Age of Darkness (36 page)

The two guards standing on patrol took
notice of Yuri and unsheathed their weapons, holding them out in defense as the
dark figure continued forward. “Stop, in the name of the king!” one of the
soldiers demanded. “What is your business here?”

Yuri’s arm flickered, and two throwing
knives hurled from his sleeves and buried themselves into the throats of both
guards, silencing them. They collapsed in a heap on the grass, their blood
staining the plants. Yuri didn’t bother to touch the corpses and simply stepped
over them, continuing onward to the jail. He grasped the doorknob and raised
his eyebrow when he saw that it was locked. A small slide near the top of the
door slid aside, and a pair of eyes replaced it.

“Who’s there?” a man’s voice growled.

Yuri responded by kicking the door with a
tremendous amount of force, ripping it off of its hinges and crushing the man
behind it in a swift moment. With a loud creak, the door slid down the stairs,
the corpse underneath. The werewolf continued forward, stepping on the broken
door, and moved into the darkness. Within moments, the shadows began to swallow
him and he found himself in pitch-blackness. His hands were clenched at his
sides as his eyes began to glow a beastly red.
I’m going to save her and
kill all of these bastards that made her suffer. They’ll all pay for this!

“Now, now,” a voice said from in front of
Yuri. “That’s not exactly the right thoughts to be having, is it?”

Yuri’s eyes widened when an image flickered
before him. He hadn’t seen this coming. How was it possible? A fist collided with
his diaphragm and sent him rocketing through the air and back up the stairway
from whence he came. He gasped, flying through the doorway and smashing into
the courtyard, ripping dirt from the ground as he rolled head over heels at an
uncontrollable speed. He jammed his feet into the ground as he tried to catch
his foothold, but maintaining balance at such speeds was near impossible. He
fell once more and landed heavily on his back, panting and gasping for breath.
His eyes were wide with shock at what had just happened.
That was no
ordinary punch. No human could throw me this far. That had to be a Bount! But
what the hell are they doing here?

***

Keimaro was enjoying himself and laughing
with Aika as he twirled her once more on the dance floor. He dipped her
finally, bringing her close to the ground. He held her tightly, and she blinked
a few times at the advanced move. By now, the rest of the nobles had gathered
around to watch the two dance. Though Keimaro had lacked confidence in his
dancing prior to coming to this ball, he was already the star.

The ground rumbled, and Keimaro quickly
pulled the princess back to her feet, glancing around at the castle. The
glasses were rattling around them as thundering explosions echoed from outside.
What is this? An earthquake?
That was when Keimaro remembered.
Yuri.

“Princess, get to safety immediately. I’ll
be right back. Make sure everyone stays inside!” Keimaro yelled, beginning to
sprint through the crowds of nobles that separated at the sight of him. If this
was Yuri, he would have to put on his mask in order to make sure that soldiers
didn’t see him protecting a rebel. That would blow his cover immediately. He
broke into a sprint out of the door and ran past Judal, who glanced at him.

“Where the hell are you going? We need to
stay and guard the princess! Let the rest of the guard handle it!” Judal
yelled.

“I have a feeling something bad is going to
happen if I don’t get out there!” Keimaro called over his shoulder as he dashed
the hallways toward his room. He hoped that Judal wasn’t following him. Thankfully,
he didn’t. What the hell was Yuri thinking? What was all this noise that he was
making? The entire castle was shaking, leaving Keimaro with the uncomfortable
feeling that something was happening beyond Yuri causing chaos. Someone out
there was matching Yuri’s power. A Bount.

Keimaro staggered into his room and slammed
the door shut behind him, ripping off his tuxedo and tossing it onto his
mattress. He reached under his bed, pulled out his cloak, and swiftly threw it
over his body. Reaching into his cloak, he took out his mask. The boy exhaled
as he looked through the eye-holes of the pale-white mask. He had to put this
thing on again. He slid the mask over his face and grunted as it began to
attach itself to his flesh, binding with his skin. He breathed, his voice
completely altered now to become a deep metallic echo. He stepped outward and
onto the windowsill of his room, where he admired the brilliant view once more.
Here we go.

The boy leapt out of his window and out
into open air, flipping through the free space. His black cloak flapped in the
wind, and his hair blew back, his eyes squinting as he soared down the side of
the tower, falling near the castle. He kicked outward and ejected a jet of
flame behind him that sent him flying sideways diagonally through the air
rather than simply straight down. As the Shokugan activated in his eyes, he
began to feel an abnormal burn in his chest. He winced, grasping at his heart
for a moment before the pain faded.

