absorbed the brunt of the Minion's force. Vacuum tornadoes ripped apart the church along with blockbuster ligtning strikes.

This tall man whom Florante bore no ill will towards. This Minion of the Archdemon he truly wanted to blast to Kingdom Come, Mammon.

This Ophanim. This Minion. This was a fellow… angel/demon avatar. Just like him.

Who was to say he wouldn't end up like him? A mindless beast to be hunted down by angels. A fallen angel. A demon. A devil.

Florante charged bolts of lightning on one hand and bolts of thunder on the other hand then hurled them one after another at the tentacled ebony monster.

Biting his lower lip at the frustration of not being able to shoot that manipulative bastard Mammon instead.

Why were they fighting again? To become avatars to millennia-old angels and demons? To become pawns on a chess game he didn't ask to be a  part of?

They were practically just the same pawns, right? This crawling chaos was also human before, like him.

If his dream of killing his bullies wasn't a dream—if none of these fantastic events were dreams—then his wish to be helpless no more just came with a heavy caveat.

Unlike the flying spaghetti monster that could regenerate itself endlessly, the crawling chaos before them and its black pulsating mass of tendrils responded quite differently to Florante's typhoon onslaught.

Even though he showcased denseness as black and bottomless as the ocean depths, his great mass of tidal waves densely compacted into humanoid form remained unmoved by Galang's cyclone winds and plasma blasts.

No wonder Jenny didn't use quick-growing mold spores or an acorn to attack this Minion. How could any of those stand a chance against this force of nature?

Maybe this time, Florante had no choice but to revert to his true Ophanim form and face off against the Minion as force of nature against force of nature. Monster against monster.

"No, Florante! Don't…!" said Raphael's avatar to Gabriel's avatar, her body seemingly pinned to the wall. "Don't change into your Ophanim form and lose yourself! Or you might become a Minion yourself! That's what Mammon wants!"

The bespectacled young (or young-looking) girl's hair got toussled by unseen winds or some sort of force of nature like gravity that blew everyone else away like a hurricane.

And indeed, before Florante noticed it, he had started to transform, his human form disappearing and reappearing as a gyroscope of flaming eyes once more.

God dammit. How was he supposed to fight against this monster any other way than become a monster himself?

Why shouldn't he be a monster? What was wrong with becoming a Minion over an Ophanim anyway? What was the difference between one monster over another?

However, because Jennifer told him not to transform into his Ophanim form, he didn't.

The shadow creature then came upon Galang's dithering, fluctuating form that went from human to Throne and back agaain like a flickering light, with crashing black waves of his dense aura, threatening to swallow him under its immense mass compacted within a lean form of a tall humanoid tentacle being.

Galang resisted the irresistable, turning his sky-blue halo into a country-sized pacific storm that made the crawling chaos' oceanic depths roil, churn, and bubble. Like the desperate cyclone howling back at the black sea, which only made its angry waters angrier.

Florante didn't ask for this. He wanted to stop being socially awkward, make friends, and for his bullies to leave him alone, not get enemies and the burden of fighting someone else's war!

Meanwhile, Mammon again spoke to their minds.

"Asking a woman if she lives nearby is often a predatory tactic. That info can expose so much. If you're around the area a lot, especially alone. Or if you're isolated and from out of town and vulnerable."

Both Florante and Jenny said, "What?" at the same time, their heads turning to see where Mammon was right then. Right now, he lived in their heads rent-free and they didn't like him invading their thoughts like that.

"LIGHT ARRAY!"

The embarrassment Florante Galang felt fueled his halo enough for him to finally release the much-delayed pinpoint bursts of concentrated pure energy he'd been gathering that shot out like explosive bullets from his five fingertips, which finally decimated the humanoid maelstrom off of him.

Unlike with the spaghetti monster, his Light Array shots obliterated the maelstrom of shadows, turning them into stains unto the pavement from the purifying brightness of his holy light.

That was Florante's best shot. The special technique he created from scratch to shoot at all his bullies at the same time with a wave of his hands.

At least now he could use his powers in a less shameful way. To defeat a monster that threatened to destroy the city instead of petty yet deadly revenge against his meanest classmates.

***

Florante screamed to the heavens and the unseen Mammon, "I didn't stalk her! O-Or I didn't mean to! I was following a lead on why I've been dreaming the nightmares I've been dreaming, okay! Seeing her face on an old yearbook was suspicious! I had no malicious intentions!"

They both couldn't see Mammon, but they could hear the smirk in his voice. "But I didn't specifically say you stalked Raphael, Ophanim. You came up with that conclusion. Methinks the lady doth protest a bit too much."

Galang's head almost twisted as he shot a glance at an out-of-breath Jenny, her hair a mess and her clothes disheveled. Meanwhile, his own stomach was in knots.

He gulped and muttered, "I meant no harm, Jenny. I didn't want to kill our classmates. I didn't intend to stalk you either! I-It just… came off that way. B-Because I wanted to know more about what's going on with me, and you're the only other person I know who's like me…!"

Mammon then added, "Literally you cannot risk divulging such information, Raphael. A man is a threat. A man approaching you alone is a threat. You should've known better. This is a woman's constant reality."

After a deep breath, Jenny adjusted her glasses, which magnified her hazel eyes. She then smiled at Florante and said, "Don't worry, Flor. I understand. You didn't mean any harm, right? It was all a harmless dream to you."

That smile. That damn smile. Florante wanted to protect that smile.

Mammon's disembodied then snarled at the pair, "…You actually believe his lies? He thought it was all a dream, so that makes it okay? By now, he would've figured out that it was more than a dream. That it wasn't manslaughter, it was murder with intent. A massacre. Stop excusing his crimes."

"I've just about had enough of you, man! Shut up!" said Florante, his fingertips burning with blue and fluorescent white electric light.

"Stop lying to yourself first, kid. You wanted to kill your classmates. You reveled in every death. If you weren't sick in the head, you would've just humiliated them as revenge for them humiliating you. That's why you dreamed that dream. It was the first time in your pathetic life that you felt in control. Give in to that desire and set yourself free!"

"Show yourself, demon!" Just one shot (or five or ten shots) of the Light Array. He just wanted to land just one right on Mammon's smug, beak-nosed face.

"Look at you go. You feel brave now, don't you? Like you're Raphael's personal Knight in Shining Armor. Or her lost puppy. But she knows the truth about you. How dangerous you are. So she's telling you everything you want to hear for now."

"Stop being such a pathetic coward and fight!" Florante said. Not really listening to a word Mammon said while he continued to gather energy from his fingertips in concentrated pinpoints of light.

"Kid, you've got it bad for her, don't you? But she's just using you. She'll learn soon enough that you can't have sympathy for the devil. That what you did was unforgivable. Don't you know, kid? We live in a society—" Mammon started.

"No, you live in a society! I live in my meticulously crafted daydream universe that I've been using as a coping mechanism since childhood!" said Florante.

Mammon chuckled. "No. You're a back-of-the-class loser who has gone on a power trip and became mad with power."

The demon's plan of buying the crawling chaos time to recuperate worked. The shadow man returned in full force. Or rather, the shadow men cometh.

The tall, dark, and devilishly bleak Minion manifested himself into multiple avatars of all shapes and sizes.

When he got aethered by Gabriel's embarrassment-fueled Light Array, he regrouped his atomized particles and spread across Makati towards the nearest of its fleeing denizens, turning them into his own avatars.

What the crawling chaos lacked in healing powers he more than made up for his ability to take over the bodies of others like some sort of black lung virus. The black plague made flesh and bone.

Florante willed himself to shoot at the numerous avatars, even though when they got blown apart, they didn't atomize into tendrils but instead burst like sacks of blood and guts.

The Light Array made short work of most of them, but that took too long to charge, so he had to settle for Lightning Strikes, Lightning Bolts, and supersonic Thunderbolts for the rest.

These new avatars of the crawling chaos were collateral damage. Men, women, the elderly, and children—entire families—running for their lives up until the crawling chaos took over their bodies and turned them into shadow people like him.

They'd been turned into blackened homunculus or zombies puppeteered by the crawling chaos himself.

At first, dealing with the "infected" avatars of the crawling chaos felt like shooting fish in a barrel, but then they displayed bizarre attributes.

Some flew with hand glider wings. Others crawled into corners like roaches. There were those that merged to form a super muscular shadow avatar that tanked Florante's Light Array, Thunderbolts, and Lightning Bolts.

From there, Florante understood.

This man-shaped maestrom. This walking void containing the vast cosmos unto itself who could affect mystic energies, both demonic and cosmic, on an undefined level.

As World War II veteran and American civil rights activist Medgar Evers said,  "You can kill a man but you can't kill an idea."

This Minion was as unkillable as an idea. And just as dangerous.

"When a man possesses this much power, he does not seek redemption," said Mammon of the crawling chaos before Florante.

***

"Susmaryosep!"

Florante had just told Mammon he wasn't an intentional murderer (or a stalker), but now here he was again, forced to murder innocents in order to keep this shadowy humanoid typhoon in check.

He clung to the vague hope that like with the flying spaghetti monster incident, everything would go back to normal. That everything would be undone. Like a dream. Like all of this wasn't really real.

If he beat the Minion, he could revert everything back to normal, like it didn't actually happen, and save the people he just killed to get to the humanoid typhoon. Or the walking typhoid fever.

However, that was one big "if".

"Change into your Ophanim form. As you are now, you're no match against the Minion," teased the coward Mammon. "Unleash your full power like he has. I dare you, Gabriel."

"You'd like that, wouldn't you? You dumb bastard," cursed Florante. "You can't fool me! I bet you convinced this poor Ophanim to turn himself into a Minion the exact same way!"

"So?" said the brazen Mammon. "What if I did? The results speak for themselves. You can't even touch him. Face him with your full power or never wake up from this nightmare."

After deftly avoiding hit after hit, Galang got clipped by a five-clawed strike. That was all it took. It went downhill from there.

The distraction made him miss several of his shots, which allowed several avatars get passed his suppressive fire to claw, stab, and bite at him.

Desperately, he wielded a lightning bolt like a sword whip, slicing and dicing the nearest of the zombie horde of the crawling chaos's avatars.

He pushed back with his halo's aura, only to buckle under the pressure of an outright stampede of shape-shifting shadow creatures. The weight of hundreds felt like the weight of millions due to the densely packed particles of the Minion's cosmic self.

His panicked wheezes became a full-blown asthma attack as he drowned in black avatars that clawed, grabbed, bit, slashed, stabbed, and lacerated him to helpless shreds.

At this point, even if he willed himself to turn into his "Be Not Afraid, Child!" form of a frightful multi-eyed Ophanim, it'd be too late.

Then, just as Florante was about to get swallowed by the oily tidal wave of inhumanity that the maelstrom Minion mind-controlled like individual puppets, a mango tree suddenly grew and blocked their upsurge in a landslide of broken branches, splinters, leaves, and mango fruits.  

Once again, Raphael's human avatar Jennifer Tolentino saved his life. She jumped and slid across the unbroken branches of the mango tree that served as a wooden barrier between them and the Minion's horde of mind-controlled minions (ironic) that he turned into clones of his wriggly dark self.

"Are you okay, Flor?"

"Y-Yeah, th-thanks for saving me."

How embarrassing. He was supposed to be her Knight in Shining Armor, and here he was serving as her Damsel in Distress instead.

He didn't even have the energy to correct her nickname of him. He might as well be a "Flor". He might as well have that girly name.

She turned towards him, her halo and her eyes shining like emeralds, and unfurled two green-feathered bird wings from her back. The thing that caught Florante's eyes though was her smile.

A sad smile that could break anyone's heart in two.

"Flor, don't be a hero. You don't have to force yourself just to make people acknowledge you," she said.

"W-What…?" he trailed off. "B-But I thought that's what I'm supposed to do as an angel! An Ophanim! I'm one of you, right? Why can't I be the hero?"

She shook her head. "When you do that, you end up blaming yourself, blaming other people, and feeling jealous of everyone. But still, it doesn't have to be like that. Even if people don't acknowledge you, you just need to be someone that you can be proud of!"

"I don't understand," he said.

She silenced him with a quick peck on the forehead.

"You don't have to fight. This isn't your war. You have no quarrel with this Minion, don't you? Just be good, okay? Maybe this time, when you wake you up from this dream, you'll decide to forget about all this and move on with your life."

"…." He could only stare at her cherubic, angelic form, dumbfounded into silence. He later realized that her kiss had healed all the wounds he'd sustained from battle and reenergized him at the same time.

Like man-sized termites, the shape-shifting avatars of the crawling chaos clawed, gnawed, scratched, ripped, tore, and outright drilled right into the gigantic mango tree they'd crashed into, turning it into sawdust in their wake.

She then fell like a hatchling from her nest, her green feathers flying everywhere as she let the horde tear her apart in Florante's stead. Cannibalizing her, to his horror.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Galang screamed himself raspy, his eyes flooded with tears, his fingertips glowing with rivulets of bright-blue energy, his halo shining with arcs of electrical power.

***

Florante Galang realized early on that really was no hero, much less a superhero.

The first opportunity that he got his superpowers, he used it for petty revenge against his bullies, his mindless massacre resulting in his high school crush becoming collateral damage.

He really shouldn't be entrusted with destructive abilities like the Light Array, really.

The realization horrified him, but he honestly wouldn't get any real satisfaction of beating a stronger foe like the crawling chaos or the flying spaghetti monster like he did when he killed his bullies in a fever dream.

He was a coward who used his powers against bullies who couldn't fight back, in revenge to how they bullied him into submission and he couldn't fight back either.

He was no better than the bullies who picked on him.

When faced with the prospect of sacrificing life and limb against a monster that threatened the lives of the whole city of Makati, he came up short.

This creature didn't bully him so he had no quarrel against him. He had no motivation to beat him. They were actually the same—an Ophanim and a Minion thrust in a fight they had no dog in.

Even when the Minion began using innocent bystanders against Florante, this merely horrified the young Ophanim instead of build his heroic resolve.

For ultimately, Galang was a selfish person who only cared about himself. He was an even bigger coward than Mammon, who became a disembodied voice in their heads that mocked them all the while.

Jenny was right. He didn't have to fight. He had no personal stakes here.

However, there was something she said before she did her heroic sacrifice that stuck with him.

"Even if people don't acknowledge you, you just need to be someone that you can be proud of!"

Someone he could be proud of, huh? How could he do that? How could he becomes someone he could be proud of even without the acknowledgement of his peers?

Like a dying typhoon becoming a low pressure area, only to get a second wind and become a super typhoon as its winds moved into the moisture-rich tropics that enhanced its shower and thunderstorm activity.

Florante looked down from his perch atop the gigantic rotting mango tree that Jenny had used her life and healing factor to induce gigantic growth.

He saw that the avatars that consumed Raphael's avatar had the dark presence of the crawling chaos leave them. Evicted or otherwise exorcised out of them. Her green aura spread across them all, healing them of the Black Plague that infected them.

This maelstrom of darkness then converged into a singular man. The original avatar that served as a candidate for whoever demon wanted to take control of him.  

Before this living, walking shadow creature could get his hands on more avatars, Florante struck at this unkillable thing as immortal as a concept.

How did one kill an idea or a movement before it could spread across the populace like wildfire?

Practical application. A dose of reality.

Ideas never pan out without a hitch in real life. Let it naturally progress and die in absurdity when applied to reality.

"Light Array!"

Thusly, Florante and Jennifer killed this idea of a Minion by not letting its dark influence spread across anymore innocent bystanders and victims then isolating him inside his one avatar, feeding it with energy until it burned out.

Like letting a fire burn itself out before it could spread and raze everything in its path.

"Light ARRAY! LIGHT ARRAY! LIIIIIGHT ARRAAAAY!!!"

The blasts of energy chipped away at the concentrated density of the indefinable cosmic mass densely packed into the shape and sentience of a tall, lean man.

The glowing, electrified Florante then pierced through the layers and layers of negative energy in order to scream at the maelstrom, "Who are you? What are you doing? Why are you doing this? Do you really want to hurt all these people? Did Mammon put you up to this?"

The pacific storm that was Florante blasted the nimbus man with lightning and thunder, converging around him like he was the low pressure area about to become a typhoon himself.

"Did you think the same thing I had when we started fighting? Did you also wonder why we're fighting and if it's worth doing this in the first place?"

After blowing through layer upon layer of darkness and density, like a self-contained black hole made flesh, Galang then went face-to-face with… a kid. Just another kid like him. A tall kid, but a kid nonetheless.

They floated there in the eye of the storm that was Hurricane Galang.

A Minion facing an Ophanim, with both of them wondering what exactly was the difference between them.

Florante grinned at the stranger and said, "Let's stop this nightmare, okay Maybe it's about time you woke up."

The darkness that surrounded them then shattered like glass, revealing an untouched city and a perfectly intact Guadalupe Church. Just like what had happened with the spaghetti creature.

…Become a person he could be proud of, huh? Maybe he could try becoming that after all.  

***

Flor awoke outside the village or street where Jenny's apartment was located. He hadn't met up with her yet or gone to her apartment. Everything that had happened so far was just a daydream.

Dammit. So even that was just a dream? A daydream, this time.

He then remembered the "last time" they ended up in her apartment and what they were talking about before they were cut off by him waking up.

Oh, did he have one of those lucid dreams again? The ones you could control consciously? Or was he even awake now?

He'd been having all sorts of dreams lately, probably to escape the hell that was his teenage life as a bullied boy.

The dreams were happening more and more often. It was harder and harder to tell what was real and what wasn't until in hindsight.

"Wait. What the hell am I doing?" he said to himself aloud, shook his head, and left without going to Jennifer Tolentino's apartment.

"Susmaryosep," he murmured under his breath, feeling like he'd somehow dodged a bullet for some reason.

***

The next day went on easier than the last, but only because Florante Galang knew what to expect of today this time around.

His classmates would either avoid him like the plague or talk behind his back as he went about his friendless existence in First Year Section St. Francis of Assisi of Fatima High.

Oh well. At least his fantasies and fever dreams were interesting, right? Even though his reality was as banal as could be.

Jennifer Tolentino and Laura Reyes used to sit near him in class, but now they sat elsewhere once their homeroom teacher and class advisor rearranged their seats.

He ended up with some dude who never talked to him sat in front of him.

He went to the library instead of the cafeteria today because he usually sat in his lonesome every recess and lunch these days.

His usual friends… acquaintances perhaps… well, the people he sat with every lunch, the Dead Kids… were off doing their own things separately. Weirdoes being weirdoes.

He should speak though. He went to the library during lunch.

He also tended to avoid bumping into the group consisting of Laura and her friends or, much worse, Gerry Jacinto and his barkada (gang).

He was used to classmates and the student body at large looking through him as though he weren't there or as if he were a ghost.

However, for some reason, he felt like he had eyes all around him, but whenever he stared back at people instead of the floor or his feet as usual, they ended up looking elsewhere. As if averting his gaze.

Was there something on his face or uniform? He hoped he didn't do anything embarrassing again. However, such concerns left his mind after his trip at the library.

He had one thing in mind. One person. Jenny Tolentino.

Granted, Florante still had his photocopies of the phone book page full of "Tolentinos" and other "T" names as well as the yearbook page featuring a look-alike Jennifer Narcissa Tolentino.

Man, he was acting really creepy now, wasn't he?

How shallow was his crush on Laura Reyes that he ended up pining for Jenny Tolentino instead? Ah, whatever.

Crushes were supposed to be shallow attraction, right? You needed to really know someone to develop worthwhile feelings for them. Or so he heard. He didn't believe in love at first sight, although he had his share of, uh, lust at first sight.

Florante found Jenny cute because he knew her they shared something in common. Also, she had puppy dog eyes behind those wide-rimmed glasses.

Why hadn't he looked at her that way before? Must be because of Laura. And because she might be a fellow angel.

Or at least his imagination viewed her as such.

Maybe this was him finally giving up on Laura in favor of Jenny. Maybe.

***

To Be Continued…

Florante starts having issues in being able to tell what's real and what's fantasy as he continues to dream up plot scenarios for his comic book and uses it to retreat from how miserable his real life has gotten.

Farewell, Abdiel

[gabriel-gabdiel]

Rurouni Yahiko Chapter 56: The Sanada Demons

The Sanada Demons have come to save the day. Can these shinobi take on the likes of the Prodigal Son and the Swordsman Bibile?

The rest of the chapters of my Rurouni Kenshin fan fiction are available here. Enjoy.

First | Previous | Next

Back inside the moneychanger affiliate offices of the Minakatas...

The Faceless fenced and stabbed his way out of the small room where he couldn't kill that one samurai boy and his sword-catching move. Hadome (Sword Halt), was it?

He'd heard of samurai catching blades by their bare hands before, but he thought it was all hype and myth. Until now.

Sure, the kid was on the verge of losing against the masked man anyway and ended up no match against him or the likes of Kinta Minakata. However, his unique sword skill did intrigue The Faceless regardless.

Maybe he could mimic Hadome down the line...? 'However, first thing's first.'

The Faceless's duelist personality or disguise—John Rathbone—had specifically been parrying and thrusting with his trusty rapier against a trio of surprisingly strong ninjas.

Ah yes. Ninjas. Shinobi. The Japanese version of government spies or secret agents.

Even in an era where war was waged with guns, rifles, trenches, and bombs, spies and intelligence gatherers remain the most important warfare weapon.

Especially all these shinobi before him who could fight in the most underhanded of ways.

The ogre, the snake, and the bat.

He couldn't quite explain it but somehow, the bat ninja manhandled him in close quarters with his blades and distracting screams, the snake ninja snake-whipped him with explosive whip cracks from long range, and the ogre stabbed at his blind spots with frightening accuracy using his war fork.

They intended to push him into a corner and triple team him from there.

The Faceless chuckled. As if.

"What sort of gutless kenjutsssu (ssswordsmanship) is thisss? You're doing more running away than ssstriking! Fight like a man, coward!" said the lispy snake ninja of the swordsmanship bible's impenetrable defense and elusive movement.

"This isn't kenjutsu. This is fencing," calmly explained Rathbone to the most violent and rambunctious ninja of the trio. "And this is a rapier. An elegant weapon for a more civilized age. Far better than a brittle katana."

He'd been through tougher battles than this. He survived entire wars and accomplished more dangerous political assassinations that paid even more handsomely than this personal grudge his protégé had over the family that abandoned him.

More than a king's ransom, even (because he'd been paid for a king's head instead).

However, using his Tactical Wheel and his mind games, he pushed the trio away enough to exit the room and pursue the escaping Minakatas.

Maybe even kill that other shadow ninja he faced off in the Minakata's East-West Fusion Mansion. Or finish off the blade catcher samurai boy.

The Faceless proved especially dangerous when he combined forces with either Kai Hidaka or Lucas Grant, which he supposed was what the Minakatas were intending to prevent in the first place.

The unified force of the Brigands Guild.

The pile of rubble and debris where Luke had been buried into then stirred.

The Prodigal Son awoke.

"Dammit. I'll be back," said Ren the snake ninja, who ran back into the room to deal with the strong, tall, and half-blooded swordsman with the bastard sword. "Take care of the other gaijin (outsider) for me!"

"Why is there only two of you now?" The Faceless mocked in fluent Japanese, knowing exactly why one of them had to leave. "I miss the other guy. Bring him back."

Because the Prodigal Son was now on the prowl, the Sanyoukai (Three Demons) of the Sanada Ninja Clan had to split up to prevent the Brigands Guild from joining forces.

With all things considered, Kinta Minakata could probably handle either The Faceless or Grant alone.

However, even he—the Kagemusha (Shadow Warrior) and the Mimawarigumi Battousai—would be pushed into the corner himself when facing off against two or more Brigand Guild members at the same time.

"Are you sure you can take me on with only the two of you? You need all three just to keep up," needled Rathbone further, who could now pick apart the occasional stabs and strikes from long distance that the ogre ninja did now that the snake ninja didn't put the pressure on with his constant whiplashes.

"Do we now?" said Zan the oni (ogre) ninja with the red ogre mask and war fork. "You sound full of yourself for a gaijin piece of shit. If you truly can take us on by yourself, I better see it first with my own eyes. Don't just tell us about it."

Instead of echoing Zan's retort, Baku the bat ninja merely screamed what John could only describe as a banshee's wail at his face, distracting him enough to nearly lose his rapier from the hard parry he had to do against Zan's twin-pronged war fork.

***

Rurouni Yahiko

A Rurouni Kenshin Continuation Fan Fiction Story by Chester Castañeda

The foreign invaders of the Brigands Guild discover that it's not so easy dealing with the persistent warriors of Japan, particularly their noble samurais and their backstabbing ninjas.

Disclaimer: All characters used in this fanfic (save some others) are the rightful property of Nobuhiro Watsuki, Shueisha, Shonen Jump, Viz, Sony Studios, Fuji TV, Studio Gallup, Studio Deen, and ADV. This disclaimer also covers all the other copyrighted materials that are far too many to mention here. Don't sue me please, I'm very poor.

***

Chapter 56: The Sanada Demons

***

At the gates of the Minakata affiliate office...

Yahiko Myojin and Kaita served as Tatsuya Minakata's escorts, only for them to find out that the nearby stables had all their horses released and all the carriage drivers missing.

Maybe even dead.

Dammit. Now what? Were they supposed to escape Chinatown on foot?

Whoever the Brigands Guild were, they really had it in for the Minakatas. Wait, what was Yahiko even thinking?

'Of course they have it in for them. Their leader or whoever is the bastard child they disowned and threw away along with his mother,' thought the Tokyo Samurai Descendant, berating himself.

This Takuto Minakata or Lucas Grant character kind of reminded him of himself.

Yahiko wasn't abandoned by his family or anything, and he was no bastard son either, but it certainly felt like the world abandoned their whole family instead during the Bakumatsu.

Regardless, so many people were dying to save two of the V.I.P.s they were supposed to protect. Was all this effort even worth it?

Kaita reappeared behind them and said, "It might be best for us to stay in the office after all."

"What are you talking about, Shorty?" asked Myojin.

"Yes. Why in Buddha's fat ass should I stay there where the assassins are?" demanded Tatsuya. "Let me out."

Kaita sighed. "There might be more of them outside and you're safer here because we have the Sanada Demons on guard."

"D-Demons? Are you out of your mind, you costumed freak?!" shouted Tatsuya. "This isn't the Edo Period! Spare me this talk of superstition and ninja lore! Get me the police and have those murderers arrested!"

This gave Yahiko pause. Wasn't Kaita one of the Minakatas' trusted ninjas? Why was Tatsuya resistant to the ninja's advice? Why didn't he know about the Sanada Ninja Clan's Sanyoukai?

***

Meanwhile, while Ren kept the Prodigal Son at bay inside that room next to the main office...

Luke's body was already in rough shape before he got whipped and scourged like a criminal or a slave by the boa constrictor taxidermy whips of the creepy snake ninja.

It only got worse from there when he went one-on-one and face-to-face against the snake shinobi.

Grant laughed. This guy again. The costumed freak who blasted him straight into a wall. What an annoying prick.

"For a snake-themed ninja, I'm surprised you don't use poison in your arsenal," Lucas said in remembrance of his fellow Brigands Guild member Cain Merrick and his own poison-based gimmick.

"Are you a child? Just because I'm a sssnake ninja, it doesn't mean I use sssnake venom like some sort of coward!" scoffed Ren, getting angrier by the minute.

The Prodigal Son didn't know how to retort to that, mainly in light of how cowardly he thought Cain was for using poisons, venoms, and toxins as his main means of "fighting". He was every bit as underhanded as any of these ninjas, though.

Regardless, Ren kept whipping Lucas from afar and every time he got near, he used that technique again. A ranged attack that struck the ground that sent earthen debris with knockout force.

Grant managed to stab Ren once with his longsword, only for it to get deflected by the thick snakeskin hide of his leather armor. It was like trying to stab a helix of coiled snakes.

How did the snake man keep doing it? That strange, explosive attack?

Wait.  It was like an extra-large whip crack. A whip produced the cracking noise whenever it traveled faster than the speed of sound.

The snake ninja combined his bullwhips (or snake whips, in his case) together to create twin whip cracks strong and fast enough to break the sound barrier in resonance and create a blast of air powerful enough to tear through the ground.

A resonant sonic boom.

Essentially, Ren whipped his twin weapons together with resonating shockwaves from extra large whip cracks, so their resulting combined air vibrations exploded like twin lightning bolts blasting the ground like roaring thunder.

Moreover, his snake armor probably kept Ren from tearing himself apart with his own whip vibrations. It helped him survive the bone-crushing force of his induced earth-shattering shockwaves.

Impressive. The snake man's fighting technique was more straightforward than most ninjas he'd encountered or heard about, who were infamous for their dirty tactics.

Regardless, Lucas grabbed hold of his bastard (or one-and-half-hand) sword and started parrying the cracking whips away with one-handed swings so that he wouldn't get further ripped apart by them with flesh-cutting slashes.

