The pounding rain did little to dampen Lee's resolve as he turned toward the neon-lit city, striding with fierce purpose. Akiko's safety was secured, but the architect of their suffering still remained - Tojiro Watanabe, tyrannical kingpin of the criminal underworld.
Lee knew facing such a ruthless foe carried tremendous risks, yet backing down was not an option. Not after witnessing the yakuza's brutal tactics firsthand, and the terror they instilled in ordinary people just trying to live their lives. No, Tojiro had to be confronted and stopped, for Akiko and all those who suffered under his violent rule whomever they maybe. Lee wanted to do them a favor.
As night descended, Lee wandered darkened backstreets staying alert for any signs of pursuit. The torrential rain provided cover while hindering his enhanced senses. Coming upon an abandoned warehouse, Lee ducked inside hoping for temporary shelter from the storm.
Creaking metal shelves lined the cavernous room, long stripped bare. Water dripped through cracks in the corrugated roof, pooling on the concrete floor. Lee wrung out his soaked clothes, the Vitalus Shard pulsing a warm red glow against his skin. Its power continued adapting his physiology in strange ways, though full control remained elusive.
No sooner had Lee begun meditating than a crackle of static burst from the pocket of his pants. Fishing out a slim smartphone he received from the Yamada's, the display showed no signal but flickered with ambient noise. Lee tapped the screen curiously, surprised by this unexpected find. Then a distorted voice cut through the static:
"I...pa...you...le."
Lee held the device closer, straining to make out the broken transmission. Another burst of static, and a woman's terrified voice screamed "HELP MEEEEE!" before dissolving into white noise once more. Lee's blood ran cold, recognizing Akiko's distress even through the electronic veil.
A message abruptly blipped onto the screen, it was a location.
Grabbing his meager possessions, Lee sprinted back into the stormy night, following some latent sense guiding his footsteps toward Akiko's fading life signature. The Vitalus Shard sang with crimson urgency, resonating with Lee's own protective drive surging to the fore. Whoever sought to harm Akiko would face his wrath tenfold.
Eventually Lee arrived at a colorless business complex, dim lights flickering behind rain-lashed windows. Slowing his frantic pace, Lee crept along the perimeter seeking answers to Akiko's call for aid. Peering into an open loading bay, his heightened night vision revealed crates and equipment haphazardly strewn about the enormous space.
Drawing nearer, movement in the shadows gave Lee pause. Two hulking silhouettes emerged, bathed strangely in an eerie red glow that played across craggy features evoking demons spawned straight from Hell's deepest pits. Twin orbs of light pierced the darkness, locking onto Lee with preternatural clarity and focus.
A low rumble emanated from the larger beast. "Found...intruder. Master...wants...him Korega."
The second shadow bared yellowed fangs in a mockery of a grin. "Yes Hyato...girl squealed...location. Now...play...with food."
These entities were unlike any foe Lee had faced thus far, warped far beyond mere humanity. They advanced with unnatural speed and grace, yet something about their larger counterpart's form nagged at Lee's memory. Had he encountered this abomination before in some past life?
No time remained for speculation. The hulking beasts closed in for the kill, obsidian claws thirsting to rend flesh from bone. Lee rolled beneath a swiping swipe, coming up inside its guard to deliver a punishing blow. But his fist passed harmlessly through a crimson shroud emanating a numbing chill.
His latest opponent laughed, a sound akin to grinding tombstones. "Foolish food...Master made us...immune pain. Now...taste shadows..."
Lee retreated from swiping talons, narrowly avoiding being rent apart. These things could not be reasoned or fought conventionally; he needed a new strategy, and fast. The twin nightmares separated to flank their cornered prey, glowing red auras inverting darkness itself.
In that moment, watching the energy shrouding his foes, Lee realized their Achilles' heel. They wielded negative energy as a shield and weapon both, yet remained corporeal shells containing essence that could still experience harm, pain, and even death. He must turn their power itself against them somehow and sever those demonic tethers to the negative realm empowering their savage forms.
But how? Lee had only begun tapping the Vitalus Shard's gifts out of necessity thus far. Could he focus its mysterious light energies in such a directed, offensive manner against living manifestations of darkness? Only one way existed to find out, and the beasts' closing pincers offered no time for doubts or hesitation.
