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Post by Master Psychic on Feb 21, 2020 23:04:29 GMT
"To give you a little bit of insight about Azrael and what I want to accomplish. Perhaps now that all of you are together, you will be able to understand where I'm coming from." Aku said, still holding Diana's hand.
Dietz, with a bit of effort, managed to pull Diana away from Aku as far as possible.
"...We don't want to hear whatever comes out of your stupid mouth. Leave." Izanami said, with venom in her voice with her eyes covered by her hair as she stared at the floor.
"...Being angry with me will not change the situation you are in, Lady Izanami. And it will not change lady Nakiri's fate either." Aku said.
Izanami balled her hands into fists as the sword she was holding was shaking.
"...Shut up." Izanami said.
Aku raised his hand, lifting one finger towards Izanami.
"There's no point in running from the truth, it's time to accept that you-"
"SHUT. UP!"
SLASH!
Aku was now missing his head as it collapsed on the floor, rolling backwards towards the platform that leads to the next ship level, staring at Izanami with wide eyes and mouth as she was standing in front of his body with her sword aimed at the ceiling as she perfectly sliced his head off his shoulders.
His body was still pointing the finger at her before it eventually fell on it's knees and collapsed on it's side. Strangely enough, no blood came out of his body at all.
Izanami was seething angrily with saliva coming out of her mouth, looking downright murderous and glaring furiously at the seemingly dead Aku while Hercule and Dietz looked shocked.
"...Holy..." Hercule said, backing away.
"...Okay, Izanami, as much as it makes me happy to see you give this guy his desserts, he was just about to tell us something majorly important about this Azrael guy, you could of atleast waited for him to tell us and then cut his head off, just saying!" Dietz said, placing his hand on his mouth to stop himself puking out.
Nephthys's expression remained the same, she din't even flinch at Izanami killing him as she stared at his head, expecting something to happen.
"...I don't believe she truly killed him." Nephthys started.
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Post by IDEK on Feb 21, 2020 23:58:59 GMT
Diana, wide-eyed, stared at Izanami's sword.
Erinye had visibly winced, and turned around.. before looking to Nephthys when she spoke.
"Looks dead to me." Bacchus said.
"He felt dead when he grabbed my wrist too." Diana pointed out.
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Post by Master Psychic on Feb 22, 2020 0:15:29 GMT
“...Let’s check his pulse just to make sure.” Hercule said, looking at Dietz specifically.
Dietz, gulping, slowly walked towards Aku’s corpse and grabbed him by his wrist and held it up, it was cold.
“...No pulse. He is definitely dead as a doornail.” Dietz said, dropping his hand.
“...No one is truly dead in this Universe.”
Dietz turned around and nearly fell on his back as Aku’s head was staring right at them, still looking as calm as ever.
Izanami’s anger shifted into confusion and fear as Aku’s body slowly started to get up and backed away from the body and unintentionally bumped into Diana displaying all kinds of emotions at the same time.
Aku’s body aimed it’s hand at the head and it levitated off the floor, now floating above the neck hole, his bones and flesh reconnected with one another.
Aku placed his hands on his head and twisted it to the left and then to the right, the Royal Guard could hear the sickening sounds as he did so to re-adjust his head before looking back at the group, standing on the same spot as before.
“...W-what the hell are you?” Hercule asked, shitting his pants figuratively speaking as he stood in front of his team.
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Post by IDEK on Feb 22, 2020 0:57:38 GMT
"...He's undead." Bacchus blinked, "Just like everything else in this universe."
"This is more than just being undead.." Diana took a step back, startled.
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Post by Master Psychic on Feb 22, 2020 6:54:33 GMT
"...He is a fiend, I've sensed it since we came back into this vessel...but his aura is a lot more different than the regular fiends, he is..." Nephthys said.
Aku closed his eyes, letting out a long sigh.
"...Truthfully, this wasn't how I wanted to reveal myself but it seems I need to come clean with you all. The form that you see is mostly a mirage to hide my true form, one of my family's techniques." Aku said.
Aku then suddenly got engulfed by a pitch black aura, unveiling what he truly is.
He was a skeleton at this point, with shreds of skin hanging from him like clothes tatters, his robe and vest were old, torn and dusty, most of his hair was missing, the only thing that remained were blue strands with his ponytail, his jaw was wide with small red beady pupils peering from his eye sockets, staring at the group.
"I am cursed, for long decades I had been." Aku spoke without opening his jaw.
"...T-This just makes so much goddamn sense that it's not even funny." Hercule said, his face and eyes were pale.
"B-but, but, how!?" Dietz asked, startled and confused to even comprehend this revelation.