Looking over the grounds, he spotted Yuri
battling a black-cloaked figure. A Bount.
Not just any ordinary Bount. It’s
him
.
Keimaro’s eyes widened when he saw the bald man cackle aloud, a familiar
laugh that pierced his eardrums. “
Junko!
” he roared, releasing more
flames behind him to propel himself forward.

***

Yuri panted, his ribs aching from Junko’s blows.
The bald man was extremely fast, and his magic controlled darkness to the point
where even Yuri didn’t know its limits. It was nighttime, and the Bount was at
his strongest. Would he even stand a chance against this guy? He didn’t have
unlimited time. Soon, soldiers would come by and overwhelm them, and they would
both probably be captured. That was not the best plan.

“Well, isn’t this a tale of beauty and the
beast!” Junko laughed hysterically, putting a finger to the bridge of his nose.
“The werewolf is trying to save a starving beauty underneath the castle! My,
my, Yuri! I’ve always seen you as the angry type, but recently you’ve been all
calm and collected. Where’s the fun in that?” He shrugged in an exaggerated
fashion. “Come on, my big, burly beast! Show me the rage!”

“Don’t piss me off, baldy,” Yuri snarled,
his teeth sharpening to daggers, his eyes red like two hot coals. “I’ll rip you
apart—”

“Then do it!” Junko urged him, still
giggling. “Go on!”

“
Junko!
”
a deep, echoing
voice roared, and Yuri glanced up to see Keimaro coming downward at incredible
speed—and it looked like he didn’t intend to stop. Jets of flame emitted from
the boy’s feet as he slammed into Junko at full speed, obliterating the earth
with a giant explosion. The two figures began to skip across the royal
courtyard like skipping stones, bouncing off of the earth and smashing clumsily
into the mansions of nobles. Massive chunks of debris fell to the earth as the
ground began to rumble from the force of explosions. Any ordinary human would’ve
died from such a fall.

Yuri watched as dozens of people began to run
from their homes in the noble district, sprinting in the direction of the
castle, where they hoped their king would offer refuge. Others ran in the
direction of the city in an attempt to escape the battlefield entirely. Yuri stared
for a moment at the destruction before racing after Keimaro and Junko to see
the results of the explosion.

***

An endless ringing echoed in Keimaro’s ears
as he blinked a few times. Dust floated around him, and he could see pieces of
debris everywhere. Flickering flames licked the ground, eating away at the
courtyard’s grass. Two shadowy figures were exchanging blows, their silhouettes
the only thing that Keimaro could see. It was Yuri fighting Junko without a
doubt. The boy began to roll onto his hands and knees, his bones aching. He had
survived the huge fall, but even he questioned the logic behind that. He
understood that he was a member of the Hayashi clan, so he would survive things
that ordinary humans wouldn’t. But the jump from the top of the castle to the
bottom was farther than anything he had ever tried before, not to mention the
fact that he had driven Junko through multiple mansions and destroyed most of
the courtyard. What kind of an idiot enters a fight like that?

Keimaro pushed himself to his feet, swaying
slightly. He watched as one of the silhouettes knocked the other to the ground
with a swift punch. The shadow turned and began to walk in his direction. The
boy’s breath was heavy, echoing through his mask. He grasped the hilt of his
sword and slid it from his sheath. His eyes widened when he saw that it was
Junko who emerged from the clouds of dust.
How is this possible? He should have
been extremely injured from my landing. How did he defeat Yuri?

“Like this,” Junko said, reading the young
boy’s mind and pointing over Keimaro’s shoulder.

A burst of blood splattered onto Keimaro’s
chin and throat. His heart was pounding rapidly, and his breath became heavy,
transforming into gasps of pain. A steel blade protruded from his stomach,
skewering straight through his body as if he were nothing but a slab of meat.
His eyes were wide with fear as he watched Junko, all of his energy draining as
the blade slowly slid back out of his body. His legs gave out, and he collapsed
onto his knees, his eyes dazed.
Who…?

“Oh my, oh my!” Darius’s cheerful voice
said as the prince walked around Keimaro with a chuckle, tapping his sword to
his shoulder. The blade was completely coated in Keimaro’s blood. “It seems
that it didn’t take as long as I thought it would to eliminate the infamous
Keimaro Hayashi,” he said, reaching down on the ground and grasping the golden
locket that had dropped from his cloak. “Ah. Or should I say Riku Hikari?”

