Loud footsteps and sounds of people talking greeted Mana’s ears when the girl finally had reached the spot where the next ritualistic murder was supposed to take place. A little surprised and in a rush to hide from being seen or noticed the magician slammed against a wall, a bit too rude for comfort as her recently gathered array of wounds flared up with painful impulses emanating all throughout her body and forcing her to clutch for her sides again. There was no way she’d have took on a group of people at the moment without having to rely too much on physical chakra augmentation.
Leaning by the side the magician took a small peek, the people inside were mobsters, Syndicate mobsters. It was only natural that they would get in her way “ after all they were the ones to gather the information first and they wanted those children out of the streets and stopped from murdering their precious happy cash cows. These men carried much more impressive kunai dispensers, even from as far as Mana stood she could notice the difference between the weaponry used in the Katabami mines and these.
The ones in Katabami had wooden frames and pieces where the steel couldn’t have been worked to be so small and delicate. They had no targeting systems or any visual aids so it was up to the user’s skill to hit the mark. Naturally it was of little matter to a ninja who was trained at accurately slinging blades and shuriken at their enemies but to a mobster with limited training it would’ve made for a poor weapon to rely on. These dispenser tubes had comfortable leather holsters and a strange aiming aid that was meant to assist the mobster by having the user peek through it and lock down on the target. Mana had seen such aiming systems worn as eye prosthetics on some mercenaries back when she and Kiyomi fought Hachi’s crew.
The magician slowly tried scaling the wall she was close to, it was to no avail, the wall was too slippery and wet and she couldn’t use chakra to just run up it like a ninja could’ve. She was growing more and more desperate, she needed to get in closer, if the kids came in contact with these mobsters it’d be a slaughter and it only took a single simple death, an insignificant fraction of a second that it took for a fired blade to pierce someone for Mana’s wish to stop this violence to blow up in her face, for the ritual to apparently be completed. The kids only needed one death, after all, they ignored the cowering man from before and only claimed one life, that meant they only needed one death for the succession of the ritual.
Mana saw a metal ladder nearby, this whole place was a construction site but it was still the middle of the night so all the materials and climbing aids and safety tools were left around. Why wouldn’t they be? If someone stole something not under Syndicate’s orders they’d be quickly dealt with. To Mana such justice system sounded mind boggling but people here seemed to agree with it. There was something that troubled her as she slowly crept up to the ladder, ducking under various unfinished brick walls and carefully treading around abandoned tools just laying on the ground so that the silence of a peaceful conversation between the Syndicate was not disturbed.
People appeared so happy with such systems. The systems were the people disobeying public order were just killed, it didn’t matter whom they were killed by. Just like that time during the Fourth’s funeral, during Tanshu-sensei’s funeral… People all got behind Sugemi’s anger and grief ridden words, they would never trust her and her ideals, seeing how well they responded to momentary pleasures silencing their consciences and just random crooks killing their perpetrators not for justice, but because they were in the way of their own plan of making money. At that moment as she reached for the next step of the ladder Mana felt the most lonely she’d felt for a while. Why were people so opposed to chance for redemption? Why would they rather see criminals skewered by other criminals than dealt with by the book?
“So did anyone actually read that note that “Momma” Zulfia left us?” one of the mobsters asked the other group carelessly smoking up a cigar and blowing it right into the air, Mana could finally make up something that these people were talking of since she was carefully positioned on a rail right above their heads.
“I dunno, sounded like a bunch ‘a mumbo jumbo. Blah blah, rituals, blah blah some ancient Gods or whatever” the other mafioso, this one wearing a black and white kimono with lotus and dragon ornaments replied also puffing black tar smoke into the air. The smoke had little time to disperse and it was really annoying Mana’s lungs as it hit right into her face by large clouds and in the darkness of the night the girl had few options of avoiding it.
“Not “Ancient Gods”, I think it’s something about a Lesser Demon…” yet another one intercepted correcting his friend.