Reaching within, Lee grasped the Shard's inner warmth and let it flow unrestrained throughout his being. Crimson aura surged to engulf his entire form, its radiance banishing shadows from the cavernous space. His assailants recoiled momentarily, shielding spectral eyes unused to purity of such intensity.
In that suspended instant, Lee honed the concentrated aura rippling around clenched fists. With twin cries of challenge and defiance, he launched fluidly between the monsters to land pulverizing blows. Crackling red discharge arced violently on impact, searing beyond claws and armor into roiling shadows beneath.
His larger foe reeled howling, form buckling under the unnatural energies assailing its dark heart. But the second recovered swift as quicksilver, slashing venomous talons seeking Lee's unprotected back. He wheeled just in time, catching the wrist in a vise-like grip. Red aura coursed into clenched fingertips, surging down clinging arm wrapped in roiling miasma.
The shadows resisted valiantly, yet purity's blazing touch proved more than they could withstand. Blackened flesh bubbled and cracked audibly as positive energy purged their tainted forms bit by bit. Both beasts collapsed mewling, frames contorting unnaturally as allegiance to the negative realm dissolved in agony. Their essences broke apart like dispersing smoke, fleeing back through whatever portal summoned forth such demonic puddle leaving behind two unconscious humans .
Lee stood amid blowing cinders, heaving for breath after unleashing the full wrath of the Shard against living darkness. But no time remained for rest. Akiko's terror-filled scream still echoed disturbingly, urging him ever onward to confront whatever new evils lurked ahead seeking innocent blood.
Steeling his nerves, Lee crept deeper into the cavernous complex tracking faint voices and flashes of movement beyond. Tormented cries grew louder the further he proceeded, yet something about their strange reverberance gave Lee pause. Rounding a dark corner, blue light spilled forth revealing the source of Akiko's earlier distress call.
Suspended above a colossal machinery pit strewn with barge-sized gears and pulleys loomed glowing screens displaying Akiko captive in a featureless chamber. Her bruised figure pounded desperately against transparent barriers, pleas muffled yet unmistakably desperate. But something wasn't right - the footage lagged and glitched unnaturally, flickering between different angles with no real logic or flow.
A chill ran down Lee's spine as understanding dawned. "This is...a recording. Being used...to lure me here."
That's when a slow, deliberately mocking applause began emanating from shadowed catwalks high above. Spotlights flared to life, illuminating a lone silhouette against iron grating - a towering, scarred figure attired in lavish silks befitting a crime lord's station. Eyes as cold and pitiless as a viper's pierced the gloom with predatory amusement.
"Well done, foreigner. You fell for my simple ruse and delivered yourself into my grasp, just as the girl served her purpose drawing you out into the open." Tojiro Watanabe's grating baritone echoed ominously through the vast chamber.
Lee glared up defiantly, remaining loose and poised should violence erupt. "Release Akiko at once, Watanabe. Your feud is with me alone."
Tojiro smiled without mirth, revealing filed teeth. "The woman's fate no longer concerns me. But you, foreigner...you who dared stand against my organization, are another matter entirely. Now you will experience the full brutality of those defying the Watanabes before breathing your last!"
With a thunderous snarl, Tojiro flung himself from the catwalk with predatory grace, landing meters from Lee like an avenging wrath of man and beast combined. His hardened gaze held no trace of mercy or hesitation - only bloodlust awaiting its due sacrifice.
"Your end begins NOW!"
----
Tojiro launched himself at Lee with explosive speed, intent on ending the fight in the opening seconds. But Lee rolled nimbly aside, calling upon the shard's power to heighten his reflexes beyond human limits. It still proved barely sufficient to evade the yakuza kingpin's savage strikes, which landed like thunderclaps where moments before he stood.
Retreating steadily under Tojiro's relentless onslaught, Lee searched for an opening to turn the tide. But the crime boss fought with unmatched ferocity, powerful muscles rippling beneath a patchwork of scars earned through decades of violence. Each bone-shattering blow threatened to cave in Lee's defenses, yet still he maintained evasive footwork through stubborn determination and the shard's resounding song.