He then crossed his arms together and braced himself for the reverberation of air that tore through the floorboards and walls like consecutive exploding landmines. Or the dust storm version of a tidal wave. One after another.

'What a tough opponent,' thought Lucas. 'I thought murdering the Minakatas was going to be a cakewalk, but my brother found himself some decent shinobi for me to play around with. Thanks, Aniki.'

Lucas thusly split the shockwave in half by slicing his bastard sword into the floor so fast he also broke the sound barrier himself, thus neutralizing the attack with his own sonic boom.

"What the hell...?" yelped Ren. "SSStupid gaijin. Learn to accept a lossss!"

Lucas attempted to chop instead of stab the thick armor with his bastard sword, only for Ren to wrap himself in his snake whips, thus shielding him from the cutting power of the high-grade steel.

'Dammit,' thought Grant, his sword again bouncing off the snake ninja. 'Stop playing dirty!'

The smirking Ren then jumped, twisting his body to unwind the whips around him. This resulted in a spiral of whip strikes that assaulted Lucas like a razor-sharp cyclone.

Lucas bathed in his own blood from the whiplashes. However, proving himself more cold-blooded than the dead reptiles Ren used for weapons, he managed to wrap one of the snake whips around his arm.

The way Ren fought reminded him of the way Kai Hidaka fought. 'You've seen one ninja, you've seen them all.'

He then pulled hard at Ren's snake whip, intending to catch him flat-footed so that he could chop him in half.

However, Ren stopped resisting and allowed himself to get pulled intentionally. He did a flying headbutt on the gaijin's noggin, who didn't expect the sudden release that snapped the whip back towards him like a rubber band.

"Don't you dare underestimate Japanese ninjutsu, you gaijin piece of shit!" shouted Ren.

He knew he had the upper hand now! He'd become a hero of the clan for taking out this monster!

***

As for the double team of Baku and Zan against The Faceless...

These underhanded Japanese spies were up to something.

A little while ago, John Rathbone still feinted, countered, and landed with regularity against the Sanada Demons while he himself used his footwork to slip, parry, block, and outright evade their own attacks from high and low.

He kept making them second-guess his next move using the Tactical Wheel of Simple Attack, Parry and Riposte, Compound Attack, and Counter Attack.

However, the three also kept intercepting the riposte thrusts and counter slashes of his rapier to save one other. Whenever he zeroed in on one of them, the other two either blocked or countered as well.

Now there were only two of them, which meant he could pressure them further to move back, allowing him enough breathing room to chase after the Minakatas. The lack of a third man cut their offensive power by a third.

However, something strange happened.

His attacks kept missing. Every thrust and slash from various angles somehow missed or wasn't timed to hit its target.

It didn't help that his normally 20/20 vision blurred from time to time, like some sort of haze came over it.

His attacks missed before because of how fast both Zan and Baku reacted to his stabs even though he kept breaking his rhythm to keep them guessing when he was going to attack with his Beat Parry Riposte.

Rathbone also noticed how Zan kept banging his war fork unto the ground to make it vibrate like a tuning fork. Did this help the ninja dodge his fencing attacks better?

Dammit, and he was just getting their timing down pat the longer they fought, thus allowing him to counter them as they charged.

Only for him to start missing during those brief vulnerable moments as well. His timing was off somehow.

His breathing also became more erratic even though he hadn't exactly burned out his stamina yet. He hadn't even broken a sweat yet he had trouble taking breaths now.

He glared at the twin ninja demons. "What did you do to me?!"

"I was worried for a minute there," said Zan to Baku. "The gaijin has no concept of sakki (bloodlust) and how to read it, so I was worried for a minute that his swordsmanship could deal with your high-pitched sound technique."

Baku chuckled. "Even if he can't detect bloodlust, his moves are all rhythm-based. Break his rhythm and his so-called fencing will end up like trash."

What did they mean by that? What was going on? They were doing something to The Faceless, but he didn't quite know what. Did they poison him or something?

No, wait. It was the bat ninja and his screams that were doing this to him! Whatever this was.

Baku kept distracting John with his high-pitched screeching. Or so the duelist thought. 'So it wasn't just a distraction...?'

Something about those sounds Baku produced made Rathbone miss his Simple Attacks or Compound Attacks (attacks with feints or switching a missed attack to a parry or a different attack).

"Just a little more," said Baku to Zan. "He's on his way to self-destruction. Finish him off as soon as he makes a mistake."

Zan harrumphed. 'Easier said than done.'

Despite the fencer's exposure to Baku's screams that messed with his body in various indescribable ways, he kept following up his misses with ripostes in fluid succession, like he meant to miss in order to draw out his opponents' counterattacks.

His misses also became hits, which forced the ninja sharpshooter with the war fork to hesitate and not overextend himself for a possible counterstrike.

'So this is western kenjutsu,' thought the demonic ninja with a long-range weapon quite like Satsuki Sakaguchi. 'Fencing, was it? It's a legitimate bujutsu (martial art) in its own right.'

Rathbone frowned as a missed slash caused even deeper cuts to appear on his body. They weren't yet lacerations, but they sapped him of his strength bit by bit, which also made him more inaccurate with his strikes.

He could not afford having his ripostes or even his parries miss like this.

***

Back to Ren versus Lucas...

Lucas reeled, his head throbbing with a splitting headache. 'Another sneak attack! Curse the Japanese...!'

Another snake whip sonic boom hit Grant like an earth-shattering landslide. Or even an avalanche.  However, he noticed that the repeated vibrations mostly traveled through the ground rather than in the air.

Predictably on the ground. Ren probably aimed his resonating whip vibrations directly back to earth for maximum impact, like the difference between a firework and a shrapnel bomb.

The sonic boom shockwave probably traveled a shorter distance in the air compared to the path of destruction it left on the ground, the concussive force turning everything in its path into a landslide full of sharp rock shards.

Therefore, attacking in the air made more sense than attacking on the ground.

Lucas grabbed his bastard sword with both hands and leaped into the sky, gliding towards Ren while the shockwave harmlessly traveled below him.

The snake ninja ground his teeth enamel to powder and wrapped his snake whips around his body again, intending to protect himself from the sword chop he knew was coming then retaliating with his topsy-turvy whirling typhoon of snake whips afterwards.

However, Ren letting Lucas hit him at all instead of dodging then countering with his whips proved to be a big mistake.

Instead of the bastard sword bouncing harmlessly off of his snake-coiled body, Grant released enough extra torque from his two-handed sword swing to drive the snake ninja straight into the ground.

Although the sword didn't cut through the snake armor, it broke Ren's arm and several of ribs by force of the impact alone. He couldn't uncoil the snake whips in time, which would've torn apart the jumping foreigner in a typhoon of whiplashes.

Ren struggled to get up, tied up by his own snake whips, looking the fool against this half-blooded bastard son with the bastard sword.

Lucas exhaled deeply and grinned at the snake man. "That was a good fight. Because of that, I'll spare you. Get strong and maybe we can fight again!"

"DON'T GIVE ME THAT BULLSHIT!" spat Ren before turning the handle of his snake whips, which retracted a hidden toxin-tipped blade that he stabbed right into the foot of Lucas.

"Ow! What the hell did you do, you cowardly ninja piece of shit!?" Lucas cried out in pain. "Also, what happened to your lisp? It's completely gone now."

"Shut up and die, basssssstard!" said Ren, overcompensating with how long he drew his 'S' sound on that last word. "That hidden blade is tipped with poison. You're as good as dead now."

"Hey, I thought you said you didn't use snake venom!"

"IDIOT! I'm a ninja! Of course I lied!"

Ugh. Ninjas truly were the worst.

***

At the gates of the Minakata subsidiary office building...

A rock and a hard place crushed the Fuuma Ninja Clan's Kai Hidaka between themselves, leaving him stuck there.

Well, no. Not really.

Rather, he got stuck between Lieutenant Satoru Sakaguchi (with his recovering daughter in tow) on one end and Kinta Minakata on another end.

The choice to where he should go couldn't be more obvious, but he also had a mission to fulfill.

Even though Kinta proved the more dangerous and immediate threat, he was also the Brigands Guild's biggest target.

Besides which, while murdering both the weakest Musou Madden Ryu practitioners should help him survive in the short term, Kai didn't want a master swordsman like Kinta hunting him down for revenge like the Kagemusha that he was in the long term.

He believed it was in his best interest to finish off the Minakata heir sooner rather than later.

Judging by how long his half-brother nurtured his grudge against their similarly vengeful family—his whole life—this desire for revenge was probably in their blood.

Perhaps even in-fighting among family members proved hereditary too, seeing how soured the relationship between Kinta and Tatsuya was.

Kinta and "Takuto" felt more like family than nephew and uncle.

Hell, Hidaka merely lurked outside and he could hear how much the two hated each other, judging from their shouting match earlier (or rather, from Tatsuya shouting alone and Kinta curtly shutting him down every time).

In light of his fight-or-flight instinct screaming at him to find an new avenue of escape, he willed himself to fight the Mimawarigumi Battousai instead, hoping against hope that either The Faceless or Lucas Grant would aid him sooner rather than later.

'Kinta-kun,' thought Satoru, holding his gasping daughter's shoulders firmly. 'Please finish that son of a bitch off!'

***

Back to Ren versus Lucas...

In sheer frustration, Ren attempted a whip crack at Lucas's face as he got up, but the blond swordsman caught it by his fist.

Lucas certainly looked like he was about to vomit. Or even shit all over himself.

As expected. Ren had his hidden dagger tipped with the concentrated "poison" (really, snake venom) of various local snakes all over Japan, like the mamushi that belonged to the family of pit vipers.

Stabbing a persistent enemy who survived Ren's whiplashes with the venomous dagger served as the snake man's ace up his sleeve. His trump card.

Typically, the stab site swelled and reddened with a huge blister. The victim then slowed down and fell ill, unable to continue fighting.

From there, Ren would've finished the person off with either grave injuries or lacerations compounded by snake venom coursing through his veins, killing him slowly but surely.

Ren could also bite the bullet and just choked the bitch with his snake whips. His enemies either died by his own hands or by the venom he injected unto them.

Just as Luke looked like he'd empty all the contents of his stomach unto the ground, he then grinned and winked at Ren. "Just kidding."

Luke grabbed the snake whip's tail and wrapped it around his knuckles.

"Jokes on you, asshole. One of the Brigands is an expert in poisons and toxins. He has helped me develop immunity to most deadly organic and inorganic chemicals for years."

From there, Lucas did to Ren was Ren did to Lucas earlier—he pulled the whip then allowed himself to leap along with the recoil or snapback of the taxidermy snake, hammering the injured snake man ninja's head with a devastating headbutt of his own.

Bam. Their heads smashed against each other with a heavy, sickening thud.

Ren felt his brain slosh inside his skull. Grant might've even cracked his noggin altogether, shattering his nose and drawing blood.

How strong was this kid?! He really did seem immune to the snake venom! Or to pain! Or to blunt-force trauma!

As expected of a Minakata spawn. Perhaps his bloodline from his father's side, the Grants, also had monstrous strength in their genetics.

Grant then gave Ren the coup-de-grace blow of driving him right into the nearest wall with a sword stab that finally penetrated through the snake armor, drawing blood.

The whole room soon collapsed all over the snake man, weakened by the numerous sonic booms produced by supersonic snake whips. The Prodigal Son had been baiting the snake ninja to blast him with shockwaves at strategic points of the room's pillars.

The final leap and blow then shook the room enough to make its already weakened and compromised foundations break and collapse directly on top of the ninja.

Before Ren knew it, it was already "checkmate" for him.

***

Back at the three-way impasse deep in the offices of the moneychanger building…

"You two don't fight like gentlemen at all. You're like savages instead," said John Rathbone to the animal-themed masked ninjas from the Sanada Clan with an upturned nose.

These honorless ninjas and their ambush-style attacks reminded John of the time when Britain colonized Africa.

Britain observed the rules of engagement against the African natives, declaring war on them and challenging them to war on the battlefield.

The Africans were supposed to engage them in battle on the trenches until a side won.

However, the tribes of Africa had no concept of how war was waged in the west and thusly ambushed the British camps without warning, like they would when they were fighting amongst themselves in tribal warfare.

These Japanese natives, or at least their ninjas, were the same savages as the African natives. To them, all was fair in war or love or some such nonsense.

Wait a minute. Samurais had bushido (the code of the warrior). Ninjas followed no such code of honor. They were so unlike their honor-bound samurai counterparts.

Both the oni (ogre) ninja Zan and John exchanged thrusts and stabs, probing each other's defenses.

Throughout the exchange, Rathbone noticed how Zan allowed his war fork to get parried by John's rapier, which made the unusual weapon vibrate like a tuning fork instead.

The demonic goblin ninja also only really attacked whenever he made his tuning war fork vibrate.

'Hmmm,' thought John. 'Curiouser and curiouser.'

Rathbone feinted a thrust one… two… three times at Zan and Baku, jabbing his undulating sword arm with motionless jabs of his rapier that went to and fro between the masked ninjas.

Like a pendulum on a Grandfather Clock.

He actually attacked the fourth time with a thrust but stopped himself short, intending to do a recovery afterwards as soon as either shadow warrior reacted and dodged.

They barely even blinked. Their hair-trigger reflexes remembered him doing the same "ultimate" feint earlier to draw out attacks he could counter, so they weren't fooled.

They moved a half-beat earlier than John, intercepting his attack before he could do his recovery and counterstrike.

Thusly, The Faceless had his sword thrust parried by Baku's metal arm bracelets with bladed hooks or claws on the side and countered by Zan's war fork.

However, Rathbone himself sidestepped in time to turn Zan's two-pronged stab into a slash that left a gash over his bodyguard vest.

Zan clicked his tongue on the roof of his mouth. He almost finished off the slippery fencer. John Rathbone appeared every bit as evasive and untouchable as a medieval ninja from Japan!

The two attempted to follow-up their own Parry Riposte with a finishing chain attack but stopped short when they heard the rumblings of the other room, followed by screams.

It wasn't Baku's screeching. Nor was it Lucas.

They recognized the voice. It was instead from their comrade, Ren the Snake Ninja with the taxidermy boa whips.

The bat ninja then told the ogre ninja, "I'm fine, Zan. Go protect the Minakatas or help Ren. The Faceless is mine. I've figured him out."

"Oh, did you now, Baku?" said Zan, the ninja with the red ogre mask and war fork. "All right. Fine. I'll be right back to finish this gaijin off if you haven't killed him by the time I return."

Zan then made his exit, hiding himself in smoke bombs that Rathbone stabbed through regardless, only for his rapier to get blocked by Baku's hooked bracelets.

John harrumphed, stabbing repeatedly at the weaponless ninja to stave him off. "Do you really think you can take me on alone, you cowardly popinjay?"

The grim bat-themed shadow warrior merely shifted into a karate stance and said, "Come hither, gaijin. Get a taste of Yamato Damashi (Japanese Spirit)."

"You're delusional." Smirking, Rathbone murmured to himself, "Once more unto the breech, my fancy clown."

Baku then screeched like the legendary banshees of Irish folklore. A haunting, bloodcurdling cry that reached all the way to the pits of The Faceless' stomach. Or even the insides of his bones, right down to the bone marrow.

'Strange. Is his incessant, irritating screaming part of his trick?' thought Rathbone as he backpedaled from the bat ninja, only to end up back in his en garde position because Baku chased after him immediately.

What was worse was that John felt like vomiting until his stomach turned inside out the more he fought this ninja.

As sickening as these deceitful and sly cowards were when it came to their dirty tactics, it wasn't enough for him to literally feel like puking in disgust.

***

Back at the front portion of the moneychanger affiliate office building…

Kai Hidaka threw himself at Kinta Minakata, hoping against hope that Lucas Grant wasn't too busy to actually handle his business with the goddamn Mimawarigumi Battousai himself.

Sheesh. Kinta was Lucas's half-brother, not Kai's. Let Lucas handle his own sibling. He (Kai) was not his (Lucas's) brother's keeper, after all.

Nevertheless, a strange thing happened.

There was something different about the Kinta that Kai faced today compared to the one he clashed swords with at Kaneda Minakata's Eastern-Western Fusion Mansion.

As usual, like in their first encounter, Kai had to scramble, duck, and sway his body like a lithe dancer to avoid the surgically accurate slashes and attacks of the infamous Kagemusha (Shadow Warrior) of Shogo Amakusa.

Kinta's accuracy hadn't gone down. Not really.

Minakata merely missed Hidaka by hairbreadths or by a razor's edge, the fidgety ninja spurred by adrenalin and twitch reflexes to avoid the iaijutsu (quick-draw) sword strikes with the nimble elusiveness of a fly.

However, Kinta's hack and slash output had gone down drastically.

Even though Kai knew that Kinta favored accuracy over volume, the swordsman had nevertheless become more conservative with his attacks now.

Almost as conservative as The Faceless when he fenced under his John Rathbone persona. John barely ever missed because he never took a stab or thrust unless he was 100 percent sure he'd get the hit.

As though he was conserving his energy.

Wait a minute.

The eyes behind Hidaka's goggled mask narrowed as he let out a long exhale. 'Huh. So fighting Lucas had that effect on him too, huh? That boy is a persistent one, after all.'

Even Lieutenant Satoru Sakaguchi noticed something was amiss. 'Kinta-kun…?'

The lack of sword slashes and pressure allowed the nimble Kai to feint an attack, only for him to shoot his rope spear in between the eyes of Satoru.

To be clear, the rope spear flew at longer distances compared to his rope darts, which he used for closer targets.

The flying acrobatic ninja figured out that Kinta decided to conserve his strength after going through the stamina monster that was Lucas.

When Kai first met the half-breed, he couldn't touch him with a bastard sword, a longsword, or even a shortsword. Hidaka moved too fast and too nimble for the kid to take down.

However, like a hunter-gatherer caveman during the Stone Age, Lucas took down faster prey like gazelle by tiring them out and pursuing them ceaselessly. Over and over. Like an unstoppable force of nature you couldn't outrun.

No wonder Kinta looked like he'd just run a marathon despite having not one mark or cut on him.

While under pressure, Minakata probably worried about the wellbeing of the Sakaguchis at the back of his mind. He would've gotten the adrenalin rush needed to save father and daughter.

However, when Kinta himself was attacked, he let his guard down and became unaware of his surroundings.

Kai noticed as much when he fought the swordsman the first time. This went double now that he'd been tired down by the implacable Lucas Grant.

How ironic for the Sakaguchi Family to end up being liabilities even though they were supposed to be there to protect the Minakata Family.

That split second of distraction and scrambling towards Satoru and Kyoko was the window of opportunity Hidaka needed to finish what Lucas had started.

***

Back at the rear exit of the moneychanger affiliate office building…

John Rathbone switched tactics yet again. He couldn't counter Baku's attacks, who patiently lay in wait and ambushed him in the darkness at every turn.

If one or two probing strikes with his rapier weren't enough, then a complicated series of them—a truly Compound Attack—was in order.

Only problem was that Baku danced around the strikes with the same deft skill that Kai Hidaka, a true-blue ninja in his own right, did.

Even though the bat ninja favored projectiles more when compared to a weapons expert like Zan, he combined the rain of kunai (daggers) and shuriken (ninja stars) at John with karate punches and kicks.

John got nailed with a couple of meaty strikes while dodging the shuriken and kunai. He'd rather get punched or kicked than get slashed.

Muscle memory forced him to do this, remembering how his own estranged son Cain Merrick would use bladed weapons to poison him and others.

The duelist scowled and narrowed his eyes. What was this walking freak show doing to him and his twitch reflexes?

It was the screams, wasn't it? Baku was shrieking like a black cloud of bats all this while. Shrieking like a bat.

In fact, Baku turned the tables on John, with him dictating the pace and forcing him to attack at every turn, only to block with his hooked arm bracelets, blind him with smoke bombs, or injure him with knives and metal shards.

They two chipped away at each other's defenses, but Baku had the upper hand. And the momentum.

Thankfully, Rathbone's uncharacteristic aggression with close-call near-misses (or near-hits, as the case might be) and follow-throughs served as his defense against a significant blow or counter.

"You'll never figure out what I'm doing to you in a million years," boasted Baku after nailing the fencer with an elbow this time, followed by a slash from his arm brace hooks.

Blimey. Screw ninjas and their stupid gimmicks! At least ordinary thieves and ruffians were too unskilled and straightforward to pull the wool over John's world-weary eyes.

Ninjas, on the other hand, thought just like him. Who knew honorless secret agents would have something in common with a gentleman thief like him?

Again, Baku hid in the darkness. He screeched, avoided, or blocked a myriad of ripostes and sword thrusts, and then kicked, punched, or threw Rathbone around like a rag doll to open him up to a fatal stab wound or slash.

Meanwhile, Rathbone could barely hit him back himself. He always somehow missed by a nose hair or cilia.  Like his internal rhythm or reflexes were off.

***

Meanwhile, at the entrance of the moneychanger building, near the stables where the Minakata's carriage was parked…

"I found a horseman!" said Kaita, who popped out of nowhere with a previously escaping driver of the Minakatas whom he held at kunai-point (or ku-knife-point, as Gan would say).

"I found one of your horses!" said Yahiko, who held the reins of the beast of burden, pulling him back to the stables. Thankfully, this stallion wasn't too spooked.

"There's a horse-drawn carriage here that hasn't been sabotaged or had its wheel axels removed!" confirmed Tatsuya Minakata, pale as a bed sheet at this point. "Perfect! Let's go! I don't want to spend another minute at this hellhole!"

"Wait, we're just going to leave? Your nephew is still out there," pointed out Myojin, only for him to get taken aback by Tatsuya's glare. "Okay. You go home to Mommy with your personal ninja. I'll stay here and look out for your nephew."

With a sourpuss look reminiscent of someone biting into a lemon or smelling garbage, Tatsuya looked back and forth between Kaita and Yahiko before relenting, "Ugh. Fine. We'll wait for my stupid nephew to come back."

The Sanada Ninja and the Tokyo Samurai exchanged looks. Should they have escaped with the uncle or were they making a mistake?

Yahiko took a deep breath. He'd deal with the consequences later. The cast was drawn. They'd made their decision, whether it was the right one or not.

They slightly regretted not escaping then and there when the doors, doorway, and walls burst forth rather than swung open before them in splinters like a carriage crash.  

***

The kunai slashes and shuriken cuts were getting closer, sharper, and deeper. Death by a thousand cuts. Or maybe a million.  

While hearing what sounded like a million bats shrieking, clawing, and biting at him in the darkness of the mansion.

Bats, huh? Baku even shot his kunai to snuff out the flames of every last candle and lamp in the vicinity, thus covering them in darkness with the barest sliver of moonlight from the windows.

He really was bat-like. He wasn't blind as a bat but he didn't need his vision as much as a bat would.

A punch from Baku cracked The Faceless' mask.

Aside from distracting him with loud screeches, Baku the Bat-Man might also be using supersonic screams to locate John's position every time.

Rathbone had read about this before. Bats were able to exist nocturnally and move in low light through echolocation.

These animals screamed at high pitches to judge distance or what they were flying through by the amount of time their screams bounced back to them.

In other words, the Baku and Zan tandem read through or perceived Rathbone's change of pace or sudden counters and ripostes from the steady rhythm of his pendulum-swing jabs by their hair-trigger reflexes and superhuman senses.

Come to think of it, didn't Zan have a two-pronged war fork that could've doubled as a tuning fork? He might've used the vibrations from that fork as his means of sonar or echolocation too.

Also, judging by the obliterating vibrations done by the snake ninja known as Ren, that ninja also probably used resonating whip cracks to create a sonic boom as his means of attack.

Ren, Baku, and Zan. They were animal-themed ninjas but they had another thing in common—their supersonic sound and vibration abilities.

They were sound ninjas.

Jesus Christ. These goddamn ninjas fought dirty but their tactics required such a high skill level that you couldn’t help but bitterly laugh at it all.

They were consummate cheaters that would stab your back like the cowards that they were. They did anything to win.

"Kill all invaders! Protect the emperor from the barbarians! All hail to the Empire of Japan! Sonno Joi!" rambled Baku, his terseness disappearing as he smelled blood and went into a feeding frenzy.

Rathbone again did his strongest feint—an actual attack cut short then recovered into a different follow-up counterattack—but this time while armed with the knowledge of how Baku made him miss.

Baku again blocked with his arm bracelets to do an early Parry and Riposte of his own to cut off the follow-up Recovery Attack.

However, Rathbone expected that and countered off of that counter instead, swaying his body at an awkward angle and slipping from the arm bracelet guard to skewer the ninja right in his heart.

He felt vibrations in his body and a second later, he missed Baku's chest and merely left a flesh wound on it instead of a stab before getting kneed in the gut for his trouble.

Bloody hell. John winced and gnashed his teeth.

Why did he miss this time? Baku was wide open! He fell for his bait! His supersonic trip-mine could only tell when he actually attacked instead of what sort of attack he'd do! It was perfect! Why did he fail…?

Wait a minute. Baku wasn't just using echolocation, was he?

'That was close,' Baku the Bat Ninja admitted in spite of himself. 'This man, The Faceless, is too dangerous to be left alive!'

John Rathbone—or rather, The Faceless—chuckled to himself. "I understand your secrets now, you Yellow Peril!"

"You don't understand a thing. Go back to the barbaric west where you belong, waito piggu (white pig)!"

***

In between the realms of the conscious and unconscious lay a subconscious Kyoko.

She'd almost been hung to death by the Brigands Guild ninja, Kai Hidaka of the Fuuma Clan.

A forgotten memory from her childhood surfaced as she swam between the converging seas of wakefulness and slumber.

It was one where she insistently asked his grandfather about how dashing the samurai were when he was a child.

Were they as honorable, loyal, noble, and heroic as the hatamoto-class samurai they worked for, the Minakatas, were?

To be more specific, were they as handsome and dreamy as Kinta Minakata? Or his silent but kind father, Azuma Minakata? Or even his scary grandfather, Toshiro Minakata?

Chuckling, her Grandpa Genzo Sakaguchi told her while she sat on his knee, "Not all samurai  are like Kinta or Azuma. They're more like politicians or policemen. Some good, some bad. Maybe even more bad than good.'

'Huh. So samurais were more like Mr. Toshiro then?' was the question Kyoko had enough sense not to ask her own grandfather.

The old man then turned serious and said, "Samurais aren't what they're all cracked up to be, Kyoko-chan."

Kyoko tilted her head in askance. "What do you mean?"

"For example, there's such a thing as Uchi-sute."

"'Uchi-sute?'" repeated Kyoko. "What is that?"

"It's also known as kiri-sute gomen."

"Kiru… Nani? (What?) Gomen? (Sorry?) Eh?" Kyoko's blew her cheeks up like a chipmunk. "So? What does it all mean, Grandpa?!"

This only made Grandpa Genzo chuckle.

Uchi-sute (To strike and abandon) or burei-sute (To offend and strike) were concepts dating back to the feudal era collectively known later on as kiri-sute gomen (The right to cut and leave).

This concept referred to an old Japanese expression about the right to strike or the right of the samurai to kill commoners for perceived affronts. Samurai had the right to strike with the sword anyone of a lower class who compromised their honor.

"It's the right of a samurai to kill commoners if they were embarrassed by them," was how Genzo phrased it. "We live in a society where a military aristocracy had the license to kill another human being just because he's of a lower class than him."

Naively, Kyoko blinked and said, "But isn't it okay for samurai to do it? Are we not samurai?"

"Listen carefully, child. For my money, no one has the right to kill another, whether they're kings or paupers. The emperor himself or the village idiot. Murder is murder. You have no right to kill someone over a slight as though you're better than them."

Kyoko's eyebrows furrowed cutely. "But higher class samurai like Kinta-chama can kill me because I'm lower class than him, right?"

"The courts would rule it as self-defense, but no. I don't believe he has the right to do it. You can defend yourself as a lower class samurai with a wakizashi, but the whole thing is bogus, if you ask me. If an affront has been committed, let everyone equally have their day in court instead of having samurai get the automatic right to kill anyone who annoys them, I say!"

Nonoko chided in the background, "Father, what are you teaching that poor kid? Sheesh. She's just a child."

Genzo cackled in an "old mannish" sort of way and told Kyoko's mother, "I'm teaching her about real life."

***

Earlier, just as Rathbone almost finished off Baku, he felt the silent vibrations seep deep into his very bones, making his joints ache.

The Faceless realized that aside from shrieks he and Baku could hear, the ninja screeched sounds beyond the human range of hearing.

Humans could only hear sound waves between 20 Hertz (Hz) to 20,000 Hz. However, sound waves below that threshold could affect any person.

Even if you sat in front of something producing a frequency of 19 Hz or infrasound level, even if you couldn't hear anything you could still feel its vibrations. Like how the deaf could feel sound even if they couldn't hear it necessarily.

At 19 Hz, humans could end up with wonky vision because 19 Hz was the resonant frequency of the human eyeball.

When exposed to 177 dB sound waves at 0.5 to 8 Hz, it could start messing with your lungs. Your breathing could end up erratic as your bones start shaking around.

