#437
In times past, the three main goddesses of the Olympian pantheon (Hera, Athena, and Artemis) made Themyscira a safe haven for their chosen, the amazons.
However, thirty years ago, thirteen of these chosen women wanted to have children, and their progeny to come from them, from their wombs, instead of mere enchanted clay. So insistent they were that Hippolyta allowed them to return to Man's world to... do the deed, and then go back to the island.
They never actually asked for their children to be of the wrong gender. Then again, most of the Olympians were known for being fickle and, using more modern terms, jerkasses when it suited them.
Naturally, none of the impregnated amazons expected to bear male children, and most definitely didn't expect for all of them to give birth to sons. And that before they realized that the newborns had too been gifted with the gods' blessings.
Unwilling to do as some of her sisters asked, but also refusing to allow men to dwell in Themyscira, Hippolyta asked the gods for advice to solve this predicament for her, because she just didn't know what to do with the babies.
The god's solution to the dilemma? Gather the newborns and give them to Hephaestus, the olympian of the forge, who gladly took them in, raising them sternly yet with paternal love as they became both his helpers... and sons in all but name. That said, they did allow the mothers to say goodbye to their sons.
Since Hippolyta had named her daughter after Artemis' roman name, Hephaestus decided to do something similar to the boys, but closer to home, naming them after the great heroes of the old times: Ajax, Odysseus, Diomedes, Aeneas (Aphrodite felt touched when she found that out), Castor and Pollux (who like the original Dioscuri were twins)...
And then there was Pausanias, a tall, well-built man, the most responsible of the helpers (they were all roughly the same age), and the only one whose namesake had been born well after the Achaean Age, being a general from the (in)famous Sparta. Ironically, he was also the son of a follower of Aphrodite.
He was the best of the men, both in body as in mind, thanks to being able to visit the world outside the forge from time to time, although he was restricted to Greece and Italy (Hephaestus' forge was located in an island in the Adriatic Sea). However, even with this, sometimes he yearned to see the world at large, to meet with the modern heroes, to earn the glory of being a hero ,and even to become one of them,. The only reason he didn't do so despite having Hephaestus' permission was that he also wanted to make sure those he fought stopped being a menace through lethal means, something that modern society frowned upon.
And then one day, as he helped his father in the manufacturing of a cannon for Ares, they heard a conmotion from the TV room, where the others gathered around the screen and muttered in excitement as it displayed a most incredible sight: a giant monster, a creature that looked like it had escaped from Tartarus itself, annihilating a group of soldiers with impunity, before battling a large, green-armored individual... who then proceeded to rip its guts out, revealing a squirming worm hiding in there.
The Doom Slayer. The only known hero that was willing to kill. They already knew of him and his opinion about evil-doers, they knew of the massacre of the Voyager of the Seas... but to see him actually killing something that mere seconds before had been a screaming girl...
It was horrifying, disgusting even... but also inspiring to some point, especially to a certain smithy.
If a man could kill to protect the innocent, and not be feared hated for it, so could others, no? Especially those who took inspiration from the ancient heroes of greek 'myth', who became so because they slayed their enemies.
He had the strength, the endurance, the motivation, and everything he thought a protector of the meek needed. The last thing to check, of course, was a place to defend.
He put on a blindfold, grabbed a knife, and threw it at a bronze earth globe, deciding to become the protector of where the blade landed, no matter how far it was. He naturally expected it to be his 'native' Greece, or maybe even Italy.
Instead, the dagger stabbed Japan. He didn't know what to feel about that, to be honest with himself: all he knew about the isles was their people went from honourable, if overzealous warriors, to disciplined workers.
"Greece would have been a tad obvious, you know, and Rome too." Hephaestus noted when he saw the result before shrugging. "I think you should make the equipment yourself."
And forge it he did, with no one's help but that of his learned skill at smithing, making a set of armor and weapons worthy of Achilles himself, despite being completley mundane (and even then, that meant they were still worthy of Leonidas). After that, and after bidding farewell to his family, he set for the archipelago.
It turned out to be harder than it seemed.
During the first days, when he wasn't trucking around the area, his stint as a vigilante was rather lacklusting, for a lack of a better term: most crime in Japan simply didn't require the need to kill the perpetrators most of the time. As for dangerous groups like the Yakuza that did deserve death, they had already been erradicated, or forced to hide further to avoid the former fate. The few times he did act like a hero ended up with him running away from the police because he was a large, armored warrior.
And then one day, as he looked over the streets of Tokyo from the balcony of his crappy apartment, he saw as a red-headed girl and her dogs were being chased by gun-toting robots through the alley below, the machines blasting away at the group and injuring the girl in the leg.
He didn't waste time in jumping down betweeen the two groups and attacking the machines with his bare hands, and while they were strong and tough, Pausanias was even stronger. It helped that their guns weren't powerful enough to pierce his tough skin, although it still hurt.
It was only after destroying the machines that Pausanias finally realized something about the girl: natural red hair was practically unhear of in Japan, her ears were slightly long and pointed, and her green eyes were literally narrow. Said eyes were regarding him with a mix of fear, awe, and defiance as he carefully walked towards her.
After calming her down and proving he wouldn't hurt them, she finally spoke: her name was Ayame, and she was a yokai, a wolf to be precise, and she needed help.
To understand their plight, we'll turn back time a few hundred years.
Hundreds of years prior, yokai reigned rampant across Nihon. Sure, there were humans that could take them on, but these were rare and few, and most of the time the humans required numbers to fight the creatures, even after the arrival of gunpowder from China and better guns from portuguese merchants.
All of this changed when the Emperor decided to modernize the country over a century prior... and that included the extermination of yokai through military intervention, severely eased by the advent of repeating firearms from America. Even then, the tables had merely evened in no one's favor, since as far as the mikado cared other countries posed more of a threat than them, and now most yokai realized they had to be careful.
Again, that changed, and this time sooner than anyone, much less the yokai themselves, had expected...
Just after the conflict with Russia, in the evening of the 20th century, the metahumans began to sprout: human men and women who had powers (no magic, not honed skill, just powers) and, in some cases, the willingness to use them to kill others. Some received them from external sources, others simply were born with them; some were simply foreigners, while others were japanese-born. All, however, were much stronger than the yokai's usual victims. Suddenly, the yokai in general no longer had the advantage of having powers on their side.
Powers like discerning who was a yokai with mere glance... and throwing bony blades at them.
And to make things even worse, the metahumans were simply the tip of the iceberg: the advancement of weapons technology, robots designed and programmed to hunt down yokai whenever they hid and termiante them with extreme prejudice, government programs (both the japanese and foreign ones), simple hunters that had gotten pretty good at their jobs, and more.
Naturally, this meant that the yokai population went from a few millions to less than half that, but those who had it the worst were the wolf yokai, who suffered the most because of their relative weakness compared to most other yokai and Meiji the Great's edict to cull the population of mundane wolves until those in captivity became the vast majority, which meant that the rest could be singled out as yokai. For years, the packs had been slowly whittled down, until only a few tribes remained across the islands... including the one that made their home in Japan's capital.
They couldn't ask other yokai for help either, or even other wolves for that matter: most loathed each other more than they loathed humans these days, and many other yokai (again, wolves included) had happily integrated themselves into human society, some not even bothering to hide their nature.
The worst part, however, had to be the hatred: no one hunted wolves, and the anti-yokai edict stopped being enforced after the surrender in 1945 and the abdication of Hirohito, but that didn't stop people from killing them anyway... and some of those had the means to do so with impunity.
What had begun as simple reprisal evolved into purely spite-driven torment by those who had not forgotten about the wolves' past attrocities and refused to let go of their hatred, and other yokai were happy to take advantage of the situation. Granted, the packs were more than willing to pay their attackers back in kind, but years of having been the aggressors and man-eaters, demonization from part of the government, complete unwillingness from the tribes' part to help each other, and simply being outnumbered by several magnitudes meant that the Tokyo tribe simply stopped having the the strength to fight back.
And that was before the deaths of several people, attacks that had been supposedly carried by dog-like monsters, made things even worse for them.
None of that meant anything for Ayame, a fiery redhead she-wolf and the future leader, who refused to back down against any threat to her family, be it human, yokai or other. Sadly, not even her determination to protect her family could help their situation.
One day, Ayame's grandfather (her parents had been killed in a fight with another tribe) finally decided that they could not stay any longer in their homeland, else they would all just die out, and so formulated a simple, yet also dangerous plan: gather enough money to leave for Russia,. (for starters none of them spoke russian, and the taiga was simply not a good place to live) but as far as he knew it would be better than living the rest of their lives like abandoned dogs wandering the streets of Tokyo.
The simpler part, of course, was getting the money and finding a flight big enough to carry a family of over thirty people and their dozen 'dogs'. It would take them some time, but it was nonetheless doable.
The hard part would be getting to the flight without being outed as yokai... or wolves.