General Mundo stepped onto the other side
of Keimaro from the smokescreen of dust. He drove his fist into the boy’s face,
and the mask shattered, leaving Keimaro in splintering pain as it crumpled to
pieces on the grass. The boy fell onto his back, crimson liquid coating the ground
beneath him. “It wasn’t hard to make you come out of the shadows after all,
Keimaro. I have been watching you for a while.”

All of these guys work with the Bounts?
Keimaro’s eyes darted from Mundo to Junko to Darius. He never would’ve
guessed that Darius would’ve been with the Bounts. As for General Mundo, he’d
had his suspicions, but now it was too late. Mundo had been the one spying on
him in the library. Mundo had been the one to set up this fight with Darius, to
force Keimaro to use his Shokugan in front him. Everything was all planned out.
And he had fallen right into the trap.

“Drag him to the ballroom,” Darius said
with a smile, reaching down to Keimaro and grasping the small chain that hung
from around his neck. The key had been hidden in his shirt, but it was quickly
yanked out from his neck. It dangled from the prince’s hands in front of
Keimaro. “So much conflict over such a small item, hmm? Junko, go get me the
chest. It’s time to end this and bring forth, finally, my age of darkness.”

By the time Keimaro actually reached the
ballroom, he was beginning to lose consciousness. His hands were covered in his
own blood, and the nobles gasped in shock at the grotesque image as he was
dragged before the king, who stood in complete disbelief. Keimaro was thrown
forward and hit the floor with tremendous force, left in a daze. The marble
floor was cold, and he didn’t bother moving. He could hear Aika’s muffled
screams as she attempted to rush forward, but guards held her back.

“What is the meaning of this?” the king demanded.

“This is your infamous Keimaro Hayashi,
milord. Why,” General Mundo said, grabbing Keimaro by his hair and forcing his
hair back for the king to see his face, “you can even see bits of the mask on
his face. We caught him for you, as you ordered.”

“Riku?” the king said, shocked. “But if he
were Keimaro … he could’ve assassinated me this entire time. Why would he wait?
You…,” he said, looking at Darius as he sauntered through the crowds of nobles.
“Darius?”

A knife hurled through the air, burying
itself in the king’s throat and slamming the old man to the ground. His choking
sound was drowned out by the screams of terror from the noble audience.
However, no one was allowed to leave the ballroom. The guards had made sure of
that.

Darius walked over to his father’s sapped body
and reached down to look into the royal blue of his father’s dying eyes. Within
moments, the king was dead. The prince’s face bore not a single sign of
remorse, for it was completely devoid of emotion. He simply reached down and
picked up the crown off of the fallen king’s head. In a single moment, the
entire ballroom silenced. Aika stood staring in absolute shock, her lips
quivering at her father’s corpse. Then she turned her attention to Keimaro, who
was bleeding out in front of him. She rushed to him, shoving guards aside. Her
father was gone … but at least she might be able to save Keimaro.

General Mundo simply smiled and allowed
Keimaro to be cradled in the princess’s arms, taking a step back as he nodded
to Darius.

“I am your new king,” Darius boomed,
placing the crown upon his head. “Those who oppose me as their ruler step forth
now. My father is no longer capable of upholding his throne, nor is he worthy
of this crown.”

“And neither are you!” a noble yelled.

Darius raised an eyebrow in amusement at
the comment and chuckled, nodding his head. He clicked his fingers, and guards
grabbed the man and forced him onto his knees. The noble shook, terrified, as
he stared at the ground, unable to meet Darius’s cold gaze. The new king began
to slowly pace with his hands behind his back. He stopped in front of the
noble.

“Everyone else will now bow before the new
king.
Bow.
” On command, all of the people in the room fell to their
knees, bowing before their new king. Some were more reluctant than others. Some
had to be forced onto their knees by guards. Darius unsheathed his sword with a
swift motion and raised his blade over his head. “You see, this is the fate of
those who oppose me.” His blade slashed downward, tearing across the noble’s
chest. Blood spurted into the air as the man screamed in agony, doubling over
onto the ground. Nobody moved forward to help him as he bled out on the marble
floor—they feared for their own lives. In only moments, he was dead.

Darius slid his weapon back into his sheath
and turned to his younger sister. “Go on, heal him. I know of your power,
little sister,” he said with a small smile. “You see, I know of everything.
There isn’t a secret that you can hide from me any longer.”