Short-term exposure to such sounds could damage your joints even. Chronic exposure to them could result in visual impairment or outright nausea.

However, these effects to infrasound weren't uniform to all people exposed across the board. It'd take constant resonant exposure to the sound to mess with your internal organs, joints, or vision.

Besides which, it wasn't as if Rathbone was sitting still while getting exposed to the supersonic screeches of Baku. He dodged and moved around a lot, plus they were making a lot of other noises that covered the infrasound as well.

Baku used his shrill shrieks for another purpose, its effects being more immediate than making Rathbone's various organs feel "funny" or "off".

There was also the fact that countering and hitting a target was all about having your body memorize a rhythm and timing to align your attacks to every last opening the opponent had.

Whether you were an expert marksman with a gun, prizefighter with thudding fists, or a swordsman with a sharp blade, hitting the target involved timing your shot, punch, or slash at the right tempo or rhythm.

If you were off by a hair or an inch, you'd miss badly.

And Rathbone missed all thanks to Baku's supersonic or infrasound screeches.

Like a singer who was off-tune, Baku kept hitting the wrong notes even though he was close to the right ones, creating a dissonant if almost accurate tune.

This also created dissonance to Rathbone's own tempo.

Over and over Baku kept getting away with it, so John slowly got used to the rhythm of the bat himself.

However, he couldn't achieve enough resonance in his counters to match Baku's rhythm, so he was the one who kept missing and getting his advance checked.

Baku's supersonic "singing" wasn't only a method of echolocation that acted like a trip-hammer or landmine on whether Rathbone was feinting or attacking for real.

The bat-man ninja also sung a song of the damned that ruined Rathbone's innate abilities to discover and exploit the rhythm of his opponent, solve them like a puzzle, and open them up to counterattacks or ripostes.

Baku mimicked the beat and tempo of Rathbone's own rhythm but was slightly off, creating dissonance in the fencer's movements. Like a terrible singer messing up a proper singer with his off-key singing in a duet.

So on top of having hair-trigger reflexes aided by superhuman senses and echolocation, Baku could also use his supersonic screeching to disrupt Rathbone's counterstriking rhythm.

A two-pronged attack if he'd ever seen one. Like the two-pronged war fork of Zan himself. Or like a classic pincer attack from Ancient Roman military strategy.

'Hmmm. Pincer, eh?' thought Rathbone with a growing smirk on the edges of his unseen mouth.

***

Satoru scrambled for his saber as soon as he saw the rope spear fly from behind the acrobatic ninja of the Brigands Guild.

Shit.

He had set his still out-of-breath daughter down on a nearby statue in a sitting position while looking for an appropriate avenue of escape for the both of them as afforded by the appearance of Kinta.

Only for Kai Hidaka to have other ideas.

The ninja's flight-or-fight instincts went into full gear, attacking Kinta for fear of him countering him if he had attacked the Sakaguchis. Only for him to use that feint as a distraction to attack the Sakaguchis anyway.

'He's slow,' thought Kai after the lieutenant deflected the rope spear with a sheathed saber, unable to draw his sword on time. 'He's easier to take down compared to the likes of the Kagemusha. He hasn't really changed much after all these years, huh? Still the weak link.'

However, as expected, Kinta leaped forward into action to save Satoru from harm even as Kai whipped his missed spear to redirect it towards Satoru's shoulder instead.

"AAUGGH!" Satoru cried out, which stirred the half-unconscious Kyoko awake.

This was what Kai wanted.

When he attacked Kinta in panic, he was the one at risk. This time around, he forced the surgically precise Mimawarigumi Battousai to attack him in panic instead.

Under his terms. In a very predicable manner. Open to counterattacks of his own.

"You're wide open, Kagemusha!" said Kai as he threw multiple rope darts at Kinta, intending to ensnare him into his web.

Meanwhile, waiting on standby from the sidelines was the "fish-hooked" Satoru, whom Hidaka could always tug towards him to use as a meat shield against Kinta's signature Full Moon Slash or Double Full Moon Slash (also known as the Blue Moon Slash).

To Kai's chagrin, the Mimawarigumi Battousai went above and beyond with his sword slashes.  

Like a lightning strike, his sword flashed and streaked across the air as it got drawn out in supersonic speed.

"Tsunami (Tidal Wave)," Kinta murmured his words of malice, the glint of his blade becoming an afterimage of moonlight.

The first slash from the Waxing Stance—a Young Moon Slash—cut apart the first few strands of darts headed towards him before they could hook themselves into the ground or his flesh to form an ensnaring net.

The follow-up combo of the Waxing Crescent Moon to Waxing Half Moon (First Quarter) Slash came twice as fast as the first Young Moon Slash. These slashes ripped apart the flailing ropes into confetti.

However, Kai anticipated as much. As expected of the man who went toe-to-toe against Gensai Kawakami of the Ishin Shishi's Four Butchers and lived to tell the tale.

Hidaka had seen this technique before from Kinta's fellow Musou Madden Ryu practitioner, Sho Kojima. He thusly knew how the Tsunami worked.

The Tsunami was a series of slashes chained together from weakest to strongest that started slowly and went faster and faster in the final few slashes as its momentum increased.

Its timing went 1 (pause) 2, 3, then 4567. Like how the turning tides started as a shallow low tide weak only to end up becoming a deep and strong high tide at their apex.

There were several ways to counter this.

The first was to block, evade, or counter the first few slow slashes to not fall for the rest of the final supersonic slashes. If he confirmed the hit, he'd do the rest of the combo.

Like getting out of the beach during the low tide to get to higher ground or far away from shore to avoid getting swept up by the huge waves come high tide.

However, the Mimawarigumi Battousai solved this by gauging the distance and doing the first few slashes on the rope darts before charging forward exactly to where Kai dodged and executing the supersonic slashes like a building deluge of high-pressure waves.

Had Kinta acted this urgently back when he faced off against his half-brother, he might have even killed Lucas then and there. Maybe.

The second (more difficult) way to counter the Tsunami was this.

Using a "lifesaver" or boat against the upcoming tides to ride the waves.

"GET OVER HERE!" shouted Kai as he pulled and dragged Satoru towards the incoming whirling dervish of steel.

Dragging him deep into the waters of Kinta's unstoppable tidal waves of doom.

***

In response to getting nearly hit to the heart by his rapier, Baku the Bat-Man Ninja sunk into the darkness further, blending into his environment and hiding his presence.

He opted to ambush John Rathbone at blind spots or while unseen, with his cloak helping obscure his figure. Slowly cornering the duelist swordsman until he had nowhere to hide.

Thusly, Rathbone's depth perception got compromised by fighting blind with what little moonlight spilled through the darkness. He couldn't see the walls, floor, or anything, so when Baku backed away from the light, it looked like he merely shrunk.

And whenever he avoided the light altogether, it looked like he got swallowed by the sea of blackness.

So The Faceless decided to adapt a new personality the same way a normal person would discard one set of clothes to another set to fit the occasion. It started by taking off his masquerade ball mask and swapping it for a different face mask.

A plain all-white porcelain face mask with no mouth and eye holes. The mask of another swordsman. A Spaniard swordsman, to be exact.

He unsheathed a hidden dagger in his person, dual-wielding an espada y daga (sword and dagger).

"Hola. (Hello). We haven't met yet, but I'm Fabian La Cerca. You are a dishonorable coward. Tonto de culo (Idiot of the ass). Prepare to die."

Baku harrumphed, unimpressed. "So you 'transformed' yourself from one colonizer to another? You're all the same to me, gaijin," said the bat-man ninja before letting out another one of his dissonant screams.

Its vibrations reached La Cerca to his very core like a loud, deafening rumble of thunder after a lightning strike.

They clashed weapons with each other. It was then that Fabian decided to talk. While Rathbone would rather his actions speak louder than words, Fabian loved the sound of his voice.

"I understand why Japan instituted the Sakoku (Locked Country) policy. You didn't want foreign influence to taint your culture before being colonized. Every neighbor of Japan were colonized by western powers through religion or trade. Invaded and conquered by the superior civilizations."

"…."

As usual, like with Rathbone, La Cerca jabbed his sword and circled around blind spots whenever Baku decided to ambush him with hand-to-hand combat, grappling, throws, or projectile weapons.

Baku's perfect pitch went higher and higher until it seemed like the bat-man had lost his voice. But he actually didn't. The soundless scream vibrated through the air, beyond the scope of human hearing.

"The Tokugawas distanced Japan from the west, thinking them as a destabilizing force. And you know what? They were absolutely right. These colonizers used religious and/or brute force to divide and conquer pieces of the east from themselves."

However, Fabian managed to feel the infrasound resonate—or rather, dissonate—into his internal organs. Like tremors from an earthquake or vibrations within a carriage going through a bumpy road.

Or an extra loud heartbeat that pulsed all over his veins, from the center of his body all the way to the tips of his fingers and toes.

"Spain got Mexico and the Philippines. Britain got Hong Kong and India while also humiliating China for good measure with the Opium Wars. Even a young country like the United  States of America was able to humiliate the Tokugawas, making them lose face and instigating the Bakumatsu (End of the Shogunate)."

Baku intensified his attacks, covering his shuriken or kunai throws with his cape or sleight of hand to make their trajectory less visible or predictable. The ninja also attacked from behind, forcing La Cerca to turn and pivot to delay his reactions.

"…Japan's justified fear of foreigners and all things foreign led to the country going under lock down or Sakoku, limiting contact with other countries. However, this also resulted in your nation becoming weak and backwards while the rest of the world progressed."

Baku couldn't believe it. Even in the cover of darkness, this La Cerca version of The Faceless kept catching his ambushes. Like he could see in the darkness himself.

What changed from before? The effects of his infrasound shouts to Fabian's ears should still leave him disoriented and out-of-sync with his counters. How was he able to do counters now?!

"In the world stage, Japan has been humiliated by the United States of  America and Britain. You've been exposed as a backwards country with primitive technology. Japan could not defeat the U.S.A. Isolationism has left you frozen in time."

The Faceless's joints had started to ache from all his exposure to the bat-man's infrasound screams, but Fabian kept pushing forward regardless. His pseudo-arthritis be damned.

Baku then realized something.

The infrasound screaming disrupted Fabian's rhythm and tempo. However, the dissonance was only slight and he merely missed by mere inches or millimeters. Sometimes by a hairbreadth or fraction of a millisecond.

Also, was La Cerca talking all this propaganda garbage to disrupt Baku's infrasound screams as well? Did the fencer have echolocation abilities himself?

Or maybe Fabian gauged when Baku was nearby through sensing the vibrations of the infrasound screams himself, thus notifying him of when to attack!

How dare the gaijin use his own screams against him! He was a clever bastard, that Faceless person. Just like Zan.

"However, resistance is futile. Thanks to the black ships of Commodore Matthew Perry, your country has opened up to reality. Ninjas and samurais are relics of the past. The bygone age of just 20 years ago now feels like it was 100 years ago, wasn't it?"

Baku's pivoting, camouflage, and ambush tactics paired with his sonar echolocation paid dividends, with him delaying La Cerca's reactions enough to occasionally hit him with punches, kicks, projectiles, or stabs with his hooked gauntlets.  

Fabian La Cerca answered by dancing around Baku in circles, chaining his attacks together, and reacting faster and faster, stabbing in the darkness and getting more hits than misses.

A stab to the thigh later and Baku understood what had changed in The Faceless.

Now that Fabian dual-wielded two weapons, he could use the first strike from his lead hand to gauge the distance and the second strike to his rear hand to make up for any misses.

His Fabian personality landed his counters now despite being out-of-rhythm because every time his rapier missed, his dagger on his other hand allowed him to fill in the gaps where he'd otherwise be open.

His rapier indeed served as his range finder to hit his target despite being a second out of beat.

"Don't you get it? The existence of the Meiji Era is proof that the West won. You are now a colony of Western Superpowers," said Fabian. "You played chicken with the West and blinked. Now you're our bitch."

An attempt to pierce a cornered Baku's eye with his rapier that missed ended up becoming a dagger slash to the belly. However, the ninja had one more trick up his sleeve.

Baku the Bat-Man flew. Or rather, he jumped and glided in the air, with his cape serving as both his wings and his parachute. The ninja couldn't get cornered.

"How about that? All your posturing is for nothing, outsider. You can't even hit me now."

This only made La Cerca chuckle.

"You think just because you can tell when I'm attacking, you can counter me? Or fly away? Fine. I'll do you one better. I'll tell you exactly what I'm about to do so you can stop me better. I dare you to stop me."

"Just shut up and fight! You talk too much, you foolish gaijin!" spat Baku, who sunk into the darkness once more to hide his presence and attack at a blind spot.

Fabian then said, "I'm going to corner you, which will make you fly. I'll then stab you while you're in midair, unable to dodge."

And then he did just that.

La Cerca predicted the ninja would feint attacking from behind, only to fly above his head and swoop down as he turned around, stabbing him at the back regardless.

He figured that the ninja would do something as tricky as set up an obvious pattern to counter as bait for him.

Regardless, Fabian pretended to fall for the feint and instead stabbed Baku as he flew. Just like he said.

"Now I'll fight you without the rapier. Just the dagger," boasted La Cerca. "I'm saving the dagger for a worthy challenger. Like that other ninja, Zan."

"DIIIIIIE!" cried the bleeding, desperate flying bat-man ninja, his gauntlets at the ready to block the dagger stabs, only for him to get run through with the rapier.

"Sorry, I lied," said the cheeky Fabian, driving the flabbergasted ninja out of the office entrance and into the exterior compound where Yahiko Myojin, Tatsuya Minakata, and Kaita stood.

"This is Manifest Destiny. Bow down to your superiors, small fry! I am the Western Superpower that Japan should fear!"

***

To Be Continued...

Remember the Sanada Demons? Yeah, me neither. Still, I'm going to attempt to squeeze out the best parts out of these infamous filler episode villains the same way I incorporated Shogo Amakusa as a major character in this fanfic.

That sounds on-brand for Rurouni Yahiko.

The trash talking of La Cerca is done as homage to the trash talking of Larry Bird, particularly when he told his opponents what he was going to do before doing it.

Danke, Abdiel

[gabriel-gabdiel]

Rurouni Yahiko Chapter 55: The Swordsmanship Bible

Who can stop The Faceless and his flawless fencing technique?

The rest of the chapters of my Rurouni Kenshin fan fiction are available here. Enjoy.

First | Previous | Next

Earlier, before Yahiko Myojin went to the Yokohama Chinatown...

Satsuki "May Brooks" Sakaguchi had invited Yahiko Myojin to join the Musou Madden School dojo to help protect Kinta Minakata and his uncle from ne'er-do-wells at an affiliate company's Chinatown office.

Yahiko considered to whether or not he wanted to accept the invitation and become a bodyguard to defend yet another V.I.P. (Very Important Person) or three with connections to the Meiji Government.

Maybe he shouldn't go since it was none of his business, really.

Then again, he reasoned that dealing with things that weren't any of his concern was how his idol, Kenshin Himura (now Kenshin Kamiya) lived his life and truth.

At least that was what he told himself as the spirit-and-image of Kenshin (hidden behind an eye patch and a garish wig) looked back at him with cutely blinking innocence.

"Can you stop staring at me that way, Minoe? You're... weirding me out," Yahiko told Munenori Minoe, who "disguised" herself currently as a man but was actually Kaede Morinaga, the female assassin of the Hidden Christians.

The Battousai of Speed.

Munenori's eyes... well, eye, he was wearing an eye patch on the other eye... darted back and forth between Yahiko and the floor. "You okay, Yahiko-chi? I heard from Chizuru-chi that Marimo-chi dumped you."

"...I DUMPED HER!" yelped Myojin more defensively than he intended. He then realized he sounded more mean-spirited than he intended. He afterwards took a deep breath and revised his statement.

"I mean, no, not exactly. Nothing happened. No one dumped anyone because neither of us was involved with each other that way, okay? I just... cleared a misunderstanding, that's all. Leave Marimo alone."

"Okay," the pouty Minoe said, pouting. "Stop being mad."

"StOp BeInG MaD," mocked Yahiko with crossed arms. "I'm not even mad, stupid Minoe."

"...Anyway, are you going or not, Yahiko-chi?" asked the eye-patched male—who was born a girl but identified as a boy sometimes—with an inquisitive head tilt. "To serve as the Minakatas' extra bodyguard, I mean."

Fascinating how this seeming airhead before Yahiko was the infamous Fake Battousai. One of the strongest members of Shogo Amakusa's Battousai Group who gave even the Juppon Gatana's (Ten Sword's) Soujiro "Heaven Sword" Seta a run for his money.

On one hand, he (or she) perfectly mirrored the ingenuous, naive, and idealistic parts of Kenshin.

On the other hand, this person  (albeit with a different personality) also mass-murdered the Fake Battousai Group formed in Shinshu then almost did the same thing to the kidnapper bandits in Hiroshima.

With that in mind, Yahiko asked the ticking time bomb in turn, "Do you want to go with me to protect the Minakatas from being assassinated, Minoe?"

Taken aback by the question, Munenori went silent for a few seconds before whispering to Myojin, "I don't know. I might have to check with her. And I don't think she wants to."

"Her?" he asked, also whispering, although he already knew the answer to his question.

"Kaede-chi," Minoe answered in kind, referring to his/her/their split personality, Kaede Morinaga.

Kaede and Munenori were the split personalities of the same person before Yahiko. One male, one female. One meek as a sheep the other as aggressive as a wildcat. They were like night and day.

Myojin wondered what happened to Minoe to end up becoming two people in one body. Or more, if the Battousai of Speed could be considered a separate person as well.

"But even I'm not sure if I want to go help out Kagemusha-chi and his family either. I mean, Minakata-chi. I'm still upset he betrayed Amakusa Shogo-sama and the Hidden Christians," continued Munenori.

Oh, right. They—Morinaga and Minoe—called the Mimawarigumi Battousai another name: The Kagemusha (literally Shadow Warrior, but in context it meant Doppelganger).

Back when Kinta Minakata was part of their group, the Kakure Kirishitan (Hidden Christians), he served as Shogo Amakusa's body double.

Moreover, Kaede had lingering resentment over Kinta Minakata's betrayal. Even more so than Minoe.

Apparently, the Mimawarigumi Battousai had betrayed the Hidden Christians about half a decade ago, while the Kenshingumi were dealing with Enishi Yukishiro and his Jinchu (Earthly Retribution) against Kenshin Himura.

"Hey. Why are y'all whispering?" asked the Clueless Gan.

Ugh. Of course. Gan—the freeloading oaf who'd been following Yahiko throughout his Musha Shugyo (Warrior Pilgrimage) since they first met in Shinshushin— was there with them

***

Rurouni Yahiko

A Rurouni Kenshin Continuation Fan Fiction Story by Chester Castañeda

Here we have another session of kendo vs. fencing. Japanese kenjutsu vs. European swordsmanship. East vs. West. Also, the Sanada Sanyoukai (Three Demons) make their debut in this chapter.

Disclaimer: All characters used in this fanfic (save some others) are the rightful property of Nobuhiro Watsuki, Shueisha, Shonen Jump, Viz, Sony Studios, Fuji TV, Studio Gallup, Studio Deen, and ADV. This disclaimer also covers all the other copyrighted materials that are far too many to mention here. Don't sue me please, I'm very poor.

***

Chapter 55: The Swordsmanship Bible

***

Meanwhile, back to your regularly scheduled Sanbaka program!

Yahiko Myojin really should ditch the Great (Pain-in-the-Ass) Gan, but they—Yahiko, Gan, and Minoe—were technically a trio through and through.

It felt like they'd been through a decade's worth of adventures in just a little over a month or so. They'd dealt with coppers, domestic terrorists, political assassins, international pirates, ex-samurai ronin, and bandit kidnappers, among many other folks.  

They were the Sanbaka (Three Stooges).

Ugh. Who even came up with that insulting name anyway? He already forgot. Was it Gan or...?

Never mind. Myojin had something more pressing to ask the clownish thug anyway.

"Say, Gan. You want to serve as bodyguard to the Minakatas with me?" Yahiko asked. "Just like we did with the Oyakata (Tetsuo Akahori) back in Shinshu."

"I'm having kishikan (déjà vu)," said the Goofy Gan before waving the feeling off, adding, "Oh wait, no I'm not."

"...O-kay," said Myojin, nonplussed (as in confused, not the other opposite meaning people usually associate with the word). The samurai kid rubbed his right temple as he felt a nerve or vein pulsate underneath his fingers.

"Let's try this again. Do you want to serve as bodyguard to the Minakatas with me, Gan?"

"...Oh! There it is! There's the déjà vu!"

Yahiko struck the Garrulous Gan on the noggin with his sheathed sword in order to truly knock some sense of déjà vu into him. "Be serious for a minute here."

Gan's rubbed his bandanna-sporting head. "Ya gotta admit the whole situation reeks of déjà vu. Instead of one Oyakata-dono (Tetsuo Akahori), we're dealing with a whole family of snotty rich people, Yoshi-boy (Yahiko)!"

"Well, I guess you're right," conceded Yahiko. "But still..."

Gan and Minoe exchanged knowing looks, puzzling Myojin.

The bigger lout then said, "But you can't leave them alone because Kaori-neechan's family friends might get hurt, right? You can't help yourself. You can't keep your nose out of their business."

A petulant Yahiko crossed his arms. "They asked me to help. It's not as if I'm forcing myself into the situation or anything." He then mumbled, "It's what Kenshin would've done if he were in my sandals."

Munenori chuckled and said, "Mochiron (But of course). You're such a Kenshin fanboy."

"I don't want to hear that from the Amakusa fangirl. I mean, fanboy," muttered Yahiko.

Clearing his throat, Myojin turned towards his Sanbaka comrades then asked, "So will you help me out? For ol' time's sake? Well, it's only been a month, but still…!"

Gan gave Yahiko a firm, "No." He then appended, "We've met only a month ago? It felt like 20 years ago."

"Eh? Why not?" asked Myojin. "Helping people out using violent force is literally what we've been doing this entire time!"

Snorting with enlarged nostrils, the Greedy Gan said, "Me and Patches (Minoe) offered our services to the Minakatas for money, and they said 'No thanks, we have more than enough bodyguards to spare!' The nerve of them! I don't work for free, ya know!"

Oh yeah. Akahori actually gave them a reward for saving his life.

"Come on, Gan! We saved Fukuoka City from marauding ronin (masterless samurai) and dealt with kidnappers in Hiroshima for relatively free! Do it to pay your debt to society, if not for your ongoing real-life debts!"

Gan harrumphed. "Nope. No more freebies or public service protection. Pay me in cash or pay me in food and drink. You can take one man's trash to another man's treasure but you can't make it drink."

What? "Ah, Gan. I don't think that's how the saying goes," said a nonplussed Yahiko, who rubbed his temples. Gan's stupidity actually hurt at times.  

"Whatever. We'll burn that bridge when we get there," the Clownish Gan said, which this time made even Minoe's one uncovered eye swirl in confusion.

"Please, Yahiko-chi! Make him stop!" said a teary-eyed Munenori.

With a shrug, Yahiko replied, "Figures. You're not exactly the sharpest egg in the attic." Two could play this game. This stupid, stupid game.

The Hypocritical Gan had the audacity to reply, "What in the blue blazes of hell and high water are you talking about, Yoshi-boy?!"

"You've opened the can of worms. Now lie on it, Gan-chi," To his fellow Sanbaka's surprise, it was a smiling, giggling Minoe who said that.

***

Back to the fight between The Faceless and Yahiko Myojin in Chinatown…

Inside the room next to the office where the Mimawarigumi Battousai and the Prodigal Son of the Minakatas were having their own face-off, Yahiko himself faced off against The Faceless.

A frustrated, sweat-drenched Yahiko blasted the room to smithereens with an explosive Dou Gami (God on Earth) in an attempt to distract his opponent long enough to set him up for a Tsui Gami (God Hammer).

Or he attempted to, but the strongest strike from his Revisal Techniques came on too slow and left him too wide open to counter-thrusts, so he got forced to halve its power with a premature floor hammering smash and retreat under the cover of smoke and sawdust.

Only to come across the annoying fencer yet again, whose quick footwork cut him off the pass.

The Faceless kept his guard up, measuring his opponent with deliberate sword thrusts. He wanted to do a feeling out process on the kid, but they ended up coming at each other strong at the gates.

He wanted to take it easy but the kid forced him to go all out.

The teenaged samurai wannabe actually had the gall to try and break his rapier in two with his inferior blunt sword! Imagine that!

The Faceless—right now in his duelist "John Rathbone" disguise—knew the reverse-edged sword shouldn't be able to break apart his rapier due to its superior high-grade steel construction, but this kid could make the floor explode with a swing of his weapon.

If this impudent child were to hit his rapier in just the right spot—on its flattest, thinnest, and weakest part—then maybe... No. That was hogwash. Nonsense.

But still. A distant possibility to be sure, but a possibility nonetheless.

Meanwhile, Myojin himself grit and ground his teeth together.

The samurai kid thought he could catch the swordsman flatfooted by breaking apart his sword with the God Hammer earlier, only for the rapier to prove resistant to breakage.

Beat. Parry. Thrust. Over and over. Rathbone's simple technique that should've been easy to counter since Yahko saw it coming, but it kept landing on him regardless.

For whatever reason, Yahiko kept falling for the same trio of moves.

A pause to lull the attacker to attack. A parry to the attack. A thrust immediately after the parry.

Rathbone wasn't a blindingly fast swordsman like Soujiro Seta. Or a fearsome attacker from all angles like Kaede Morinaga. He instead practiced all the basics of swordsmanship and honed them to their highest level.

The brigand played around with the young Myojin like they were having a sparring session at the dojo.Like he was a mere sparring partner.

If it weren't for the Kamiya Kasshin Ryu ougi (succession techniques) of Hadome (Sword Halt) and Hawatari (Sword Crossing), Yahiko'd be dead by now, if not in critical condition.

Nevertheless, he could only use the cross-wrist parry for so long before an enemy could figure out how to counter it.

Myojin also looked like he dove into a cactus patch with all the nicks, scratches, and flesh wounds he got from The Faceless's unbreakable steel rapier.

"Who the hell are you?" demanded Myojin. "Are you part of the Brigands Guild?"

The disguise-wearing masked man reminded the Tokyo Samurai Descendant of Aoshi Shinomori's right-hand shinobi—the late, great Hannya. The second-in-command in the Tokyo Oniwabanshu.

"I'm known by many names," said The Faceless. "But right now, I am known as John Rathbone. Delighted to make your acquaintance."

'Right now? What did this weirdo mean by that?' thought the Tokyo Samurai Descendant before responding, "I'm Myojin Yahiko. Remember the name!"

"Terribly sorry, sir. I don't make a habit of remembering the names of future victims."

"...You son of a bitch!"

In the middle of this embarrassing swordsmanship clinic was a steady beat of weak, avoidable thrusts that kept Yahiko at a distance, not unlike the flickering, long-range staff strikes of May Brooks.

So how come Myojin could counter Satsuki's strikes and go beyond her striking range but not this much slower fencer with a shorter-reaching rapier?

No, that wasn't it. That was oversimplifying things.

This assassin had a rhythm to him. Like a dancer, he could time Yahiko's every strike before his upper body swayed, ducked, and went narrow when the boy managed to cut the distance between them.

This made him difficult to hit despite having a height advantage over the shorter young man. Also, his sword thrusts kept the teenager at bay, measuring their distance from each other every time.

Rathbone's feet also circled and pivoted him away from harm before Yahiko's sakabatou (reverse-edged blade) could even touch him, on top of his lead sword hand parrying any other strikes that got past his footwork and bodywork.

The fight made John reminisce on how the Mimawarigumi Battousai countered his fencing with his own pure skill. The boy before him proved too inexperienced to figure out his swordsmanship style.

However, Yahiko had enough skill to avoid getting finished off by the fencer's riposte. That parrying movement from his crossed wrists deflected rapier stabs as much as the reverse-edged sword's own parries.

Furthermore, unlike many of The Faceless' victims in the past, the kid seemed extra skilled at dodging sword thrusts. Like he'd been practicing against this very specific technique.

Rathbone sneered. Yahiko couldn't keep up with his pure blade techniques, so he had to resort to weaponless parrying and riposting to survive.

'My, my. This kid might prove himself as interesting a fellow as the Kagemusha himself.'

Yahiko pushed Rathbone to an impasse, at least.

'What an excellent Parry and Riposte, even though his parrying technique is... unorthodox, to say the least. He's quite the blade catcher. I wonder if he could catch blades with his bare hands. I've heard of Japanese swordsmen doing that before.'

The boy even put a scratch on his mask and a bruise to his abdomen with what would've been a rib-smashing body blow.

Enough fun and games though.

To defeat the Parry and Riposte, one had to do a Compound Attack.

Otherwise known as a series of attacks and counterattacks timed with feints, it opened the defender up to a mistimed parry or riposte that left him vulnerable to follow-up counters.