“Meh, Ancient Gods, Tailed Beasts, Lesser Demons, Snow Country… I don’t believe in any ‘a that shit…” the first gangster sneered at his pals blowing out an increasingly annoying and irritating to Mana’s chest puff of smoke.
“Snow Country is an actual fucking country ya goomba!” his suit wearing pal slammed him in the back of the head so hard that the mobster’s hat fell off.
“Uh-huh… That’s what they tell you” the bullied naïve mobster nodded sarcastically before leaning down to pick up his hat. “I mean it could be a real country, you could be right, it could be an actual country right south from Kumogakure… All I’m saying is that I don’t believe you. It could more likely be just a big lie! I mean how could a country be freezing cold right south to fucking Kumogakure, I mean Kumogakure is like a rocky scorching wasteland of mountains so hot you could cook an egg on their surface… And it’s supposed to be north of the Snow Country? Na-ah, I’m not buying it… It’s all a conspiracy, see”
“Conspiracy?” all of the mobsters got interested and walked out into the light, Mana noticed that her shadow was visible from where she stood, reflected by the small lamp that the mobsters had positioned in the center of the abandoned construction building.
“Oh yeah. They say it’s a country with like its own snowy fields and shit… But actually it’s a secret training facility of Kumogakure’s where they’re training dolphins with sky piercing laser beams designed to nuke entire countries” the first one explained.
“Oh, shut up ye big palooka, Ole Pa Bonztail is the only guy with a pool of skypiercin’ laser wearing dolphins. That’s cause he specifically ordered them to be bred. I even was on a mission to bring him goddamn dolphins from Kumogakure Archipelago myself. Bought them on the black market from “Zombieface” Yoruma Yoshiaki…” the kimono wearing mobster angrily dismissed his peer before looking right at Mana’s shadow. The magician’s heart gone cold as every single mobster also caught the sight of her shadow, now only narrowly seen as the magician was trying to move out of sight as slowly and stealthily as possible, unsuccessfully it seemed.
“We’ve got a tail, pop it!” one of the mobsters yelled out, jumping and turning around only to launch a barrage of blades at Mana’s direction, the magician had no other option but to jump away from them, she had to be fast, these blades were being fired faster than the human eye could track them so she tried flaring up her physical chakra so she could move out of the way, the magician tried flipping off of the rail but her side tore up in pain forcing her to scream out and trip over the rail falling down onto a bunch of sawdust raising a large blinding cloud that was irritating to the eye.
Mana felt up her gut and felt a sharp blade somewhere in her gut, she dodged most of the barrage but her wounds made her skip one… Or at least she thought she only skipped one as the pain from the wounds was so crippling that she would barely even be able to feel anything else, even if it was a blade fired into her body at high speed.
“Hey, Mik, there’s some blood over here, I think we got em!” the mobster shouted out. Mana realized that they were dangerous close, she was too weakened by her wounds to consistently beat them at hand to hand, even if they were blinded by the sawdust that was slowly settling down. She could barely even run… Mana’s little fragile fist grabbed a brick and pressed it hard by her chest before she stumbled out from the corner tossing it haphazardly and carefully at the general direction of the noises. She could hear someone screaming in pain and deafening clangs of blades being fired at her direction that just bounced off of the walls she was hiding behind.
There was no use, she was too weakened and slow, now with that wound in her side she could barely even move around fast enough to be anything else but a wounded prey waiting to be tracked down. Mana prepared for what seemed more and more like her last stand but she could hear no more yells, only a brief gurgle of blood killed the silence forcing the girl’s heart to freeze and her eyes to open wide in shock. As the dust cloud settled down the girl moved out from the cover to see the mobsters all stabbed to death messily and a bunch of children grasping shards of glass so hard in their little hands that they bled profusely.
Mana’s hand slowly moved on her side gut wound, she gripped the kunai stuck in her gut which she had not pulled out since it’d start an inevitable process of her bleeding out. That was the only weapon she had besides her cards but with her body as frozen and crippled in pain she’d lack the precise and skillful movements needed to sling cards.