This last part was why Ayame had sneaked into the Edogawa Natural Zoo to get several members of her pack that had been captured weeks prior by animal control as they roamed the city in their alternate forms. She didn't expect the place to be guarded by LexCorp drones. Armed LexCorp drones. She could have escaped them easily since she was the fastest of the tribe, but she didn't want to leave her packmates behind.
Fortunately for them, Pausanias had been there.
After Ayame told him their story, Pausanias asksed her if he could go with them back to their tribe, to see if he could help them in some way, something she agreed to after thinking about it. Naturally, her tribe was wary about him and his intentions, and not just because he was human, and a metahuman to boot, but also because he was a foreigner that reeked of some unknown power.
Their mistrust faltered when Ayame told them about the robots and the greek's intervention, and when Pausanias offered them all the funds he had, as well as to take them to their airport with his truck so that their journey would be more inconspicious, it practically ended up halved, so desperate for help and for someone willing to do so they were, even Ayame.
When a baffled elder asked him why did he do this, help what people saw as monsters, he merely replied:
"It's the least I can do for your tribe. That, and because as a hero it's my duty to help those who need it."
What they didn't know was that Pausanias was only mostly doing it out of the goodness of his heart; they didn't need to know he wanted to get glory out of his deeds.
For several days, Pausanias helped the tribe prepare for the journey, earning the trust of the group, Ayame included, but even with hers and the others' accounts they didn't believe that a man, no matter how strange he was, could destroy several machines all by himself.
That is, until a dozen LexCorp drones, following the trail left by the wolves, forced their way into their hideout, weapons rised and optics blazing red as they glared at the surprised and terrified tribe.
The drones barely managed to say anything through their speakers before both Ayame and Pausanias were upon them. The future leader took down three of them with a combination of speed, fencing, and hardened leaves, but most ended up ripped apart by Pausanias. Had they been able to, they would have celebrated such victory, but instead the tribe got into the trailer and Ayame to the truck with Pausanias. They knew that more would come after them
How naïve had they been, genuinely believing that some robots would be their only obstacle in their journey, that they were safe.
They only found out they had been followed when they were stopped in route to the airport by a certain detective. a highway between Tokyo and one of several airports of the region, on the cab of the semi-truck carrying her tribe, Ayame watched with a mix of annoyance and amusement as their newfound protector, Pausanias, sang about trucks and rubber ducks, not because he did so badly (in fact, he had an incredible singing voice), but because he tapped his knees from time to time like some giddy kid.
A far cry from the silent warrior that saved her from those robots days prior.
She had been cold and aloof towards the man during the first two days, and not just because he was a human and a meta, and her people's story with them; after all, he literally came out of nowhere and said he'd help them in getting out of Japan the moment they told him abour their plan to leave for the simple reason that, as a 'hero', it was his duty. Even after seeing him actually acting like a buddha (like playing with the children, and shrugging instead of retaliating after one of the packmates broke a chair over his head), and of course having been rescued by the man, she still didn't appreciate his presence.
After a while, though, she warmed up to him when it became clear his intentions were genuine, although she still decided to wait until fully opening to him.
That and, as much as she loathed to admit it, the fact he was good-looking for a human, with his muscular and tall yet lithe body, those gray eyes of his and that trimmed beard, although the braids were a bit off-
'Don't think like that!' Ayame berated herself when she realized she had been staring too long at Pausanias. 'You've only known the guy for a few days! Besides, he's greek, they probably braid their hair all the time'
Ayame shooed away those thoughts and looked outside the window, specifically the forest they were passing near, as to not think about Pausanias in a... certain way. There was little to no traffic hindering them due to it being a low-intensity highway, specifically chosen by Pausanias for that very same reason.
The she-wolf was dressed in her usual garbs, a simple frannel and jeans, both red, while her pelts were being guarded by one of her cousins back in the trailer. Aside from that she also wore the disguise she used when in public, a simple hat to cover her pointed ears, and sunglasses to hide her eyes, in case they stopped and for when they reached the airport.
Better than covering her entire body with bandages and feigning having fallen several floors, like a certain young man who at that moment was most likely regretting his course of action given the trailer, while ventilated, was nonetheless cramped and his wheelchair too much space.
This, of course, meant that several wolves were being forced to sit on top of him.
Pausanias, on the other hand, was fully human and so had no need of disguising anything that could out him as a pseudo-demigod, though he couldn't hide the fact he wasn't japanese with those round eyes and tanned skin of his. That said, he still had what could be considered a disguise, mostly because he wore it over his armor: the jacket he hadmade it seem like the forged muscles of his breastplate were actually his. This made him look even more muscular than he already was. His shield and helmet laid behind his seat just in case he needed to grab them quickly, while their swords were hidden in the glove compartment, again just in the unlikely case they needed them.
Indeed, he seemed to be awfully similar to her in several ways.
"Pausanias, can you call the others, to know how are they doing inside? Just in case."
The man gave a nod and grabbed the radio communicator "How is it going back there, over?" He asked through the talkie. The others had a walkie-talkie set to talk back to him.
"It's starting to smell and getting a bit hot, but other than that we're peachy, rover!"
Pausanias sighed. "It's over, Ginta, over. And it's your own fault if you get hotter, over."
"Hey, we've only been here for three hours, and..." Ginta's voice trailed off before they heard a groan. "It seemed a great idea at the time."
This prompted everyone (Pausanias, Ayame and even the rest of the tribe) to laugh at his expense.
Or at least that was what she thought.
"Any idea of how long until we get to Kamakura?" Another voice chimed in, one much deeper and older. It was Ayame's grandfather, the current leader of the tribe, an old wolf without a human form who had also been the first one to fully trust the greek man and believe his words, and seemingly not just due to desperation.
"Still a couple of hours of travel at least." Pausanias replied after checking the time.
She heard her grandfather sigh. "I thought it'd take longer."
That caused Ayame to lose her smirk, not because of the time, but because it made her remember that Pausanias wouldn't be coming with them: he'd get them to the terminal, bid them farewell and wish them good luck in Siberia, and then go back to Tokyo. He didn't even ponder of going to Russia with them and try to be a hero there.
Then again, none of them aside from Pops asked him if he wanted to come with them, even though they'd be rebuffed by him just like with the old wolf.
And then her thoughts on the matter were interrupted she heard the unmistakable sound of a police car's siren, one that was steadily getting closer and coming from behind them. She could see the lights from the window, but the car proper had to be on Pausanias' side since she could not see it.
Puzzled, Pausanias looked out of the window from his side and then back to whoever they were. Ayame didn't see what they did, but she did hear him groan in annoyance. "They want me to pull over."
Ayame became worried all of sudden. "Why? Did you go over the speed limit?"
Pausanias shook his head. "This thing can barely reach eighty kays per hour, so no. No idea why, exactly, maybe a random inspection or an alcohol check, but I better stop the truck. Don't want to get a fine and somehow end up chased by the entire department just because I didn't obey, don't we." He then replied to the passengers about the police.
Ayame knew he was just joking, but at the same time, given everything that transpired until then, everything could happen.
Just as Pausanias stopped the truck near a clearing between the road and the forest , the police car's driver decided to catch up. As it drove ahead and then turned around, Ayame saw that it was, indeed, your typical police car coloured white and black, its sirens blaring and its lights blazing as it stopped ahead of the truck. Overall, it did indeed look like your average patrol cruiser.
Well, it would have seeed normal, had it not been for the fact that, rather than the symbol of the NPA, it had the insignia of the Destrons right in the grill.
It was impossible for her to miss it, and not just because of her eyesight: the boys of the tribe, both young and not-so young, were fond of both The Transformers and Beast Wars, the latter mostly because of that winged wolf knight. The agency was very strict when it came to etiquette, so how did some cop manage to emblazon his car with a toy's symbol, said toy's popurality notwitstanding?
She didn't think of the possibility of the driver being of high enough rank to ignore the mandate until they came out of the car.
As the driver of the car parked the vehicle in front of the truck and then stepped out of it, Ayame's eyes opened in shock and fear when she saw who he was.
A man wearing wearing a jacket over a white shirt, a black tie and a wide-brimmed hat. It wasn't these detail what revealed his identity to the she-wolf however, but the wide, serene smile he had on his somewhat wrinkled face, and the fact he had his eyes closed even as he walked up to the truck.
Ayame swore her heart skipped a beat when her mind made her remember who was this man.
Commander Uehara Daizo. The man who had defeated and arrested several known criminals, like Saico-Tek, Nya-Nya and Scarface, all of them dangerous in their own right, with nothing but sheer grit, guile, and his trusty .38 revolver, or at least that was how the song went.
He had also been appointed to solve the case of the 'man-eating dogs'. Which in this case meant he was after them.
"Hello there!" Daizo greeted as he walked up to them.
And then he got close enough, and Ayame's blood froze in her veins when she got a whiff of his scent.
Pausanias, being human as he was. Ayame, however, couldn't be fooled thanks to both her superior smell and yokai senses.