Izanami was speechless, breathing slowly as she looked as scared as everyone else as she dropped her sword on the floor from fright.
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Post by IDEK on Feb 22, 2020 17:30:05 GMT
"...How did this happen to you?" Erinye asked. "This couldn't have been caused by this place, or Minkah."
Bacchus's grip on his weapon only tightened, while Diana stared at Aku, her mouth moving as though trying to speak.
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Post by Master Psychic on Feb 22, 2020 18:02:50 GMT
"Yeah, you were born in 2, right, the only way you became like...this, is if you died in 6 so what gives!?" Dietz asked, freaked out by Aku's appearance.
Aku's changed back to how it was and his eyes were closed.
"...I could tell you, but I would guess that you would have a difficult time believing my words so instead...I will show you what lead to my demise...and to my suffering." Aku said.
He raised his black glowing hand up and spread a wave that covered the entire room, slowly changing the scenery as Izanami shielded herself with her arms thinking it was an attack while Hercule, Nephthys and Dietz looked at the wave as it went by.
The Royal Guard din't appear to be in the ship anymore, instead they were standing on a frozen wooden bridge placed between two mountain sides that looked familiar to Izanami and everyone else was covered in ice.
"...Where are we?" Nephthys asked.
"...This..is Shimo, as far as I can tell, a place from my Earth. The same place where the Chikara's were exiled on after their treachery." Izanami said, sounding surprised.
Dietz, confused, stared at the sky covered in stars as it looked like they were raining down from the sky while Hercule looked at the spot Aku was standing on and he wasn't there anymore.
"Huh, where did he go?" Hercule asked.
"The answers that you seek are right there." Aku said.
Everyone turned to the right and they could see Aku standing at the end of the bridge, with his back turned as he was staring at a group of people who were fighting dozens of blue haired people with markings around a icy hill with a burning shrine on top it and two people on top of that shrine.
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Post by IDEK on Feb 22, 2020 18:10:21 GMT
"Can all of you guys in 2 show people your backstories this way?" Diana asked.
"Probably just the magicians." Bacchus supposed.
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Post by Master Psychic on Feb 22, 2020 18:51:06 GMT
Izanami and Nephthys was closer to the scene while Hercule and Dietz remained in the back.
"...How are you able to just...show us all of this?" Hercule asked Aku.
"I am sharing with you my memories, and this memory represents the downfall of my family. This took place shortly after the giant beast was split into the tailed beasts and Minato Heiwa and my aunt, Ariana Chikara, passed away after defeating the beast. A week later, everyone found out about the people responsible for the beast's rampage and the guardians were sent to put an end to my family for their crimes, crimes that I wasn't a part of." Aku said, staring at the burning house.
There were 8 guardians present in the fight as one of them, Ramona, was standing on four legs, her pupils now looked like a cat's, surrounded by four Chikara's and gracefully dodged their incoming attacks with her agility and slashed at two of them with claws of ice, shredding their necks.
A younger Eduard holding his bayonets and a massive eyebrowless man wearing a sleeveless red armor with a red cowl around his neck with a red fabric around his mouth used as a mask were surrounded by the Chikara's who were materializing swords and spears in the air, launching at the two. The two got stabbed but managed to doge some of the weapons before Eduard charged in with his bayonets while the larger man's fists turned into stone and stomped the ground with his feet, causing the ice to crack and the Chikara's attacking them fell through the ice and broke their necks from the fall.
In the air, a brown haired man with a long ponytail, a bushy moustache wearing a long sleeved reg baggy shirt with baggy yellow pants was sitting on top of a large wave of sand that came crashing down on the army of demon looking animals and reanimated corpses, Isshi Chikara got buried by the sand avalanche and suffocated in it.
Also in the air was a younger man short purple hair covering the right side of his face wearing a black, blue and white robe sitting on top of a black and white bird, drawing something on a sheet of paper with a pencil while 7 long dragons, each having the color of the rainbow on their bodies were occuppied with floating around the Shrine and burning it down till they got crushed by two falling stars.
Three women were standing next to each other, back to back. A woman with blue eyes, short green hair wearing a white robe raised a fortress of vines that shielded them from poisonous needles launched by three Chikara's while a brown skinned woman with fluffy black hair wearing a purple robe was playing a clarinet and striking the needles with musical notes coming from her instrument and the third girl had short blue hair, orange eyes with rather shark like teeth, wearing a short sleeveless shirt, a black garment around her torso looking more like a peplos with her belly exposed and a short navy skirt and her arms turned into waterspouts that managed to struck two of the Chikara's out of the air.
