Night One Hundred And Fifty Six
Age 1991
The Catacombs...
"Hero?"
"North." Hero said flatly.
'Hey God...'
"'What?'"
'Is it just me or is Hero pissed? You feel these emotions to right?'
"'Meh... I've seen angrier...'"
"Oh Hero. It's a good thing you're here!" North said with wide eyes. "Look." He pointed his sword at Shelly, and Ken who were both bleeding out on the floor. "There are Bestia Macht that can take the forms of people!" He said with wide eyes. "You need to help me stop them! I think the entire Enforcers might be under their control! They keep thinking my idea is bad! That's how I know they're fakes! I'm a good guy, and Sissy always told me the Enforcers were good guys!"
Hero gave the man a look of pure pity as he shook his head. "I don't even need to ask Row if you're lying or not... You honestly believe that story don't you... It isn't me you're trying to trick is it."
"What are you saying Hero?"
Hero ignored the man walking past him. North watched him for a moment. Hero took his jacket and placed it over Ken, and Shelly. "Sit tight. I'm gonna take this guy down."
"The others?" Ken asked weakly.
"They'll be here."
"Y... You called them first right?" His silence was all she needed to know his answer. "Hero... Please... Please tell me you told the others where we were... Please don't tell me you're going to fight North on your own... Don't be dumb..."
"I'll heal you guys when I beat him." Hero said standing back up and facing North. "If I do it now you'll get in the way of our fight."
"Hero..."
North frowned as he eyed Hero up. "Why'd you take your jacket off?"
Hero raised his arm up as it morphed into its clawed form. "Because... I don't wanna be an Enforcer when I take you down. Nothing about what I'm going to do to you can be called heroic..."
"I see... You're one of the Bestia Macht aren't you-"
"I came down here planning out an entire speech you know." Hero said sighing. "I was gonna try to get through to you, but I heard about the missing kids, and coming through here I saw the remains, and I see Ken and Shelly. I was gonna try to save you North, save you from the despair that was clinging to you... But you know what. Screw it. You win. I can't save you, and I don't want to save you. I don't want to pull you from the despair clinging to you... I want to shove you down in it as deep as I can. Yet again I lost. So I'm not going to save you. I give up. You don't deserve my hope."
"Bestia Macht. I don't know what you've done with Hero, but I will find him. Like me he is an icon. A symbol of hope, justice, and love. A hero of justice. A superhero."
"You still think I'm a- You know what forget it. I don't care." Hero slammed his clawed arm into North as hard as he could sending the ice armor wearing man into one of the few walls that was left standing. Hero slowly turned back to Ken and Shelly for a moment. "Sit tight. I'll save you both. I can at least save someone. That much I know..."
"Hero..." Ken frowned as she watched him.
"Y... You better save us..." Shelly said trying to speak but having a hard time. "After all you owe me..."
Hero didn't say anything as he turned away from them and began to walk to the spot where North was. 'Hero...' The voice of Row said speaking in his mind. 'Can you do this...'
"'I'm sure Hero can win. In the state that sorry fool is in, he can barely fight. Hero far outclasses him right now.'"
'Winning isn't what I mean... Believe me, I've seen Hero win at impossible odds. What I mean was... Hero... Are you going to be able to kill this man? That's what you want isn't it? To murder him... Stop Irene from seeing the state her brother is in... You've never killed a human though... Even when you fought our mother, the female Hero, or when you fought that Mystery man, you held back, your killing intent. Can you step over the ledge and kill someone...'
"'Kid... Why not let me take over your body?'" God asked. "'Unlike Row, I'll give it back by the end of this?'"
'That's not fair! You can't just-'
"Shut up. Both of you." Hero's arm morphed into a drill as he finally reached North. "I have work to do." He slammed his drill arm down right as North got back up. North blocked the strike with his sword both of them having a match of strength. In his injured state North proved to be to weak, as Hero's drilled shattered his blade, and broke past the dragons head shredding it to bits and making North howl in pain as it began to rip past his ice metal arm, and into his fleshy wrist.
North jumped back, his right arm now nearly gone as he quickly reformed a much larger metal, and ice version of Hero's drill arm which he stabbed forward, but Hero's arm reverted into a claw and caught the drill. The drill ripped past the center of his large hand coming out the back, but Hero's clawed hand simply squeezed down crushing the ice drill and shattering it as North once again jumped back staring at Hero with wide eyes.
Hero ignored his pissed off looks as he bent down and picked up one of the metallic ice shards. He brought it up to his lips and bit into it, quickly swallowing the entire thing. His arm began to glow as he reformed it, with the new metal, and ice, and even some of the bones he picked up, fixing the damage with ice, bones, and metal. He squeezed his clawed hand into a fist a few times, the ice somehow not melting from the heat of his claws. "This will do..."