“Mother?” the children asked someone still remaining hidden, turning around frantically.
A loud wooden tick at the floor helped Mana narrow down the location of this “Mother” that the kid were looking for.
An old woman dressed just like any other old lady would be dressed in the streets, if a little drastic with the number of woolen scarves she wore, walked out and examined Mana’s broken body with her elderly eyes and a strict wrinkly face.
“Sacrifice?” the kids asked in a monotonous tone looking questioningly at their leader, the elderly woman scratched her chin, she appeared somewhat indifferent and hesitant to utter the words.
“No need, my deacons, the ritual is complete anyways” she uttered the words from her wrinkly and chewed up and torn skin covered lips. The woman wore a nasty scar that covered her face diagonally which the magician only made out once the woman walked out more clearly into the light.
“You’ve killed them… You’ve killed them for nothing. You’ve killed so many people for what? For absolutely no reason at all!” Mana shouted out in anger clutching her burning ribs and lungs from the pain that stressing the chest summoned.
“I killed them because of my faith. Faith that the lives of my sons shall be avenged, faith that redemption will come to the wicked” the woman said indifferently turning away from Mana and walking away into the endless swarm of little kids, some of them could’ve been as young as eight, some of them may have been as old as Mana. All of them had strange and haunting glowing white eyes with only a black piercing glow of a hieroglyph shaped iris in their eyes.
“Redemption? I see no redeemed here, only corpses…” Mana replied quietly as she lamented all the people that died because of this woman and her “faith”. “Nor do I see any Gods… Your ritual was a dud”
The woman stopped in her tracks and looked around ecstatically. She was so hyped about something, so fired up that her nameless God will be summoned. “No, girl, the wicked ones will be redeemed, the Goddess will descend, I’ve told her where by drawing the beacon of blood. Then they’ll become one and I can wipe this city clean, no more Syndicate, no more mothers losing their children to the night!” the old crone screamed out slobbering over her face and onto her own children that appeared indifferent to the old woman’s nervousness. She waited for a while, waited and waited but to no avail. No Gods descended upon the Earth.
“The infidel is right, the Goddess did not come… Something must’ve been wrong, the holy monk told us she’d descend if the beacon was drawn, something must’ve been wrong, these sacrifices must’ve been unclean, sacrifice the girl! Let me do it, maybe you did something wrong!” the woman ordered pointing at Mana. The children all launched at the magician at once swarming her, Mana swung back haphazardly, she was afraid in her heart of hurting these kids. They looked… Haunted… Possessed, not in their right minds. And yet…
They crawled all over Mana, made a human pile on top of her clawing at her face and dragging her by the hair, tearing at her clothes trying to flay her skin off before Mana could suffer no more and pushed the especially ferocious ones away. She had less than a fraction of her strength left and she wasn’t even using that. The magician may have felt easier about fighting back normal opponents after Guru Ayushi’s lessons but fighting possessed children just felt wrong. She was just wailing in a nailed down coffin, as good as dead, as good as sacrificed…
Mana was forced to the ground and her hands broken behind her. The girl screamed out loud of the pain and slammed her head at the ground to concentrate on that pain instead of that of her both broken arms. A kid peeled her face off the ground by her hair and lifted her up just enough to reach the old priest’s knees.
“Higher, no more throats, I need her heart! Her essence is in the heart!” the woman shouted on her children. For a woman that claimed to do all of this unspeakable horror for her children she seemed to completely lack any compassion or love towards these children, viewing them as her pawns. A soft and lovely poem left her lips yet her hand held firmly a hooked knife. Mana looked the woman in the eyes, determined and not yet broken despite the fact that she absolutely was.
“You showed remarkable mercy to my deacons, did not even hurt them much, those Syndicate dogs didn’t give my children that luxury, they covered their beds with blades for nabbing some expensive things from their store… Your sacrifice should light the beacon” the woman spoke.
“The Beacon of Blood” the kids simultaneously repeated in their lips in a coordinated fashion.