Their clash sent shockwaves resonating throughout the huge chamber, its exposed beams and machinery rattling under their earth-shaking combat. Lee grasped a steel-beam to swing around behind Tojiro, delivering a punishing kick aimed between massive shoulder blades. But the yakuza wheeled lightning-fast, forearm intercepting the incoming leg with crushing force.
Lee's fibula snapped audibly under the impact, dropping him writhing to the concrete. Before he could roll clear, a meaty foot stomped down with terminal intent. Flares of crimson light erupted as the shard protected Lee at the last instant, deflecting death's heavy blow. Yet Tojiro followed up instantly, blackened knuckles smashed against Lee's guard like cracking thunderheads.
The fight had barely begun, yet waves of pain and exhaustion already gripped Lee's broken frame. Tojiro dominated through sheer brute strength even at his advanced age, reinforced by innumerable battles waged against those daring oppose his criminal empire. Lee spat blood, mustering a fleeting window to retreat limping beyond arm's reach once more. His only advantage lay in the shard's mysterious energies, bending physics yet straining under each earth-shaking assault.
Tojiro sneered excitedly, admiring rapidly purling knuckles erupting from split skin. "A promising start, pup. But resistance is futile against the might of my fists." His motions flowed between athlete's grace and savage ferocity, an apex blending both into a murderous artform few lived to describe.
Lee wheezed raggedly, hunkering behind a cloud of crimson aura summoned to numb flaring injuries. Tojiro was no mere thug brawling in alleys - he confronted a martial artist refined through decades of life-or-death struggles, fully living up to legends of peerless brutality. Lee struggled, clinging to stubborn hope the stone possessed to the secrets untapped countering even this deadly opponent.
His limp faded under energies mending fractured bone by unwilling stride, yet pain shrieked continuous operatic lyrics through wracked flesh. Lee launched back into the fray with distorted mobility, meeting Tojiro's next skull-cracking hook attempt with a well-placed palm strike. But snarling knuckles simply compressed the aura like crumpling paper, smashing their intended target regardless.
Lee's neck snapped back violently from the force, cracking against exposed girders hard enough to raise stars swimming before blurring vision. His guard crumpled, inviting a barrage of pulverizing hooks raining merciless punishment. Crimson flare engulfed Lee momentarily under each impact threatening to buckle bone and brain alike into pulp. Somehow he maintained tenuous consciousness, curling around protective aura flaring persistently through waves of agony.
Tojiro paused in sadistic amusement, watching Lee writhe upon the stained concrete flooring vomiting viscera. The stone burned hotter than ever against heaving flesh, flickering between defiant scarlet and ominous violet hues. Its energies seeped deeper into Lee's failing frame, transmuting pain into purpose through some primal resonance. Muscles swelled rapidly around broken bones grinding themselves whole beneath rioting tissues.
Lee rose unsteadily through sheer force of will, blood-splattered visage set in a death's menacing grin revealing elongated canines slick with gore. Tojiro grinned savagely in approval - this foreign whelp possessed spirit to match his own, refusing to yield against all rationality. The fight had barely begun in earnest.
"Yes, show me your fire!" Tojiro bellowed in primal challenge, launching forward with renewed frenzy.
Lee intercepted instinctively, seizing the yakuza chieftain's meaty wrist in a vice-like hold. Bones creaked threateningly within his transfigured grip, yet Tojiro merely roared in manic bloodlust. Black flames crackled along engorged veins surging from his fist, licking hungrily at Lee's fluxing aura. Recognition dawned amid the whirling exchange - this was the selfsame unholy energy empowering the shadow beasts previously.
Tojiro capitalized upon Lee's distracted state, smashing an elbow into his unprotected temple. Stars collided violently behind eyes rolling back, yet fingers clenched tighter reflexively even through lassitude's red mists. Negative energy coursed into welcoming pores, tracing throbbing vessels conducting its corruption deeper. Searing pain blazed along arteries contaminated by creeping darkness, kindling further change within Lee's straining form.
His expression contorted savagely, crimson aura warping between scarlet purity and violet taint. Lee struggled against the shard's destabilization through Tojiro's sinister influence, yet already darkness seeped into recesses of fading reason. The yakuza kingpin grinned madly, feeding his foe's mounting hysteria with merciless hammer fists. Lee reeled wilding beneath the savage onslaught, violet energies beginning to spill uncontrolled.