"...Are these people...the guardians?" Nephthys asked, looking at each of them and their talents, taking note of every detail.
"One guardian is a powerful force to be reckoned with but fighting a group of them is the same as taking on a furious storm...and just as you would guess, my family did not survive this storm." Aku said.
Looking up at the shrine's roof, there was Celeste standing on it, glowing black as she aimed her hands towards the sky and three more stars came down, crashing down on the ground, the blast sent three of the guardians and a few Chikara's flying while hiding behind her was a younger Aku with shorter hair and wearing a red robe, looking very scared as he watched his family members getting killed one by one by the guardians while his entire house was slowly burning.
"...Were they actually planning on killing you aswell after they were done with those guys?" Dietz asked.
"...I do not know if they would of killed me too to finish off the bloodline completely, they never found me at the end of the battle." Aku said, staring at the sky as a crashing star phased right through him, which made sense considering it was just a memory.
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Post by IDEK on Feb 22, 2020 19:48:51 GMT
Erinye clutched at her own chest, while Theseus remained unconscious and critically injured.
"...I heard you got thrown off a cliff or something." Diana mentioned
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Post by Master Psychic on Feb 22, 2020 20:04:35 GMT
Aku simply nodded in confirmation as the scene continued to play out.
Celeste looked very frustrated as the numbers of her family were slowly decreasing before she turned to her son and grabbed hold of his shoulders.
"Aku, my little angel, you cannot die here, I will keep these fools at bay while you will be somewhere safe, the legacy of the Chikara can't end here." Celeste said.
Young Aku looked up at his mother, looking very scared.
"What about you mother? I don't want you to die." Aku said.
Celeste placed her warm hands on his cheeks, gently smiling at him.
"Do not fret, angel, I will survive and I will find you. I promise." Celeste said.
"...I believed her on that day...but now, I realize she was lying, she knew she had no chance of surviving on that day...but she made sure that I did." Aku said, with a little fraction of emotion in his voice.
Celeste turned away from Aku and aimed her hand at the base of the mountain, a star shaped gate appeared and Celeste picked up little Aku and threw him off the mountain, screaming on his way down before he landed right through the stargate and it vanished without any of the guardians noticing.
"No one saw me landing in the portal so they assumed that I died. Despite her power, my mother was defeated and vanquished from the mortal world." Aku said.
"...Did she knew where you would end up?" Nephthys asked.
"She din't, her throwing me in that portal was a last minute decision, she din't have a destination in mind, all that mattered to her was that I would survive, even in the end, she wanted me to live despite what all of you may think of her." Aku said.
Then, suddenly, a gust of sand engulfed Aku, blocking the Royal Guard's view as the scenario changed again and they were now standing in the middle of a desert at night, except Aku was missing.
The stargate opened up in the sky and young Aku, still screaming, landing roughly on the sandy ground.
"...You landed right in Universe 6 after that battle." Izanami said, staring at the younger version of Aku.
"Yes." Aku's voice answered but his adult self wasn't anywhere to be seen.
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Post by IDEK on Feb 22, 2020 20:52:24 GMT
"...Oh." Diana blinked. "That explains it.."
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Post by Master Psychic on Feb 22, 2020 21:28:49 GMT
The younger Aku slowly stood up, his robe covered in sand and looked around his surroundings as everything looked unreal in his eyes.
"When I arrived on this desert, everything looked so strange and unfamliar, it was a uncomfortable feeling like I din't belong here, the air itself was cold." Aku said.
Young Aku, slowly breathing, placed his hands around his arms and shivered with tears coming out of his eyes as he looked scared.
"But despite the surreal area, my mind kept flashing to the bloodbath, seeing every relative of mine dying in front of me and I believe I was gonna die with them too, then I had a realization....I was alone, utterly and horribly alone. A child stuck in the desert with no one at his side and with nothing to defend himself." Aku said, as his younger self placed his head against the ground and began sobbing quietly.
"...What did you do next?" Hercule asked, looking at the kid with a bit of pity in his eyes.
"I waited days for mother to show up and save me, but she never arrived and I had to look out for myself." Aku said.
The scene in front of them slowly transitioned to young Aku walking on the desert in the middle of the day before it turned to night, then back to day, night, it was a constant switch between day and night before it stops at young Aku, now holding onto a large stick as he was just making slow steps instead of walking, looking pale and tired.
"Many days passed and I was low on food and water, I had to survive on whatever I found on the ground even if it was just a small piece of meat or fruit and drink water from small ponds, the heat was deadly and at that point, my body was starting to give in, lacking the strength and energy to continue on." Aku said.