Mana blinked rapidly, “Fine. Pierce my heart, murder me right here but no Gods will come. I’m glad to prove you wrong even if dying is what it’ll take to do so” Mana defiantly spoke up.
A loud thud followed by the woman’s scream and a crash into an unfinished wall greet Mana’s ears and not the pain of being stabbed. That pain she knew all too well and yet… At no moment did it come. Meiko’s grinning face stared at the restrained magician just before the blacksmith got serious again. She looked at the kids that held Mana captive, some of them still held broken shards of glass in their bleeding arms refusing to let go of it.
“Guys, don’t do this. The old hag is an old fart and she doesn’t know what she’s doing. Don’t kill Mana, she’s a kind person and you’ve killed too many…” Meiko got really engaged in her hostage scenario speech.
“They’re not gonna kill me, Meiko, the old woman ordered to let her do it so they’re waiting for her to kill me” Mana interrupted with a pain ridden voice. Quickly the blacksmith moved in and tackled a large group of kids away from Mana before picking her up and moving away from the swarming group of possessed children.
“No… No… The monk told me that the Gods would come if I light the beacon, he even gave me the means of gathering followers! He couldn’t have lied to me! Why have the Gods abandoned me!?” the old woman moaned spitting up blood in the broken wall that she busted through. She didn’t talk very loud so a lot of her senseless psycho cult babble came out as hardly comprehensible.
Mana wanted to clutch her aching chest but her broken arms didn’t move. The magician just asked Meiko to move her in closer to the old woman, the blacksmith hesitantly agreed and jumped off the platform she had settled on top of and slowly approached the woman.
“I’m sorry for what happened to your children. No one should ever be murdered like they were, no matter if they stole something or not. But you have to understand that you behave in no way differently than the killers of your children. Gods don’t come for people like that, the more I see of this life, the more I realize there may not even be Gods there to come for us. There’s no divine retribution or redemption but the one we make for ourselves. Trusting a supernatural force to solve all our problems is naïve and vain, especially when one does it with these abhorrent methods” Mana uttered with a whiny and weakened voice, her skin started becoming pale from the blood she’d loss after being shot with a blade and attacked by the children that opened the old torture wounds.
“You… Ignorant, infidel little whore!” the old woman screamed out clawing at Mana but her body was too broken by Meiko’s strike to leap at Mana, she only wailed at the magician as Meiko’s grasp where Mana was ended up far too tall for the broken old hag to reach. “You dare preach your heresy to me!? I’ll claw your eyes out and when my Gods come I’ll bring you back only to claw them out again!”
A deafening sonic boom knocked Meiko off her feet tossing both Mana and Meiko in different directions, the old crone began screaming in pain and shock but her mad screams were snuffed out by the absolutely dominating sound of the white flare of light that began emanating immense gravitational waves followed by even more loudly roaring sonic booms as each one passed. A couple of children were thrown away through multiple brick walls upon even coming close to a single wave, as close as fifty meters to one. The pressure inside one of them must’ve been immeasurable by a human mind.
Inside the ravaging and ground opening waves of sound booms and gravitational anomalies was just a beacon of purple light that lit up and revealed a figure standing inside of it. It was a feminine figure with two long appendages at the end of her head that extended well past her bottom and up to her knees, she wore a white bodysuit that appeared to be part of her skin, almost like a living armor tissue covered with pitch black and almost cybernetic looking black symbols and motifs, the entire armor was covered with ornaments except for her open cleavage and her face which were the only parts of the entity’s body uncovered by the armor tissue but instead purple skin, the creature’s mouth and eyes glowed with vibrant dark green lanterns that finally became apparent as the lightshow ended.
“Mana?” Meiko looked at her friend horrified.
“So… The ritual is… Real?” Mana’s absolutely frozen in shock face just barely twitched enough to announce to her friend who just gulped observing the magnificence of the entity that appeared in front of them.
The Goddess has descended to where the beacon was lit…
[Reviews - 0]Chapter or Story
Table of Contents
- Text Size +