"D... Damn you..." North growled reaching into his pocket and pulling out more of the vials injecting them into his neck. North watched as the catacombs began to vanish, as did the snow, and his village. He now stood in a massive flaming hell scape, and in front of him he saw it. No mere Bestia Macht, but rather the actual devil himself covered in his thick muscles and his curved horns. The head of a goat, the wings of a bat, and the body of a man. "I get it... It all makes so much sense. Now I know I'm doing the right thing, Satan!"
"'Satan? My religion doesn't even have a devil?'"
'What did he take?' Row asked.
"'An enhancement drug I invented before Equations were a thing. It gave a person a massive power up. You silly mortals dubbed it God's Blood, though I didn't ever use my blood, so I don't know why it go such a name... It was discontinued due to the fact it made a person begin to see some messed up things...'"
'So those drugs are what made North evil-'
"'No... The person can easily tell what's real and what isn't... It may make you see things, but it doesn't alter your mind, or make you more evil or anything... He was always like this... All the drugs are doing, besides powering him up, are allowing him an excuse...'"
North gave a large grin as he reformed his dragon head and the mouth opened a beam of spiraling blue energy morphing out of it. He pointed it towards Hero his grin getting even larger. "Let's see how you like this! That claw won't be able to block this."
Hero gave a smirk as he stared at North. "You really have lost it haven't you... I won't block it. I'll dodge it."
"Ahh but... It's not for you." North slowly pointed the head away from Hero, and over to Ken and Shelly who's eyes went wide. "It's for the other demons."
"You bastard!" Hero was silenced as the beam fired a mass of blue energy firing out. Hero fired towards Ken and Shelly as fast as he could but quickly realized he wouldn't be able to move them both out of the way in time. "Change of plans." He slid in front of them and held his hand out right as the beam slammed into it. The beam began to easily freeze and shatter his right arm as it began to break.
Hero's screams soon followed as the beam began to wash over him and his legs began to shake. He gritted his teeth as hard as he could as he pushed with all his might.
"H... Hero?" Ken gasped out. She slowly managed to get to her feet dragging Shelly with her as they moved out of the way. "Hero don't die you idiot!" Ken felt her legs suddenly give out as she fell forward landing behind Hero and dragging Shelly with her. If he fail... That blast would hit all three of them, and judging by the screams of pain Hero was making it didn't look like he was gonna be able to hold on for much longer...
"D... Damn it..." Hero growled trying to fight the blast as he was pushed further back.
"Die... Die, die, die!" North laughed.
"Seriously Hero!" Shelly yelled. "Now would be a good time to prove you can save us!"
As she said this the beam began to once again over take Hero as he felt the ice crawl up his skin. 'Once again...' Hero thought for a moment as he felt his body grow cold. 'Once again I can't save them... North... I gave up on you. You beat me. I can't drag you out of despair... But Ken... Shelly... Max... Shiki... Kitsune... Light... I... Irene... I can save all of you... Next time... I just need to be better.'
For a moment his mind wandered. Leena, the doll, the old man, his brother, the female version of himself, Serenity, innocent people, the humans wrongfully turned into beasts, Rose, the kids, Shelly and Ken. Irene... Every time. Every time he always came up short. Even when he got his new weapon, or new arm, he always...
The weapons never worked...
'I just need... Something I can use to keep you all safe.' Hero gritted his teeth as he pressed into the beam with everything he had, his teeth actually beginning to crack as he pulled with all his might, grabbing more, and more, power. "I can be... I can be the shield that keeps them safe."
The beam exploded in a mass of light as Hero's arm began to reform. Not leveling up, rather changing much like it did the first time, and the second time. He reformed his arm, into not a weapon, but a shield... His entire right arm, was made out of the same slick grey metal it had been. It was the size of his normal human arm, and not the size of his clawed arm. From wrist down to his elbow, a grey shield was morphed into the arm. On the shield a demonic head was on the front of it. Ken and Shelly stared with wide eyes as Hero pointed the new arm at North.
'I... I don't get it? Hero... The real one... She only had two forms... How does he have a third?'
"'Do you really need to ask that?'" God asked.
'What?'
"'Hero's said it since the moment you first talked to him. He's Hero Law. He's his own person. Do you think the limits of the female Hero, effect him? This proves him true. He's done something she'll never be able to do. He's formed something to keep his friends safe... And in true Hero fashion, he copied Eins Licht...'"
"Shield Of Hope."
"What?" North asked frowning.
"That's the name of this shield." Hero said walking towards the man and spinning his arm on its joint. "This arm allows me to protect." He clenched his hand into a fist as a mass of green energy swirled around it, making it look as if it was on fire. "But it also allows me to shove me hope down the throats of you bastards."