Those were the mind games afforded by Rathbone's Tactical Wheel that left even the Mimawarigumi Battousai stumped and confused.

Like a game of Rock Paper Scissors wherein each technique defeated the other. However, this time around it was Simple Attack beaten by Parry and Riposte beaten by Compound Attack.

Just as Yahiko feared, his one counter to John's Beat Parry Riposte sequence that let him survive soon became too predictable.

Thusly, Rathbone tricked Yahiko into doing the Hadome too early to pry the kid's clamshell defense wide open, disarming him with the Circular Parry before he could do the another follow-up Hawatari riposte.

The sakabatou clattered uselessly on the floor. Meanwhile, the top of Yahiko's wrist guards gushed with his own blood after all the parries he'd done against John's naked rapier.

'Dammit! He's too good!' thought Myojin.

He didn't really fall for the trap. Rather, he ran out of options and the Kamiya Kasshin Ryu two-part ougi was the only thing that worked against Rathbone.

His Plan B was actually doing his Hadachi (Sword Break) shirahadori (sword catching) technique—where he caught the sword by one hand and snapped it apart in twain or at least snatched it away—but Rathbone retracted the rapier in time before he could grab it.

Did Rathbone read his Plan B too? Had his every movement become predictable to the experienced gaijin duelist even up to that point?

All the same, as John Rathbone prepared to run his rapier through the defenseless Myojin's wide, bugged-out eyes, they both heard a banshee wail echo across all four corners of the room.

Like screeching widows crying at a battlefield filled with their husbands' and sons' corpses.

***

Back outside the affiliate moneychanger building in Chinatown...

A cold air around Kyoko Sakaguchi became colder somehow, her breath fogging in front of her as she took a knee, her legs buckling from underneath her. Her back felt like it burned or set ablaze though.

She looked over her shoulder. There stood—or rather, crawled—the goggled brigand member, looking like a walking bug with his lean arms and gleaming lenses for eyes.

"Ah. An actual challenge," said he. "That was a superb sword slash. An excellent follow-through from a missed iaijutsu slash. That took me by surprise. You Musou Madden Ryu students are something else."

Resisting the urge to cry out, she hissed at him, "Who are you? Why are you after Kinta-sama and the Minakata Family?"

"...Fine then. I'll give you my name, little one. I'm Hidaka Kai of the Fuuma Ninja Clan. Regarding the Minakatas, it's nothing personal, I assure. I'm just here to fulfill a job."

"Wh-Who sent you?"

She barely deflected another rope spear with the Fuyutsuki's blade that would've punctured her eye. The strain from her effort took her breath away, with her back screaming in agony while her actual throat could only gasp for air.

"Ah, the first piece of information was free. The rest you'll have to take from me. Over my dead body." Hidaka's lengthy exhale created billowing clouds of mist that he disappeared into.

'I-If only Seta Soujiro-kun were here...!' she thought, recalling the time when she saw Keisuke and his entire Fake Battousai Group massacred in the forest. She thought, like Yahiko Myojin did, that Soujiro killed those men.

It turned out that Soujiro didn't but the duel he had with Yahiko showed that he was quite capable of such nonetheless.

Wait. No. She had enough of men saving her from these other men. In life, there rarely were any heroes to rescue damsels. Most damsels ended up victims. Dead. Or worse.

She refused to be another victim.

She willed herself to sheathe her sword, knowing her normal swords swings weren't nearly fast or strong enough to even faze the enemy before her.

Still, she had to cut him down somehow.

She wanted to be strong. She wanted to be more like her mother, her big sister, their family friend Chizuru Raikouji, or even Soujiro's girlfriend Rin Akahori.

She felt sick and tired of feeling so powerless all this time. She wanted to act. She wanted to help. This was the perfect opportunity to do so.

The Mikazuki O Tsuku Nari (Crescent Moon Slash) wasn't working against Kai Hidaka of the infamous Fuuma Clan. Or rather, it couldn't hit the acrobatic target before her.

So she tried herding the ninja away from the area with her one sword-drawing slash that was about a quarter the power of a Mangetsu O Tsuku Nari (Full Moon Slash) but was also a quarter of a hairbreadth faster.

The shinobi kept flipping away and throwing around his assortment of rope darts, rope spears, and rope grappling hooks. He also swayed his body in weird contortions that prevented the young lady from landing her signature move

Actually, that was her best move since she still hadn't mastered any advanced iaido or iaijutsu slashes above the Crescent Moon Slash, such as the Hangetsu O Tsuku Nari (Half Moon Slash) or Mangetsu O Tsuku Nari (Full Moon Slash).

Of course, doing the Aoitsuki O Tsuku Nari (Blue Moon Slash or a second Full Moon Slash a fraction of a second after doing the first one) was definitely out of the question. That was a bridge too far for her at this point.

'So this was the power of the Fuuma Clan,' she thought, her slashes unable to land. She couldn't chain her attacks as well as Sho Kojima either, so it left her open to counterattacks every time.

Kai toyed with her. Instead of doing counter slashes, he ripped her clothes apart instead to embarrass her, unwilling to hurt her any harder than the deep slash on her back.

Hidaka wolf-whistled. "You're a pretty little thing, aren't you?"

This only enraged her further, her slashes becoming sloppier as a result.

She missed him again with her quick-draw slash, not having enough time to re-sheathe her grandfather's sword as Kai threw a rope spear to her neck.

She then deflected the follow-up whiplash with her empty scabbard.

However, this time around, it resulted in her getting entangled by the rope because Kai jumped over her head then ran circles around her to lasso his bindings across her small body.

She fell to the ground, practically hog-tied by Hidaka, who pulled the cords tight enough to make her trip onto herself and lose her balance.

Hidaka harrumphed. "Jeez. Even the innocent granddaughter of a Musou Madden Ryu master is troublesome to deal with. What a fearsome iaijutsu school you have there, Missy."

The ninja warrior then shot another rope dart at the roof, with the intention of hiding inside the space between the roof and ceiling to ambush any remaining, surviving bodyguards who'd dare exit the premises.

"P-Please. S-Stop..." she begged, her eyes welling up as she crawled towards Kai like a worm. "Father is...!"

She remembered that her father went inside the building. She didn't want Lieutenant Satoru Sakaguchi to end up stabbed from behind by this nimble, rope-climbing shinobi.

"Stop? No. I'm afraid not. Apologies, milady. I can go wherever I want or do whatever I please. For I am the last of the Fuuma Ninja Clan and I have its name and reputation to live up to!"

As he rappelled upwards into the roof, Kyoko jumped up and attacked him, maneuvering her grandfather's blade in a way that cut through the tight bonds on her arms, hips, and legs.

'What the hell…?!' thought Hidaka, his slack-jawed expression hidden by his goggled mask.

She dashed towards the flatfooted Kai, quick-sheathing her sword with a supersonic "ping" sound like a gunslinger holstering his gun for a showdown.

'Huh. She has the gall to play possum against me, huh?' Right after Kai decided to spare her life and all too!

Hidaka pulled and retracted the rope spear he'd shot into the roof, turned, and threw it at the foolish teenaged girl running towards him with malice in her heart.

***

Back at the main office of the moneychanger building...

Books and ripped-up pages flew from the bookshelf. Papers scattered across the floor. Vases shattered. Tables broke in half. Every inch of the walls and floor got marked up by deep cuts and slashes, as though an ax murderer ran amok in there.

Most importantly, the Minakata bodyguards shed blood. Piles of bodies and limbs littered the landscape. Several of the surviving guards had long ago fled.

The bodyguards who didn't—couldn't—escape just became bodies instead of guards.

What a messy reunion Kinta and Takuto Minakata had. Their sibling rivalry went to another level of violence even though mere minutes ago, they were mere strangers.

However, the Battousai of the Mimawarigumi lived up to his ruthless reputation that earned him the same nickname as the Battousai of the Ishin Shishi by absolutely confounding the invading foreign bastard wielding a bastard sword before him.

A man whom he shared blood with. His half-brother from another father. The Prodigal Son of the Minakatas.

Once upon a time, Lucas Grant was supposed to be Takuto Minakata himself ("Minakata" instead of "Akahori" because Kinta's father, Azuma Akahori, married into the more prestigious Minakata Family).

While Yahiko underwent a western swordsmanship clinic under the "tutelage" of The Faceless at the room next to the office they occupied, so too did Kinta Minakata "school" his estranged younger brother with the ins and outs of Japanese swordsmanship or kenjutsu.

A samurai clinic for kenjutsu and how much faster its techniques moved compared to westernized swordsmanship, if you would.

"Shit," said a bloody Lucas, spitting out blood from his busted lip that got clipped by his big brother Kinta's blinding quickdraw moves.

This was called iaijutsu or iado, if Luke remembered correctly.  The way of the sword-drawing school.

Luke attacked with his hybrid sword at varying speeds, breaking his rhythm and the strength of his sword swings by shifting from wielding his bastard sword one handed to two handed.

He took full advantage of how his bastard sword served as a hybrid between the one-handed sword and the two-handed longsword.

Ordinarily, this would've allowed him to chop apart and run through anyone before him like a butcher would to hanging pig corpses at the slaughterhouse.

Most couldn't predict his wild slashes as they came at varying speeds and strengths.

The two-handed slashes slashed stronger with deeper, bone-cutting impact. The one-handed slashes moved faster with shallower, flesh-rending cuts.

He also learned how to feint for good measure to deal with the likes of his master, The Faceless, whenever they sparred.

On top of his whirling dervish of cold steel death, Luke could also physically assault enemies with punches with his free hand and kicks for good measure. The pommel of his sword's handle also served as a great hammering weapon.

The handle itself could block his brother's katana cold like piece of steel pipe, even.

He used his knowledge of the Tactical Wheel (taught to him by The Faceless) to the utmost in order to keep whatever enemy he faced guessing whether he went for an attack or drew out a counterattack that he'd counter in kind.

However, despite the many dimensions to his swordsmanship that proved good enough to murder most of the bodyguards the Minakatas hired, his big brother read him like an open book.

With his almond eyes wide open, Kinta saw through Grant's sleight of hand that allowed him to slip in quick one-handed slashes in between full-on two-handed slashes.

The Kagemusha also made the Prodigal Son miss the mark at every turn, thusly punishing him with either the Tsunami (Tidal Wave) of Old Moon Slashes or the bone-shuddering power of a single Full Moon Slash.

Figuring out that his brother's thicker, denser sword—also bigger than Rathbone's rapier for good measure—was stronger than even his Japanese blade made of multi-folded high-grade foreign steel, Kinta dispensed with the parries and dealt countless ripostes instead.

Whenever Luke forced Kinta to parry, the Kagemusha parried the heavy longsword by the flat of its blade instead of its edge to prevent its thicker part from hammering and shattering his curved sword, the Akatsuki (Red Moon), apart.

Unlike Lucas's bastard sword swings that varied in rhythm and speed, all of Kinta's supersonic swings varied in strength instead. They all uniformly moved so fast that the naked eye couldn't see them.

Their differences in speed between his weakest slash to his strongest slash were instead a matter of milliseconds instead of seconds.

This gave the Kagemusha plenty of opportunities to punish and slash apart the defenseless Prodigal Son—who only knew how to attack and whose best defense was unrelenting offense—at will with every swing.

Thusly, Kinta's white shirt became as pink as cherry blossoms as his brother bled on him.

Also, Luke couldn't land a significant blow on Kinta at all. At least when he sparred with The Faceless, he landed once or twice. He couldn't catch his long-lost big brother flatfooted all this time.

Thus Kinta also lived up to his other nickname, Kagemusha. Fighting him was like boxing with your own shadow. He was untouchable.

The literal son of a gun looked like he'd been scourged with whips from the amount of cuts, flesh wounds, and outright ugly lacerations he got from the inimitable shadow warrior.

The shorter Minakata manhandled the taller Grant as though their heights were in reverse and Kinta was the bigger, stronger one of the two.

Like an adult would a little kid. Or how a big brother would toy with his younger sibling.

'Dammit. Cain was right. You really are something special,' thought Lucas.

Aloud, Luke told Kinta, "Even though you're literally killing me right now, you're the one Minakata I want to kill the least, Aniki (Big Brother)."

The Mimawarigumi Battousai could only respond with a glare, his body as tense as a tripwire ready to let his sword fly at the slightest movement from the implacable man before him.

Kinta's ototo (little brother) kept on coming at him like a recurring nightmare or waves of the sea, his every wild slash that missed him by inches or centimeters feeling like it could lop off his limbs or chop his body in half. Or even in quarters.

A high-pressure offense that pushed him to the edge even though he had not been hit once.

It was like playing dodge the car in the middle of open traffic or a busy intersection, dodging high-speed carriages and wild horses at every turn. Wherein one mistake could spell the difference between life and death.

Grant spared a glance at his Uncle Tatsuya, wrinkling his nose at him like he would to a cockroach or a dung beetle. "And you, you're the one among the Minakatas that I want to kill the most. Vile scum."

Lucas remembered how Tatsuya actually hid behind one of his bodyguards and pushed him towards the Prodigal Son's bastard sword in order to escape a sword stab.

The cowardly banker truly was toxic sewage water personified. A narcissist who valued his life over others.

Right after the display, Grant merely knocked out the bodyguard thrown towards him to spare his life.

The guard's life proved much more valuable than the pig that used him as a meat shield.

Grant truly regretted all the collateral damage he had to cut through to finish off the family who betrayed him and his mother.

In the background, Tatsuya Minakata allowed himself to relax and put away his pistol. As insufferable as his nephew Kinta was, he nevertheless did short work of his sister's other brat.

So the one who ended up out for revenge and hired the Brigands Guild in order to kill the members of the Minakata Family off was the bastard of some gaijin invader.

It figured that the forbidden—no godforsaken baby who brought shame to their family came back to pull them further into misfortune and despair. This lovechild of his sister was nothing but bad news.

He wished his sister miscarried that devil of a bad seed of hers. Their family should've nipped him in the bud and had a special doctor conduct an abortion for her for good measure.

Tatsuya still had his hand on his pistol regardless. Not only because it was better to be safe than to be sorry. He felt something was very wrong with this picture. Something was quite amiss.

For one thing, his stack of bodyguards within the room had all been killed, forcing his V.I.P. nephew to do bodyguard work for them.

For another thing, the state of his swordsman nephew concerned him.

Even though he didn't get so much as a nick or scratch from all the high-pressure sword swings he narrowly avoided, Kinta himself did more than break a sweat.

He wasn't only covered with his brother's blood but also his own sweat. His breaths became belabored, as though the effort of mauling the black sheep of their family sapped him of energy.

'What the hell are you doing, you stupid brat,' thought Tatsuya, cursing under his breath as he licked his dry, chapped lips. 'Being a professional murderer is the only good thing you've done for the family, dammit! Don't go buckling under the pressure now! Our lives are at stake! My life is on the line!'

Also of note, despite all the blood loss and wounds he received care of his sibling's accurate slashes, Luke looked strangely calm (if a bit annoyed). Like he was used to being in such a sorry, injured state.

Like he was the one who was none the worse for wear. Like the sticky blood all over his body was red paint and his wounds were tiny paper cuts that mostly irritated him.

Tatsuya gulped. The lanky, reed-thin banker who doubled as a ruthless businessman eyed the nearby exit.

The door wasn't all that far away, but while Lucas stood there between him and freedom, it might as well be located in China or America.

So close yet so far.

***

In the shadows lurked Kaita of the Sanada Ninja Clan. The invisible ninja (secret agent).  

He'd thrown several kunai (daggers) at the Prodigal Son to hinder his bloody warpath, which bought Kinta time to rest and saved the lives of several Minakata bodyguards, allowing them to escape.

However, even though he kept the security safe, the two V.I.P.s he should've prioritized protecting remained in the line of fire against this crazed gaijin with his western-style double-edged katana.

Also, the kunai that slashed and stabbed Lucas Grant barely fazed him. Like he'd been pelted with pebbles or pricked with needles. Like he'd been through worse.

He wished he could do more to help, but this Takuto person seemed prepared to catch blades from out of nowhere. Like he was used to the shadowy tricks of ninjutsu (way of the ninja).

This confidence must've been through Grant's training with The Faceless, who seemed like the western version of a shinobi (spy) himself.

Regardless, Kaita had one task at hand. To keep the Minakatas safe from harm by any means necessary.

In light of how worthless the Minakata bodyguards ended up being, the young ninjutsu master ended up relieved in retrospect that he summoned the Sanyoukai (Three Demons) of the Sanada Ninja Clan to help them out.

Sure enough, just as Kinta's Akatsuki clanged hard against the handle of Luke's bastard sword, something rather stress-relieving happened.

Grant's handle block of the second attempt at the Blue Moon Slash (Double Full Moon Slashes a fraction of a second apart from each other) would've finally allowed him to grab hold of his tired brother and stab him to death.

However, fortune smiled upon the Minakatas as one of the Three Demons appeared and blasted the lanky Luke away right into the nearest wall like he was shot out of the cannon.

As though he were Marimo the Human Cannonball.

***

Meanwhile, in the next room where The Faceless and Yahiko Myojin dueled...

A large, 6-foot-something figure barreled through the wall like so much cardboard or tinder. Like a bomb suddenly went off.

This allowed the disarmed Yahiko to roll away from the thrust to his eye, the rapier clipping his eyebrow and temple instead, before he dashed and scrambled towards Kenshin's sakabatou.

Of course, at first, he also had to stare slack-jawed at what happened along with The Faceless (presumably, since he was wearing a mask and his features weren't visible).

He had no time to think about what just happened and what its implications were. He just had to act fast, trusting his instincts would steer him through.

Anyway, what the hell was that? What came crashing down the wall? A bomb? A runaway carriage?

No, it was a body. Another foreigner in a fetal position, covered in rubble, his blond hair matted with red blood.

Yahiko's eyes narrowed. The way the man crashed reminded him of Kenshin Himura's Dou Ryu Sen (Earth Dragon Flash) or his own Dou Gami (God on Earth).

Who was responsible for this?

The smoke cleared, and out came three shinobi also reminiscent of the circus freaks that were the Tokyo Oniwabanshu.

Each wore different masks, just like the walking loony bin with the rapier that defeated all of Yahiko's Kamiya Kasshin Revisal Techniques.

One wore a green snake mask and had a gaudy armor made of snake scales. He held on each hand extra-thick twin whips that were also made of snake hide, their handles adorned with snake heads and their tips adorned with snake tails.

Yes. He had taxidermy snakes for whips.

Another wore a scarlet demonic oni (ogre) mask with small horns on the forehead and spiky hair that might've been part of the mask design. Decked in blood-red clothing and armed to the teeth with various swords, daggers, shuriken (ninja stars), and projectiles, he held with him a two-pronged war fork.

The last one wore a realistic bat mask that looked like taxidermy work but its head was far too large to belong to a real bat. He sported daggers attached to the side of his gloves like fins, a black-and-blue garb that allowed him to blend into the night, and a bat-winged raggedy cape that billowed behind him.

"Yikesss. I think I overdid it with the ssshockwave," said the man underneath the snake mask, who had a lisp to his speech.

"Good," the solemn one of the trio, the one with the bat mask, said tersely. "You're supposed to do that."

The third man of the motley crew, the one with the horned ogre mask, cackled. "Baku is right, Ren. If you've actually managed to kill Lucas Grant, then our mission is complete."

"If that'sss the cassse, then ssstab him to death now, zzz-Zan!" rebutted the ninja snake man named Ren, only to end up face-to-face with The Faceless.

"Oh, so the Minakatas had shinobi backup aside from their usual collection of useless cops and hired guns and swords," said John Rathbone, his rapier at the ready as he fell into the fencing "En Garde" ready stance.

'Who are these freaks?' thought Yahiko. 'Are they more of the brigands from the Brigands Guild? They aren't as tall as the foreign invaders, so maybe they're Japanese traitors like that acrobatic ninja freak with the grappling hook and rope spears!'

However, the thing that happened next made Myojin doubt that all four of these masked men were allies. Otherwise, the Brigands Guild had a real problem with in-fighting among their ranks.

Rathbone ended up dueling all three of the demonic and/or animalistic ninjas before him, with them scattering like cockroaches then swarming him like bees from a disturbed hive.

Myojin couldn't believe his eyes. He didn't know what to be amazed at more—having these three ninjas push The Faceless to the brink or seeing The Faceless still avoid getting skewered or penetrated when faced with a triple team.

After that, Yahiko ended up bumping into another masked ninja in front of him. However, this one wore the traditional ninjutsu cloth mask over the mouth rather than the elaborate costume masks of the other three shinobi.

"Splendid. One of you (Minakata bodyguards) survived," said the white-haired ninja who appeared out of nowhere, seemingly emerging from the shadows like how one would fade or sink in the murky darkness but in reverse. "Help me get evacuate the Minakatas out of this building."

"Uh, okay," said Yahiko, who then saw the sweaty Kinta and, uh, a trembling Uncle(?) Minakata follow behind this new ninja guy.

Huh. There was something mighty familiar to Yahiko with the way this ninja came out of the blue like that.

No, it wasn't like Aoshi Shinomori's Ryusui no Ugoki (Water Flow Movement). Instead, it reminded Yahiko of another ninja he fought recently. Another invisible ninja.

Why was Yahiko feeling strangely nostalgic today? First, it was The Faceless and his stupid Tactical Wheel fencing. Second, it was this teleporting ninja. Then there was Marimo's arrival to town.

Maybe he was missing Tokyo a little too much.

For some reason, the infamous Mimawarigumi Battousai and Shogo Amakusa's doppelganger looked pretty winded. Like he just ran a marathon or something.

"What's your name, bodyguard?" asked the ninja. "You're a bit short for a bodyguard, though."

"Tokyo Shizoku (Tokyo Warrior Class). Myojin Yahiko," answered Yahiko. "Also, I'm taller than you, Shorty." Sure enough, Kaita was indeed half a foot shorter than Myojin.

'Shizoku, huh?' thought Kinta. 'So he belongs to the same warrior class as the Sakaguchis.'

"Okay. Whatever, kid. I'm Kaita from the Sanada Ninja Clan. At your service," said Kaita.

"At my service?" asked Yahiko.

"No, you cheeky bodyguard. The Minakatas."

"Alright."

Kaita shook his head and rolled his eyes. Nevertheless, he tolerated the goofy kid's naiveté. After all, out of all the bodyguards in the next room, the only one left standing was this boy.

Even though he had to face that monster. The man known by many names—The Faceless. The swordsman from another land who dueled Kinta Minakata to a draw.

Kaita then turned and addressed everyone before him. "Kinta-danna (Lord Kinta). Tatsuya-danna. Myojin-da... well, Myojin Yahiko. Follow me."

Kinta and Yahiko exchanged brief glances and curt nods at each other.

'It's that kid again. The one that Brooks-san beat at sparring,' thought the Mimawarigumi Battousai. 'She barely beat him at sparring,' he corrected himself.

"You're from a samurai family, right? Who is your father?" asked Kinta, to Yahiko's surprise.

"He was a member of the Shogi Tai and died for his beliefs," Myojin answered.

"Shogi Tai, huh? He must be a well-respected man," said the Minakata heir, to which Yahiko could only nod and answer, "Yes, he was."

To himself, Myojin thought, 'He's much friendlier than Shinomori Aoshi after all. What a nice guy, that Kinta.'

He was a hell of a swordsman too, merely judging from how untouched he remained against his foreign half-brother and his person-sized sword.

As Yahiko and Kaita escorted the Minakatas towards the exit of the building, the overwhelming stench of death assaulted them as soon as they opened the door outside the main office.

Even before the Prodigal Son had declared his war on the Minakatas in person, he and the rest of the brigands had already made short work of the army of hired guns and swords the Minakata Family got as protection.

The rusty tang of blood permeated in the air like a heavy velvet cloak of red death.

'Oh no,' thought Yahiko, a chill running down his spine. 'What happened to Officer Daddy? I mean, Kyoko's father? Also, what about Kyoko? Or Satsuki? Did any of them make it or...?'

It reminded Myojin of the massacre of the Fake Battousai Group. Or the horror stories he had heard about Makoto Shishio's Ten Swords.

According to Kenshin, they actually put a whole village under siege once just so Shishio could enjoy its hot  springs.

How was the Brigands Guild able to do this from under their noses? How many of them were inside the halls of this office? How many members did they have in the first place?

***

Back outside the affiliate building of Minakata Pharmaceuticals in Chinatown...

'No,' Kyoko Sakaguchi thought with a grimace. It wasn't supposed to end this way. After the countless hours of practice and drills, it couldn't end this way.

Was all the effort she exerted a waste after all? Was she always going to be a victim? Was she forever defined by the moment when the late Keisuke assaulted her then hurt her father?

"NOOOO!" she screamed, attempting to do a Half Moon Slash of her own, but this put severe strain on her arms, hips, and back due to the increase in centrifugal force.

'She's being too impatient,' thought Kai. 'She's rushing in and forcing her attack. Just like a petulant child. Or an emotional woman.'

Identifying the sudden burst of speed, even if it was just slightly faster than before, Hidaka responded by throwing his rope spear right into the direction of the whirling and pivoting girl.

She unsheathed the sword in time, the extra strong pull stretching her arm outward so hard it felt like it almost got ripped off her shoulder from the socket. The rope got sliced cleanly, its sharp end embedding itself into the ground with a dull thunk.

More importantly, because it was a Half Moon Slash, its striking range or area of effectiveness went further than just directly before her.

"S-So fast," the ninja couldn't help but mumble as Kyoko came at him like a streak of greased lightning.

Kai dodged the slash with an upper body sway, a side step, a backwards jump, and a swing away with a rope dart to the roof. Like he always did.

Only for his face to get sprayed with a fountain of his own blood.

"WHAT THE HELL...!?" he screamed before gurgling and choking with the red liquid.

Kyoko didn't fare any better than Hidaka though.

Every nerve of her petite body—as well as she herself with her mouth—then screamed in agony after she failed to do the proper follow-through from the slash.

'I can't breathe. My arms and legs feel so heavy they feel like someone else's limbs. And I can't even think... Father, Grandpa, Kinta-sama, help...!'

She crumpled down on the ground like cloth that fell from the clothesline, with nothing to support it.

However, her effort bore fruit. She had cut right into the vest and goggled mask of Hidaka, drawing blood from chest to neck and chin.

Any deeper, and the blade would've reached his heart and killed him. Sliced his jaw in half. Split apart his Adam's apple. Made him breathe through his neck.

This "mere" girl was a threat to his life after all. He had to finish her off.

Hidaka swung around the trembling girl then tied a noose around her neck, with the intention of hanging her like many of his other victims.

"You want a war? You're gonna get one, bitch. The Fuuma Clan wills it."

***

Back inside the long halls of the affiliate moneychanger building...

Kaita the Sanada Ninja led the Minakatas and Yahiko out of the office, which had become an unfamiliar labyrinth due to all the piled-up bodies and blood splattered all over the walls.

All the lamps were also cut down to size or had their flames put out as well, which necessitated the shadow warrior to take out a glow-in-the-dark rock to light their way.

It was a weeping stone from Okayama that "bled" blue glowing blood.

It reflected against the actual blood splattered across the hallways.

The musty tang spread all over the rooms and hallways, seemingly permeating right into their clothes. It'd take weeks to wash the smell out.

The smell of blood and cut meat. They truly were dealing with butchers, weren't they?

Kaita, Kinta, and Yahiko were used to the smell, for good or for ill. Tatsuya felt like vomiting then and there.

"Hey, Sanada Kaita. Where are we?" asked Myojin.

Ugh. This guy. "My family name isn't Sanada," answered Kaita. "Also, you talk too much."

"But you just said you're from the Sanada Ninja Clan."

"Our ninja clan was established under the Sanada Nobishige. Laymen like you know him as Sanada Yukimura."

"No way. Him? You're pulling my leg!"

"...."

Yahiko cleared his throat then nodded, rubbing his chin. "Huh. You learn a new thing everyday." To himself, he thought, 'Unbelievable. The Minakatas have historical ninja clans serving under them? It pays to be rich, huh?'

Yukimura or Nobushige Sanada was a famous Japanese samurai warrior of the Sengoku (Warring States) Era. He was especially famous as the leading general on the defending side of the Siege of Osaka.

Sanada was a historical figure like Hajime Saito was, except even more ancient. So the Sanada Ninja Clan had been serving him since the late 1500s, huh? Their clan should therefore be 300 years old!

Something else then occurred to him. All this talk of historical figures reminded him of how Shogo Amakusa himself once embraced the name Amakusa, thusly calling himself the Second Coming of Shiro Amakusa.

The infamous Shiro Tokisada Amakusa led the Shimabara Rebellion, an uprising of Japanese Roman Catholics against the Shogunate from December 17, 1637 to April 15, 1638. They were eventually defeated, and Shiro was executed at the age of 17.

Shogo seemingly became the grown-up reincarnation of that 17-year-old saint. Could there be a connection…?