The detective still smelled like a human, plus some smoke, but there was something else there, something she couldn't really discern sans it smelled awfully similar to... ink. And yet, he didn't feel like a yokai like her.
Her left hand had unknowingly raised to open the glove compartment to reach for her sword, but a confused Pausanias stopped her. "Ayame, what is it?"
"Are you blind?! He's Daizo!" She replied frantically, hoping that said detective didn't hear her as he got closer and closer, never raising his speed.
"So? He doesn't know who you are." He reassured her.
"It's not that!" She whispered. "It's his smell!"
At this Pausanias frowned, looking backwards so slightly as to not fully face the approaching, who for some unknown was taking his sweet time in coming to them, but still look at him. "His smell?"
"He is not... I don't know what exactly it is, but his scent isn't fully human!" She replied.
"You mean he's a meta like me? That's why you're spooked all of sudden?"
Ayame shook her head hurriedly. "It's not that! I mean he..."
"Am I interrupting something?" She heard the drawl of an Osaka native from behind Pausanias. Said warrior turned to see the smiling face of Daizo, who was looking up at him due to the difference in height.
Before Pausanias had time to even open his mouth, Ayame practically jumped forwards to meet the officer. Why did she do that despite the situation, she didn't know. Maybe to distract him from... something? Not even she knew!
"Good morning mister commander!" Ayame quickly interjected with what she hoped was a dopey smile, careful to not show her fangs, using two titles to make herself seem like your average young, excitable woman journeying with her 'boyfriend' "Never expected to be pulled over by Japan's most famous enforcer of the law!"
Daizo sniffed the air and then looked over at the trailer. "Are you carrying a pack back there? I mean, carrying animal in that kind of trailer is a crime, you know."
Ayame faked a laugh at that, while at the same time tapping Pausanias' leg to get him to play along. "You know how some dogs are, they follow their owners anywhere!" He replied.
At this Daizo raised an eyebrow, clearly confused. "Family?"
"Yeah, my family, thirty of them and an entire pack of lovely pooches!" She cringed at herself for using the word 'pooches', not just because it was a grave insult towards her kind and because she was the one who uttered it, but also because just how ridiculous the tone she was using had gotten all of sudden. "Antonios here needed to drive his new truck with some weight dragging, and they always wanted to see a truck from the inside."
It was the alibi she and her family had prepared in case they were stopped by the police; she just didn't expect to actually use it... or do so because the single most dangerous thing to her tribe would be pulling them over!
Pausanias understood what she was doing, giving her a small nod, before turning back to the detective. "So, is there any reason you stopped us, commander? Shouldn't you be back in the city, what with those things running rampant?"
Daizo shrugged, his smile never leaving his face. "They gave me a day off, stress and all that. As for you, I'm afraid one of your rear lights is broken."
Pausanias frowned at that, before grunting. "Must have been some asshole we didn't see."
In truth, their ride until then had been very quiet... and Pausanias had even delayed it to make sure they wouldn't be stopped for that very same reason. Something was up.
"You don't believe me? Get out there and take a look, son." Daizo replied before looking at Pausanias more closely and seemingly realizing something. "Say, you're not from here, aren't you?"
"What gave me away?"
"Your face, your accent, and the fact your girl called you Antonios. Could be portuguese or spanish, but they don't have 's' at the end." Daizo replied.
Pausanias, after glancing at Ayame and wordlessly saying 'stay here', gave a little chuckle before opening the door and coming down. "Antonios Fotas, from Greece. Came here for a job as a delivery boy, but ended up a trucker."
"Isn't that better?"
Pausanias shrugged as he closed the door. "Took me a while to learn how to drive the previous truck. This one's a monster in comparison."
As the two made their way to the back of the truck, Ayame grabbed the communicator to tell the others about why had they stopped, hoping that they could keep their composture.
"Someone grab the damn thing!" She practically screamed at it.
"Ayame, did we already reach the-"
"It's Daizo! He's stopped us!"
There was silence for a second, before she heard her grandfather speak in a terrified tone. "You mean Uehara Daizo?
"Yes!" She even nodded frantically despite no one being able to see her do so.
"Oh no." She heard him breathe. He wasn't the only one: the entire tribe entered in a panic at the sudden news, but fortunately they were relatively quiet; none dared to raise their voice beyond a whisper, for fear of being caught.
"Hey, as long as we stay quiet, nothing will happen, right? Right?!" She heard Ginta say.
"He knows you guys are there."
"Say that again, please, I think my ear is-no, nevermind, we're hearing him talking with Pausanias right outside the freaking trailer!"
"Ayame, why the hell did you tell him about us?!"
"I had to tell him, he could smell you!"
She heard groans from several tribemembers. "That's what we get for skipping the changing form training!"
Ginta spoke once again "Then as long as we play our parts, we should be fine, no? I mean,"
"That's the thing, he might not be even human!" She still wasn't fully sure herself, but they needed to get the point across.
And then, as if by coincidence, something moved on the corner of her eye, outside the truck. Ayame glanced in the direction of the movement ... and, once more, her heart momentarily froze when she saw something that, for all intents and purposes, should not even exist.
Where there was a simple police cruiser before, now stood a towering humanoid robot, as tall as the trees behind it, its eyes blazing red as it stood up to its maximum height... and a gun in place of its right hand that, given its height, had to be at least as big as Ayame's entire body.
A gun that was being aimed, given the direction it was aimed at, right at an unaware Pausanias.
..........
Yeah, we're going to be without DS for a while (two more chapters), and hey, cliffhanger! Otherwise was Ayame's acceptance too quick (he'd been with them for a week), or reasonable given the situation? As always, was the chapter well written and entertaining, despite lacking action? Is the drama enough? Should Ayame and the tribe be more prejudiced? Did I introduce Daizo in a proper manner? Was the ending alright? Tell me things, guys!
And yes, Ayame and Pausanias are going to end up together. I mean, why not?
The decepticon in question (Destrons is their original name from Japan) is Barricade. Yes, it's an ink monster (it skipped the transformation, that's why Ayame didn't heard it changing). No, there won't be any more decepticons in the future, it's just a quirk of Daizo that shall be explained in the next chapter.
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Stupid the Ork
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Never enuff Dakka
Oct 15, 2021
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#458
One moment, Pausanias was commenting to Daizo about many things, among them the possibility of the commander seeing the family of yokai, to the point of forgetting about the broken mirror, the next he heard the screech of something metallic and Ayame screaming.
Startled, the young man turned around to see what did just happen, and saw something he most definitely didn't expect.
Ayame fighting a twenty foot-tall robot ( or rather, a twenty foot-tall robot that looked like a police car had decided to become a laser-shooting android) with nothing but her sword and speed. Fortunately, like any giant robot, it was slow and clumsy, and Ayame had super speed and reflexes on her side. On the other hand, she wouldn't be able to damage it, not with a simple sword and hardened leaves.
Unfortunately for it, Pausanias was near, and he didn't actually need weapons to tear it apart.
Not even bothering to ask Daizo for help, Pausanias tore his jacket and ran at full speed towards the machine, which had finally grabbed Ayame after she managed to make it drop its gun, and prepared to rip her in half. The machine didn't have time to turn towards the source of the screaming before Pausanias slammed himself into one of its legs, forcing it to the ground and allowing Ayame to escape its hold.
"Ayame!" He asked while helping her to stand up. "Are you alright? That thing nearly ripped you in half!"
Ayame nodded, a bit shaken by having been extremely close to death, but otherwise fine okay all things given. "A bit hurt, but I'll live. Besides I'm not the who crashed himself against a giant robot!"
Pausanias waved her off. "It's just metal, and believe me, I've been hit by worse before." He hadn't, but being hit by a training press had to be close enough. He then turned to look at the fallen machine. "Any idea of what is it?"
"I think it's a Destron." Ayame replied.
Pausanias turned to give her a puzzled look (he knew of The Transformers, but only by their english names, and even then the most he actually knew of them was that they were transforming robot), but before he could ask further the machine roared and stood up, grabbing weapon from the ground and glaring at them. "Let's scrap this thing."
Ayame nodded, and both charged at the Destron, not realizing that the tribe had gotten out of the trailer by the ruckus... and that Daizo was watching them from afar.
Ayame, being much faster than, only this time she made sure to stay well outside its reach, throwing her leaves at it to distract it, while Pausanias met its free fist with his own, blessed, trained muscle matching cold, hard metal. His idea was to lunge at the machine's main body, force it to the ground once more, and then rip its internal components to take it out, but all of sudden the robot became quicker on its feet, refusing to approach the warrior more than the necessary, even if he could take the punishment.
The Destron's other arm, the one the machine couldn't use against Pausanias, kept firing laser after laser at Ayame, each shot destroying a tree as it struck it. The she-wolf, though, was simply too fast for the machine's targeting systems.
Eventually, seeing that the fight was going nowhere, and not wanting the machine to forget about her and shoot Pausanias, Ayame raced once more at the it, but rather than attacking outright she instead climbed up its front and, screaming, threw several leaves onto its face, disabling its eyes and rendering it blind. This didn't destroy it, not by a longshot but it did make it impossible for it to see them.