Aika stared at her brother in disgust,
reaching down to Keimaro’s pale, frail body. She placed her hand gently over
the bleeding wound, and her hand began to glow a bright white light. The flesh wove
back together as if time itself were reversing. The blood was absorbed into the
wound like a sponge as the skin kneaded into place. In only seconds, the wound
was closed, and the color had returned to Keimaro’s face.

“What have you done, Darius?” the princess
screamed, turning to face her brother with tears in her eyes. “That was our
father! He’s done nothing but care for us our entire lives, and this is how you
repay him? We have no reason to—”

“Power,” Darius said. The single word
silenced Aika, and the prince laughed. “Isn’t that what it’s been about all
along? The only reason I decided to take up arms and fight for our empire is
for power. I was granted the ability to command subordinate men to give their
lives for whatever cause I chose, but that power wasn’t enough! I will rule
this continent and hold power over all. Haven’t you known this all along,
sister? There are those who are born to rule and those who are born to be
ruled! Our father had his era of fun and games, but I am here to ensure that we
dominate over everyone in this world. No one will be able to stand up to our
empire with me as king! Any opposition will be crushed, whether it’s outside or
inside my empire!”

“Now you sound like the monster that I came
here to kill…,” Keimaro muttered weakly, slowly pushing himself into a sitting
position. He chuckled with a shake of his head. “You know, I always found it
weird. I don’t care if all of you nobles look at me as a monster now, but only
moments ago, you respected me. There is no difference between the Hayashi clan
and ordinary humans. But, while I was posing as an ‘ordinary human,’ I noticed
something odd. Your father didn’t seem like he was the monster that I came to
Bassada to kill. It was you—you led the Bakaara massacre. In fact, it was your
idea to invade Bakaara all along, wasn’t it?”

“You got me,” Darius said with a sly grin,
“and I’m happy to tell you that you’ll feel the same pain that you felt before,
soon.”

“What?”

“I told you that I know everything.”

Keimaro’s eyes widened when he thought of Z’s
mansion. Darius knew about that, too? His hands were clenched into tight fists
at his sides as he stared at the new king. What had become of them? “I’ll kill
you, you disgusting bastard,” he snarled and watched as Junko walked back into
the room with the chest gripped in his hands.

“Oh my, it looks like you’re getting Kei
all hyped without me!” Junko said as he set the chest down heavily onto the
ground. All of the nobles stood back and watched in awe as Darius pulled out
Keimaro’s key and began to walk to the chest.

“Darius, stop it!” Yuri’s voice yelled as three
guards pulled the werewolf inside and forced him to kneel beside Keimaro. His
face was covered in heavy bruises, and he gasped as he watched helplessly while
the prince inserted the key into the chest and threw open the latch, lifting
the lid. “You don’t know what will happen if you do this. The world will be
thrown into darkness! Humanity as we know it will perish! You won’t have the
power that you desire. All that will happen is corruption. You will die as
well.”

Darius reached down into the chest and
pulled out a tiny silver whistle. He chuckled as he held it up into the air,
glancing at Yuri and Keimaro over his shoulder. “I don’t think you understand.
This is my era. An age of darkness is coming, boys—the darkest storm that this
world will ever see. You can either face the tempest and be engulfed by the
shadows alone, or you can join me in the eye of the storm, where I will be your
ruler.” He raised the whistle to his lips and said, “Long live the king.” Then he
blew.

***

In that moment, the earth began to quake
rapidly. The Forbidden Forest shook as the trees whipped back and forth.
Monsters and beasts of all types raced from the forest line to stagger out onto
the fields outside of Bassada. The earth split as a massive fault shot across
the ground, opening a giant sinkhole that swallowed everything in its path. A
roar split the air, mimicking an earthquake. A huge claw shot from the hole,
squashing trees underneath its gigantic grasp, and the king of beasts began to
haul itself out of the darkness of the forest. Large, bone-like structures
flapped into the air with webbing that formed giant wings. Black scales that
were stronger than steel covered the colossal beast, coating it in protective
metal plates. Its eyes gleamed like two emeralds the size of boulders. They
blinked a few times as the creature flapped its wings once, pushing the lower
part of its body out of the abyss. It shook its graceful, monstrous head and
snorted, smoke rising from its nostrils. Hind legs gained their foothold,
smashing trees as the majestic beast stood upon the earth. The beast opened its
mouth to reveal its sword-like teeth and released a jet of flame into the air,
covering the sky in roaring fire.