Somehow he grasped flickering rationality's fraying threads, focusing resistance through the shard's welling song. Positive energy surged outward in explosion of searing glory, banishing corruption's hooks from flesh and flaring his aura anew. Tojiro was thrown back howling, blistered palms steaming angrily. Lee panted amid swirling mists, realizing imbalance's razor edge he danced - yield too far either way risked losing self to madness or shadow.
"You wield forbidden power, Watanabe" Lee grated through mangled vocal cords. "Tell me - who is your true master pulling your strings?"
Tojiro straightened proudly, regarding branded palms without flinch. "My allegiance lies to one far greater than any mortal king or crime lord. He has granted dominion over this realm's underbelly, so long as tribute and souls continue flowing their way."
Something about that ominous mention triggered elusive memories from the first encounter visions of the previous guardian, yet Lee had no time unravelling riddles midst reality's occurrence. Tojiro bellowed a guttural war-cry, flinging himself anew into the fray as dark flames surged once more from engorged veins. Their titanic battle entered its apex along flashing storm and grinding steel, two indomitable beings battling through raging fury.
The stone flared simultaneously scarlet and charcoal within Lee's resonating aura, fighting to maintain his balance's delicate equilibrium. His enhanced form contorted lithely between earthshaking impacts threatening to reduce mortal flesh into pulp.
Tojiro's strikes fell slightly wilder through accumulating wounds yet remained cataclysmically potent, driven by primal instincts refusing to tire or falter before victory.
Lee fought to turn the tide through superior footwork and technique, yet raw power differences proved insurmountable thus far. An opening emerged amid whirling flurries - Tojiro overextended with rising bloodlust, leaving flesh briefly exposed. Calling upon reserves plumbed from agony's wellspring, Lee focused vibrating energies throughout trembling limbs.
His answering chop detonated upon Tojiro's unprotected collarbone, channeling the full latent wrath residing dormant since creation's dawn. Bone splintered loudly with crackling discharge enveloping his opponent, flinging the yakuza lord's body through crumbling iron walls rent effortlessly apart. Brick and mortar cascaded noisily into rain-lashed darkness beyond, Tojiro lost in the shrouded debris.
Lee stood amid wavering mists catching breath, agony mounting dizzily after unleashing fury's dread glimpse. Had he slain his hated nemesis at last? Boots crunched upon rubble, resolving that doubt with swift vengeance.
Tojiro clawed free of drifting dust, silhouetted against flashes strobe-lighting roiling heavens. Red rivulets of blood dripped sullen from multiple lacerations painted gruesomely across his broken frame, yet unyielding spirit shone undimmed.
Though rent by bone and riven by muscle, Tojiro's indomitable carnage endured on stubborn will alone. Black flames shrouded wounds healing at inhuman rates before Lee's stunned face. When at last the lightning cleared, only a savage grin splitting his battered features remained unchanged.
"You fight well, outsider...hardy and resourceful beyond expectations. But resist as you might, this night ends in only one way - with your broken body lying at my feet!"
His next lunge carried new predatory nuance, gauging Lee's every motion with surgical precision. Tojiro fought with instinct bordering precognition now, having shrugged off mortal injuries.
Lee slammed through the reinforced glass wall with bone-shattering force, crashing out onto the rain-slicked overhang stories above the city streets. His battered form rolled uncontrollably over the angled pane, barely catching himself on the edge with broken fingers. Below, midnight traffic whipped by the echoes of the blinding downpour, an endless fall awaiting the slightest slip.
Tojiro emerged through the shattered window frame moments later, graceful despite injuries that would have felled lesser men. He paused to admire Lee grasping the cliff's edge through sheer force of will, holding dominion over life and death in bloodstained palms. Dark flames crackled expectantly around clenched fists raised to deliver the coup de grace.
Before the killing blow could fall, a lone luxury sedan prowled into the complex's entrance, engines roaring amid the tempest.
Tinted windows powered down electronically as it rolled to a precise stop, unveiling a lone immaculately-attired figure waiting patiently within. At his beckon, an ornate umbrella emerged to shelter finely groomed visage surveying the scene above dispassionately.