That meant, by extension, that it couldn't see Pausanias imitating Ayame and climbing up its body, only this time to reach its head and rip it off with all his might.
It's body giving a metallic groan, the headless robot dropped to the ground in a heap, its chassis losing any color as it did so, and shaking the trees around it.
Pausanias, seeing that the machine would not move, crushed its head for good measure and threw it away before going to Ayame, who was panting due to both exhaustion and excitement.
"Ayame, you alright there?"
"Yeah, just tired. Never expected to fight a Transformer, let alone a Destron." She said before smiling at him. "And thanks for the help."
Pausanias returned the smile. "It's my duty remember?"
Meanwhile, several tribe members approached the downed robot carefully, not knowing if it would get up again. All sans one, that is.
"Is that a Destron?!" Ginta practically shrieked, no longer confined on his wheelchair but still covered from head to toe in bandages; at least he wasn't complaining about the heat they gave. "Did Ayame and Pausanias just kill a Destron?!"
"Don't get too close to it." One of his tribe mates warned him.
"Oh c'mon, it's dead! I mean, they didn't get its laser core, but it ain't moving either!"
"Wait." One of the wolves said before getting close to the fallen machine and sniffing it. "Does this thing smell like ink to you too?"
And then the downed robot, to the shock of the group, began to melt, not into molten slag as it logically should had, but into a black, viscous mass. Said glob of black slime, but instead of attacking them, it went across the group without even touching them, and moved towards the truck... or, more specifically, to Daizo, who for some reason didn't seem to care that a giant mass of liquid darkness was crawling specifically at him.
Had the blessed man known the truth at the moment, he'd tried to kill Daizo. Alas, he didn't.
Before Pausanias could warn him of the danger, the slime reached the detective, who raised his arm as it came closer... and then, to the astonishment of the group, absorbed it through the palm until nothing was left.
Daizo, seeing the astonished and even scared looks they were giving him, turned around to do something they couldn't see and then turned back towards them. "Damn, I guess the jig's up." He said in a humorous tone. Naturally, given the situation and what just happened, nobody laughed.
"I told you that bastard isn't human." Ayame whispered to Pausanias as she stood next to him, sword in one hand and magical leaf in the other as she glared at 'Daizo'. "He smells like one a bit, but there's something else there, ink I think."
"Anything else?"
Pausanias, hearing this and after watching the 'man' absorb a mass of ink that previously had been a murderous robot bent on killing them, and one that before that had been Daizo's car, reached a conclusion: that thing was not Uehara Daizo, and it had tried to kill them.
With a scream of anger, Pausanias grabbed the closest tree to him, and then threw it at 'Daizo', who didn't have time to dodge the makeshift javelin until it hit him and made him explode into a splash of ink. The thrown tree kept flying until it hit the other side of the road, leaving a small trace of ink on its way.
The tribe, Ayame included, stared at the spot where the greatest threat to their lives had been standing on mere seconds prior, frozen in awe, not believing that he had just been taken out so easily despite his reputation. Well, that and because they just bore witness to Pausanias' strength. They DID know that he was strong, but not that strong. In the meantime Pausanias, went back to the cab, not only to start the engine but also to get his helmet and weapons. After fighting a Transformer and killing a creature passing itself as commander Daizo, he wanted to be prepared for anything.
"Holy crap, you just killed commander Daizo!" One of the wolves cried the situation kicked in.
Pausanias, after putting on his helmet. "That thing was not the commander. Now stop gawking and get back inside, we must leave, now, before-" He managed to order before a voice interrupted him.
"Oh, already leaving, mutts?"
Everyone turned around to see something that froze them (even Pausanias to a point) with fear.
It was Daizo, standing next to the truck alive and well, wiping his jacket from dirt and still with that damnable smile on his face, as if he hadn't been liquidified mere seconds prior.
"Welp, I gotta hand it to you, you pack one helluva wallop." He said after stretching his arms after getting a tree thrown at him, even tipping his hat at Pausanias in respect.
"W hat have you done to the real Daizo, freak?!" Pausanias snarled as he crouched in a fighting stance, pointing his sword at the creature.
He felt a soft hand grabbing him by the sohulder. It was Ayame, who was had her pelts drapped on. Her gaze was too fixed on the officer. "Pausanias... I think that thing IS the commander."
The 'creature' recoiled at the tone, before sighing in annoyance. "Hell, never expected a wolf to actually be perceptive, and a goddamn spartan of all people to be idealistic. Son, the girl's right, I AM detective Uehara Daizo."
Pausanias stared at Ayame; a part of him didn't want to believe either of them, but after everything he had just seen, he knew they were telling the truth.
Which, by extension, meant he was most definitely a fraud, because Pausanias didn't know which term meant 'bastard who uses his powers to kill people and make himself look like a hero'.
"Yep, I'm a scoundrel, a dirty murderer, a disgrace to the Agency and a liar." Daizo said when he saw the glare Pausanias was sending him. "And unfortunately for you, I cannot let you leave with that knwoledge... or live, for that matter."
"Why did you do it." Pausanias asked, not thinking before speaking, angry as he was. The only thing stopping him from running at Daizo and chopping him in half was that he didn't know his full capabilities, only that he could shrug having a tree thrown at him and could control ink.
"What do you mean, exactly?" Daizo asked back. "Setting your furry friends up? Sometimes the crooks I catch are real so that people don't get suspicious, while others I make them when I go for the grandiose, what with being able to create anything. This time, it was time for the real deal. Helped that one day I found out about the yokai extirpation order from the Mikado himself."
"So, that's why you made up the 'man-eating dogs'?" Ayame growled. "Because you're a lazy bastard hellbent on genocide?"
Daizo chuckled. "More or less, yeah. You know, I think this is what supposed to happen: good cop reveals himself to be 'evil' and all that." He even airquoted when he said 'evil'. "I could tell you the story of how I, a simple painter from the feudal era, ended up becoming the most powerful sonuvabitch in Nippon, and even more. However..."
Daizo then extended his arms towards them, prompting the two to flinch. However, instead of attacking as they thought he would, Daizo instead began sprouting a veritable sea of ink from them, which then divided itself into several globs.
Said globs of ink stood up and took the form of tall, armoured robots with red lenses and guns attached to their arms. Pausanias had seen those machines before: the LexCorp drones from the zoo. Pausanias had already fought them before: their weapons were weak, their chassis easy to scrap, and their intelligence too rudimentary to make them little more than a nuisance.
Thing was, those things merely looked like robots, their guns were not a threat to Pausanias alone, and there were fifty of them instead of just three... and that number was growing by the moment.
Daizo then overlooked his army and then harrumphed for some reason. "I think it's a bit unfair, don't you think? I mean, there are too many robots, all of them armed with machine guns, and only two of you are able to fight them." He then snapped his fingers. "I can fix that."
The drone army became ink once more, and Pausanias actually hoped that Daizo had decided to fight them himself... only for the mass to turn into another army, only this time it was an horde of monsters: orcs, goblins, zombies, dragons and giants bigger than his truck, demons just as big as the aforementioned behemoths, human barbarians that nonetheless clearly fit amongst their peers... and, maybe not incidentally, wolves the size of horses.
Daizo chuckled when he saw the terrified looks of the yokai and the greek. "I gotta give it to the americans, they know what to make to inspire me. It's a quirk of mine, really." His jovial voice became even more jovial, which only made him seem even more unnerving. "How about giving you a five minute start before my army straight out of Wizardry, magic included, hunt you down, uh?"
Pausanias kept staring at the army. He knew he could all of them on, but only one on one, not an entire army of them. An army that for all he knew could get even larger.
And that, of course, not taking its creator himself in account.
"Pausanias, what do we do?" He heard the horrified voice of Ayame's grandfather ask him.
Pausanias stayed quiet, still thinking.
Again, he felt the touch of Ayame's hand on his shoulder. "Pausanias?"
Against that kind of power, there was only one thing they could do.
"Run as fast as possible."
..........
He should have known they were being herded until they encountered the cliff. After all, dragons could fly, and theorically so could demons.
Or the fact he was fighting ink. Ink that could just recover from any slash and chop from his sword, or even reconstitute into something else. That said, even if he had known that critical piece of information before, he would had still fought them.
He and the adults of tribe were more than capable of climbing up the thirty-foot stony face, and Ayame could even clear it in a single bound, but the elders, he children and those in wolf fom could not, they could not just get around it in time... and the horde was dangerously close. He actually pondered on the possibility that Daizo had planned all of this ahead... which both infuriated and scared him.
He only saw one solution: stay behind and fight Daizo's horde so that the tribe could get away. To where, he didn't know, but anywhere else would have been better than being killed, or worse, by ink monsters.
It had been stupid of him to expect the tribe to leave without him after everything he had done for them, but at the very least they didn't try to get themselves killed helping him fight the horde.