Young Aku began coughing before he dropped the stick and collapsed on the ground from exhaustion, breathing slowly as he weakly looked up at the sky with tired red eyes.
"At that point, I asked myself if I have done something wrong to deserve this, were my family's crimes so vile that I had to be punished in this fashion? Do I truly deserve just for being born? That is what I kept asking myself before my conscience slowly died down and went to sleep without realizing it." Aku said and his young self slowly closed his eyes and buried his face into the ground.
"...Is that how you died?" Izanami asked.
"Normally, yes...but it wasn't that case as you will see." Aku said.
It was day again and Aku was still conscious as a chubby woman with a tanned skin riding on a camel wearing a black veil on her head wearing a dirty short sleeved dress with a basket full of fruits placed on the camel's back arrived on the scene and gasped as soon as she saw the passed out young boy and got off the camel, rushing towards him to check up on him to see if he was alive.
"To my luck, a woman who was a travelling merchant crossed paths with me and out of the kindness of her heart, decided to take me with her to where her family was staying. She decided to save me, a stranger that she never met and never did anything for her, but regardless of that, she took pity on me and did not want me to die." Aku said.
"...That...is very sweet." Nephthys replied, looking touched as she placed her hand on her chest.
The woman placed Aku on the camel and it began walking till they reached a large tent that was big enough to fit five people in the middle of the night and brought him into the tent, inside was a old man wearing a dirty white robe with closed brown skin and next to him was a little girl with brown hair wrapped in a ponytail, gold eyes with arms covered in bracelets and wearing a dark yellow dress without shoes and both of them laid eyes on the kid the woman brought in, their entire tent was filled with food, water and things they were selling to others.
"The woman was living with her daughter and her father and helped get back on my feet by sharing with me their food and water." Aku said.
The daughter handed the woman a flask full of water and opened it, lowering it down into Aku's mouth and din't stop till it was out of water.
Aku coughed the water out before he opened his eyes and slowly turned his head to the family.
"W-what, where am I? Is this...the afterlife?" Aku asked.
"Shh, there, there, you will be fine. I saved you from becoming vulture food and brought you back here. Now, tell us, how did you end up on that desert alone?" The woman asked.
Aku, looking at the woman, stared down with a sad expression.
"...M-my family was being murdered, I was thrown into this place by my mother...I don't know where she is or if she is still alive...I'm...I'm the only one left. Please don't leave me alone." Aku said, wiping his tears with his sleeves.
The old man placed his hand on his shoulder with a welcoming smile on his face.
"We won't kick you out. What is your name, little one?" The old man asked.
"...My name...it's...it's Aku." Aku said, not looking at the old man.
"Aku? That's a weird name? What does it mean?" The little girl asked.
"...It means...Evil, from what I heard." Aku said.
"Evil? You don't look evil, you're nice. My name is Lily, my mother named me after a flower." Lily said.
Aku looked at Lily, studying her from her head to her feet.
"...It's nice to meet you." Aku nodded, blinking once.
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Post by IDEK on Feb 22, 2020 23:40:01 GMT
"...It doesn't look like you stayed with them." Erinye commented.
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Post by Master Psychic on Feb 23, 2020 7:22:33 GMT
"For the time being, I did. I had nowhere else to go and they gave me shelter, treating me like I was a part of their own family, it was strange and yet...I felt happy, in one way." Aku said.
The scene then changed to Aku and the mother who were in another village, selling products to villagers, then changing into the grandfather teaching him about the hieroglyphic alphabet by handing him a small tablet and Aku studied it carefully.
"I began learning a bit about this world and it's customs, it was clear as day that it was different from Universe 2 and it's traditions." Aku said.
The scene then transitioned to him and Lily picking up flowers together, then at one point while Aku wasn't looking, Lily covered his face in dirt and she did the same to herself, he turned to confused but she just laughed, having childish fun and even though he din't understand it, Aku himself slowly began to laugh aswell and the two ran off to play together somewhere.
"Despite my situation and where I was...I felt warm inside by their acceptance towards me, I was a complete stranger to them but showered me with kindness and love that I din't ask, I was starting to think that maybe this is where I actually belong...but miracles never last forever...it all ended on that dreadful night that changed my life forever." Aku said.
"The dreadful night?" Izanami asked, looking up at the sky as she couldn't see Aku anywhere.
The day turned into night with the moon in the sky and the sounds of horses neighing as the Royal Guard turned around to see a group of five people wearing white cloaks, veils around their mouths and turbans wrapped around their heads, riding on their horses and passing by the Royal Guard as they were heading towards the tent.
"Who are those guys?" Dietz asked, folding his arms.
"...Bandits." Nephthys frowned.
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