The dragon had awakened.

***

“Now,” Darius said, spreading his arms with
a wicked grin as the castle began to shake furiously from the force of the
dragon’s roar. “Embrace your inevitable doom and accept me as your new king!
Let’s hear the world quake in fear!” With a thud, the dragon landed on top of
the castle, ripping open the ceiling of the room with a single slash of its enormous
claw. Debris rained down from the ceiling as nobles screamed and scattered, fleeing
from the fierce beast.

Keimaro stared with widened eyes at the bright
emerald gleam of the dragon’s eyes as it snorted, prying apart the ceiling
until there was nothing left but the open night sky. The boy’s eyes flickered
to a slight movement from the top of the dragon, and he saw a man stand up from
the beast’s mane before he leapt down, landing in front of Darius.

Kuro Hayashi.

The man had spiked black hair that was
slicked back aside from a few strands that fell forward, casting shadows over
his red eyes that truly resembled a demon’s. He seemed ageless, ancient, and
youthful all at once despite the fact that Keimaro knew that he was hundreds of
years old. The man slid his hands into the pockets of his black cloak, which matched
those worn by the Bounts. He gave Keimaro a smile, a small necklace swaying as
he did so. “Ah, so it seems that you have succeeded in awakening me, Junko.
Well done. And who is this boy that we have before me today?”

“He is—”

“Why are you asking who he is rather than
who I am?” Darius demanded, stepping forward. “I am your king and therefore your
ruler. I am the one who awakened you. Not Junko.”

“Is that so?” the man said, glancing at
Darius over his shoulder. He flicked his wrist, and Darius’s entire body was
practically torn apart. There was no blade, no magic, no nothing. Crimson blood
simply splattered onto the floor, and the prince collapsed to his knees, shock
registering onto his face. The new king stared at the man, his hands shaking
and his face growing pale as a ghost.

Keimaro watched in shock.
How did he…?

“You … betrayed….” Darius coughed, his
throat filling with his own blood as he glared up at the man with disbelief,
his hand grasping a wound across his chest. “How dare…?”

The man swung his arm, and Darius’s body
writhed in a barrage of invisible slashes before finally collapsing onto the
ground in a heap, a pool of blood beginning to form around his unmoving corpse.
The cloaked man’s eyes opened slowly, lacking any remorse—and any emotion, for
that matter. He had not a care in the world for the murder he had just
committed.

He cracked his neck and sighed, stretching
his arm into the air with a small smile. “So! You are a member of the Hayashi
clan, no?” he said, kneeling in front of Keimaro. “My name is Kuro Hayashi, so
I guess you could technically call me your ancestor, huh?” He chuckled, but
Keimaro spat in his face, erasing the man’s smile. He rose to his feet and wiped
the spit off of his face with his hand. “The first couple of minutes of being
reawakened, and this is the treatment I get, huh?” He looked at Keimaro with a
raised eyebrow. “From the look in your eye, you understand pain. In fact, you
understand me, no? How the gods took everything from you and killed—”

Keimaro rose up to face Kuro, his eyes
shining red with rage. “The Bounts took my parents from me. No one else. In
other words,
you
are responsible for their deaths,” he said as he glanced
over his shoulder at Yuri, who was still on his knees. He walked behind Yuri
and touched the metal that cuffed his hands together. Keimaro’s hand released a
surge of fire into the cuffs, turning the metal bright red before it liquefied
and splattered onto the ground.

Kuro watched with keen interest, raising
his eyebrows with surprise at the flames that left Keimaro’s hand. “It seems
that we have quite the interesting specimen here, don’t we, Junko? Someone else
who is like me—or, rather, he is one-third of what I am.”

Freed from the cuffs, Yuri moved to his
feet, his spine writhing and stretching as his body sprouted white hair. His
irises flashed bright red, and his body morphed into a werewolf in a mere
instant, his claws sharp as knives. His snout elongated, and he snarled at the
sight of Kuro, showing off his beastly fangs.

“And a werewolf,” Kuro said with a smirk. “How
vicious.”

“Run,” Keimaro said to Yuri. “I’ll be right
behind you.”

Yuri looked at Keimaro for a moment with
glistening eyes and grunted. He turned and dropped to all fours, looking at
Aika and nodding. “Get on,” he growled.

Keimaro met Aika’s worried eyes and nodded,
turning to face Kuro as the princess mounted the werewolf. They scampered out
of the ballroom toward the courtyard where nobles and guards were yelling in
confusion.