Even in after losing his sword and getting overwhelmed, half dead and getting the life beaten out of him by dragons and demons the size of houses, Pausanias refused to yield, to beg for mercy, and not just because it wouldn't have changed anything.
Until Ayame came screaming at Daizo with her blade raised. Just as quickly she was defeated and then set upon by the ink creatures.
He didn't bother to shout at Daizo to let her go: he knew the monster was bent on killing the entire tribe.
"Imagine the headlines: the commander wipes out the man-eating dogs from Hell and their Spartan master!" Daizo said as he raised his arms, ala a film director, as the largest of the ink creatures continued kicking Pausanias, all the while Ayame screamed her heart out and struggled to escape the monsters holding her in place. "Of course, I'll have to make up a reason for you for being here, but that'll be easy to-uh?"
Whatever made Daizo stop talking also made Pausanias' torturers to stop attacking him, letting him
A somewhat round object that Pausanias recognized as one of the many weapons he had made for Ares alongside his father.
A hand grenade.
He simply couldn't mistake it for anything else, since it looked too much like the ones used by the U.S military, pin ring and everything only more... futuristic, for lack of a better term.
And then the ring, defying everything Pausanias knew about grenade parts, pulled itself out of the bomb, as if pulled by magic. Pausanias didn't have time to ponder on this because he was laying just a meter away from the grenade.
And then it started beeping.
'Shit!'
Gathering the little strength he had left, fueled by fear-boosted adrenaline, Pausanias took advantage of the momentary distraction to get up from the grass, run up at Ayame and throw the two to the ground... just as the explosive detonated, creating a explosion so powerful it utterly annihilated anything within a radius of five meters.
Had Pausanias raised his head at that moment, he would have seen that the creatures within that radius simply ceased to exist, and those close enough exploded into black-coloured gore, instead of ink. Instead, he was busy making sure Ayame (and his hearing, for that matter) was alright.
And then, as the smoke and dust cleared and he finally looked up to see the results of the explosion, Pausanias saw, standing right in the spot where the grenade had gone off like a spire of green steel, the most awesome and relieving sight he could think of.
Doom Slayer himself.
..........After the dust cleared up, and everyone saw who came, everything fell silent. Even the horde, previously screaming like the army of monsters it was, stopped not just making any sound, but also moving.
Which made sense. After all, it wasn't everyday Doom Slayer came to save someone's behind.
Both Pausanias and Ayame, still on the ground, stared up at the armored figure standing tall in the center of the crater and his back turned to them, the former in awe and wonder, the latter in terror and dread, but both with equally wide eyes. Ayame even gave a whimper of fear when he turned around to face them, not helped by them laying on the ground, and in turn making Slayer seem even larger than he already was.
Suddenly, two objects appeared out of thin air and right into Doom Slayer's grip. He then extended his arms towards them.
One, the one he held with his left hand, was a long, bulky weapon of some sort. Ayame had no idea what it was, but Pausanias did, and in fact he had seen it in action when Doom Slayer used it to a hijacked tank on its tracks; according to his father when he saw footage of the weapon, it was some kind of energy weapon.
The other was a simple chainsaw, with several sections of its blade covered in rust. Only, it wasn't your average logging tool, given the fact it was nearly half as big as the man himself (who in turn was over a foot taller than Pausanias), and had two horn-like metal protrusions at the base of the blade. That, and it had something on its blade that most chainsaws didn't have.
At least not those used to cut down trees, that is. And, upon closer inspection, Ayame realized that the rust on the blade... actually wasn't.
'Is that dried blood?' She thought with horror.
Pausanias, on the other hand, was still dumbfounded by the fact Doom Slayer of all people had come to their rescue, given that there must have been situations that required his attention in the rest of the world. As a matter of fact, he really didn't expect anyone to come to their aid.
And then a thought, a treacherous one, struck him when he realized that maybe, just maybe, Doom Slayer appearing was not coincidence: how exactly did he know? Did the know who and what Daizo really was? Did he let it happen?
The young man didn't realize he was clenching both fists as he stared at Slayer, his brow furrowing into a half-glare.
As this happened, the tribe overlooking them from the cliff saw that the ink creatures, for one reason or another, did not attempt to exploit the calm to attack the three as expected; as a matter of fact, they seemed to be scared. Had any of them looked at Daizo, they would have seen him terrified out of his wits. They didn't, however, astonished as they were.
Doom Slayer, after a couple of seconds, tossed the weapons to the pair just after they stood up: the rifle to Ayame, the chainsaw to Pausanias.
Ayame nearly fell over when she caught the gun; she was stronger than she looked, a given for humanoid yokai, but it still was a gun half as big as she was, and probably half as heavy. Her dismay only grew when she saw that the device was not only stupidly heavy and bulky, but also lacked anything that resembled an ironsight... and that without taking into account she knew jack about firing guns at all, much less blasters. Did he really expect her to know how to aim it, let alone use it?
Pausanias, however, had a much different reaction.
A few moments after his fingers gripped the chainsaw's handle (unlike Ayame, he had no problems catching the thing), Pausanias began to feel fresher, angrier even. He didn't heal or anything, he just stopped feeling pain, which given everything should have made him wary.
It instead allowed him to remember what Daizo had told them, what he had planned to do to the tribe, the fact he nearly killed him and Ayame, and the fact that Doom Slayer had, for some reason or another, let it all happen.
He was furious, so much that the possibility of Slayer having not realized about them didn't occur to his adrenaline-rushing mind.
One of the ink monsters, a goblin, chose that moment to attack, charging at Pausanias shrieking and with its knife raised high.
The son of Hephaestus merely glared at the approaching creature, signaling Ayame to not intervene, and just as the goblin lunged at him, Pausanias swung the saw at it, bisecting it vertically. However, instead of oozing ink, the serrated blade actually cut something that could be called black gore, just like the one left by the grenade.
As they fell back to the grass, the 'solidifed' innards didn't recombine, or liquidify, or anything. They just... stayed dead, for lack of a better word.
This also made the entire horde, and their creator, to recoil back in what unmistakably had to be fear.
Pausanias stared at the remains of the creature, then at the blade, and finally at the Slayer, his anger at him momentarily forgotten after seeing that he now had a way to actually kill the monsters.
Both exchanged knowing looks and nodded, before Pausanias revved the chainsaw and charged at the horde and Slayer walked towards Daizo, leaving a startled Ayame fumbling with her improptu weapon.
..........
As I suspected, John's hasty enchantments hadn't been needed: the plasma gun's bolts were hot enough that the ink forming Daizo's creatures simply vaporized, essentially killing them by accelerated evaporation. The fact she didn't know how to handle firearms wasn't really an issue, given the gun's sheer rate of fire and relative little recoil. Plus, soon she realized it wouldn't slow her down by much.
On the other hand, the ink freaks struck with the chainsaw, due to the girl's inherent power that my weapons (plasma gun included, even though it really wasn't necessary in this case) shared with me, entered a stage of pseudo-solidification that prevented them to recompose, which was very bad for them given that said state was due to, well, a fucking chainsaw.
Or, in layman's terms, they became real 'boys' for a moment before being brutally sawed apart, or blown in case of the grenade.
Unfortunately, giving the chainsaw to the man, called Pausanias. had the unexpected side effect of making his levels of adrenaline rise to their limit due to a placebo effect which, given the situation, turned him into a berserker... or rather, a pseudo-berserker: he was pissed, but still had enough sense to not attack the girl, Ayame. Nonetheless, that anger of his ended up being a minor annoyance for me a few minutes later.
Now that both of them were more than capable of dealing with the ink constructs, I decided to focus on Daizo. Sadly, I didn't want to kill him, not yet, becase I needed to know why did he attack them (remember, I'm omnipresent to a point, not omniscient), and what else had he done, even though I had an idead that ended up being quite close to the truth.
Didn't stop me from ripping him piece by piece several times when he became a giant ink monster to save his sorry hide.
And no, I don't mean the induced pain he got every time I tore his monsters apart.
..........
Uehara Daizo, commander of the National Police Agency and famous across the archipelago for stopping several dangerous villains that he himself had created, began the day believing that the final stage his plan to get a promotion was secure: follow the truck carrying the wolf tribe, stop them in a low-transit highway so that there wouldn't be any witnesses, kill them, and then telling the boss an outrageous story about how he finally caught and killed the man-eaters. Sure, the driver turned out to be a superpowered guy, but that only delayed the inevitable.
Then things took an unexpected turn for the worse. Much, much worse.
At that moment, Uehara watched as the new arrival, and most likely the cause of the explosion that nearly blew him apart, turned around to face Antonios and his yokai girlfriend, his face betraying no emotion as the man made a gun and a chainsaw of all things appear out of nowhere and gave them to the couple.
In truth, he was scared shitless, and not just because his plans had been foiled for the first time since ever, but also because of who had done so.
'Do something already, you big metal prick!'