Those brief moments seemed to stretch on like an entire decade for Lee as his consciousness began to slip away. Through hazy vision, he watched as the two suited men made their way across the dimly lit floor of the abandoned chamber. Their expensive leather shoes echoed with each measured step against the cracked concrete.
"Tojiro Watanabe" came the stranger's cool baritone, carrying effortlessly despite the storm's howling din. "You have taken something not rightfully yours - Akiko Kuchiguze, favored niece of the Kuchiguze clan's esteemed Oyabun. Surrender her at once unharmed, and you shall suffer no retaliation for this transgression."
Tojiro turned slowly, blood draining from his savage features at the very mention of that ancient and revered crime family. Though the city's undisputed kingpin, even he dared not provoke the Kuchiguze's wrath without dire consequence. His furious gaze flitted between Lee's tenacious grip and the sedan's impassive passenger, weighing immense risks inherent to either choice.
In the end, survival instincts ingrained through decades of narrow escapes won out over vengeance's siren call. Tojiro spat contemptuously, dark flames dissipating from quivering fists. "Take the girl and be gone from my sight. This changes nothing - the streets will run red before I allow outsiders to undermine all I've built!"
With that dire vow, the yakuza lord walked on rubble, stalking back into shadows outpacing parting storms. Lee held onto flickering consciousness straining to comprehend these rapid developments, grasping for any handhold that might spare his failing strength a while longer. Below, the night's conclusion would be written in crimson once more.
---
pain.
Lee's consciousness faded in and out as the luxury sedan sped through rain-lashed streets. Each time awareness resurfaced, blurred visions greeted him between waves of agony.
Streetlights strobed dizzyingly past fractured windows, hinting at breathtaking speeds defying Tokyo's gridlock. Figures moved overhead in hushed conversation, foreign tongue that may as well have been birdsong for all its recognizability.
Lee struggled to comprehend through wracking pains hammering his broken frame. The Vitalus Shard lay worryingly dormant, denying its gifts of translation that could unravel this thread's course. Weakly craning his neck, a familiar face swam into focus astride his bruised skull.
Akiko mouthed rapid-fire Japanese with welling tears, yet her cerulean eyes reflected only relief finding him yet clinging to life. Her anguished beauty was the last thing Lee beheld before darkness reclaimed battered senses once more.
There he found only a limbo of formless dreams and growing agony, echoing with distant pleas for salvation. A presence made itself known amidst the void - flickering and frail, its resonance carried eons of knowledge and sorrow.
"Lee...must fuse...shards...power...fading..."
He recognized the Daughter of Resonance's voice filtering through some greater gulf, yet her meaning dissolved upon comprehension's shores. Lee writhed and bellowed namelessly, feeling existence slipping its mortal shackles. Then awareness surged abruptly once more, snapping back everything grasping oblivion's edge.
Sterile walls greeted blurred vision swimming into focus, medical equipment beeping rhythmically beside a plush bed. Firm yet gentle hands tended injuries sealed by advanced technologies, mending bones with care befitting a master's art.
When at last consciousness clung stubborn without ebbing, Akiko's teary yet radiant face leaned into view, joy and relief etched plainly upon exquisite features. Her voice carried music even mangled by an unfamiliar tongue. Nearby, silhouettes conferred in hushed murmurs rapidly answered.
Lee blinked blearily, struggling to piece fragmented awareness into coherence once more. Survival remained tenuous, but warriors far nobler than himself had overcome through even slighter grips upon the veil between realms. For now, rest would fortify his strained will ... pushing back mortality's curtain another day.
But deeper mysteries lurked where light and shadow met, begging revelation's dawn.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Akiko Kuchiguze :
Name: Akiko Kuchiguze
Age: 25
Ethnicity: Japanese, noble decent
Height: 158 cm (5'2")
Weight: 48 kg (106 lbs)
Hair: Long black hair with bangs cut in a straight line just above her eyebrows. Her hair has a soft wave and shine to it.
Eyes: Large doe-like eyes that are a sparkling light brown. Her eyes often convey warmth and kindness.
Skin: Pale, smooth skin with a soft glow.
Body Type: Slim yet curvaceous figure. Smooth and delicate features.
Personality: Compassionate, gentle and caring towards others. having overcome hardship herself through resilience and inner strength. Often puts others needs before her own. Has a playful, flirty side as well shown through her interactions with Lee.