"There shouldn't be more than three Brigands inside the area," Kaita reported to his master, Kinta. "Two of their members are currently in Yokohama Police custody."

Kinta nodded. "Are you sure there are only five of them?"

Kaita responded, "We've researched all the recent arrivals at the Yokohama Pier and recorded sightings of their criminal activities. There are five of them that we know of. Your half-brother, Lucas Grant. The man with many identities, The Faceless. The poison swordsman Cain Merrick. The acrobatic ninja Hidaka Kai. And the axe murderer Hugo Lentz."

'There are only five of them? And two of them are in jail?' thought Yahiko. 'Three people are responsible for this massacre? It's like we're dealing with hitokiri, the Shinsengumi, or the Juppon Gatana here!'

Kinta's eyebrows furrowed. "Something's wrong."

They then met up with a familiar face before they arrived at the exit.

***

Back outside the office...

The rope dart hooked itself unto Kyoko's shoulder, while the rope wrapped around her neck like a lasso over cattle. 'Oh no...!'

The sprain on her shoulder and the strain on her body kept her from using her grandpa's sword to cut down the rope.

Before she knew it, Kai Hidaka of the Fuuma Clan had already found a nearby tree for which to lynch her, with him using his own strength to raise her body up to hang her by her neck with the noose.

It hurt to breathe. Her life then flashed before her eyes.

She remembered playing around the dojo where Kinta Minakata practiced, admiring his perfect form and perseverance. She also recalled marveling at the golden locks of the foreign young girl that would become her stepsister.

May Brooks was her birth name but she looked ecstatic when Grandpa Genzo had her put in the family registry as "Satsuki Sakaguchi" instead.

"Satsuki", incidentally, was the Japanese translation of the month of "May".

There was also Chizuru Raikouji, who was her stepsister's rich best friend growing up that wasn't at all like the rich snobs that regularly visited the many Minakata special events and various properties across Yokohama and beyond.

She remembered her goofy father Satoru doting over her, which made her mother giggle.

He loved making her mother laugh. She even recalled how he'd call her mother embarrassing names like Princess Kaguya, Izanami, or Tamamo-no-Mae.

She had a soft-spoken yet dependable sort of father in contrast to her headstrong mother that kind of reminded her of an older version of Chizuru.

No wonder their family friend Chizuru and Nonoko got along famously. Like two peas in a pod.

She vaguely remembered her grandfather disapproving her parents' relationship, but her father won her mother over by supporting her dreams of opening her own soba shop instead of inheriting the family trade of blacksmithing and jewelry making.

'Mother. Father. Goodbye. I love you,' she thought as she drifted into the black abyss, tears falling from her eyes.

She then felt precious air to rush back to her lungs as the vise grip unto her neck loosened. Did the rope break? Did this enemy before them decide to spare her?

No, there wasn't a merciful bone in his body.

Unable to brace herself as she fell, she felt like a puppet whose strings had been cut. Afterwards, strong hands caught her in mid-fall.

She opened her eyes. First, her blurry vision saw a flabbergasted Kai scrambling back to his feet.

She blinked back tears then saw her father carrying her. Saving her once again from harm.

She smiled. "Father."

He looked scuffed-up and his disheveled uniform got torn in several places, but he looked otherwise fine.

He came back for her, even after she insisted to do bodyguard duty for the Minakatas when her whole family was against it.

He wasn't looking at her though. He instead stared straight at Hidaka, speaking in a cold voice and timber she rarely heard before.

"Get away from my daughter, you freak."

***

Luke Grant dug himself out of the pile of wood and plaster that he got buried under after something made him crash into the wall.

Dammit, and he was so close to beating his skilled half-brother through a war of attrition too! Who dared interrupt him and his long-lost brother's fateful duel?!

"Yo. I sssee that you're awake, gaijin."

Lucas shook the cobwebs out of his head, his vision finally clearing as he stared at the person who said those disrespectful yet lisped words.

He then saw a grown man wearing a snake mask and leathery body armor made of snakeskin while holding two taxidermy boa constrictor snakes as whips.

"…Who the hell are you?" he asked.

"I am Ren of the SSSanada SSSanyoukai (Three Demons). And now that you know my name, you're asss good asss dead."

What the hell was Lucas looking at? What was going on here? Ah, it didn't matter who this clown was. What mattered was that he was in the way.

Ren was in Luke's way towards revenge against the evil Minakatas and their noble demon of an heir. The Kagemusha who became their chosen one instead of him, the black sheep of their family.  

He then saw Ren whirl his snake whips in such a way that their resulting whipcrack—essentially a miniature sonic boom—burst into a huge shockwave and localized landslide that buried him anew in plaster and wood as well as earth, rock, and tiles.

The whole room shook from the resulting explosion.

Huh. His mission of revenge in Japan was going to be tougher than he thought.

***

Before Lieutenant Satoru Sakaguchi went back outside to save his daughter from being lynched by the Brigands Guild's Kai Hidaka...

The quartet of Yahiko Myojin, Kaita, Kinta Minakata, and Tatsuya Minakata strode in the middle of the lobby inside the moneychanger office when they were ambushed. By the undead. Or rather, the living dead.

As in their living traitorous bodyguard pretending to be dead, lying near the bodies of the unaware bodyguards they had killed.

Hiding behind freshly killed bodies was a classic ambush tactic by the ninjas of Japan.

Fascinating how the Brigands were able to come up with such a tactic. Perhaps it was taught to them by that acrobatic ninja in their ranks? Or maybe The Faceless himself had ninja training.

"Kinta-sama! Yahiko! Watch out! It's a trap!" a scuffed-up and disheveled Lieutenant Satoru Sakaguchi shouted out to the Minakatas and their escorts while doing battle with his saber against one of the guards he was with.

"Watch out, Ojisan (Old Man)!" shouted Myojin, who snatched out the glinting something in the darkness by reflex.

The attempted stab to Tatsuya's side was deflected by Yahiko's Sword Break technique that allowed him to catch blades with his bare hands.

Instead of attempting to break such a short dagger, the boy instead twisted and broke the wrist of the man holding the weapon. He then slammed the handle of the sakabatou into the person's throat.

Kinta himself did a destructive Full Moon Slash  that dropped multiple attackers at once, resulting in multiple sprays of blood that didn't look any different from the rest of the splatters made by the actual bodies of the dead bodyguards.

Yahiko whistled in appreciation. 'And here I thought Satsuki's Full Moon Slash was a thing of beauty! Damn. Look at how fast and smooth he drew out that katana. No wonder he was called the Mimawarigumi Battousai. No wonder he was able to defeat Kawakami Gensai of the Shidai Nikuya (Four Butchers).'

Kinta didn't even break a sweat slashing apart their ambushers.

Weird. Earlier, he looked like he ran a marathon. So he already recovered from earlier?

From what little he'd seen of him so far, Yahiko surmised that Kinta's iaijutsu style was so perfect that he used minimal effort.

Wait. What was it about his half-brother alone that tired him out compared to him easily dispatching multiple attackers?

"You bastards! I paid good money for you! Traitors!" screamed a sweaty Tatsuya, who took out his pistol and started shooting at everything that moved, which made both Yahiko and Kinta jump away from him.

As for Kaita, he was nowhere to be seen suddenly. Did he abandon them in their time of need?

Nope. Instead, unseen from the darkness, he threw his kunai at various hidden bodyguards in between panels, sliding doors, walls, and ceilings as they moved in for the kill.

These glow-in-the-dark blades served as tags or markers for both Yahiko and Kinta to take the remaining turncoats out with sword slashes, scabbard strikes, and handle pummels.

The camouflaged ninja with the cloth mask and white hair was a pretty dependable person himself. Like a male Misao Makimachi or something.

It was then that Kinta noticed the strange blade of Yahiko. A reverse-edged sword. He heard tales and rumors of his namesake, the Hitokiri Battousai, carrying such a sword.

So Munenori Minoe was telling the truth. The kid that tagged along with him did know who the real Battousai was.

Fascinating.

The Yokohama Lieutenant finally reached the quartet after dispatching the last nearby bodyguard traitor. "We were setup! Every other bodyguard in this building is working for the Brigands Guild."

"'Is'?" repeated Tatsuya before reloading his pistol, moving towards a groaning ambusher who was still alive, and shot him in the head. "Not 'is'. 'Was'. 'Were'."

Kinta then asked Satoru, "Where's Kyoko-san?"

Satoru answered, "I left her outside with the perimeter security guards." The color from his bruised face then drained, his mouth hanging open as he mouthed, 'Oh no,' but no sound came out of his mouth.

A chill traveled the back of Yahiko's head, his heart sinking. "I'm going to save her, Satoru-san!" but then he got grabbed by the shoulder. By Kinta. "Wha...?"

"Please," said the Mimawarigumi Battousai. "Take care of my uncle. I'm going after Kyoko."

Yahiko gulped and absently nodded at Kinta. He then looked over beside him, expecting to see their ninja guide, but he couldn't locate him.

The Tokyo Samurai Descendant then yelped out when Kaita chimed in from behind him, "Understood, Kinta-danna. Myojin Yahiko and I will escort Tatsuya-danna out of Chinatown."

And so it was decided that they split up, with Yahiko and Kaita protecting Tatsuya while Kinta and Satoru went straight for Kyoko.

However, even after exiting the moneychanger office, they weren't exactly home-free yet.

***

To Be Continued...

Yeah, yeah. I know. I'm also using minor Rurouni Kenshin filler episode characters along with Original Characters (Do Not Steal) to fill out the lore of this series.

However, Marimo Ebisu the Cannonball Girl did so well a couple of chapters ago that I couldn't help myself. Besides which, the Sanada Ninja Clan has been lurking around the block since the earlier chapters anyway.

The déjà vu joke from Gan is from an episode of "Friends". Phoebe says it. I also included some malaphors (the blending of idioms or clichés until they don't make sense) I've read in some meme in their dialog for good measure.

Danke, Abdiel

[gabriel-gabdiel]

Rurouni Yahiko Chapter 54: The Prodigal Son Strikes Back

The identity of the Prodigal Son has been revealed. He can now enact his revenge against the Minakatas.

The rest of the chapters of my Rurouni Kenshin fan fiction are available here. Enjoy.

First | Previous | Next

Immediately after Yahiko Myojin's loss to Satsuki Sakaguchi in their "friendly" sparring match at the Sakaguchi Dojo...

"BANZAI! (HOORAY!) BANZAI! BANZAI!" cheered the kendo students of Musou Madden Ryu after witnessing their amazing blonde bombshell of a foreigner teacher show that upstart kendo master from Tokyo what for.  

Abelia La Cerca got caught up in all the cheering too, but instead of "Banzai", she repeatedly shouted, "VIVA SATSUKI!" over and over instead.

"I wouldn't celebrate if I were you," said Genzo Sakaguchi, the grandfather of Kyoko and Satsuki Sakaguchi (A.K.A. May Brooks). His arms crossed. His sourpuss face glaring at every one of his embarrassing students who got defeated by a teenaged kendo master from Tokyo and their own blonde gaijin (foreigner) English teacher.

A collective shudder and multiple groans filled the dojo as past memories of endless drills and grueling training filled the minds of all these Musou Madden Ryu students.

"Man, it's true what they say. They grow up so fast," whispered the pompadour-wearing Sho Kojima to Kinta Minakata.

Sho wore a haori and hakama with flowery colors so loud they looked like they belonged in a parade or festival. After all, he didn't wear colors. He wore flavors.

Kojima then reminisced, "I 'member when Satsuki-chan was just a wee lass. Look at her now. She's even better at naginatajutsu (glaive technique) than many a native practitioner I've personally seen."

Kinta could only nod, but more in agreement with his Master Genzo's sentiments over the pathetic state of the Musou Madden School's students (that he overheard) rather than with Sho's own praise of May Brooks (which fell on deaf ears).

He found it unacceptable that these so-called men were this terrible at swordsmanship. Were they so weak that they'd force women and children like Satsuki and Kyoko to act as bodyguards for the Minakata Family due to their incompetence? Had they no shame?

Meanwhile, Miss May Brooks herself noticed the intense stares of her two seniors and waved at them thusly.

May Brooks walked towards them with quick thumps of her socked feet on the wooden floor. She and Sho then greeted each other with respectful bows.

"Whaddya think, Sho-sensei? That Tsunami wasn't half-bad, right?" Satsuki said with a wink. "It looked as fast as one of your Tidal Waves, innit?"

"Not bad. Not bad at all. You still need to work on your close-range slashes like the Mangetsu Tsuki O Nari (Full Moon Slash), but your sense of maai (range) is superb as usual. You flogged him like a racehorse. Although I expected more welts from him."

"Blimey, he's a slippery one, he is. I was so gutted that Joshua-kun (Yahiko-kun) avoided so many of my strikes! He even left me gobsmacked with that last technique of his! It was mint! "

"...Uh, you're speaking gibberish again, Satsuki-chan."

"You wot, mate?"

Kojima sighed and scratched his cheek, smirking.  He then said, "Are you havin' a giggle?" to the best of his abilities, with the words coming out more like, "Aru yu habingu a giguru?" thanks to his accent.

This seemed to wake Miss Brooks up. "Oh. OH! sorry guv'na! I mean, sorrymasen, Sho-sensei!"

With a chuckle, Sho patted May's golden-haired head like he would a cat.

"Good job. Just don't forget to work on your defense. That last exchange with that samurai kid almost gave me a heart attack. I thought you'd lost for sure."

Satsuki pouted adorably. "Stop treating me like a kid, Sho-sensei!"

***

Rurouni Yahiko

A Rurouni Kenshin Continuation Fan Fiction Story by Chester Castañeda

And now back to your regularly scheduled Japanese soap opera at Chinatown.

Disclaimer: All characters used in this fanfic (save some others) are the rightful property of Nobuhiro Watsuki, Shueisha, Shonen Jump, Viz, Sony Studios, Fuji TV, Studio Gallup, Studio Deen, and ADV. This disclaimer also covers all the other copyrighted materials that are far too many to mention here. Don't sue me please, I'm very poor.

***

Chapter 54: The Prodigal Son Strikes Back

***

Back at the Sakaguchi Dojo...

The juvenile-in-appearance Abelia La Cerca—the poster child of neoteny herself—asked Kinta, "Do you think Satsuki is good enough to take on the likes of my brother? Or the rest of the Brigands Guild?"

"If it were up to me, the Sakaguchis would not be placed anywhere near the Brigands Guild," Kinta answered, which surprised Abelia. He usually spoke much terser than that.

"Did you see me beat Joshua-kun, Kinta-sama?" May Brooks asked while blowing kisses at the morose swordsman. "I dedicate that fight to you!"

"It was splendid, Brooks-san," he said flatly, which made May pout.

"Call me Satsuki instead, Kinta-sama!" said May. She then "went there" after spotting Abelia, the "little girl" whom she'd only met for the first time then and there.

"Aw, and who's this? A new family friend? Is she going to be another member of the Sakaguchi Family?" she asked with twinkling, shining blue eyes.

"Q-Que paso? (W-What's happening?)" stuttered Abelia, her hazel eyes wide open and her face paler (than usual). "Who is this again, Kinta-sama? How does she know you?"

"Hello there, luv. What's your name?"

"Eh, hola! I mean, hello! My name is Abelia. Abelia La Cerca." Miss La Cerca bowed to Miss Brooks.

Brooks herself reminisced how her "Grandpa Genzo" rescued and adopted her as part of the Sakaguchi Family. She even got a Japanese name added to their family registry and everything after she was orphaned and stranded in Japan as a child.

Was this La Cerca girl a newly adopted daughter or granddaughter of the Sakaguchis?

"Aw, you're such a cutie," said Satsuki, who resisted the urge to pinch Abelia's cheeks.

The shy Señorita La Cerca pouted, moved behind Kinta, and tugged at his shirt.

Satsuki's jaw then dropped as she looked at Kinta, Abelia, then back to Kinta and said, "Oh no. Kinta-sama, don't tell me...!"

Kinta raised an eyebrow at the blonde in askance.

"Don't tell you what? What do you mean, Satsuki-chan?" Sho asked for Kinta's sake.

With tears in her bejeweled eyes, Satsuki said, "Blimey! Is she Kinta-sama's love child? Who's the mother? How could you betray me... uh, us this way, Kinta-sama!"

Kinta didn't do things like face-fault or drop face-first into the ground in exasperation—he was more the straight man than the idiot in a comedic sense—so thankfully Koijma was there to do such things for him.

"Now wait a damn minute! Abelia isn't Kinta's love child, you blonde bimbo! Jeez!" Sho decried for Kinta's sake, the corners of his mouth quivering as he resisted the urge to smirk, smile, or laugh out loud.

Then, with tears in her eyes, Abelia told May, "¡Ay, perdone! Señorita, por pabor! (Pardon me! Please, Miss!) I'm actually 20 years old!"

Everyone just stared at her afterwards, which led her to murmur, "Madre mia (My Mother)," under her breath.

Abelia appeared prepubescent, so she could pass herself off as half that age.

However, she actually lied about her age. No, she wasn't younger than 20 years old. She was older than that. As old as her brother Cain Merrick, in fact.

***

Several weeks later, at the Yokohama Chinatown...

Kinta Minakata had just confronted his alcoholic banker uncle, Tatsuya Minakata.

They were inside one of the offices of an affiliate company (a money trader outfit) that their front company, the Minakata Pharmaceuticals and Foreign Trade Corporation, bought out like the burgeoning zaibatsu (megacorp) that it was.

These offices crawled with bodyguards made up of police escorts, personal security guards, ex-samurais or ronin, ninjas, and even outright mercenaries-for-hire.

Uncle and nephew talked about the shady business dealings of Tatsuya's father and Kinta's grandfather, Toshiro Minakata.

About how, as a hatamoto-class samurai in direct service to (and thus only answerable to) the Tokugawa Shogunate, he took advantage of his position to supply opium to China during the Opium Wars of the 1830s to the 1860s.

He then invested his drug money to build the family fortune, seemingly taking cues from the rising Japanese middle-class full of merchants and businessmen.

Normally, samurai were closely associated with the middle and upper echelons of the warrior class. They trained as officers in military tactics and grand strategy.

As a decorated military veteran given the task of dealing with Chinese trade at the Port of Nagasaki during the Sakoku (Isolationism or Locked-Down Era of Japan), Toshiro not only policed the seas against Wokou (Dwarf Pirates). He also approved of practically government-sanctioned opium delivery to China that he and his family profited over for decades.

During the Tokugawa Era, samurai didn't need to build their wealth since they were privileged from the start. His peers called him greedy and corrupt. However, Toshiro was actually being as cunning as a fox.

In the height of irony, Toshiro established a pharmaceutical company that truly utilized the full potential of his family fortune from the Sengoku Jidai (Warring States Era) onwards, with the business doing double duty as the manufacturer of high-quality opium and laundering all that money back by making western-style medicine available to the Japanese citizens.

Toshiro basically used his spy history and connections, coded language, and secret intelligence tactics to pull the wool over the Shogunate's eyes and profit over China's own misfortune against western superpowers.

Then, before he could get caught with all his multimillion yen drug dealings, the Bakumatsu (End of the Shogunate Era) happened. The Minakatas were able to keep all their ill-gotten wealth as isolationism and the bakufu (shogunate) ended, with them easily handling the transition from one government administration to another.

The samurai class ended but they were able to transition as part of Japan's new ruling class, the oligarchy.

Meanwhile, even though Kinta Minakata was part of the Shogunate forces as the Mimawarigumi Battousai, his family didn't suffer from them choosing the losing side of the war.

Like with Hajime Saito of the Shinsengumi, he (and his family) ended up in good political standing with the Meiji Goverment exactly because of his strength and reputation.

Ironic, seeing that the likes of Takamori Saigo—an actual Ishin Shishi (Royalist)—ultimately got betrayed by his own allies despite being in the winning side of the war.

***

Yahiko was supposed to do some more sparring and training at the Sakaguchi Dojo in general and with May Brooks in particular when he caught wind of the recent news.

Their sparring session was canceled in favor of a trip at the nearest Chinatown in Yokohama.

From his conversations with May/Satsuki, he found out that the Minakatas were being targeted by a foreign mercenary group named the Brigands Guild.

This Brigands Guild had apparently closed in on the Minakata Family, leading to an emergency meeting filled with all their personal bodyguards, including the Sakaguchis.

Several of which were martial arts students from the Sakaguchi Family itself like Kyoko, Satoru, and Satsuki.

Should he interject himself into their personal business though? Yahiko was mostly interested in the Battousai Group, not the Brigands Guild.

The samurai kid shook his head. There would come a time when he'd end up face-to-face with Kaede Morinaga's Battousaigumi.

Then again, Kaede mentioned that Minakata also had connections with Shogo Amakusa's Hidden Christians as well.

She called him Amakusa's Kagemusha (Shadow Warrior) or something. She also called him a traitor to their cause.

Maybe Kinta was a past member turned enemy of the Battousai Group? Regardless, it was something worth checking out down the line.

For now, if Myojin could help his new friends out with the strength he gained from his adventures with his old friends—the Kenshingumi—then he would do so.

Besides which, what would Kenshin Kamiya (nee Himura) do in if he were in Yahiko's shoes right now? Would he not interject himself into other people's business for the sake of helping out?

Yahiko had to do this because Kenshin would do the same. He'd help out anyone in need before him in the best of his abilities, even to the point of self-sacrifice.

The young lad chuckled in remembrance of how Kenshin's stubborn nature when it came to sticking his nose into other people's business was how he was able to save him from a lifelong debt to the yakuza.

This strong sense of justice was what made Battousai Himura such a fearsome figure during the Bakumatsu.

Personally, it wasn't in Myojin's nature to pry into the affairs of others like some sort of interloper with a savior complex, but... maybe sometimes, being like Kenshin was the right thing to do.

So that was what Yahiko did. He became as Kenshin-like as he could muster while undergoing his Musha Shugyo (Warrior's Pilgrimage).

Involving himself with the Sakaguchis and Minakatas should also help him with his kendo training. Kind of.

There was no better way to sharpen his skills when it came to kendo than by roughing up some criminals and foiling the plans of gaijin assassins.

This was how he ended up tagging along with the Sakaguchis as the Minakata's extra security detail while one of the heirs of the fortune, Kinta, discussed disturbing family secrets within their Chinatown offices.

He thusly snuck into the room next to the offices where uncle and nephew were having a meeting of the minds, with them hurling accusations, dirty laundry, and skeletons in the family closet all the while.

He'd feign shock regarding how the Minakatas gained their wealth—though political connections, abuse of authority, and illegal drug dealings around the time when Japan limited its foreign trade—but his exposure to the likes of Jusanro Tani and the yakuza had long ago awakened him to the ugly truths of the Japanese elite and its corrupt oligarchs.

Meanwhile, the "empty" room he stayed at actually teemed with family bodyguards, among whom were several "ninjas" laying in wait using camouflage techniques and everything.

There was no way the Brigands Guild could possibly penetrate their impenetrable defenses, right?

***

Back in the offices of one of the Minakata Zaibatsu's affiliates...

Tatsuya reacted well enough to Kinta's probing questions. By physical force instead of words.

He'd already swung a fist at his nephew, who dodged it easily.

Kinta said, "You haven't answered my question. Was the company just a front for grandfather's drug cartel?"

Tatsuya harrumphed and straightened out his crumpled western-style suit.

"I remember the way you'd piss yourself whenever I came home pissed off and drunk. How'd a wet spot would form on your pants. Whenever you were in my way. Whenever you bothered me," Tatsuya, the banker of the Minakata Family, jeered at his nephew.

His sister's son. The son of the black sheep of the Minakata Family.

Kinta's uncle took another swing at Kinta, which made the nephew almost push the uncle to the floor in self-defense.

He would've done it too had he not sensed another fist headed his way from behind him that he had to block using an open palm with a loud smack.

One of Tatsuya's bodyguards—a man as tall as a lamppost—towered ominously over even the infamous Mimawarigumi Battousai, who himself was already taller then the average Japanese man.

This person then backed off, seemingly sensing the bloodlust of Kaita the Sanada Ninja, who'd by then unsheathed blade on instinct.

The camouflaged ninja then sheathed his kunai back and hid his presence.

Kinta grunted in acknowledgement of his uncle's strange guardian. The both of them then eyed each other warily.

So Tatsuya brought with him some extra insurance. Or protection.

Something about the lanky bodyguard's face left Kinta unsettled, though. He couldn't put his finger on just what.

"I don't care if you're the Mimawarigumi's version of the Ishin Shishi's Battousai. To me, you'll always be my younger sister's bratty li'l kid," said Tatsuya with a dismissive harrumph.

Kinta frowned as his uncle grimaced at him in kind. Tatsuya's sister, huh?

A memory floated in the surface of his mind. That of a mother he never knew who brought dishonor to their family.

"Don't you forget that, you insipid pissant. Learn your place," said the sneering Tatsuya, who smoothened out his ruffled western-style three-piece suit. "We could've banished you along with your shameful mother. Have a bit more gratitude, you ingrate!"

Kinta's mother and Tatsuya's younger sister had a name though.

The Black Sheep of the Minakata Family. The daughter who was disowned by her own mother and his grandmother, Grandma Mieko.

Kinta's estranged mother.

Her name was Aoi Minakata.

"Hearing" her name in his mind left him with a complicated feeling in his heart. Or several feelings. A mixture of pity, guilt, longing, betrayal, and shame.

Kinta's father was the husband she cheated on with a foreign dignitary. The man who, in turn, killed that same gaijin and then took his own dishonored life to save face and his family's honor.

Save face? More like take the coward's way out.

His name was Azuma Minakata (nee Akahori).

Under the bushido ideal, if a samurai failed to uphold his honor, the only way to regain it was by seppuku (ritual suicide).

It was just like his belligerent Uncle Tatsuya to air out the family's dirty laundry when confronted with the skeletons in their closet.

On the other hand, Kinta did force him to do so by accusing their beloved patriarch, his grandfather Toshiro Minakata, of being a drug lord who laundered all that blood money into legitimate pharmaceutical and medicinal businesses.

Their family fortune sat on a throne of lies, greed, and corruption.

"Should I go to the authorities instead?" asked Kinta. "Grandfather left quite the paper trail. You and Uncle Kaneda worked as accomplices to his graft and corruption. I'm sure they'd love to investigate one of the Akahoris' connections for crimes."

Tatsuya's scowl ran even deeper.

Nevertheless, Kinta felt like he had to do this. He had to get into the bottom of what the Seiryu Clan was and learn more about the so-called Black Book of his uncle from his father's side, Tetsuo Akahori.

This was the key to solving the mystery and conspiracies behind who hired the Brigands Guild and why they were assigned to take out their entire family. Their privileged clan.

Kinta sighed. His intention was to get dirt on his Uncle Tetsuo and all these clans their families were associated with, but the paper trail the Sanada Ninjas decoded instead pointed him to the skeletons in his family's own closet.

Was it intentional? Was this Akahori's gambit all along?

That son of a bitch. What a goddamn manipulative, magnificent bastard.

Growling, Tatsuya said to Kinta, "Fine. What do you want to know?"

"The truth."

"...Can you handle it?"

"I need to know it in order to protect this family."

Kinta wanted to know exactly what he was protecting here. Warts and all.

Tatsuya spat at the floor and slapped his forehead, brushing his sweaty bangs back. "Dammit, I need a drink."

The Minakata nephew and grandson clarified, "Why is the Brigands Guild after the Minakatas? Is it because of Grandfather Toshiro's drug dealings? Or his connection to the Seiryu Clan?"

The sullen Tatsuya poured himself a bottle of whiskey while his nephew kept staring at him all the while with the eyes of a hawk.

Eyes that reminded Tatsuya of Kinta's honorable-to-a-fault father Azuma, to be honest.

'They're both fools too concerned about honor,' Tatsuya merely thought, but his disdainful eyes practically shouted that sentiment at Kinta. 'Seeing such a holier-than-thou goody-two-shoes in action make me sick.'

A second later and Tatsuya finally spoke.

"Probably Seiryu Clan business," was his uncle's terse reply before gulping down a shot of alcohol and pouring another shot afterwards.

"Who are the Seiryu Clan?" asked Kinta.

"We are the Seiryu Clan, you idiot," answered Tatsuya. "Our secret society was divided into four families in accordance to which region they were from in Japan and what connection we had with the government. Our spy group got dissolved due to in-fighting. The marriage between my sister and your father was supposed to fix it. For all the good it did."

"My father belonged to another clan?" asked the former Mimawarigumi Battousai. "I mean, the Akahoris did?'

"Yes. The Genbu Clan. Then your mother ended up having an affair with gaijin, which severed the ties between the Seiryu and the Genbu. With that alliance broken, the Seiryu is now just another enemy of the Genbu as they... or he... made his move to take over this collective intelligence the clans have gathered through the decades."

"He? Do you mean Uncle Tetsuo?" Kinta asked but more like answered.

Tatsuya nodded. "These assassination attempts on our family members have all the earmarks and fingerprints of your other uncle, if you ask me."