The goddamned Doom Slayer, aka the superhero he really DIDN'T want to ever come to Nippon for any reason. He didn't want Superman to come either, but the Boy Scout lacked the... whatever Doom Slayer used to teleport around, and very possibly see things that should have not been seen.
And unlike Superman, or any other famous superhero for that matter, Doom Slayer was more than willing to kill his enemies. Just ask those Red Pitchfork nutters or that parasite from Spain. Apparently he killed only when the victims themselves did something unforgivable.
Like, for example, murdering several dozen people and then accusing an entire group of yokai of doing the deed just to become superintendent, something that most definitely warranted the death penalty in most of the world. None of that, however, held a candle to everything he had done for four centuries, not even faking those villains and the deaths they caused. Or the hundreds of murders he committed since becoming a monster for that matter.
For the first time since he became the monster he was today four hundred years ago, Uehara realized he could be dead in the next five minutes.
Then, something (he didn't know what) compelled one of his semi-independent monsters to attack Aleksandros... only to be cut in half by the chainsaw. From top to bottom.
'What the hell?!' Uehara thought as he stepped back in fear and clutched his chest, feeling as if HE had been the one cut in half. This also caused not just one or two, but all his ink creatures to imitate him.
Many other monsters attacked, but Antonios, swinging a revved chainsaw around as if possessed by an onryo, killed them just as quickly as the first one. Each creature killed made Uehara hiss in pain, again feeling as if he was the one being cut to ribbons. Worse still, the girl began firing the gun Slayer gave her, and while her aim left much to be desired at first, eventually she got an idea of how to use it, and even remembered she was faster than a cheetah, adding further to the carnage.
And then the Doom Slayer decided to kill some himself as he made his way to the commander.
Something that, of course, meant that the pain soon became agony, because they were actually killing the ink constructs... and by extension, hurting (though not really weakening) him. The explosion from before, but those had been just a few inklings unfortunate enough to be close, and they died so quickly he didn't really feel it, not five of them every ten seconds! He had never fought someone who could actually hurt him!
'How?! How can they do that?!'
Then the green bastard, instead of helping the greek guy and the yokai kill his monsters as he hoped, kept moving towards him, only this time he began to run. Uehara promptly made half of the army ignore the girl and Aleksandros and go straight for Slayer, and began spewing more and more ink, but even then it became obvious this was delaying the inevitable.
He couldn't get out of this one talking and twisting words, not with Doom Slayer, who despite the increasingly stiffer resistance from dragons, giants and demons didn't stop his march, his visor showed a glare that could have killed him had it been possible.
Uehara had to fight, and pray he could do better than a shark demigod.
And the only hope he had to at least offer some resistance was to unleash his most powerful form, the one he was reluctant to use because it took too much energy from him to form.
But anything just to keep living, at least for a few minutes.
'He wants to kill me? Fine! But I'm not dying without a fight!' Uehara thought as Doom Slayer was mere feet away from him before tearing his shirt open, grabbing his chest... and ripping it out.
..........
'I think I'm getting the hang of this!' Ayame thought as she raced around the monsters, filling them with blue orbs of energy as she went, and relieved that she now could fight back against the monsters. The weapon was heavy, yes, but as she found out to her relief, not so much as to make her that much slower than usual.
Which still left her much faster than any of the monsters, which allowed her to develop a simple yet extremely effective tactic: run circles around them, force them into groups, unleash hell until they turned into vapour, rinse and repeat.
Pausanias, on the other hand, kept going at the horde without abandon, his body now partially covered in black blood and flesh from his victims. He didn't even need to keep the chainsaw running, he was more than strong enough to just cleave anything on his path. She was understandably worried that he ended up attacking her by accident, but at the same time was confident he wouldn't recognize her, which she doubted given he was simply very angry.
'And even then, I can just get out of his way' She thought as she liquidated a group of skeletons under the cheers of her tribe.
And then, of course, was the man who had basically saved them, Doom Slayer, of whom she was now significantly less scared after he helped them. She didn't care what Doom Slayer was going to do to that bastard (torture him, beat the hell out of him, kill him outright) as long as it made him suffer for what he did, but she did know that it would hurt.
Ayame, after getting rid of yet more monsters, watched in trepidation as the future soldier closed the distance between him and the commander, but just as he was about to reach him, Daizo did something that shocked her at first.
First, he grabbed his shirt and ripped it open. Ayame would have laughed at his action had it not been for Daizo immediatly grabbing his belly and, to her horror, ripping it out. Only, instead of spewing out blood and guts, the newly made hole on his body disgorged a torrent of ink that engulfed a smiling Daizo completely, but didn't stop at that.
As the ink kept flowing in front of Slayer, Ayame watched with terror how the mound kept growing in size, developing something that could be described as forelimbs, growing a strange, smaller mound at the top... All while Doom Slayer did nothing, seemingly inspecting it with interest.
And then a large mass eerily similar to a fist, larger than a car, sprouted from the growing mass and struck Doom Slayer with enough force to send him flying backwards into the treeline. Said fist then placed itself on the ground just as the rest of the arm began to came out, followed by another arm.
As the amorphous mass began forming into the shape of a man, Ayame's eyes widened in dread as the creature kept growing, and growing, and growing some more, until it finally stopped after reaching the height of a small skyscraper.
Daizo, who looked like a normal human a mere minute before, was now a towering giant made of ink, dark as the night sky and several times larger than even the largest ink demon, a eerie red haze glowing from both its eyes and the inside of its mouth. Overall, it looked like a demon had crawled it's way out of Hell itself.
Pausanias stopped his rampage to gawk at the titan raising over them like a spire of death, and even the other ink monsters stopped fighting to stare at their master. Ayame could also hear screams of panic and terror from where her family was located.
"Didn't expect that, did you, you green bastard?!" Daizo bellowed as he glared at the spot where Doom Slayer crashed, his roar shaking the very ground where the stood and deafening Ayame's, hurting her hearing to the point of making her cry in pain and drop the gun to clutch at her ears.
Whatever else he was going to do (keep talking, attack them, anything) was suddenly interrupted when a green missile crashed into its chest at breakneck speed.
..........
Welp, Doom Slayer finally joins the fray, but so has Daizo, and this might be the first somewhat serious fight he's been since his arrival at DC. Does Pausanias becoming a killing machine just because a placebo and in spite of his injuries make sense to you guys? Could the placebo work at all given the universe and his own background?
If the fight scenes seem to be crappy and vaguely described, consider this:
A) As stated in Daizo's POV, it's the first time since ever someone managed to actually hurt him in any way.
B) Both Pausania and Ayame are actually good fighters themselves (though Pausanias is the better of the two), but had no real way of fighting Daizo's army.
C) Doom Slayer fighting some ink mooks. That is all.
As for Daizo's rather weird train of thought in the second half (first scared, then deciding to fight), he's been driven half-mad: unlike other villains, he knows to not understimate enemies that seem capable of dealing with him, and obviously knows of Doom Slayer's opinion towards villains like him.
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Stupid the Ork
Oct 19, 2021
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Stupid the Ork
Never enuff Dakka
Oct 24, 2021
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#486
Daizo could be considered my first 'true' oponent, in the sense I actually faced some sort of resistance from him: in his giant form he was vastly stronger and tougher than King Shark had been, although the latter was mostly due to his sheer size, and because at that size and state of mind he wouldn't register the wounds I inflicted, and again because of his size I couldn't apply the pankration techniques I self-learned, so the fight ended up coming to a trading of blows and some ripping.
It still wouldn't save him (I was merely giving him hope so that I could crush it) but it did made me remember that there were things out there in the universe, most of them vastly stronger than Daizo, things that could actually challenge me.
And one of them was Raven's father. Which I had yet to find despite my technology, John's magic, and the aid of the future League.
And then my sight gazed upon Pausanias and Ayame. Both of them were dangerously close to the fight, the girl frozen because of the fear, Pausanias due to the astonishment of seeing Doom Slayer and a titan of ink duke it out right in front of him. I really didn't want them to end accidentally killed in case I not-so impossibly slipped up or Daizo noticed them and decided to drag someone to the grave with him.
Later I also found out that Pausanias was also one of the foster sons of Hephaestus, who being a god did in fact know Raven's disappearance... but let's not be hasty.
At that moment I thought that maybe, just maybe, I could use more help, if not for finding Raven, then at least to protect the innocent, given that, as I already told you, I'm not omnipresent. Plus, they had prove themselves to be capable of fighting: had Daizo been vulnerable to conventional means, they'd have killed him. Of course there were several issues, like Ayame understandably being wary of humans and refusing to leave her tribe, and Pausanias newly made inner turmoil concerning me for reasons you might already know.
First, however, I had to earn their trust, or something similar. That, and see their fighting capability against a colossus.
Which was why I decided to feign being momentarily overwhelmed by Daizo, and see if they decided to 'help' me fight him.
Again, this also gave Daizo hope.
Hope that we crushed.
..........
'And here I thought we'd be giving him his just deserves' Thought Pausanias as he saw a literal battle of giants unfold right in front of him, loathing of the soldier forgotten for the moment and admiration remembered.
