*Further into the northside of Orion, the battle between Brister and Hargus raged on. On a quiet intersection, the head of Sanada peeked out from a manhole*
(Sanada): The coast is clear.
*Sanada removes the manhole cover and climbs out of the sewer followed by Raika. The two take a second to assess their surroundings where they see a chop shop not too far from them and a few other shops and buildings*
(Raika): No sounds of gunfire. Which means the fighting hasn’t reached this area yet.
(Sanada): For the time being. Let us resume the mission.
*As they begin to walk down the streets, they hear a sound coming from a building. Sanada readies his sword while Raika takes out a handgun. They slowly and quietly approach the building where the sound came from. Peeking inside they see a man stumbling around*
(Stumbling man): Please! Is anyone there? Please help me, I can’t see.
*Raika and Sanada nod at each other. Raika puts her handgun away and slowly approaches the stumbling man while Sanada stays hidden*
(Raika): It’s alright now, sir. I’m a knight of Brister. I’m here to help.
(Stumbling man): Thank the gods! Me and my family were being chased by Hargus soldiers. They fired a flash bomb and I got separated from them.
(Raika): How long ago was this?
(Stumbling man): Ten. Maybe fifteen. I don’t know. All I know is that the flash blinded me and now I can’t see.
(Raika): It’s alright. I’ll get you to safety.
*Raika begins to approach the stumbling man to help him up unaware of the smile he was hiding. As Raika leans over to extend her hand to him, the stumbling man quickly lunges toward her pulling out a daos to kill her. However, his attempts fail when Raika quickly pulled out her handgun and shot the daos out of his hand to make him defenseless. Raika then points her gun toward the head of the man who puts his hands up all while smiling joyfully*
(Stumbling man): What’s the matter, can’t take a small joke?
(Raika): Not when it involves my life. You do a terrible job hiding your murderous aura, Aika.
(Aika): So, you know who I am? That’s Brister scouting for you.
(Raika): How could I not. After all, you’re responsible for the death of five Brister citizens who were human and the attempted murder of two other citizens who were human.
(Aika): Really, two of them survived? That’s a shame.
*Raika punches Aika across the face angered by his lack of remorse. Aika falls to the ground as blood comes from his bottom lip*
(Raika): Shut your damn mouth, you psychopath! Those five lives aren’t even counting the ones outside of Brister.
(Aika): *Chuckles* Like I care about the life of some human trash.
(Raika): Seriously, what happened in your past to make you hate humans so much?
(Aika): Nothing. Nothing happened to me. I had little to no interaction with humans in the slums I grew up in. All I ever wanted to do was be a hero. As I got older, I began to see the discrimination between our two races. I didn’t care about any of that, and just went about my life like normal. However, one day, it finally happened. I was coming home from another boring day of work when all of a sudden I saw a man trying to rape a dog demihuman. Normally, I wouldn’t care, but her cries for help moved me somehow. Before I knew it, I had picked up a broken glass bottle from the ground and shoved it into the throat of the man. The demihuman hugged me, thanking me for saving her. It was exhilarating. For the first time in my life I felt alive. Like my life had meaning and this was my purpose. You may call what I do murder, but to me, it’s a holy act to protect demihumans from the likes of you humans. I will never stop, until every damn one of you is gone and we demihumans can live in peace.
(Raika): That’s quite the messed up view you have there. I think you can use a good rest now.
(Aika): You’re going to kill me?
(Raika): What? You think I’m one of these noble knights who believes everyone should get a second chance and redeem themselves? Don’t screw with me. It’s a battlefield, it’s normal to find a dead body or two. Personally, I think a quick death is too lenient for you, but I’m in a hurry.
*As Raika prepares to fire her gun, she gets hit by a ball of light which sends her to the ground. Aika uses this chance to pull out his second daos and tries to attack Raika. His attack gets blocked by Sanada who appears instantly between Aika and Raika. Raika recovers from the light attack and fires at Aika who dodges the bullet and flips backwards in the air. He lands right by his first daos and picks it up. Gael soon enters the building and stands next to Aika*
(Aika): Cutting it a little close there, Gael.
(Gael): Consider that payback for keeping me out of the loop yesterday.
(Sanada): Hmmm~, the dog from the reports. Raika, can I leave the psychotic bat to you?
(Raika): Do you even need to ask? Don’t know why you’re interested in the little puppy but go easy on him. He’s just a kid.