Tetsuo Akahori. The younger brother of Kinta's father, Azuma Akahori.

The wily manipulator of the House of Akahori and the Genbu Clan, which were the spies responsible for keeping tabs with the Ishin Shishi royalists.

Tatsuya laughed a hollow chuckle while swirling the drink in his glass.

"And, as usual, you can't pin anything on him. There's no way we can prove he's behind all this nonsense. He always has his tracks covered, just like how Father used to when he was alive. But it sure stinks to high heaven of him. He probably found a way to hire the Brigands to take our entire family out."

"Why? For what purpose?" the nephew further queried. "What is he after?"

"The same thing Father was after, probably," said Tatsuya. "Your grandfather wanted power. Prestige.  Fame. Privilege. Making his mark in this world. Maybe even helping rewrite our shameful family history. It's in our blood, kiddo. And in their blood as well. The Minakatas and the Akahoris are cut from the same cloth."

Oh right. The Minakata name was a stolen one, taken from a dead family of privilege back in the Sengoku Era by a band of roving disgraced ronin (masterless samurai). They were originally ochimusha with their chonmage (topknots) cut off.

These dishonored samurai thieves ended up becoming the ancestors of the current Minakata line, with the original line killed off during the Warring States period. It was stolen valor, plain and simple.

"Tetsuo-ossan could seize power with the Black Book?" asked Kinta.

"From what I understand, our family belongs to one of four spy clans. The Seiryu Clan. The Black Book is nothing more than a record of government secrets used for blackmail. No more, no less."  

Under the hands of someone like Tetsuo Akahori, it served as his multitude of clues to every last sin, crime, or manipulation of all the major political figures and dynasties in this country.

His codex of the many schemes perpetrated by the current administration of former royalists.

A Black Book that listed out these politicians' debts to society, just like how a literal black book worked.

"My brother-in-law is a real piece of work," said Kinta's other piece-of-work (or piece-of-something-else) uncle without any irony. "He wants to take all of us out and steal our thunder the same way our ancestors did with the original Minakatas. Imagine that."

"Was it because of some sort of grudge?" asked Kinta, remembering another dearly departed relative from all this talk about Tetsuo.

His Aunt Sakura. Tetsuo's wife, Sakura Noe.

He felt his heart twinge and throb in remembrance of her.  His gentle mother figure in lieu of his real, estranged mother he could barely even remember at this point.

He then felt shame wash over him for feeling that way. He shouldn't let his emotions overcome him like that, the same way his passionate mother did that fateful day she got caught by his father cheating on him with her lover from another country.

Unbridled passion and emotion could push a person to do something drastic, like betray his or her spouse. Or country.

Therefore, Kinta pushed such feelings deep in his heart before it could take control of him.

The Bakumatsu was indeed a tumultuous time.

It was one thing for his mother to have an affair with another man from under his father's nose. However, it was a whole other kettle of fish for her to do so with a foreigner around the time foreign relations were strained.

She inadvertently became a symbol of the shogunate's weakness against foreign invaders, leading to bloody revolution.

However, Kinta also thought the Minakata Family immediately disowning her was too drastic a decision. He felt sick at how quickly his relatives banished her for the sake of saving their hides. Their so-called "honor".

Then again, he did somehow owe the Minakatas one for taking him in despite kicking off the black sheep of the family, abusive as they were to him.

His uncles treated him as though he were the bastard spawn between Aoi Minakata and her foreign lover rather than the legitimate heir to the family fortune.

As if reading his mind, his uncle said, "You should know better than to antagonize us, boy. We raised you. We bathed and clothed you. We even allowed you a share of the wealth, the so-called 'blood money' you feel contempt for yet still enjoy because we acknowledge you as a legitimate son of the family."

Uncle and nephew glared at each other eye-to-eye.

"You know what it is about you that makes me sick to my stomach, you ingrate? Your holier-than-thou attitude. The way you look down on us after everything we've done for you. How dare you."

Kinta couldn't deny that allegation. He'd considered many a night to disavow his wretched, criminal family. Especially now that he had proof of their illegal activities.

His uncle continued his rant.

"Understand that you'd be trash without us and without the Minakata family name. Know your role and shut your mouth. If it weren't for our magnanimous decision to keep you around instead of disowning you, you'd be no better today than my sister's other bastard gaijin lovechild."

The air inside the office felt so thick it suffocated the people inside. As though they'd just drowned in stale air. Thick, humid air.

He also had a name, by the way. The Prodigal Son of the Minakatas banished away along with his traitorous mother.

"Minakata Takuto."

This gave both Minakatas pause.

"W-What...?" trailed off Tatsuya, whose eyes then traveled back to the person who said that forbidden name.

It was Tatsuya's exceptionally tall bodyguard who spoke those words. That name.

How did he know the birth name of Aoi Minakata's bastard son?

The bodyguard chuckled then talked further.

"Takuto, huh?" he said in Japanese with a slight accent. A foreigner's accent he didn't have a few minutes ago when he talked to his boss. "It's been years since I was called that. I have a new name now. Lucas. Lucas Grant. The name my father intended to give to me before he died."

***

In the office next door...

Yahiko's eyes narrowed as he strained to hear what was going on in the other room.

Not because he had trouble hearing the words but more because his mind had trouble processing their significance.

Wait, what? Who was it that said "Minakata Takuto"?

Oh. The guy who said that was Takuto Minakata.

Who was Takuto Minakata? Weren't they talking about a gaijin lovechild from a disowned family member?

Jeez. He felt like a nosy housewife eavesdropping on her quarrelling neighbors as they aired their dirty laundry next door. He felt dirty just listening to all this unsolicited info.

However, he steeled his resolve. He felt something was definitely afoot.

This wasn't merely simple internal drama between family members. It was a power grab by one of their own fellow elites. Possibly by the person whom the Tokyo Samurai Descendant (and friends) had just saved from his own assassination.

Tetsuo Akahori.

Yikes. It saddened Yahiko how he had to protect oligarch nobility whose daily drama directly influenced the state of society and the wellbeing of the Japanese people.

Even though these wealthy people and V.I.P.s—the ones who belonged to the upper-echelon oligarchy of Japan—stunk of the same uppity attitude of Jusanro Tani, they didn't deserve cold-blooded execution.

To be honest though, Myojin was more concerned with how the Sakaguchis were somehow dragged into this mess due to old family ties and historical subservience to the former hatamoto-class samurai family.

This honor-bound sense of duty among past superiors reminded Myojin of the same debt of honor Tsubame Sanjo and her family had over Mikio Nagaoka and his family, even after the samurai class was abolished by the Meiji Government.

Or how Yahiko himself had to serve as the errand boy and pickpocket for the yakuza after becoming an orphaned child of samurai in Post-Tokugawa Japan.

Nearly all ex-samurai families faced such messed-up circumstances ever since Japan's upheaval from the Sakoku Era to the Bakumatsu to the Meiji Era.

Nearly all of them, anyway. Obviously, this wasn't the case for the Minakatas or ex-Ishin oligarchs.

The Son of Tokyo Samurai then heard anguished screams from an ensuing scuffle inside the office next door.

He turned to investigate along with the rest of the alerted bodyguards, only for one of them to unsheathe his saber and slash at everyone present with frightening efficiency.

Yahiko himself drew the sakabatou (reverse-edged sword) in time to block the blade, which wasn't actually a saber but instead a... a... rapier, was it?

A foreign sword forged from a solid metal bar of carbon-rich steel.

He remembered its name from the stolen foreign swords he saw used by the Wokou under the leadership of Shura's maritime nemesis, the Pirate King Hananuma Masakichi Inoue!

'What the hell was going on here?!' thought the flabbergasted young man. 'Who the hell is this guy? Wait… The Brigands Guild! This guy is probably one of the Brigands Guild!'

'Hmmm,' thought The Faceless after his blade clanged against the unexpectedly thick spine of the Japanese sword swung at him.

Once he shed his policeman guise and brandished his rapier, he expected to massacre the room-full of bodyguards and their brittle Japanese-made sabers or katanas.

Only for this teenaged upstart to block his strike with an unusually robust sword for something made of pig metal.

The Faceless realized something else. 'This li'l boy with the weird sword has some fight in him.'

***

Meanwhile, outside the money changer office...

Lieutenant Satoru Sakaguchi told his daughter, "Stay here with the rest of the security guards! Secure the perimeter! The Brigands Guild is probably attacking from the inside right now!"

"Father, wait..!" cried out Kyoko Sakaguchi, but she turned around too late. Her father was gone. He'd left her with the other Minakata hired bodyguards (or secret service).

She considered following him because the outside office perimeter had the patrolling May "Satsuki" Brooks to protect it, but Officer Sakaguchi ordered her to stay regardless.

So she followed his orders like the good daughter that she was.

Kyoko also probably said a few other things, but Satoru couldn't hear her gentle voice amidst their loud footfalls on concrete floor as he charged along with several other Minakata family bodyguards armed with swords, pistols, and rifles as well as the top students of Musou Madden Ryu.

A feeling of déjà vu filled Satoru's gut to the brim. This sneak attack reminded him of the one done to Tetsuo Akahori back in his hometown of Shinshushin.

So much for the 1880s being peacetime in the Meiji Era! What was with all these assassination attempts of top officials one after another?

The aftermath of the Chichibu Riots remained fresh in the minds of the police force, at that. However, they'd recovered enough from the trauma to provide better protection for the Minakatas than they did with the Akahoris.

However, the Yokohama Police Force sometimes refuses police protection to private citizens no matter how influential to the government they were.

Therefore, Satoru had to go there in his own time (and dime) to act as the Minakatas' bodyguard, along with the rest of the family and several of their school's best students.

He wondered if the Brigands Guild were somehow affiliated with the rebel Shogo Amakusa and his Hidden Christians before pushing such thoughts aside. Now wasn't the time for such idle musings.

He had to pursue these gaijin invaders properly so that the casualties here would be minimized compared to the disaster that happened in Shinshu.

He hoped against hope that these so-called brigands weren't a collection of Amakusas in remembrance of how Shogo single-handedly decimated multiple police squads like a one-man army.

That one man Kinta had faced off previously in his Uncle Kaneda's home certainly was Amakusa-like. That person with no face could fight toe-to-toe against the Mimawarigumi Battousai himself.

Satoru would be more at peace if Akahori's bodyguard, Soujiro Seta, were there with them right about now.

If there were members of the Brigands Guild like The Faceless, they'd all be all screwed.

They might as well evacuate the offices and just burn the place down to the ground to rid of these foreign vermin. Or at least fumigate the bastards.

***

Back inside the main office...

Both Minakatas, nephew and uncle, turned as white as bed sheets as they stared at the tall bodyguard before them.

What was once a man that resided in the background had ended up in the forefront of their attention. Like a marble statue that had come to life.

Lucas "Takuto Minakata" Grant bowed at both Kinta and Tatsuya as though this was a curtain call at a theater play and he was one of the actors taking a bow to the audience.

Like May "Satsuki Sakaguchi" Brooks, he was another person with two names and a foreign lineage involved with the Minakatas.

"It's a pleasure to meet you after all this time. You know me as Minakata Takuto, but to my comrades, the Brigands Guild, I'm instead known as Lucas Grant."

They should've noticed him earlier, what with his unusual height, length, and lankiness.

Sure, several other bodyguards with them matched his tallness. However, they didn't match his musculature and thickness.

Especially when he took off his Japanese disguise, his chiseled facial features showing hints of English or even Nordic features mixed with East Asian blood.

Speaking of which, after a couple of seconds of hesitation, the other bodyguards thusly dog-piled Takuto.

Smiling, Lucas grappled and threw the security around like rag dolls. Or little children. They made a mess, crashing into furniture and smashing into walls like they were flimsy matchboxes.

And now that the Minakatas were focused on him, they also noticed his blood thirst. His manic eyes belied his calm demeanor.

The camouflaged ninja from earlier attempted to attack Lucas with knives, only for him to bat them all away with his sheathed western sword, the half-breed foreign invader eyeing him and his cloaked movement in the corner of his blue eyes.

"So you now know the truth about your family, samurai?" said he Prodigal Son of the Minakatas to Kinta Minakata. His half-brother from another father. His mother's bastard child.

Takuto Minakata. Lucas Grant.

"So you're now aware that you belong to a corrupt lineage of crooks and thieves? Or even demons on earth? But maybe you already knew about that from the start. Maybe you're a bloody little devil yourself, Mr. Mimawarigumi Battousai."

Kinta couldn't believe his eyes. Takuto was there. In the flesh. The living proof of his mother's betrayal of his family.

For a change, Tatsuya Minakata was at a loss for words. His little sister didn't only have one brat but two. And now he had come back from banishment to enact his revenge against them.

Against the family that abandoned him and his mother.

Now it made perfect sense why the Brigands Guild was after them specifically.

They weren't just hired guns. They were his hired guns. The (literal) bastard found a way to rise from poverty and fund his revenge against the family that threw him and his mother away like trash due to her betrayal.

Was it the "Grant" family who funded this? Did Lucas find the relatives of his dead father and then waited all this time to get his long-awaited vengeance?

Kinta could've sworn it was Akahori who manipulated events to end up this way though. Call it a gut feeling based on past experience.

'Dammit,' thought Tatsuya. They—the Minakatas—had his sister marry the brother of Tetsuo specifically to avoid ending up in the Genbu Clan's warpath.

Sure, it was also to gain enough leverage for their family, the Seiryu Clan, to take control of the Black Book themselves, but that was to be expected of the politics of nobility.

'All's fair in love and war.'

Lucas grabbed hold of what looked like a book or even a tome as thick as the Christian bible, waving it at the Minakatas' faces like an arrest warrant.

"I have the smoking gun... or guns, as the case may be... of the Minakata Pharmaceutical Company being a 'habitual line-stepper' in terms of criminal activities. Your company wasn't only founded by laundered drug money. It also grew into a powerful multinational conglomerate through illegal marketing and medical practices."

Some of the knocked-out guards started coming to while the others remained unconscious.

Grant had enough presence of mind to beat the hell out of the awakened ones using his thick tome or callused knuckles before they regained their senses enough to be a threat to him.

All the while, he kept on talking.

Even as his fists got stained with their bodyguards' blood, he kept going with his long-winded spiel, spewing venom and bile all the while.

"Even before the Bakumatsu, Minakata Pharmaceuticals had been engaged in bribing physicians and suppressing adverse trial results. Since the 1860s, around the time the Meiji Restoration came about, your wretched hive of scum and its subsidiaries have been assessed with millions of yen in civil penalties and criminal convictions that have been swept under the tatami mat through your influence and connections with the Meiji Government."

With gleaming eyes and a fist dyed red with blood, Lucas asked Kinta again, "Do you support your family of criminals or not?"

Tatsuya had just about enough of his estranged nephew. "You son of a bitch...!" he trailed off, a pistol in his hand that he drew from a hidden pocket inside his overcoat.

"Hey," said Lucas, looking across the barrel of the gun like he would a wall, his glare focused more on the person holding the firearm.

His sweaty, half-drunk uncle, to be more specific.

The Minakatas then noticed the sheathed sword at Grant's side. They had concluded earlier it was another straight-bladed saber like the police officers had, but that was an optical illusion.

"Don't insult my mother like that. Call me the bastard all you want, but don't you dare sully my mother's name by calling her a bitch, Uncle Tatsuya."

Lucas then unsheathed his humongous sword.

In light of how tall he was, the sword did look like an ordinary saber when he held it. But only because it was proportional to him.

To anyone else who wielded it, it would've been obvious it was an extra-large sword.

The Prodigal Son of the Minakatas brandished a "hand-and-a-half" sword. Otherwise known as a bastard sword.

***

Right inside the next room...

As their swords clashed again, The Faceless got a better look at Yahiko's weapon that didn't break apart as easily as all the other brittle katanas and sabers that surrounded him.

'What an unusual Japanese blade. The sharp end is at its inside curve like a scimitar or scythe yet this boy uses it like a blunt bat or steel pipe.'

Curiouser and curiouser.

The Faceless donned a new mask before falling into his fencer's stance, which meant he shifted into his fencer disguise or perhaps even personality—the honorable duelist gentleman, Duke John Rathbone.

Rathbone embodied The Faceless' his extensive knowledge of western martial arts. The same honorable Englishman that took on the likes of the Mimawarigumi Battousai to a draw, with their matching skills in swordsmanship.

Yahiko went into basic neutral Chuden-no-Kamae (Water Stance) instead of his favored aggressive Jodan-no-Kamae (Fire Stance) in reaction to the somewhat unfamiliar sword style of this person before him.

He had to. Unlike when he dueled against local ronin, former samurai, or May Brooks, the thin, tall man before him fell into a stance he'd never seen before.

This masked man was probably one of the so-called Brigands Guild that was after the powerful Minakata Family of Yokohama.

One of the foreign invaders coming to the shores of Japan in order to fulfill the bloodthirsty desire of revenge by an abandoned half-gaijin child born from the Bakumatsu Era.

Where had Yahiko seen this situation before? 'Is this Lucas person the Englishman bastard version of Yukishiro Enishi or something?' he thought.

With a flourish, Rathbone then introduced himself to Myojin, saying in accented Japanese, "Greetings and salutations. My name is Duke John Rathbone of the Brigands Guild. Prepare yourself. En garde."

'Rasubo...?' thought Yahiko, unable to put into words the syllables of Rathbone's foreign name since Japanese lacked the sounds needed to pronounce it natively.

The teenager then saw the Duke move his lead sword hand like a metronome or a probing, one-handed Tsuki (Throat) strike, startling him.

This was the first time he'd seen the stance, but it looked somehow… familiar.

There was something hypnotic about the way the deceptively thin rapier blade swung to-and-fro from Rathbone's ready position.

Yahiko did probing swings of the sakabatou at the seemingly half-hearted thrusts of the tapered but strangely dense blade.

Little did he know the sword used high-grade steel instead of the katana's lower-grade steel mixed with powdered carbon during its smelting process.

Myojin whiffed on a strike that Rathbone baited him into doing, but countered with a cross-wrist Hadome (Sword Halt) to shield him from a mid-range stab to the heart.

He then stopped short of doing a Hawatari (Sword Crossing), turning the aborted counter into a feint that allowed him to sidestep and parry another thrust.

His sweated bullets and gulped hard, unable to find an opening to hit the fencing master without him getting countered with a stab in turn.

For one reason or another, he couldn't time him as well as he did the long-ranged strikes of Satsuki Sakaguchi.

Yet something nagged him at the back of his mind. Those constant thrusts timed with stomping footwork—where had he seen them before?

Did they remind Yahiko of Hajime Saito's Gatotsu or Hiratsuki? No, that couldn't be it.

Or maybe even someone like the elusive Aoshi Shinomori and his Ryusui no Ugoki (Water Flow Movement)? 'Nah.'

The Faceless smirked to himself inwardly, wondering, 'How far can this pup go?'

Rathbone and his pendulum of rapier strikes then started controlling the distance, mastering Yahiko's timing, and setting the boy up to hit him without getting hit in return.

The same thrusting sword served as John's shield too, parrying every attack attempt from Yahiko and thrusting afterwards, thus the samurai boy couldn't commit to any full-force attack.

Measured aggression. A swordsmanship clinic.

It felt like Myojin was swinging Kenshin's reverse-edged blade at a ghost. That somehow stabbed back.

A phantom nest of scorpions. A million suicidal bees with their stingers at the ready.

'God dammit,' thought the nicked and cut Yahiko, gritting his teeth.

What had he been practicing endless drills and sparring for if not to take down mercenaries like these?

He could barely dodge all this thrusts and slashes to his person, his wrists already raw from all his bare-skin blade blocks.

In Japanese, Rathbone told the bleeding Yahiko, "I have seen the best that Japanese swordsmanship has to offer, and you're not it."

***

Back at the main office...

Kinta himself fell into his modern iaijutsu or iaido stance that the Mimawarigumi confused with the Hitokiri Battousai's classical battoujutsu stance, moving in front of his uncle to protect him from, well, his own bastard half-brother.

His bastard half-brother with his bastard (or hand-and-a-half) sword, to be more specific.

The hand-and-a-half sword, by the way, was a late 19th Century term. Before that, this weapon type was only known as a "bastard sword", which referred to any blade that was an "irregular sword" or "sword of uncertain origin".

Meanwhile, the French "épée bâtarde" and the English "bastard sword" originated in the 15th or 16th Century.

Elizabethans used terms like "short", "bastard", and "long" to focus more on blade length. As for any sword that could be wielded by two hands, they called "two-handed".

By the 20th Century, the "long sword" or "long-sword" term referred to the rapier in the context of Early Modern or Renaissance Fencing.

Regardless, Takuto sneered, wielding his lengthy medieval, double-edged straight sword made of pure high-grade European steel.

"So you've chosen your side. So be it, big brother. I'm a little disappointed in you, though."

"Little brother," said Kinta in kind, pausing as though balking at the "aftertaste" those words left in his mouth.

Did they taste bitter as medicine? Or did they have a surprising sweetness to them that left him longing for a long-lost family member?

Perhaps even both. A bittersweet flavor.

Regardless, Lucas couldn't tell. The Mimawarigumi Battousai had quite the poker face.

Lucas continued. "I've been watching you all this time. You seemed like a stand-up guy. Certainly an honorable samurai when compared to someone like Cain Merrick."

He chuckled to himself. "You're one of the good ones, Minakata Kinta. However, you've chosen to protect criminal masterminds. The representatives of Japan's Oligarchy. But of course you'd do so. You're also one of them."

"That's enough from you," said Tatsuya, who then fired his pistol at Lucas Grant's face to preemptively assassinate the assassin.

Lucas ducked from the shot, the bullet grazing his shoulder as the cold bite of supersonic steel drew blood.

He then rose up in one fluid motion, his gleaming eyes leaving a streak of blue as he swung his bastard sword towards his Uncle Tatsuya's neck to give him a taste of the cold bite of his own (superior) steel.

Kinta himself reacted almost as quickly, even before any shot was fired, his wide eyes noticing Lucas' muscle twitch fast enough to activate his hair-trigger twitch reflexes and let his katana fly from its sheath.

The Mangetsu O Tsuku Nari (Full Moon Slash) from Kinta's curved blade clanged hard against the upward strike of Lucas's straight longsword, thus turning it more of a Hangetsu O Tsuku Nari (Half Moon Slash) instead.

Because Kinta's inherited sword, the Akatsuki (Red Moon), was forged using steel melted from the stolen weapons of the Wokou pirates as well as the swords of European invaders, it used the same grade of steel as his little half-brother's bastard sword.

'Just like Cain Merrick said,' thought Lucas. 'His sword is made of high-grade steel. It's sharp enough to cut apart European swords. But more importantly, his strike was able to block my own even though he has the shorter, thinner sword.'

The reverberation from the vibrating swords sung a solemn hymn of Cain and Abel that reached the two brothers all the way to the bone.

'He really is the Kagemusha. A true-blue samurai. The last of his kind.'

The floorboards splintered beneath their feet, the wood shards flying across the room.

Tatsuya himself tumbled to his posterior from the strength of the diametrically opposed blows, his second pistol shot veering wildly to the ceiling.

To Kinta, Lucas said, "You were the chosen one between the two of us. The favored son. Or grandson. Or nephew. I understand. Even if you ended up in a family of criminals, why would you abandon them after they've given you all of your precious privileges and political influence?"

The clash of blades neutralized their respective strikes, so Kinta couldn't do his signature quick follow-through that would've turned into a second Full Moon Slash, otherwise known as the Blue Moon Slash.

Kinta realized one more thing as he sheathed the Akatsuki back to its scabbard in anticipation for another attack. His gaijin half-brother stopped the Full Moon Slash with a one-handed slash from his heavier bastard sword.

Lucas wielded a heavier sword (48 inches or 120 centimeters) approaching twice the length of his katana (24 inches or 60 centimeters) with enough power in one hand to cut the Mimawarigumi Battousai's strongest attack in half or quarter strength.

"Unfortunately for you, that means you're now my target. Understand that this is nothing personal between you and me, big brother. I want your family dead. You're just collateral damage. Sucks to be you, bro."

***

At the gates of the moneychanger affiliate office...

Kyoko Sakaguchi considered disobeying her father's orders to follow after him, with the reassurance that Satsuki remained there patrolling the surrounding area with her naginata (glaive) in tow.

A festival occurred from beyond the gates across Chinatown. From what Kyoko had heard among the locals, it was for the Dongzhi Festival or a celebration of the Winter Solstice.

The parade would've served as the perfect cover for a team of international assassins in masks and costumes.

They would probably otherwise stick out like sore thumbs, but then again they were also capable of donning subtler disguises. Like the shinobi of yore in Ancient Japan.

She closed her eyes and tried to calm herself down.

Her excited hyperventilation ironically suffocated her rather than give her lungs the right amount of oxygen, her breath forming puffs of white smoke like from a kettle or a steam locomotive.

She then overheard the following conversation from several of the Minakata bodyguards beside her.

"Ugh. Why do we have to baby-sit the lieutenant's daughter? Jeez."

"I'm fine with it. She's kind of hot in a girl-next-door sort of way."

"She's just a kid, you pervert! And it's not like her stick-up-his-ass father would approve! He'd cut you down like he did that guy back in his hometown."

"Ha! I can wait. Just like Genji Monogatari (Tale of Genji)!"

"Shut up. That's enough from you two. She'll hear you."

She opened her eyes and chanced upon the bodyguard that leered at her from head to toe, making her cover herself by reflex.

The other bodyguards had the courtesy of looking away and pretending not to see her, which was a courtesy that the shameless man could not afford her.

Realizing that she'd noticed his gaze, the man winked at her and licked his chops. Like an eager wolf to a lamb.

The leering, creepy man reminded her of Keisuke. Not in appearance but in action.

'Ew. Gross.'

Something about the face she made must've made him realize the error of his ways, because soon enough, he looked away and whistled an off-tune folksong, his back turned at her.

She heaved a sigh of relief. In the past, she would've wilted like a freshly picked flower left on an empty vase over such male attention, which she heard gave them the wrong idea.

At least that part of her personality changed for the better.

However, on the flipside, sometimes a disapproving frown, a look of disgust, or an outright "No!" wasn't enough for men like him to take the hint.

Regardless, the double pony-tailed girl gripped her grandfather's sheathed sword tightly as she clasped her hands together in seeming prayer.

She vaguely remembered "Grandpa Genzo" talking about the Fuyutsuki (Winter Moon) and how their family inherited it from a legendary samurai's old pair of Sengoku Era swords.

Technically, the present Fuyutsuki wasn't the original Fuyutsuki but what was left of a tachi (ancient Japanese long sword) and wakizashi (secondary short sword) named Kogetsu (Little Moon) melted together to form the extra thick steel spine of the current version of the sword.

Unlike the Ship of Theseus—where all of the original boat's parts were replaced, so it was questionable whether the ship could still be considered the original or a brand new ship—the Fuyutsuki was a brand new sword born out of melting an ancient longsword and its short sword companion into one sword.

Like the reverse Ship of Theseus, almost. The separate ship made of the wood taken from the old Ship of Theseus to build a new boat altogether.

It was through the Fuyutsuki that Kyoko gained the confidence to go through the strenuous swordsmanship exercises required to master Musou Madden Ryu. It served like her grandpa's helping hand for her personality flaws.

Like a cane or crutch, almost.

Incidentally, the Ship of Theseus was one of the topics she learned from the personal bodyguard of Tetsuo Akahori, Soujiro Seta.  

She wished Soujiro was there with her now.

Even though they weren't the same age, he wasn't that much older than her and he was the only boy a shy girl like her could talk to ever since Keisuke… made her family limit her interactions with boys her age.

Soujiro never looked at her that way. She could trust him.

He was instead enamored by the daughter of the Akahori Family. The hauntingly beautiful girl with porcelain white skin and snow white hair: Rin Akahori.

Just to be clear, Soujiro never looked at Rin with lewd eyes either. The gaze he gave her was one that Kyoko wished she'd get from a man she cared for in return.

Loving, caring eyes instead of the dirty gazes from lustful men that made her feel filthy and exposed.

By the way, Rin was the one who taught Seta about the Ship of Theseus, among other western ideas and literature. In turn, he brought the subject up to Kyoko.

Kyoko sighed and stared into the cold, moonlit sky. Soujiro had Rin. Kinta had... her Big Sister Satsuki.

No one within Satsuki's age range could beat her in long-range weapons combat, especially when she found her range.

The blonde bombshell turned adoptive daughter of the Sakaguchi Family proved herself a sharpshooter with a bladed stick. She might probably be the strongest female practitioner of Musou Madden Ryu, even.

Quite unlike Kyoko, though. She only started studying the family martial arts for the sake of protecting herself from the likes of Keisuke. For self-defense.

Someone as gentlemanly and reputable as Lord Kinta deserved having a foreign goddess like May Brooks as a wife instead of her: The lowly daughter of a Yokohama cop and a soba restaurant cook.