Yes, giants: Doom Slayer was at least a foot taller than him, and Daizo... Well, nothing had managed to reach that size, aside from that giant chimp Superman had battled years prior, and even then, it was just that, an oversized monkey, not a giant made of ink.
The fight with the ink monsters had finally ended: those he and Ayame didn't kill either became inert or turned into ink once more to rejoin their master. He would have dispatched the former, but he was too busy observing the fight, reminding him of the stories of the Gigantomachia, the war between the Olympians and the Gigantes colloquially known as giants, that nearly destroyed Greece to free the Titans, of how Hephaestus himself caved countless heads with his hammer and fought alongside god and demigod to vanquish them underground.
Only this time, the size disparity between the combatants was rather excessive, given that the Gigantes weren't truly giants by human standards, and couldn't make themselves any bigger unlike their enemies.
Fortunately, Ayame wasn't so enraptured by it: after making sure her people were safe (they had been understandably terrified of Daizo's transformation, but Doom Slayer's attack help them keep their wits), she grabbed the plasma gun and continued destroying the remaining inklings, taking advantage of their paralysis.
Finally done, the yokai girl approached the amazed warrior, noting that he was dangerously close to the fighting, and still heavily injuried, enough to worry her more than the fact he was still carrying Slayer's chainsaw. At least he
"Pausanias, I think we should go with the others." Ayame said just as Doom Slayer slammed himself against Daizo once more, forcing him back to the ground. The impact was so strong, it created a shockwave that rustled every tree in sight, and even pushed the pair back. That only increased her fear of Pausanias, and her, being squashed by six hundred tons of ink. "And you need to have those wounds taken care of."
But Pausanias didn't budge a muscle even as she pulled from his arm, enraptured as he was by the fight. Ayame's worry only got worse by this lack of movement: at least when he had been crazy he walked and spoke (well, yelled like a maniac).
"My aunts are nurses, they can patch you up, c'mon!" She said before sighing and placing the gun's hot barrel on Pausanias' uncovered arm, making him yelp and finally getting him out of his daze.
"Uh?" He muttered in a confused tone, even blinking as if he had just gotten up from the bed. He then looked around and realized what happened. "Oh, sorry it's just... I've never seen this kind of fighting before... or Doom Slayer fighting someone for more than half a minute. It's amazing."
Ayame looked back to the fight and saw Slayer jumping on Daizo's face to punch it several times. "I guess it's incredible." As much as she loathed to admit it, she too was fascinated by the sheer scale brawl, but nonetheless she didn't want to be there if it scalated, which probably would. "We can still watch it with the others, at safer distance even. Plus you're bleeding like a stuck pig." She then grabbed him with her free hand and, seeing he wasn't offering resistance, began to drag him to the cliff. "C'mon, let's get those gashes cleaned."
However, they had barely moved three meters when Pausanias, still wanting to see the fight, looked back.
Just in time to see Daizo suddenly grab Doom Slayer out of the air and, with a roar, slam him against the ground with all his might. The attack made the earth rumble and even sent trees flying.
None of this registered on the pair, who stared at an equally confused Daizo with wide eyes.
"W-what did just happen?" Ayame muttered in a mix of shock. She really didn't expect Doom Slayer of all people to be taken out by that. It was as if Superman had been forced down by whoever that brute from Gotham was called.
"Daizo grabbed Doom Slayer and shoved him so hard he caused a short earthquake." Pausanias replied, just as shocked, if not even more.
"I know it happened, I just can't believe it!" She cried as she gestured at the giant form of Daizo. "Doom Slayer, beaten by some century-old ink monster turned cop, just like that!"
"Neither do I." Pausanias replied, just as surprised. And yet, something in his mind, something born of seeing the same videos of the man manhandling King Shark and holding up a fifteen-storey building told him this was just a momentary setback for the warrior from the future.
His hunch ended up being right, because a moment later Daizo screamed in agony as Doom Slayer tored his way out of the giant hand, his roar so loud that Ayame, because of her fine hearing, had to cover her ears until it died off.
"Nevermind then, it was just a lucky hit." Pausanias quipped as Slayer climbed his way up Daizo's arm.
Ayame, seeing that Slayer hadn't been defeated, released a sigh of relief.
"I thought for a moment we we're next." She breathed out. But then, a thought struck her: Doom Slayer had until then proved himself to be practically unstoppable, and at that moment reminded them of that little fact. And yet, how did Daizo manage to hit him at all? "Although it makes me wonder, how did Daizo get him?"
"I think your guess is better than mine, although that's because I don't have one." Pausanias admitted with a shrug of his sohulders. "What do you think?"
"Maybe he's holding back?" Suggested Ayame, although it was obvious by the tone of her voice that she wasn't sure herself. "Or didn't expect Daizo to be this strong?"
Pausanias shook his head. "I doubt he'd be holding his might with someone like Daizo." The possibility of Doom Slayer having observed them from before reared it's ugly head, but he pushed it aside for the moment. "And why do you suggest it?"
Ayame tried to think of a proper response. "Maybe to try and get Daizo to lower his guard? Or maybe he doesn't know what he's done and planned to do, otherwise I'm sure he'd killed him in the first minute."
Pausanias looked at her, then turned back to the fight just to see Slayer free himself and then uppercut Daizo. "Those are possibilities."
"Hey guys!" It was Ginta, who had finally discared his stupid mummy-wannabe disguise, alongside several other tribemates, both men and women, all of them young; apparently the group had come down the cliff to where were they stood while they were distracted. "Nice view ain't it?" He said with a grin.
Ayame was less than amused by their presence. "What the hell are you doing here! Can't you see the two forces of nature clashing and tearing the damn forest apart?!" She screamed at the group, making them wince. "It's dangerous in here!"
Ginta gestured at the duel. "To see it better and up close. I mean, it's Doom Slayer beating the holy shit out of a giant monster! Plus, you aren't exactly out of the fire, if you get what I mean."
Pausanias nodded in agreement, still not taking his eyes off the fight, just as Slayer twisted Daizo's right arm. "It's perfectly reasonable reason."
Ayame sighed in annoyance. "Only for idiots."
Pausanias was about to retort when one of the girls pointed at the fight. "Erm, guys?"
The group turned around to look at was she pointing at... and their blood froze on their veins.
Once more, Daizo had taken hold of Doom Slayer and tossed him off of him, only this time, very possibly due to sheer desperation and lack of options, he decided to go on the offensive. The moment Doom Slayer touched the ground, Daizo's giant fists fell down and struck once, two, three, more times at the spot he had fell on. And this time, Slayer didn't explode from below his hand.
This continued for a full minute, each hit shaking the earth and sending up clouds of dust, until Daizo finally stopped to catch his breath of all things, or maybe to calm himself down. Either way, it would have been comical, the sight of a hundred-foot giant being scared as Hell, but for them it was instead terrifying.
Didn't help that they could see Doom Slayer's prone body on the ground, motionless.
And maybe even, as impossible as it sounded, as much as their minds told them to not believe it, lifeless.
"He's not getting up." Ginta voiced what the others were thinking. "Big guy isn't getting up!"
And then Daizo, as if struck by something, turned to look to his left... and smirked when he saw them. Words could not describe the feeling the group had of being stared at by something that could take on one of Earth's mightiest heroes. Fear just didn't cut it.
Except for Pausanias, who only felt his anger rise.
"It seems I forgot about you pups." He said, his inhuman, reverbering voice sending shivers down their spines. "And it seems I underestimated myself of all people!" He chuckled. "Never expected to actually kill the fucking Doom Slayer! Too bad I can't brag about it, but I CAN brag of killing the man-eaters and the Spartan."
The yokai realized they were doomed, and that nothing could save them from Daizo.
But then, they had forgot that they didn't necessarily need Doom Slayer, only his weapons.
Pausanias didn't know what came over him. Maybe foolishness, maybe refusing to go down without a fight against the bastard who wouldn't stop at nothing to see him and the wolf tribe dead, maybe wanting to believe that Doom Sayer had been merely rendered unconscious, or even that he was actually testing them.
(By sheer coincidence, the last one ended up being partly right).
Or maybe, just maybe, he still had some rage left in him directed at both Daizo and Doom Slayer, the former for natural reasons, the latter because Pausanias still wasn't sure if he had let it all happen.
'Screw it, doubts for later.' Pausanias thought before raising the chainsaw and, with a shout, throw it at the head of the distracted ink titan.
Daizo's speech about how some people were made to become great and others to help those reach said greatness was rudely interrupted by a chainsaw to the head, and either by divine providence or sheer luck the tool landed right in the left eye. Again, words could not really describe the feeling of agony that fueled his roar.
The yokai, Ayame included, looked at Pausanias, completely aghast.
Pausanias didn't bother to look at them, focused as he was glaring at Daizo. "Stay back, I'll take care of him."