*Raika begins to fire at Aika who deflects her bullets as he begins to run toward her. Raika dodges his slash attack by jumping backwards and jumps out a nearby window. Aika follows after her where he continues to deflect her bullets as they make their way over to the chop shop. Raika makes it to the driveway of the chop shop where she stops running and turns around to face Aika. She begins shooting at him where he deflects her bullets until he’s within striking distance. With a gleeful smile, he takes a swing at Raika only for her to put her gun away and duck his attack. Raika grabs his right arm and proceeds to punch him in the stomach knocking the wind out of him and hip tossing him onto the hood of a nearby car. Aika grunts in pain but recovers fast enough to dodge a punch from Raika by rolling off the hood of the car. Raika takes out her gun and prepares to fire at Aika, but he throws one of his daos to knock the gun out of Raika’s hand. Aika runs toward Raika trying to slash her but she steps back to dodge the attack. Aika continues to try and slash Raika where she keeps dodging his attacks before he swipes low which forces Raika to jump leaving her defenseless in the air. Aika capitalizes on this by hitting Raika with a dropkick which sends her flying into the garage of the chop shop. Raika hits the side of a car back first landing on the ground leaving a dent in one of the doors. Aika begins running towards Raika preparing to hit her with his daos, but she moves of the way and Aika instead plunges his daos into the car where it gets stuck into the car. Raika attempts to kick him, but Aika catches her kick and throws her back towards the side of the car where he begins punching her but Raika protects herself by putting her arms up to guard her face. Raika counters Aika with a headbutt which dazes him and causes him to take a few steps backwards allowing Raika to catch her breath. Raika soon goes on the attack and runs toward Aika where she attempts to punch him, but he sidesteps her and attempts to throw a punch of his own only for Raika to block it. The two begin to throw punches at each other with each one getting blocked by the other until Raika finally lands a thrust kick in his stomach which pushes him back*
(Aika): Hmm~, you are different from the other humans I have faced. Your reaction time and reflexes are not that of a normal human. What’s your secret?
(Raika): Let’s just say you’re not the only who knows what it’s like to live in darkness.
(Aika): Enhanced senses. Well then.
*Aika takes out a third daos he had hidden in the back of his pants*
(Aika): Let’s see how long they last.
*Aika runs towards Raika and begins slashing at her where she dodges his attacks before doing a backflip in the air and tossing a bunch of lightning shuriken at Aika who dodges them by jumping above them in the air. The lightning shuriken land on various cars in the garage with one of them slicing through the chain that lifted the garage door. With the chain broken, the garage door slams shut locking them both inside. After landing, Raika takes out her energy saber surprising Aika and charges at him. Aika defends himself with his daos where Raika slashes through it to leave Aika defenseless, but he counters by doing a high kick to knock the saber out of her hands and into the air. Both Raika and Aika jump in the air to grab the saber with Aika jumping higher and claiming the saber for himself. Rather than use it as a weapon, he instead throws the saber at the power box hanging on the wall to make the garage completely dark. When Raika and Aika landed back on the ground, Raika attempted to punch him, but Aika dodges the punch and delivers his own punch to Raika which connects on her cheek. Raika recovers and takes up a boxing stance where she starts jabbing at Aika who continues to dodge her attacks*
(Raika): *Inner Thoughts* This is bad. His senses are a lot more heightened in the dark. Time to go with plan B.
*Raika gets snapped from her thoughts by Aika who elbows her in the stomach and then kicks her on the side of the head which sends her falling backwards to a car. Aika tries to hit her with a running thrust kick, but she jumps on top of the car and rolls to the other side as Aika gets his foot stuck in the window. Aika pulls his foot out of the window and jumps over the hood of the car to the other side to see that Raika is not there. Aika smiles and begins to walk around slowly*
(Aika): Come out come out wherever you are~. It’s useless to hide from me.
*From an unknown spot, Raika throws a bunch of shuriken at Aika who easily dodges them. As soon as Aika dodges them, Raika jumps out from his backside with her energy saber prepared to strike Aika in the back only for him to dodge, grab the saber from Raika and throws her to the ground. He then points the saber to Raika’s head with a triumphant smile*
(Aika): You know, it’s times like these I wish I wasn’t blind. I would love to see the look on your face right now.
*Raika then smiles*
(Raika): Yeah. Same here.
*Using her right hand, she presses a button on her left hand’s wristwatch. All of a sudden the shuriken that were previously thrown let out an electric pulse which causes all the car alarms to go off*
(Aika): AHHHHHHHH~!
*Aika screams out in pain dropping the saber and clutching his ears to try and block out the sound but it’s no use. Raika rises back up to her feet and concentrates to gather electricity into her right hand. Her right hand turns into pure electricity where she creates a fist and punches Aika across the jaw releasing 120 volts of electricity through his body. The current passes through Aika’s heart and central nervous system instantly killing him. Aika’s lifeless body falls to the ground unresponsive as Raika picks up her saber and puts it away as her right hand returns to normal*
(Raika): Like I said, you’re not the only one who knows what it’s like to live in darkness. Stay in it too long and you become something that’s even more disgusting than the Eclipses.
Author’s Note: Another chapter down and another good fight courtesy of Raika. This was more grounded as opposed to the previous two fights which is what I try to do in each fight. Bring something new and not make it feel like the previous fight you just saw. For this fight we’re in a confined space and using the environment to our advantage which is what people would do in a real fight. Once again this fight was won by who had the better strategy mentally. While Raika is obviously stronger she was at a slight disadvantage thanks to Aika’s animal abilities, so she had to counter them and I thought using sound would be a fun and cool way for her to get the victory. Aika’s character and backstory were inspired by Hodi Jones from One Piece and Zsasz from Batman. He’s got the psychopathic tendencies of Zsasz and the backstory of Hodi. He’s never been harmed by humans nor interacted with them. However, everyone around him hated humans and when they praised him for killing one, he got a taste for what it felt like to be a hero and he became tainted by it. As someone who’s been a victim of racism I’ve learned that racism and prejudice aren’t inherited, they’re things you learn. Tune in next week when we get the confrontation I’ve been building up for the last few chapters, Sanada vs Gael. This should be interesting. Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time.