Satsuki and Kinta belonged together. Like an eastern prince meeting up with a western princess. Like an "East meets West" sort of deal.

All four of the security detail at the front gates of the office then heard a loud bang from above them. It sounded like it came from the roof.

"Huh? Was that a cat?" said the perverted security guard from earlier, scratching his cheek.

Another guard walked to the courtyard to get a better look at the top of the building.

The leader of the guards warned, "Careful now. The Brigands Guild is a tricky band of mercenaries. Don't be surprised if they have some flying freak shows with them."

Kyoko vaguely recalled the briefing she, her father, and the rest of the hired swords and guns got from the longest serving bodyguards of the House of Minakata.

So far the assassins had with them a man who used a poison-coated sword, a man with a thousand disguises, a huge burly lumberjack with a battle ax, and one other weird member.

The one who used grappling hooks and whirling blades to attack. The supposed lone pure Japanese member of the Brigands Guild.

Another shot that sounded like a firework rang out, followed by the scream of a fallen comrade.

A rope spear plucked itself out of the guard's chest, which gushed a fountain of blood.

Startled, the two remaining bodyguards took out their pistols.

The black-clothed man spun around like a whirling dervish, his blades gleaming in the moonlight before staining the sky and ground red like it was the Bakumatsu all over again.

"Who the hell are you? Identify yourself!" said one of the guards.

The swinging, kicking, and slashing shinobi rebutted, "Dead men don't need to know my name."

The guard presumably in charge barked out, "It must be him! The tumbling ninja with the rope spears! Shoot at him! Blast him to hell!"

Gunshots fired at the flipping and jumping ninja in dark clothing and an elaborate gas mask with goggles on it.  

"Hey, he speaks Japanese! Are you Japanese?!" demanded the man who winked at Kyoko earlier, his pistol firing in the darkness. "You traitor. You're a ninja from Japan, aren't you? How dare you betray this country and ally yourself with foreign invaders!"

The goggled brigand harrumphed. "I have no allegiance to this country. My only allegiance is to myself."

The leering man ran out of ammunition and got his neck punctured with a rope spear while he fumbled to unsheathe his sword. He then slumped to the ground, gurgling.

The remaining bodyguard told Kyoko to run inside and get help before he himself had rope wrapped around his neck.

The Brigands Guild mercenary then used his body weight to lift and pull the guard up to hang him from the branch of a nearby tree.

Kyoko gulped, resisting the urge to flee. Her whole body screamed at her to run and hide.

She was the one who insisted to go with her father regardless instead of stay at the dojo with the rest of the students.

'Father. Grandfather. I'm sorry. I must fight.'

She just had to do it. She felt compelled to do so. Perhaps more for her sake than even for the sake of safeguarding the Minakata Family.

Before the guard could reach all the way up to the branch, Kyoko charged and let her Fuyutsuki sword fly from its scabbard, cutting down the rope and saving the man's life.

As the bodyguard's body dropped to the ground, she sheathed her sword back in a fluid motion. Just like how she practiced it countless times against straw dummies.

The goggles of the acrobatic man gleamed in the darkness before more rope spears flew from his wrists with a flick of his arms through a strange mechanism of some sort attached to the side of his hips.

With her heart in her throat and her hand firmly grasping the handle of her grandfather's refurbished ancient sword, Kyoko aimed for those contraptions in particular as she dodged the spears and dashed towards the strange man in black.

She proved elusive care of the ingrained sidesteps that she practiced to perfection care of the Young Moon Slashes she constantly avoided when sparring with Satsuki and her long-distance attacks.

The invader ended up within range of her slash.

Thanks to Grandpa Genzo letting her borrow his Fuyutsuki, she was able to finally do a perfect Mikazuki O Tsuku Nari (Crescent Moon Slash) at the ninja.

She had yet to do a Hangetsu O Tsuku Nari (Half Moon Slash) or Mangetsu O Tsuku Nari (Full Moon Slash) though.

As an amateur swordswoman, every other slash below the Crescent Moon Slash, like a Young Moon (Waxing Stance) or Old Moon (Waning Stance) Slash, she could do.

Darn it. Someday, she'd do a Full Moon Slash and show the rest of her family she wasn't the deadweight.

Today was not that day though.

As she prepared to cut through the rope spear devices attached to the brigand's hips, his body rolled along with the slash, the Fuyutsuki cutting nothing but air.

"Eh...?" she said before she got slashed apart from behind by the somersaulting ninja.

The cut would've been deeper had she not shifted her weight and changed stances from Waxing Stance to Waning Stance.

This allowed her to follow-through her missed strike with a Crescent Moon Slash to the rear that deflected the blade that almost cut all the way to her spine.

***

To Be Continued...

I'm still not over having to rewrite Chapter 52 from scratch. Regardless, I promise to be more careful in saving my work in the future so that I won't pull a Sisyphus and keep on rewriting things I've already written! Dammit!

Also, it needs to be said. Ever since Nobuhiro Watsuki wrote a continuation of RK involving the Hokkaido Arc, this story is now an "Elseworlds" kind of story set a little after the original ending of RK.

Danke, Abdiel

[gabriel-gabdiel]

Rurouni Yahiko Chapter 53: A Trip Down Memory Lane

An old flame of Yahiko returns to Yokohama.

The rest of the chapters of my Rurouni Kenshin fan fiction are available here. Enjoy.

First | Previous | Next

Back at Yokohama during Winter 1884...

A week had passed since the fateful sparring match between Satsuki "May" Brooks and Yahiko "Joshua" Myojin.

However, the clash between Satsuki and Yahiko quickly became old hat for the kenjutsu students of the Sakaguchi Dojo.

Why?

It was because Satsuki's adoptive grandfather and grandmaster of the Musou Madden School, Genzo Sakaguchi, insisted that Yahiko return and regularly spar with her and the rest of the students in the dojo to prepare them for, well, war.

A war against foreign invaders, apparently.

The so-called Brigands Guild was out to assassinate the members of the Minakata Family, the hatamoto class samurai family whom generations of Sakaguchis served under since the Sengoku Era.

In any case, Mr. Myojin had ended up being a sparring partner for Miss Brooks in the end.

They sparred with each other until everyone got sick of it, including them. Then they sparred some more.

They kept sparring until every following match lost all meaning to them. Like they were being punished through the endless battles.

This was all part of Genzo's Training from Hell: His students' collective punishment for performing poorly against both Yahiko and May.

This went on for several more days until the fateful confrontation between uncle and nephew at the House of Minakata.

***

Rurouni Yahiko

A Rurouni Kenshin Continuation Fan Fiction Story by Chester Castañeda

Old friends meet up with new friends.

Disclaimer: All characters used in this fanfic (save some others) are the rightful property of Nobuhiro Watsuki, Shueisha, Shonen Jump, Viz, Sony Studios, Fuji TV, Studio Gallup, Studio Deen, and ADV. This disclaimer also covers all the other copyrighted materials that are far too many to mention here. Don't sue me please, I'm very poor.

***

Chapter 53: A Trip Down Memory Lane

***

'Boy, there sure are a lot of foreigners in Yokohama.'

Those were actually one of the first couple of thoughts in Yahiko's mind when their train to Yokohama from Hiroshima first arrived.

Was he not distracted by the prospect of sparring with Satsuki, he would've focused more on that train of thought. However, even the eventual sparring match reinforced his first impressions on Yokohama.

After all, "Satsuki" was actually May Brooks, an Englishwoman adopted into a Japanese family.

A foreigner.

Damn, there sure were a lot of gaijin in Yokohama. It was crawling with them, in fact. Like an anthill. Or a beehive.

Or rather, weren't they more like a swarm of murderous wasps invading a beehive that they obviously didn't belong to?

Maybe that was a bit much of a comparison. However, that was what the Satsuma Domain felt was happening when the Americans first opened up Japan's ports to world trade.

Like they were being invaded by another country.

Yokohama was the place where it all began, from the Convention of Kanagawa to the Bakumatsu. It literally helped end the Sakoku (Locked Nation) Era of Japan, even.

It was all because an arrogant American foreigner embarrassed the Shogunate by forcing it to open Japanese ports for foreign trade.

It was reminiscent of what the British did to Imperial China with its Opium Wars for the sake of getting tea and other goods from the country.

The consequences of their actions could be felt even to this day, in 1884.

Like Yokohoma ending up like a center for world trade full of foreigners. Or Emperor Meiji being installed into power by the Ishin Shishi winning the Bakumatsu and establishing of the Meiji Government.

Regardless, the boy from Tokyo had ended up with a new routine ever since he lost that damn spar in Yokohama.

He attended "classes" at the Sakaguchi Dojo and served as one of its teacher's sparring partners almost daily, including weekends.

On the bright side, he got paid cold, hard cash for his efforts to train. He had that going for him, which was nice.

He was actually there to help Old Man Genzo Sakaguchi and Kinta Minakata along with a short list of volunteer students to help guard the Minakata Family while the Brigands Guild remained afoot.

The Great (Pain in the Ass) Gan also helped out in his own way. The meat shield served as a pretty impressive hand-to-hand combat sparring partner. His fighting style with the big metal bat didn't need as much polish or technique as his street fighting experience.

As long as Gan held actual job and pulled his own weight in terms of rent money, Yahiko was fine with whatever the lout wanted to do.

Even Munenori Minoe visited the dojo from time to time to help out with chores, clean the equipment, or do practice drills on defense.

However, he didn't do much there otherwise.

Yahiko expected more from him. He knew Minoe was capable of much more.

Like in Shinshu, it was hard to convince people that this meek guy with an eye patch and wig was actually a fearsome warrior and assassin in his own right.

Or her own right. Since Minoe was basically just Kaede Morinaga with a wig strapped to her head care of an eye patch.

But if Minoe thought he was a guy, who was Yahiko to tell him otherwise?

The thing was that Minoe barely went to the Sakaguchi Dojo ever since Yahiko's first spar with   Satsuki.

He was a martial artist himself who was probably even better than Myojin at kenjutsu but he chose not to help the Sakaguchis or Minakatas out.

In their other misadventures, Munenori was practically inseparable with the rest of the Three Stooges. Not this time, though.

'Was he avoiding going to the Sakaguchi Dojo because of Minakata Kinta?' Yahiko mused. 'What has he been up to this past week anyway?'

***

Dreading another blistering (and blister-inducing) sparring match with the master of long-range naginata/bo strikes for today, Yahiko found time to write more letters about his exploits addressed to his childhood sweetheart Tsubame Sanjo.

It came with the implication that she should also read the letters to Kenshin and Kaoru Kamiya as well, so they'd also know whatYahiko was up to.

It was his way of relaxing himself.

He sure hoped they were doing fine. Too bad they couldn't write him back in return, seeing how he had no permanent address at the moment.

Also, what would've been Kenshin's reaction to all these strange people using his former sobriquet "Battousai" long after he was retired from being a hitokiri (manslayer)? Everyone was pulling a Hiruma Brothers' style "prank" on him, it would seem.

'Maybe Amakusa Shogo called his band of misfit samurais the Battousaigumi (Battousai Group) partly as his way of challenging Kenshin. He's actually daring him to find them and stop them from abusing his name.'

Yahiko then thought of Tsubame and how she'd pack him lunches or wait for him to come home after every kendo practice, when she herself was done with her shift at the Akabeko (Red Cow) Restaurant.

He missed those idle days of his after all that nonsense with Jinchu and whatnot was finally laid to rest. There was something nostalgic about them, to be honest.

'Wha...?'

Speaking of nostalgia, he just saw a poster posted on the outside of the Yokohama Post Office. A poster for the circus.

It advertised clowns, acrobats, trained animals, trapeze acts, musicians, dancers, hoopers, tightrope walkers, jugglers, magicians, unicyclists, and more.

Huh. The circus, huh? He should pay a visit to the circus one of these days.  

Now that brought back memories.

Before he met Miss Sanjo, he was first smitten by a certain "Human Cannonball". A pretty girl about his age. Like Tsubame, she also had the annoying habit of calling him by the name...

"Yahiko-chan...?"

Staring back at him with a ream of posters tucked under her arm was the girl he was just thinking about.

A girl he hadn't seen in six years. A girl he thought he'd never see again in his lifetime.

"M-Marimo!?"

He felt like having a heart attack then and there.

"Oh, it is you, Yahiko-chan! I'm so glad you still remember me!" said Marimo.

What were the chances of them meeting like this?

Now if only Kenshin, Kaoru, Kenji, and/or Tsubame was right behind her too. Maybe even Sanosuke (Sagara/Higashidani), while they were at it!

Actually, Shinshu was further away than Yokohama was from the Kamiya Dojo. Since he was nearby, maybe he should drop in and visit his friends back in Tokyo instead!

***

Come to think of it, right at the very top of the same circus poster he'd been staring at was the very same "Human Cannonball" Marimo Ebisu, grinning while sitting atop a huge cannon.

'She's still going at it with the human cannonball gig, huh?' he thought. 'Some things never change.'

Marimo, a circus performer, was one of countless people the Kenshingumi (Kenshin Squad) met and helped out. Her job was to get shot out of a huge cannon that was aimed towards a target in an acrobatic fashion for the entertainment of paying customers.

Kenshin, Sano, Kaoru, and Yahiko saved the circus run by Marimo's ringmaster father Jirokichi Ebisu from a circus competitor named Soubei Sumidaya, a man whose own circus started failing after his star attraction, Marimo, left.

Sumidaya actually attempted to sabotage the Ebisu Circus by forcing them to immediately pay their loan to him they used to set up their own big top. According to their unfair contract, Marimo and her father would go back to his circus if they fail to settle their debts.

Afterwards, Soubei had his people steal the money that the Ebisu Family were intending to pay the loan with while at the same time injuring Marimo's father by getting him buried in a pile of wooden boards.

The evil circus ringleader then had some of his goons steal the gunpowder used to fire the Ebisu's cannon and then got the rest of his ex-convict performers to attack the Ebisu Circus in the middle of a performance for good measure.

The Kenshingumi not only filled in as Ebisu Circus performers themselves to stall for time; they also saved the day by taking out Sumidaya's gang in one fell swoop. Even Megumi Takani helped them out by mixing the right gunpowder portions needed for the cannon to work safely on top of tending to an injured Jirokichi.

"How are you? It's been ages!" Marimo asked Yahiko.

"I've been doing fine, all things considered," he replied. "I see you're still working at the circus."

"What can I say? I love my job." She giggled, brushing a stray lock of hair to the side of her face.

The circus was in town, and Marimo was one of its headliners in Yokohama.

At any rate, he and his second crush (Tsubame was his first) caught up with each other like old friends while he helped her put up those posters she carried to advertise her circus troupe's upcoming performance.

"How's everyone in Tokyo? Are they doing well? How are Kenshin-san, Sano-san, and Kaoru-san?"

"Well..."

He couldn't possibly recount everything that happened during Kenshin's stay with Kaoru in the Kamiya Dojo.

She didn't need to know about Jine Udo, Isurugi Raijuta, Makoto Shishio, or Yukishiro Enishi. No need to tell her about those serial murderers, anti-government rebels, and/or wannabe dictators.

He instead gave her the abridged version of what had happened so far. Even more abridged that the letters he sent Tsubame about his current exploits.

Marimo particularly loved the news that Kenshin and Kaoru were married with a child, Megumi was still practicing medicine in Aizu, and that Sanosuke Sagara had been adventuring all over the world, reaching as far as the United States of America.

Man, she was still so pretty. She really blossomed from being a cute girl to a heartbreaker in just six years.

Marimo Ebisu might not be as bombastic as May Brooks was, but she was still drop-dead gorgeous. Sometimes nothing could beat the adorable cuteness of youthful Japanese beauty.

She was like his nostalgia from when he was 10 years old personified. A muse from his past.

Marimo and Yahiko exchanged bows after their posting of all the posters was done. She then told him to come see her at the circus sometime by giving him a free ticket for today's show.

"Thanks for helping me out. See you later, Yahiko-chan!" she said as she waved goodbye.

"Uh, same to you, Marimo," he said lamely. The fact that she called him with the childish "-chan" honorific didn't even register in his mind.

Was he dreaming? Someone pinch him.

"OW! What's the big idea...?"

And so someone did. Right on the cheek.

He turned in time to see two of three Sanbaka (Three Stooges) and Chizuru Raikouji (the girl who pinched him) staring holes at him.

"That's what we'd like to know, 'Yahiko-chan'," said Chizuru, who looked at him with half-lidded eyes, a knowing smirk, and an upturned nose.

He also idly thought that maybe it'd be better if he "swapped" places with Chizuru so she'd be the one to complete the Sanbaka trio of idiots instead.

***

As they walked back to their respective inns, Yahiko's trio of companions grilled him for information even though he'd rather they went to a cookout grill instead. Like for yakiniku (grilled meat cuisine) or something.

"Was that your girlfriend from Tokyo we've heard so much about?" asked Minoe. "She's the one who calls you 'Yahiko-chan'. Right, Yahiko-chi?"

"Oh yeah, Sanjo no Kiwami or something," said the Moronic Gan.

"Sanju no Kiwami (Triple Extreme) is a punching technique, ya doofus! Her name is Sanjo Tsubame!" Yahiko said, not bothering to try and figure out how Gan coincidentally came up with Sanosuke Sagara's learned special technique.

"But this poster here says her name is Marimo the Human Cannonball," said Chizuru.

Uh-oh. Yahiko was the bigger moron after all. He gulped and sweated bullets. "Ummm..."

"Is that her stage name, Yoshi-boy?" asked the Idiotic Gan. "You didn't tell us your girlfriend is a circus performer! I thought she was a waitress in some maid cafe!"

Ah, what the hell. The jig is up. Might as well come clean.

"All right. Listen up. Marimo is not Tsubame. Tsubame is a different person, okay?"

"Oooooh," the Sanbaka (and Chizuru) chirped together in a sing-song way.

"Cut that out," he admonished his three "friends". "Marimo is... well, someone that I, we (the Kenshingumi) met at the circus. We helped her circus out when it was in trouble."

"Your ex?" supposed the Clueless Gan, which earned him a "MEN! (HEAD!)" strike to the noggin care of the wrapped-up sakabatou (reversed-edge blade).

"No, stupid! She's just a friend! A circus girl we saved from being harassed and duped into a bad contract by her former boss in Tokyo!"

"Oh, I get it. She was your first crush!" supposed Chizuru.

"N-No, she's not! She's my second... I mean, no. No! I met Tsubame before her, okay?"

"Ha. Bingo. Second crush, huh?" The Raikouji Heiress smiled like a cat that ate the canary. Her womanly intuition struck remarkably true like a pinprick to the center of Yahiko's heart. "No wonder you were ogling her with goo-goo eyes."

Tokyo Samurai Descendant winced, as though someone just punched him in the gut. "Raccoon Girl, stop it right there!"

Damn. The Kaoru look-alike was scarily perceptive. More so than the "real" Kaoru, even.

"No, that can't be it," said the bright-eyed (well, one-eyed) Minoe. "Mochiron! (But of course!) There's no way Yahiko-chi would ever cheat on his girlfriend in Tokyo with his other crush!"

"GUUUAAA!" exclaimed Myojin, who ended up on the ground, kneeling and on all fours in pain. Doing the dogeza or the Japanese kneeling position to prostrate oneself, especially if that someone were ashamed or embarrassed immensely in public.

"P-Please, Minoe. Have mercy."

***

A week ago, right after Yahiko lost his friendly sparring match against Satsuki...

Munenori Minoe and Kinta Minakata had a little private meeting at the backyard of the Sakaguchi Dojo.

"What are you doing here?" the straightforward Kinta asked. "Did Amakusa Shogo send you after me?"

Minoe chuckled. "This is actually a bit of a detour on my part, but I intended to keep an eye on you regardless. Same with Akahori-chi."

"Detour?" he repeated. "Oh. You're traveling with that kid, right? Why is that?"

Munenori rubbed his bandaged hands to keep them warm. "That 'kid' knows who the real Battousai is, Kinta-chi."

"Oh," he said, remembering how focused and obsessed Kaede was with meeting the original Hitokiri Battousai, to the point of dressing and even looking like him. "Really? That kid has connections with Himura Battousai?"

"Yes, he does. He even inherited his old sword."

"...I see."

Was this the reason why despite looking about the age of a teen, this samurai boy from Tokyo was able to take down grown men from their dojo and almost defeated one of their best students?

Was Yahiko Myojin taught kenjutsu by Kinta's incidental namesake all this time? 'But his sword style didn't look like Hiten Mitsurugu Ryu at all.'

"And as for you," said Minoe, who took off his wig and eye patch, revealing his rust-red hair and lazy eye with a cross-shaped scar near it. "Do you intend to betray Shogo-sama again, Traitor? Are you still working under Akahori Tetsuo?"

By reflex, Minakata's hand went immediately to the handle of his sword as he fell into the aggressive Waxing Stance of Musou Madden Ryu, ready to pull his Akatsuki (Red Moon) blade out of its sheathe at a moment's notice.

He wasn't talking to Minoe any longer, but instead to the much more dangerous and erratic Nisemono Battousai (Fake Battousai): Kaede Morinaga.

"Shozo Lorenzo. Genemon Gaspar. Lady Magdalia. Do any of these names mean anything to you, Traitor? You Judas!"

Incidentally, Judas Iscariot was one of the 12 apostles who ultimately betrayed Jesus Christ for 30 pieces of silver, leading to the Messiah's crucifixion and death.

"I remember all their names," Kinta said, his countenance unchanging. "I will never forget them."

So Kaede asked, "Whose side are you on then, Minakata Kinta? Shogo-sama's or Akahori's?"

***

Yahiko Myojin grumbled to himself. He ended up under the big top after all, attending Marimo's show in spite of himself. Against his better judgment.

He originally didn't intend to attend the circus performance that afternoon. He had hellish training and sparring to do at the Sakaguchi Dojo with May Brooks and her students, after all.

'Er, on second thought, they can take a rain check,' he mused. 'We can have a day or two without sparring, right?'

Regardless, some burly idiot with a drinking and gambling problem stole his ticket to the circus from under his nose and went there in his place instead.

Myojin was forced to actually wait in line and buy a ticket, if only to make sure the "Great" Gan wasn't up to his usual mischief of brawling, drinking, stealing, lying, and owing more food and gambling debts.

Man, Yahiko had half a mind to continue his journey without Gan and just dump the "Soba King" on the road or leave him like a stray cat at a park one of these days. He was nothing but trouble.

Then again, Gan also gave him the excuse to play hooky on the Sakaguchi Dojo for once and enjoy himself for at least a day after a week of torture and countless pole, shinai, or bokken strikes to his person.

The Ebisu Circus Troupe had blossomed and become a far bigger company than its owners dreamed possible in just six years.

The ringmaster Sumidaya would've rolled in his grave if he were dead (knock on wood). Right now he was serving his sentence in Tokyo Penitentiary, so it was possible for him to roll around his jail cell instead.

Instead of only offering one main star attraction in Marimo the Human Cannonball with half-hearted side attractions here and there, the Ebisu Circus had grown big enough to do tours on a national level.

"You actually came! I'm so glad!" cheered Marimo, who was in her form-fitting leotard cat suit as she met up with Yahiko at the entrance of the circus tent.

She waved off the cashier from selling Myojin a ticket, whispering that the boy was her guest.

"I can't wait for you to see me perform later!"

"I wouldn't miss it for the world," he lied with a grin while scratching the back of his head, one eye on the lookout for any sign of the Unruly Gan.

"Dad, you remember Yahiko, right?" Marimo told her father after leading the boy in question to him.

"Ah, yes! The boy who saved our circus along with that nice swordsman fellow, doctor, kendo instructor, and street fighter!" said Jirokichi Ebisu, the ringmaster of the Ebisu Circus Troupe. "Has it been six years already? Time sure flies! I hope you enjoy the show, son! Tell Himura-san and company that Ebisu Jirokichi sends his regards!"

"Yeah, sure, and thanks a lot too!" Yahiko said, who even indulged enough to buy himself popcorn and a candy apple from the nearby concession stands of the big top. Might as well, since he was already there. "Oh, and it's Kamiya-san now. Kenshin married into Kaoru's family."

"Is that right? Congratulations to them, then! I always had an inkling suspicion they'd end up together."

"Would you believe they even have a kid too?" gabbed Yahiko between mouthfuls of popcorn.

"Ha! Himura-san, you sly dog! I mean, Kamiya-san, right? Way to go. That girl is quite a catch. I hope in the future that Mr. and Mrs. Kamiya will get to see how much our humble show has improved through the years!"

"I'll tell them all about it!" said Myojin.

Jirokichi then turned towards his star attraction and said to Yahiko, "If Marimo is lucky, then maybe she could get the same happy ending herself!" while giving her a wink.

"Shut up, Dad!" Marimo fidgeted cutely in her skintight uniform that left little to the imagination. "You're embarrassing me in front of Yahiko-chan!"

"Bwahahaha! Puppy love is so adorable!"

Yahiko laughed along with Jirokichi but his pretend mirth didn't quite reach his eyes. 'She's still going with the 'chan' thing, huh? I guess Marimo will never see me as anything other than that 10-year-old brat she met six years ago.'

He spared a glance at the young girl and her hour-glass form in that tight-fitting outfit before their eyes met and they looked away in embarrassment.

'Also, 'puppy love'? What puppy love? Does Marimo have a boyfriend already or something?'

"Well, we better get going! Marimo, go to your trailer and prepare yourself. Son, enjoy the show! It's about to start!" said the Ebisu Ringmaster.

"Don't mind if I do!" said Yahiko, who then took a large bite of his candied apple.

***

The show went off without a hitch.

It certainly helped that no competing circus ringmaster and his failed circus performers were trying to sabotage their performances this time around.

Ebisu Circus, which was founded in 1878, performed in four to five locations around Japan each year, setting up its bright-red, 20-meter-high big top in each place for roughly three months.

The circus also had shows twice a day, morning and night, up until the end of the month.

This year, in 1884, the troupe opened in Osaka before moving to Nagoya and then Yokohama, intending to perform in Fukuoka before the year was over. According to Jirokichi, they might add Asakusa or Takamatsu if the shows proved successful enough.

This time around, they had everything going for them. Lion tamers and other animal trainers. A zoo full of trained animals. Circus clowns. Magicians and other illusionists. Escape artists able to free themselves from the Chinese water torture box or while hanging upside down like a bat.

There were also jugglers, acrobats, dancers, and death-defying trapeze artists present, among whom included their headliner Marimo Ebisu.

At present, Ebisu Circus had around 50 to 60 performers, among 20 were from overseas. The ringmaster said he scoured the globe to find the best performers as his circus grew in popularity, although it did help that international ports like Yokohama allowed them an influx of foreign talent to hire.

No wonder the lines and crowds Ebisu Circus had currently gathered were even longer and bigger than the ones the Kenshingumi came across when the troupe had first formed. They'd really expanded their show into a world-class extravaganza.

If only Kenshin and the others could witness the spectacular program. It was well-worth the price of admission (had Yahiko paid)!

'Man, I do hope they add Tokyo to their tour dates. This is amazing,' thought Yahiko.

Before the main event with their headliner—Marimo the Human Cannonball—finally started, they held a short tournament of sorts to showcase the skills of their strongman weightlifters, bodybuilders, and wrestlers, many of whom were trained in classic Japanese jujutsu, judo, and sumo as well as Greco-Roman wrestling and freestyle wrestling from the western world.

Yahiko yawned.

As popular as the wrestling portion of the show was to the kids, he was too old and too experienced in martial arts to not recognize the stage tricks and fake fighting that the strongmen did to each other when doing their little pretend tournaments.

Some of it was impressive, but it wasn't real fighting. More like a dance made to look like a real competitive match.

At the tail end of the wrestling show, they held a contest where the audience members were invited to participate to see if they could take on the circus strongmen in a match.

At least when they were fighting against audience members, some of the more experienced wrestlers had the chance to showcase their actual skills instead of doing fixed choreographed fights for a crowd, but those lasted in mere seconds.

As extra incentive, they offered cash prizes to anyone who could defeat the circus's stable of strongmen.

"BWAHAHAHA! I am the Soba King! The Great Gan! Beware my wrath, puny mortals!"

Wait a minute. That voice. Yahiko knew something was amiss!

Right there, on the ring down below, came forth the Rambunctious Gan in all his bandanna-wearing, barrel-chested glory, beating on his pectorals like one of the damn trained gorillas the circus had caged.

Yahiko had almost forgotten himself. This was the reason why he went to the circus in the first place! To chase after Gan the Ticket Thief and keep him out of trouble!

***

The audience ooh-ed and aah-ed at the spectacle before them.

As far as the audience knew, this unknown Japanese "strongman" thug that wasn't part of the previous shows took down the circus's own strongmen one after the other with karate kicks, punches, elbows, knees, throws, and body slams.

Yahiko tried to go back to the entrance to retrieve the sakabatou he left behind (no weapons were allowed inside the big top for obvious reasons), but it was a packed house and he was soon distracted by the Muscular Gan making short work of the long line of strongmen, wrestlers, bodybuilders, and martial artists one after another, sometimes two or three at a time.