With that he did the most ridiculous and dangerous, yet brave thing he could have doen: he gave a battle cry and charged at Daizo, no longer wrathful and therefore cautious. Daizo, on the other hand, wasn't: he was hurt, he had lost and eye, but most importantly, he was winded after pounding Doom Slayer and coming victorious, and so wasn't thinking straight.
He wouldn't actually fight him, though, not if he did it right.
Pausanias' plan was simple: climb up Daizo's body, recover the chainsaw, and cut his head off. With his current form, Daizo was more than capable of killing him with a single blow; however, it also made him slow and sluggish, and it was obvious he didn't know how to fight much smaller oponents. Better yet, he apparently couldn't heal his lost eye.
Daizo stopped screaming before grabbing the tool on his eye and pulling it out, after which he looked at the approaching greek. "I'm going to shove an industrial printer worth of of ink down up your ass, you Achilles wannabe!" He roared as he, in a moment of pain-induced stupidity, threw the chainsaw at Pausanias, hoping to kill him.
Instead it impaled the ground right before Pausanias, who promptly grabbed it and jumped just as Daizo sweeped at him, grabbing onto his arm.
Daizo was about to squash the human pest when, suddenly, he was once more interrupted, this time by a hail of plasma bolts hitting him in the back. The damage was not minimal, trickles of ink fell down of Daizo, but it also made him angrier... and made him forget about Pausanias, and focus on Ayame, who refused to do nothing, not now that she could fight back and make him pay.
Most imporantly, however, she realized what Pausanias' plan was.
"Bitch!" Daizo shrieked at her.
Ayame merely grinned at him, showing her fangs. "I AM a bitch, you know!" She said. "A wolf to be precise!"
"You're gonna be a RUG when I'm done with you and your boyfriend!"
"You'll have to catch me first, then!" Ayame then flipped him off and shot some more plasma into his face before speeding off into the forest. Mad with pain, fear and rage, Daizo gave chase, followed closely by those tribemates also unwilling to stay idle, despite knowing they had no chance to fight Daizo.
"Shit, man, the bastard's fast!"
"Of course he is, his legs are longer than a bus!"
"Shut up and keep running!"
Daizo kept running after Ayame, smashing over trees and rocks as he went, too furious to remember Pausanias, who had jumped from the arm to the main body and started to climb. Other men would have fallen either because of the wild movement or the sticky-less nature of the ink composing Daizo, but Pausanis not only made of sterner stuff, he was also strong enough to just sink the fingers of his free hand on Daizo's 'flesh', using the chainsaw as an improptu climbing axe. The corrupt officer was simply too mad to care about the pain this gave him, not helped by Ayame sporadically shooting at him to keep his attention on her.
At least until Pausanias finally reached his right shoulder and sunk the serrated blade on it by mistake.
The sheer closeness of the pain and the fact it didn't come from the yokai's attack made Daizo stop and try to grasp his shoulder... only for it to pierced by Pausanias. As he looked again, he glared in fury when he saw Pausanias standing mere feet away from his head, glaring back and with the chainsaw revved.
Daizo growled, his hot breath washing over Pausanias. "You son of a bitch..."
Other men would have balked at the sight of a one-eyed, ink-bodied giant glaring at them.
Not Pausanias, not with his anger and determination, his goal to fulfill being so close, and the adrenaline coursing through his veins.
"I'm the son of a god, freak!" Pausanias growled back before raising the weapon given to him by Doom Slayer, and cleaving Daizo's head from top to bottom with all his might. From the open wound erupted a geyser of black ichor that nearly pushed Pausanias off of Daizo, but the saw blade, still lodged on Daizo's head, kept him anchored.
The now nearly-headless body of the titan stood frozen for a few moments, until whatever it passed as its nervous system keeping it erect ceased to work, at which point it fell, the earth shaking as several hundred tons of ink crashed against it.
Pausanias, winded, tired and heavily injuried but otherwise content and victorious, let himself drop off the giant corpse, chainsaw still clutched. He was promptly set upon by Ayame, who hugged him, followed closely by the cheering wolves that had followed them.
"You did it! You killed Daizo!" She cheered with a smile before stepping back and then helping him stand up.
Pausanias, who was still breathing, smiled at her. "I wouldn't have been able to do it if you hadn't dragged him into a wild chase, you know."
Ayame smile's widened at his appraisal, and was about to reply when, suddenly, she heard the rumbling of something large moving from behind them. Turning around, the group saw with increasingly opening, horrified eyes as the previously thought to be dead Daizo rose from the ground, ink leaking from his body but clearly alive. And, by the way his fists were clenched, pissed off.
The monster turned to face the wolves and the son of Hephaestus, and from it's chest grew a face that leered down at them.
"Did you really think you could kill me just like that!" He roared at them, or more specifically at his 'killer'. "This body's just a tool! You hurt me good, but that's it! That's ALL!"
"W-what does it take to kill that freak?!" Ginta cried in shock.
Pausanias just growled as he once again started the chainsaw. "We'll just have to keep attacking until he's nothing but a pile of black gore, then!"
Ayame, glaring up at Daizo just as Pausanias, aimed the gun at Daizo, while the rest of group, despite knowing they had no way to hurt him, took stances anyway, preferring to die struggling than to be hunted down.
Daizo laughed at their defiance. "I like your guts, kids, but in the end it won't really matter! I took out Doom Slayer by myself! Do you really believe you can defeat me, when HE couldn't?!"
Before they could do anything, a deep, guttural voice spoke right behind the group.
"You didn't."
Pausanias and the others frantically looked back to see the last person they expected at that moment.
Doom Slayer.
As the green soldier, after several seconds of silence, began to make his way towards him, Daizo didn't scream, he didn'tattack, he didn't even try to run to save his miserable pseudo-hide. He just stared at the man he really thought he had killed.
And whimpered as Slayer jumped at him once more.
..........
So, how was the chapter? Was it a good mix of action and narrative? And the ending? Sorry for focusing again on the crossover immigrants and not enough on Doom Slayer vs. Daizo, else the chapter would have been too short.
If some of you wonder how did Daizo even manage to put up a fight against Doom Slayer, it's chiefly for two reasons:
-Being a supernatural creature himself, Daizo can make his giant body obey a part of the square cube law (the larger a living organism is, the stronger it has to be so that its body doesn't collapse on itself, while also ignore. Granted, this is true for every giant monster in fiction, but I felt the need to point it out.
-Doom Slayer let him, both to see how well did Pausanias and Ayame fight him now that they had the means to do so... and to raise his hopes of winning.
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It seems Doom Slayer has decided to get personally involved on this... which makes sense, given Pausanias' brave but futile performance against Daizo. Never said anything about the SI not delivering the weapon himself.
If the fight with Barricade seems sloppy to you, it's because (I think) it is: sometimes I'm just not good at writing fights. Fear not, though, because the next chapter's fight will be better written (or at least, that's what I hope).
Last edited: Oct 19, 2021
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..........
Sorry for the narrative heavy (okay, nearly narrative exclusive) chapter, I thought the arc (yes, arc) and the new characters needed backstory; the following chapters will be focused first on the start of the fight from their POV, then DS's 'intervention', so we're gonna be with them for some time.
Anyway, how was this chapter in general? Too long for a backstory chapter? Is Pausanias' want of honor a realistic flaw for a man raised by a literal god from Ancient Greece? Also, I'm revealing what other works and characters have been added to the story because one is very sparsely written about here, and the other is practically unknown. So, going by the characters.
-Yokai in general: Inuyasha. Specifically, Ayame was Koga's love interest in the anime (she doesn't exist in the manga). As for why I specifically added her, dunno, I saw an image of her the other day and thought 'eh, why not?'. Plus, I used to watch the series when I was a kid because my big sister hogged the TV and didn't let me watch anything else, so it got ingrained in my head. As for why Ayame, she seems like an underused character to me.
-The hoplite: Spartan: Total Warrior, a very anachronistic, yet fun game (and Creative Assembly attempt to port a game to consoles) where you play as an spartan fighting against the legions of Rome (and in the year 300 B.C) with the aid of Ares. I was raised by the game, and one day I realized that with some tweaks it could fit perfectly on DC's timeline. The Spartan is never actually called by name in the game, so I named him Pausanias (namely because Leonidas is also in the game... as are Castor, Pollux, an Elektra turned amazon, a Sejanus turned sorcerer...).
Oh, and Ares ends up being the BBEG AND final boss of the game.
For those who might be wondering, the Olympians do not know about Doom Slayer; they do know that something powerful has entered their universe, but being the greek gods they are, and Doom Slayer making it seem like he came here through technological means, they have yet to put two and two together, although they'll realize (some of) the truth if/when they meet him in person.
Also... Doom Slayer finally made it to Super Smash Bros. Ultimate! Hurray!
... as a Mii gunner, despite being a very, very iconic videogame character armed with several 'family-friendly' guns. Better than nothing, I guess. On the other hand, does this mean he can still get a spot in Mortal Kombat?
Last edited: Oct 6, 2021
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