Return of the Fallen Volume 4 Chapter 11
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Author: Blue_Rat
ch11
(This feeling…?)
Kazuki stomped on the branch and felt a strange yet familiar vibration flow through his foot and up his leg.
Kazuki knelt down on the branch, no longer paying attention to Kai and the fused beast’s fight. Touching the branch, Kazuki shut his eyes and felt the power. A sense of nostalgia swept over him. The tree felt so close to him. It felt like it was something that he had to keep safe no matter what.
(This power, this feeling.)
Kazuki slowly opened his eyes.
(If this whole space is my soul world and this fake body I’m currently in is my consciousness or mind, then my actual soul…is it this tree?)
Kazuki’s eyes turned to the fused Beast core he assumed he brought to the very center of this soul world. Looking at the distance between the tree and the Beast core, it was only a few feet away.
(Could it be that you cannot truly fuse a core with the soul. Otherwise, why did they not naturally come together? There can only be one center in this place, right? If that’s the case then wouldn’t it be where this soul tree has been all along. The Beast core is a foreign object and was brought in here. it can’t be in the center because this soul tree is already in the center.)
Many thoughts began to race in Kazuki’s mind as one theory led to another.
(If this is all the case, then the soul and Mage cores are not actually fused but instead connected. That would also align with what Kai had said earlier. He said that when his Mage core and my previous Mage core fused with my sister Fera’s, a connection of some sort was formed. This allowed the remainder of his soul to hopscotch between my soul world and Fera’s. If that’s the case then when his Mage core was ripped out of him, the piece of his soul that was connected to his body, that was what was left behind and once his body died, the piece of soul that was still in his body must have perished as well. Does this mean that one cannot remove the soul from the body or could it be similar to the removal of the Mage core? The soul, like a tether, is tied to both the body and the Mage core.)
Kazuki was finding that the more he thought about this the more sense it made.
(Could this be why that when my Mage core was separated from my body and I lived, my soul within my body was fine. At the same time, there was still a fragment of my soul attached to my original Mage core, again this connection inside Fera allows Kai to travel between us. It’s all about connecting the three. Mind, soul, body. My mind represents my consciousness and all of my thoughts, while my soul is this tree, representing my memories experience, and will. But then does that mean the Mage core represents the body.)
Just as Kazuki’s thoughts were wandering down a rabbit hole.
*Shinck*
The Branch in Kai’s hand stabbed into the tiger head’s eye, destroying it completely. At the same time, his body left the ground as he leaped upwards, his foot came sideways and his body spun, delivering a kick to the Mangshi head. The tiger kicked out a razor-sharp bird claw, Kai though leaned backward and it flew over his head. Kai’s head was about to touch the ground but before it did he stabbed the tree branch into the ground behind him, stopping himself from crashing headfirst into the ground.
Flicking his wrist, he pushed his body upward and he slipped under the large ugly beast. Jumping around its side, he grabbed hold of its loose patchwork fur and pulled himself onto the beast’s back.
Slamming the thick branch onto both the tiger and the Mangshi head, he chuckled.
“Getty up you freak. It’s a nice day for a ride is it not?”
The beast grew infuriated and the wings upon its back stretched out and flapped hard towards the ground. The beast bent its three legs at the same time and leaped propelling itself high into the air.
“Whoa, calm down, you ugly thing I was just teasing you.”
The weird beast thrashed in the air and performed a barrel roll, trying to shake Kai off it. None of it worked though. That’s when it looked over at the large tree Kazuki stood on and rushed forward. Its speed was swift and it rammed into the tree with a terrible force.
*Bam*
The entire tree shook from root to tip. Kazuki fell down on his ass and felt something deep within himself tremble. An agonizing soul-shredding pain rippled through him and he almost fell. Kazuki blinked and the frozen lake appeared before his eyes.
(What!)
Once more he felt that same soul shredding pain and a bit of blood spilled from the corner of his lip. He could see no injury on his body at all.
(Don’t tell me it was from that beast.)
Kazuki quickly shut his eyes and concentrated on his soul world. Opening his eyes he was back on that same branch he had just been on a moment ago. Kai looked up at him apologetically.
“Sorry about that, I’ll stop playing around before you take some real damage.”
Kazuki took Kai’s words to heart and examined this tree again.
(This tree is my soul and that attack from the beast, so that’s considered a soul attack, similar to Zetsu’s but unlike Zetsu’s I can see the attack first hand.)
The attack was similar but still different. Zetsu’s caused Kazuki’s body and power to completely shut down but this ugly beast caused real physical damage. Kazuki’s mind once more expanded as he witnessed a new soul attack personally. He did not want to experience that a second time.
Kai knew that Kazuki had just suffered and was no longer in the mood to play. Kai jumped off of the beast’s back and gave up moving around using his feet. Teleporting directly in front of the beast, Kai thrust the branch toward the tiger head but the tiger head stretched its neck backward and tilted its body to the side. This put the Mangshi head directly in Kai’s way.
If the Mangsi could show human emotions on its face right now it would probably be one of betrayal but because it was neither human nor had cognitive thinking its only instinct was to bite the human in front of it and kill it.
Kai didn’t even have to dodge and simply extended his hand further and flexed his wrist. The branch in his hand accelerated faster and at the last moment changed directions and sliced the top half of the Mangshi’s head apart with ease. The Mangshi’s head fell limply and dangled from the neck lifelessly.
Fear was a natural instinct and right now, that’s what the tiger should be feeling at this moment. One after another this small human child in front of it slew the heads next to it with ease. However, the instinct of fear didn’t appear. Instead, the beast roared out mightily before chomping down on the Mangshi’s neck beside it.
*Crunch*
*Thud*
The tiger bit through the Mangshi’s neck as though it were a hot knife through butter. The Mangshi head fell to the ground before disappearing into tiny particles of light.
The tiger’s eyes glowed with fiery light as it glared at Kai. Kai hadn’t expected this. Not only did the tiger not seem scared but it even looked like it was growing both mad and excited. Kai could see some intelligence in the tiger’s eyes.
(This thing should be merely a fragment of a soul and run off of instincts alone but the way it’s looking at me, it’s not intending to die here.)
“Kazuki, whatever you do, don’t come down from there. This beast, it didn’t lose its intelligence when it became a soul fragment. Either that or it did lose its intelligence but regained it when it fused with the other two beast soul fragments. This isn’t some mindless creature, no, this thing knows exactly what it’s doing.”
Kazuki watched from up above and could see a change in the beast.
*ROOOOAAAAARRRRRRRR!*
The tiger beast flapped its wings and vanished from its spot. Kai twisted the branch behind his back and blocked a heavy hoof from the Beast. Kai swung out and the beast vanished again. After images flowed like an illusion as it moved through the air.
The next moment a clawed talon appeared directly in front of Kai’s face intending to tear his face off. Kai teleported behind the beast and thrust the branch forward. The beast whipped its wings sideways and slapped the branch away. Next came its two back legs. Like a wild horse bucking, its odd ugly feet came crashing towards Kai’s chest. Kai teleported again and so too did the tiger beast. The two disappeared and reappeared all over the sky and ground.
When the first head was removed, Kazuki and Kai both noticed the creature’s speed and movement vastly improved. It could be said that they expected the creature to move better after having another head removed and the tiger gaining complete control over the body but this was ridiculous.
Kazuki’s eyes could barely follow as the two caused loud crashes to ring out everywhere. One thing he knew for sure though as Kai was no longer messing around. This had become a true fight and Kazuki couldn’t tell who was winning.
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