It was a royal ass-whuppin'. A rumble where the Monstrous Gan came out on top. The Soba King of the Ring was seriously cleaning house.

No one who came down on that wrestling ring could get him out of it, it'd seem. Was this all pre-planned in advance? Was it part of the show? But why would a circus humiliate its own performers by "losing" to some random audience member?

'What is that idiot up to?' Yahiko thought. He himself could charge into the middle of the ring and try his luck with toppling Gan, but he had seen the strength and durability of the big oaf firsthand. He felt more confident taking him on with a sword instead of without it.

Yahiko then face-planted when he realized who was the girl—the valet—in the ring with Gan.

"Ohohohoho! That's right! Can no one take my," the girl in kabuki makeup cleared her throat and grimaced, "husband out? Are the wrestlers in this circus nothing but weaklings and clowns against the Monster Among Men, Gan the Great?"

"It's the Great Gan, Kaori-neechan! Get it right!"

"Shut up and mug at the audience, Soba King. I'm working here."

It was Chizuru. Even with her face completely plastered with white paint, Yahiko could recognize that face and that comically large hair bow anywhere. Or at least mistake her for Kaoru Kamiya. She was acting as manager to the dine-and-dashing food bandit.

Myojin sighed and sat back down. He wanted to hit himself for falling for carnie nonsense and circus trickery.

Of course Gan beating up strongmen was all still part of the show. Of course none of this was real and all of it was scripted. Circus or carnival wrestling was fake, after all.

What the hell were the Ebisus thinking, making them part of the show though?

"Are they friends of yours, Yahiko-chan?" someone asked him from behind.

"Ah! Marimo!" said Yahiko. "You scared me. What are you doing here? Shouldn't you be at your trailer?"

Marimo pouted cutely. "No. It's boring in there. All you can do in there is stare at a wall or eat. I want to watch the show with you. I want to see your reactions from up close."

Yahiko blushed and turned his attention back to the ring as Gan threw several other circus wrestlers over the top rope, growling and grunting like an unhinged wild beast. "How'd you know they were my friends?"

"I saw you with them after I gave you a ticket to the show," she explained. "I also asked them when they got here if they knew you."

"So what's going on?" Yahiko asked, pointing at the commotion that two of his so-called comrades was making. "Who put them up to this?"

"Well, Gan-san volunteered to fight the strongmen for real but my father had other ideas. He offered him some money to do a scripted show instead. The girl he's with, Chizuru, offered to be his manager for a cut of the money, saying he owes her anyway."

"Yeah, that sounds like Raccoon Girl, all right," said Yahiko with a shake of his head. "She's the stingiest rich person I know."

"About that. Is that Chizuru person a relative of Kaoru-san?" she asked. "Like a little sister, cousin, niece, or something?"

"Oh. OH. No, there's no relation between the two of them. But it's freaky, isn't it? How much they look alike, I mean," he said. "They're like twin sisters or something."

"When they first inquired about our wrestling tournament and cash prize, I almost thought you brought Kenshin-san and Kaoru-san with you over from Tokyo! Oh, and that poor Sano-san let himself go."

Yahiko laughed at her joke. "Hey, that was a good one." He then realized something. "Wait, what do you mean 'Kenshin-san' was with them? Wasn't it just Gan and the Raccoon Girl?"

Right on cue, a familiar voice shouted, "Stop right there, criminal scum."

Instead of Munenori Minoe, there stood Kaede Morinaga.

His other personality. The wig and eye patch was off. Her red hair was tied in a ponytail that started on the nape of her neck. Her scar under her eye visible to those with front row seats.

And indeed, even from a distance, she did look like Kenshin to all those who ever knew or met him.

"Well, if it isn't my mortal enemy, Samurai X!" said the Great Gan to Kaede while flexing his biceps (and sucking in his gut).

'Who the hell is Samurai X?!' thought Yahiko with a facepalm.

***

The audience booed Gan as he pushed and prodded around the shorter Kenshin look-alike Kaede like she owed him money.

"Leave the little girl alone!" some of them said. "Or little boy! I'm not sure!"

However, those who knew Kenshin and especially those who knew Kaede knew what was in store for them next.

They waited. Anticipated. With bated breath.

In Christian terms, it was a David and Goliath type of scenario. Where the young (uncrowned) King David slew the Philistine giant Goliath with a slingshot and stones to the skull.

Or at that was how Kaede envisioned it, since she actually paid attention to the bible readings Amakusa did of both the Old and New Testament for his faithful.

In Japanese History terms, it was a Kamikaze (Divine Wind) scenario. The mismatched Japan was able to overcome the Mongols through Divine Intervention in the form of a typhoon.

Morinaga then fell into her deadly Scorpio Stance.

"Swarming Stabs!"

She used sticks instead of her actual weapons, but this was a fixed carnival-style wrestling match anyway. And she was supposed to be the underdog.

The thrust pushed the muscular gorilla man to a corner. From there, as the roars of the crowd grew louder and louder, she did one of her signature moves.

It missed against Soujiro Seta, but the Glacial Gan would not be able to avoid it. He was too big, too slow, and too dumb to be able to do so.

"Scorpion Nest!"

The cheering reached a fever pitch as the seeming redheaded stepchild and weakling wrecked Gan apart like a hapless sand bag.

The feeling of nostalgia filled Yahiko yet again, remembering how the wimpy Kenshin wreaked havoc all over the Tanishi Yakuza, blowing everyone's expectations (and bodies) away.

The crowd then roared in approval as Kaede blew away the swaying, bruised Gan with one final "Deathstalker Stab!" that pushed him out of the ring, in between the ropes.

The match was over. She had won. The crowd roared with approval.

"That stick fighting girl was amazing! She was so fast with her strikes!" was the unanimous consensus of the audience. What a match. What a show.

So that was the end of that.

Myojin brushed away the sweat on the edges of his eyebrows. Damn.

She didn't hold back. She went all out instead of doing choreographed weak strikes or even sparring taps.

The ending was obviously scripted, but the hits weren't.

However, right below the ring, the scuffed-up Gan stirred. Even from that far away, Yahiko could see the wide grin on his face. Afterwards, the lout grabbed something from underneath the ring.

It was a wooden club.

'Wait, the match is over, right?' thought Yahiko. 'Gan, what in the world are you planning?'

***

The Great Gan entered the ring from the bottom rope, towered before the tiny Kaede, and then said, "Those love taps are not enough to take me down, Samurai X. Or am I talking to Patches now? Is that why you're acting so weak?"

This elicited a snarl from Kaede. "Don't compare me to Minoe. Don't imply he's weak either, while we're at it."

Gan snorted. "I don't get why you have so many nicknames for yourself like you've been possessed by multiple spirits, but I'll humor you for now. However, what I won't tolerate is how you keep pulling back your strikes. To do so is to disrespect me. You can do better than that, Samurai X!"

"What are you doing, Gan?" hissed Chizuru. "This isn't part of the script!"

"Sorry, Kaori-neechan! I'm going off-script! I'm doing improv!"

The Humongous Gan hurled his bat at Morinaga multiple times, who then proceeded to dodge in every which way. He ended up hitting nothing but air, the ring ropes, the pillar, and the post, but no swing landed on the Fake Battousai.

Like this was a replay of his fight with Shogo Amakusa back in Shinshu.

Yahiko gulped and clutched his arm rests, his fingernails digging into the material. As much as he hated to admit it, this match-up did leave him at least a little bit curious.

How would a serious Gan fare against a serious Kaede in a real fight?

Gan, with his superhuman stamina and durability versus the offense-minded, lightning-quick Morinaga.

His swings started going faster. And wilder. Gan hit everything he could reach with his weapon. The ring ropes shook around with a twang like they were being strummed like guitar strings.

Each hit spelled death, or at least a one-hit K.O., if any of them were to ever make full contact with the tiny girl or her tiny head.

If they could make full contact.

"Have you lost your goddamn mind, you ape?" Kaede asked, still keeping herself from breaking his kneecaps or shoving a stick up where the sun didn't shine.

Gan was one of Minoe's friends after all, but if he pushed her hard enough, something disastrous might happen.

She did the Scorpion Nest to help better parry the bat strikes and counter the batter at the same time, but each contact she made with his weapon reverberated right into her bone.

On his part, Gan ate all the strikes she hit him with like rain off his back.

She then pivoted and did Swarming Barb thrusts at Gan's blindside. It barely fazed him and one swing of his bat was all he needed to swat her and her silly sticks away.

'Since when was he this strong?' she wondered. If she only had sharp swords instead of sticks, it might've made a significant difference.

The structure underneath the ring mat cracked and buckled from their combined the force of their hammering blows. Like endless waves crashing off of a cliff side until it was crushed into sand and rubble over time.

She dodged, parried, and blocked, but she wasn't as much of a defensive expert as her Minoe personality. Her defense was her offense, and Gan shrugged off her offense. So in essence, he also shrugged off her main line of defense.

"How many more of my attacks can your thin wrists block, Samurai X?" shouted Gan.

Soon, bruises and welts formed all over her body.

Strikes meant to hit a target were different from parries and deflections, so Gan managed to tag her little by little every time she attempted to bombard him with strikes even though she was much faster than him.

They weren't so much parrying as they were exchanging strikes that sometimes happened to get in the way of each other.

Gan soon had her cornered at one of the ring posts and clipped her arm with a crack of his bat when she didn't deflect fast enough. Like a trip hammer, this made her turn and counter with a Deathstalker Stab to the skull.

His head got knocked back for a second before he grinned and kept attacking someone who was used to being the attacker.

The predator had become the prey.

"More! MORE! Hit me HARDER! I can barely feel your mosquito bites on my skin! I'm barely bleeding here, Samurai X! Or should I say Patches?"

This was getting a little dangerous.

Meanwhile, Chizuru had long ago left the ring, probably to ask for help from the remaining wrestlers backstage or even call the police. Like a person with common sense would.

Even though Kaede gave the likes of Soujiro Seta a run for his money, she was merely stick-fighting against someone as sturdy and resilient as Gan, who survived even the most fatal of Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu techniques using a real sword.

Granted, he was hypnotized into thinking he had died, but he was still a tough son of a gun. Beating him with sticks would not cut it. She needed to use her blades to stand a chance.

Unbidden, Morinaga then remembered Kinta Minakata's answer to her question back at the Sakaguchi Dojo.

"I'm on no one's side. I don't want what happened to Shimabara to happen to my family. Not again."

To which she responded, "Whatever happens to your family would just be karma for what you did to mine!"

Yahiko stood up from his seat. "I've got to go, Marimo. I have to stop those two!"

"Eh?" Marimo said, just noticing him move. "But isn't this part of the show?"

"It doesn't look like it to me!" he said.

A sickening crack of the bat hit Morinaga upside the head, drawing blood.

Yahiko shouted, "NOOO! Kaede! Gan, you son of a bitch! Someone stop the goddamn match!"

She then countered with a Ryu Kan Sen (Dragon Wrap Flash) at the back of Gan's own head.

"!?" Yahiko was left speechless. He didn't know what to say.

The glint in Kaede's eyes had changed. Something awoke deep inside her thanks to that crushing blow to her head.  

The Immovable Gan paused for a second, noticing the change in fighting style, before waving his bat around regardless, none the worse for wear.

"Time to swat down this annoying fly!"

But this time, he couldn't catch her. She was dodging better than before. Faster too.

'Shinsoki (God Speed),' thought Yahiko. Kaede had reached the high-speed footwork of Kenshin to complement her hand speed advantage.

Minakata's words put Kaede's mindset back to the time when she served as the Kagemusha (Shadow Warrior) to Kenshin Himura while Kinta himself served as Kagemusha to Shogo Amakusa.

When she really did act like the spirit and image of Battousai Himura. Amakusa himself taught her everything she knew about Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu.

The girl herself felt nostalgic for that time before Akahori helped with the genocide of the Hidden Christians.

If only she could turn back time. If only she could change the course of history.

If only she really were the Battousai.

Before the Indestructible Gan could react, the Battousai of Speed hit him flush with every variation of the Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu technique known as Ryu Kan Sen.

"Ryu Kan Sen Kogarashi! (Dragon Wrap Flash Gale!)"

"—Tsumuji! (Hair Spin!)"

"—Arashi! (Storm!)'

The howling winds from her relentless typhoon of attacks battered and blew apart bits and pieces of the mountain—of Mount Gan—but it would not move. It would not let her pass.

"That's more like it. I kind of felt that last one, kiddo! Do better!"

As another famous saying claimed, 'No matter how much the wind howls, the mountain cannot bow to it.'

The Fake Battousai then declared, "Ryu Sou Sen Garami! (Double Dragon Flash Head Attack!)" before spinning and focusing the entirety of her momentum towards breaking Gan's neck.

The move that "finished off" Gan at the Akahori Mansion (Formerly the Tani Mansion) now barely made a dent on him.

Gan's ripcord neck muscles splintered Kaede's sticks apart before they could even break one bone on his body or tear apart his thick neck, which he flexed hard enough to stop the sticks short from doing damage.

The Mountainous Gan chuckled as he flexed his biceps and pectorals. "Kumamoto (Shogo Amakusa) hit me harder than that, Samurai X!"

Yahiko's jaw dropped. Never mind Kaede doing better had she gotten access to her swords. How unstoppable would Gan be if he had his tetsubo (metal bat) with him instead?

Kaede wiped the blood from her face, shook her head, and blinked. She then saw the sorry state of her weapons. And grinned.

'Oh my. They look like oversized prison shivs now.'

"Are you done playing? Be serious for a minute, Samurai... GUAAAA!"

Gan barely raised his arms in time to deflect multiple stabs that would've punctured a lung or gauge his eyes out, with it instead slicing open the ridge of his brow.

"BWAHAHAHA! DEATHSTALKER STAB! SWARMING BARBS! SCORPION NEST! DIE, DIE, DIE, DIE, DIE...!"

She cackled and screamed as her blunt sticks for weapons were now shaped like daggers and spears. Unhinged, to say the least.

Finally getting nicked and cut apart enough to bleed at last, even Gan himself started to holler in laughter, his face a crimson mask.

"That's the spirit, Morinaga Kaede! If that even is your real name!"Gan screamed her whole name as he bludgeoned the cackling lunatic herself to the head and chest with sickening cracks of his bat whenever she got close enough to hit.

Like rabid dogs, they ripped apart each other with no regard for defense or safety.

"You're still incomplete! You're not fighting at your full potential! I will not lose to an incomplete person! Not while there's two or more of you inside of you instead of just one!"

"SHUT UP AND DIE, GORILLA MAN!"

Didn't Yahiko claim circus wrestling was for children? No, the clowns were for children. No child should see this barbaric display!

Before anyone in the audience could realize what had happened, all the wrestlers and strongmen from the Ebisu Circus ran into the ring and brawled with both the newcomers along with themselves then and there, signaling the end of the match by disqualification.

It became a free-for-all bloody brawl.

A melee that (smartly) showcased their whole roster of strongmen, bodybuilders, and wrestlers defeating the outsiders who dare infringe on their turf in a blowoff, one-off fued of sorts after those two took their spotlight away from them.

"Wait, what? That was all part of the show?" said Yahiko, who finally sat down and exhaled the breath he didn't realize he'd been holding in all this time.

What was even going on anymore?

Something about two factions running into the ring to take out Gan and Kaede, only to end up brawling with each other since they remembered they were rivals. Or something.

That was what he overheard the audience members say anyway. Those were the people who'd been keeping up with all the strongman wrestling matches of the Ebisu Circus.

Yahiko didn't regularly attend enough circus and carnival wrestling matches to keep up with their little storylines or changing allegiances.

"I told you so," Marimo chided. "Your friends did well. They stuck to the booking. I think. Also, I'm about to come on next myself for the show's main event. Wish me luck, Yahiko-chan!"

"Oh. Oh! Uh, good luck!" said Myojin, still pondering which part of the wrestling show was scripted and which part was unscripted.

When the (literal) dust settled from the dissatisfying ending of the wrestling portion of the show, one of the audience members remarked, "Wow, what a dusty finish."

***

Yahiko thought he was seeing things back in the Hiroshima bandit camp full of kidnapped women. Apparently, this was not the case.

He really did witness Kaede Morinaga doing Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu techniques instead of her Scorpio and Cancer Stances.

So aside from Kaede, Minoe had another personality. A third one. One who only knew Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu.

Like the spirit and image of Kenshin himself, thusly living up to her moniker: The Fake Battousai. The Battousai of Speed.

She was the same Fake Battousai who wiped out the Fake Battousai Group in Shinshushin led by the late Keisuke.

'Keisuke, huh?' It felt like Yahiko hadn't heard that name in ages even though he was in Shinshu just a few months ago, still nursing persistent sword wounds he got from fighting Soujiro Seta, Shogo Amakusa, and the Nisemono (Fake) Battousai.

The Fake Battousai Group was a joke. However, the Real Battousai Group that they based their name on was no joke.

It cost them their lives (and their male bits) to take up that name.

The prospect of fighting a whole group of Battousai-tier opponents like Shogo, Kaede, and Kinta (as well as perhaps several others) was not something anyone should take lightly.

So why did the prospect of doing so excite Yahiko Myojin so much? Maybe it was the influence of Sanosuke Sagara in him acting up. The guy was a "bad" influence to him, after all.

'But what about the Brigands Guild?' he thought. He'd only heard of them recently and how Kinta dispatched several of their members with his supreme iaijutsu skills.

Surely these brigands weren't as dangerous as Minakata or Morinaga, right? Certainly, the Ten Swords or the Six Comrades were stronger than them as well.

***

And now for the main event. The Human Cannonball that closed off the show.

The teenaged Marimo, although still quite thin, was much bigger than she was 6 years ago, when she was 10 years old. Thusly, her father had gotten her a bigger, more powerful cannon to allow her to do her dangerous stunt to sail across the audience with the right amount of firepower.

She posed and danced along to the beat of the music as gorgeous circus dancers and acrobats did the same down at the foot of the huge cannon.

They did the drum roll. Everyone was on the edge of their seats as she entered the cannon.

The ringmaster himself did the countdown for his daughter's main event. "Five! Four...!"

The rest of the audience joined in, including Yahiko.

"Three!"

"Two!"

"One!"

Kaboom. The cannon roared and the earth rumbled. Off went the Flying Marimo.

Everyone stood up to try and follow the whizzing blur that was Marimo across the big top and into her targeted net.

Yahiko, a trained martial artist, was able to catch sight of the full arch of her flight.

It was so beautiful. She flew like a swan taking a dive at a lake as she went through multiple flaming hoops and then landed on the safety net down below.

This was a routine action for her that she did twice a day, which belied the real dangers of such an act.

And just like that, within 5 minutes of drawn out anticipation and a second of climax, the show was finally over.

"Thank you and good night, everyone! I love Yokohama!" said Marimo to the crowd.

The audience erupted in claps and roars of approval, which was especially unusual for a Japanese audience to do due to their culture of politeness and public etiquette. Marimo deserved the standing ovation, though.

Yahiko came over to Marimo after the whole troupe went through their curtain call. He caught her signing autographs, blowing kisses, and waving to the milling crowd. What a superstar.

"What was it like, getting shot out of a cannon?" he asked her after he caught up with her, when she was done working the crowd.

She replied, "It's hard to describe. It's like riding the most intense, wildest bronco, but the horse has wings and you're flying in the air! With no saddle! There's a big boom and a second later, you're flying through the air, unfettered and untethered by anything. It's the best feeling in the world!"

They then went out of the tent through the staff exit, away from the exiting crowd of satisfied customers.

They walked together, with her struggling to keep pace with him. He slowed down his walk to accommodate her.

Afterwards, they heard a whistle followed by a small boom. More whistling booms, crackles, and pops followed.

They looked up into the sky.

Sure enough, fireworks painted the black canvas with fire flowers of light and sound.

The bright and flowery sparks in the heavens changed the lighting around them from red to blue to yellow and every color in between. Their mood shifted with these heavenly variegations.

It was like they'd been transferred into another world. Everything suddenly looked otherworldly. Almost dreamlike.

"Hey, what's with the fireworks?" Yahiko asked. "Is there a festival nearby or...?"

"You didn't know? This is our last show of the month for Yokohama," she said. "By tomorrow, we'll be packing up and traveling to Fukuoka. We added fireworks in our last night as a show of appreciation to the people of Yokohama for making our trip here a smashing success."

"Oh. Well, then! This is a great send off, if that's the case," he said. "The Ebisu Circus has become better than I remember it."

She chuckled. "Thanks, Yahiko-chan. I'm glad. We were practicing hard all month and in this particular show, everything just clicked."

Before they knew it, they were standing on a hill, overlooking the flowery lights above.

What a magical night. It was almost... romantic, to say the least.

Too romantic.

What was with this mood?

'Stop it,' he reprimanded himself. 'Stop thinking such thoughts.'

He then turned his head in time to meet eyes with his second crush.

They looked into each other's eyes and got lost in them. This time they couldn't tear themselves away from their gazes.

Myojin's heartbeat went a mile a minute. Nothing else short of swordfights and sparring matches made his heart go crazy like this.

Marimo closed her eyes and parted her mouth slightly, her head moving towards Yahiko's.

He himself closed his eyes.

Their lips were about to touch.

He then saw a vision of a crying, bawling Tsubame in his mind's eye.

***

No. This was wrong. He shouldn't do this.

'Stop right now. Don't make Tsubame cry.'

He shouldn't do something that could make Tsubame Sanjo despair if she ever found out about it.

'She doesn't need to know,' a voice at the back of his mind whispered to him. A sinister voice.

'No. She won't need to know because nothing will happen here,' his inner voice of reason countered.

Yahiko finally decided to come clean, grabbing hold of Marimo's shoulders before she could lean in for their kiss. This startled her.

"Y-Yahiko-chan...?"

"I'm sorry, Marimo. I already have a girlfriend."

The glint of hope and expectation in Marimo's eyes (that Yahiko noticed just now) was extinguished with those simple words.

"What? Huh. Oh."

There was a pregnant pause between the two of them.

"Is it the crazy girl that looks like Kenshin-san? Samurai X-san?"

"WHAT? No!" he exclaimed, saving himself from tripping face-first to the ground.

Yahiko then took a deep breath, composed himself, and said, "Her name is Tsubame. Sanjo Tsubame. She's my coworker at a maid cafe back in Tokyo. I met her before I met you. We ended up together while you were long gone, touring the nation with your circus."

Another second or two of awkward silence passed between them.

"Are you sure it's not the cute girl with the hair bow? The one that kind of looks like Kaoru-san?"

"DOUBLE NO! Ew! Like I'd ever date a look-alike of Raccoon Girl! Kaoru's like a big sister to me! Gross!" said Yahiko. He then stuttered, "...H-Hey, Marimo! Are you okay?" after seeing the face she made.

Marimo smiled at him with glistening eyes as the fireworks finally died down.

"Ehehehe. Looks like I've just been dumped."

***

As Yahiko went back to the inn he stayed at, exiting a rather eventful circus variety show, his head filled up with various thoughts although his heart felt altogether empty.

He ultimately did the right thing in the end.

Even though he sure did take his sweet time to do so. What the hell was he thinking anyway?

He shouldn't lead a girl around when he was already taken, even though he wasn't even completely aware of her feelings up until the last second.

'Sorry, Tsubame. Sorry, Marimo.'

Wait. Was he forgetting something? Was it Gan? Did he leave Gan behind?

No, screw the Goofy Gan. Yahiko wasn't even supposed to go to the circus tonight in the first place. He was forced because Gan was up to no good once again. So let him rot, wherever he was!

No, he shouldn't make excuses. No one forced him to go to the circus to see Marimo.

He'd been tailing her around like a lost puppy ever since they met each other again at the post office. He totally led her on even though he didn't intend to do so.

He should've seen the signs. Or maybe he did notice them but he didn't want to be presumptuous.

He should've nipped this issue right at the bud from the start. Because of his carelessness, he ended up making a girl cry. He was the worst.

The Tokyo Samurai Descendant then felt a chill down his spine.

He thusly ducked before a Tsuki thrust from behind could hit him at the back of his neck, feeling its murderous intent in full.

He turned in time to see a familiar face. Too familiar, to be honest. 'Dammit, I forgot to attend training!'

"AHA! There you are, Joshua-kun!" shouted the blonde bombshell Satsuki Sakaguchi/May Brooks of the Musou Madden School. "I've been looking all over for you! You've been skipping our sparring sessions again, haven't you? I've waited all day!"

"Ah, Satsuki! I can explain!" Yahiko said, though he did not feel all that confident with his (lack of an) explanation. He then heard a cackle from behind him.

"Hahahaha! Iiiinteresting," said Minoe, who'd actually been standing behind Myojin all this time.

Or rather, said Minoe after his wig and eye patch were blown away by the shockwave of air produced from Satsuki's pole thrust, resulting in him awakening his "Kaede Morinaga" persona.

'Ah! Since when did he...?' thought the Son of Tokyo Samurai. 'I mean, she! I mean, whatever!'

"Who is this cheeky bimbo anyway, Urchin Head? I'll mess her up," asked Kaede with a yawn while rubbing her eyes. Practically half-awake.

"She's not a bimbo, Minoe! I mean, Morinaga! It's Satsuki, Chizuru's weirdo gaijin friend who thinks she's Japanese!" said Yahiko, but Minoe, well, Kaede didn't hear him. 'I guess Morinaga hasn't formally met Satsuki yet!'

"She better watch herself. I'm not in the mood for shenanigans. That meat shield you call a friend really pissed me off earlier."

"Hey! Who are you calling a bimbo? What's gotten into you?" asked Satsuki, who brushed her golden hair back then fell into the Waxing Stance of her naginatajutsu school. "Even if it's you, Minoe-chan, I won't let such a comment slide!"

"Oho. You dare approach me?" said Kaede, who tied her unfurled hair up to a high topknot ponytail then unsheathed her sword and dagger weapons.

"What's going on here?" asked Chizuru, the fourth wheel of their group, who ran into the would-be "crime scene" with click-clacking boots as she fixed her large hair bow.

"Joshua-kun stood me up on our date!" answered Satsuki, playing the victim.

"That brute! Kick his ass!" the Raikouji Heiress said, believing Miss Brooks immediately. "What would your girlfriend back in Tokyo say about this? Cheater!"

"Hey, hey, hey! Now hold on a minute!" said Myojin. "Don't pick sides! And you, don't call our sparring matches 'dates'!"

"An opening! DEATHSTALKER...!"

"...And you! No fighting, dammit!" he said as he parried the sword with Kenshin's sakabatou and jumped in between Kaede and Satsuki to break up their burgeoning cat fight.

They soon after became an entanglement of limbs and clothes.

"Out of my way, Urchin Head...! Eeeek!"

"Ah wait, just where do you think you're grabbing, mister?!"

"Blimey! Joshua-kun! You're so forward! My heart belongs to Kinta-sama, though!"

"...I'm sorry! It was an accident!"

Just then, all four of them—three excitable girls in various states of undress due to wardrobe malfunctions from the scuffle who pushed, pulled, and tugged on the shirt and pants of a similarly disheveled guy every which way—stopped cold when it dawned to them who had been quietly watching them all that time.

And understanding how suggestive they all looked to any passerby who saw them without any context.

"So which one of these lucky girls is Sanjo Tsubame exactly, Yahiko-kun?" Marimo asked with the sweetest of smiles.

Oh no. Yahiko had been demoted from "chan" to "kun"

"M-Marimo, it's not what it looks like...!"

God. Damn. It. That was the absolute worst thing he could've said. Famous last words from many a man caught cheating with floozies.

"How dare you play with a woman's heart like this! Have you no shame? You... you... filthy animal! Perv! Womanizer! Two-timing scoundrel! You're an enemy to all women! "

"NOOOO! Marimo, you've got it all wrooong!"

The ensuing slap was so crisp, its sound reverberated all the way to the nearby docks.

Oh well. There were worse ways to end one of your first crushes than to be mistaken for a playboy by your crush.

'Sayonara, Marimo,' Yahiko thought with tears streaming down his cheeks and a wry smile on his face as he saw Marimo's svelte silhouette retreat into the distance with his blurry eyes.

Even though he developed feelings for Marimo as well, he still met Tsubame first and ultimately fell for her the hardest when push came to shove.

"Who the heck was that?" asked May as she brushed and tucked a lock of her blonde hair behind her ear and pulled her sleeves back to her shoulders. "Mary Moe? Marie Mo?"

***

To Be Continued...

Mary Moe... She's a vegetarian!

So here's to having another filler episode character incorporated into the story. First Shogo, then Shura, now Marimo. They join the ranks of the reworked Kaita and Misanagi from the infamous Black Knights saga of the third season of RK.

Danke, Abdiel

[gabriel-gabdiel]

R.I.P. Jason David Frank (1973-2022)

[gabriel-gabdiel]

He remembers our time together differently.