Chapter Eight: The Legend of the First Astrodeus (I1B0C8)

 Chapter Eight: The Legend of the First Astrodeus

 

“I always said this city was doomed from the start.”

Lazaro glared at the starlit walls which surrounded the distant city of Sentia. With his sail extended as far as it would go, he drove toward the city walls with every weapon holstered on his body; Lazaro was ready to jump into action. Vaida and Hatasuko sailed along the bumpy land behind him, though every piece of gravel shook their sail-rana. A thin layer of darkness had already flooded the sky above the city, and smoke lifted into the air. They were too far away to hear any shouts, but Hatasuko sensed the anguish through the tempest in his head. He felt new lost souls trickle into the storm of screaming spirits.

“There are only four gates in the entire goddamn city. How were they ever supposed to evacuate? This city was a mistake all along. It’s a deathtrap. The Interfectus is attacking, and they’ve all got nowhere to run. You know what that means, don’t you? We’re gonna die in this city,” Lazaro yelled over the gusting wind.

            Though Lazaro wanted to turn away from the unsavable city, he ignored his survival instinct and drove headlong toward the city. Their journey to Sentia had been delayed by the ocean waves, so they had already arrived too late to help people evacuate in advance. They were still too far from the city to see the monster in the sky, but the air hung heavy with its pressure.

“When we arrive, I’ll try to break holes in the wall. My warhammer’s strong enough to do it. I want you two to help rush people to safety. Be warned that the Interfectus is an intelligent creature; it will keep the walls intact on purpose. It will probably guard the gates so no one can escape. The monster will kill anyone who tries to leave,” Lazaro explained.

Madeline whispered from the edge of the tempest, “The people have no escape. There is no running or hiding. Humankind has been in this position for a very long time, but now you get to see it in the literal sense. If there’s no way to escape, we can only fight back. You must defeat the Interfectus.”

“But how am I supposed to do that? You said we all have some intrinsic power, but how do I access it? What is the fuel? I need to use everything I’ve got if I want a shot at fighting back,” Hatasuko answered.

“The fuel for this power is called quintessence, but this is no potion or chemical that you can just buy. It is an invisible substance, imperceptible and immaterial in the physical world! It is an energy that you carry in your soul, but you can only forge it from the spirits of the dead. It is a hefty price to pay, but you are already cursed to carry the weight of the dead on your shoulders; you are the perfect vessel to use quintessence. It will fuel the power that lurks in your soul, and it will transform your body into the perfect weapon! With the voices of the damned and a heart heavy with quintessence, you will evolve into an Astrodeus. You are the perfect candidate to become the first Astrodeus,” Madeline explained.

Though he stared at the back of Vaida’s head and the walled city to the north, Hatasuko did not process anything in the physical world. He instead focused only on the tempest; his body trembled from the possibility of a power that could combat the Interfectus.

“Let me see if I’ve got this. By using energy from the lives lost to the Interfectus, I can fuel the power that could take one down. I think I can understand that, but what is an Astrodeus? What does it mean to be an Astrodeus? I have never heard that word before.”

Madeline said, “I don’t know the details; this apotheosis has never happened. But I do know this: You must sacrifice your humanity if you want to save them.”

“If my humanity is the price to pay for my destiny, then I will sacrifice it without a second thought,” Hatasuko decided.

As the sail-rana charged toward the walls that surrounded Sentia, Hatasuko became overwhelmed by the symphony of screams in his mind. Through the veil of smoke and pulsing starlight, he saw a burst of shadow spheres within the city walls. He heard the crackle of fire and countless screams. Hardly any silhouettes fled the city, which meant that Lazaro was right all along; the Interfectus was guarding the four city gates.

When Vaida saw that they would soon disembark, she reached down and grabbed her whip. It sat on the floor of the sail-rana at her right side, so when she leaned over, Hatasuko saw that she wore a large eyepatch over her right eye. It was a white material that clung to her face by a thin elastic band. Hatasuko wanted to say something to rebuild her self-esteem, but he feared that any mention of her scars would just rekindle her pain.

“I hate how much this world hurts you,” Hatasuko whispered as he readied his weapons.

“I’m just getting what I deserve. Please don’t feel sorry for me. Let’s just stay focused on the Interfectus,” she said in a voice half-hidden by the wind.

“Fine, but this isn’t over. You better stay alive so we can talk about this.”

Lazaro pulled his mast shut, slammed his warhammer on the ground, and quickly slowed his sail-rana to a stop. Hatasuko and Vaida tried to do the same with their swords, but Lazaro acted much faster. He jumped out of his boat, kicked it onto its side, and then raced toward the city wall with his hands on his warhammer.

As Hatasuko and Vaida disembarked from their sail-rana, Lazaro let out a grunt and slammed the spike of his warhammer against the wall. A cloud of dust and a cluster of gravel flew from the place where his warhammer struck; he closed his eyes so that they would be safe from shrapnel. Cracks covered the wall in this place, but the wall stayed upright. Lazaro heard the footsteps of his allies running closer, so he took a deep breath and swung his warhammer at the same part of the wall.

            The cracked section of the city wall collapsed in a shower of crumbling rocks. A thick cloud of smoke and dust flooded out from the hole in the wall. Though he saw nothing through the cloud of debris, Lazaro ran across the broken rocks and into the city.

“There’s a new hole in the wall! Get out now before the smoke clears!” Lazaro shouted in front of the opening.

Vaida and Hatasuko rushed through the hole right before a small crowd of people charged through it. People piled out of this opening as quickly as they could, but the Interfectus quickly noticed the breach. When the evacuees realized that they finally had a way out, countless people charged toward the opening.

“Vaida, Hatasuko! Get ready to throw! And then go off into the city!” Lazaro shouted as he pressed his shield against the back of the crowd, speeding them up.

“Yes, sir!” Hatasuko yelled back.

With its golden eyes glaring at the hole in the city wall, the Interfectus unleashed its scattershot of shadow spheres. Vaida and Hatasuko both threw rocks into the sky without aiming; the spheres camouflaged with the smoke and could not be seen.

Somewhere in the smoky cloud above the rooftops, a rock and a shadow sphere collided. This caused an explosion which lit the sky with a tremendous glow of blue fire. The shining light illuminated every building; the radiance revealed every silhouette. During this, Hatasuko and Vaida ran down the nearest street toward the southern gate. Terrified civilians stood in the way, all waiting for a chance to run.

             “Keep going! Get out of here as fast as you can!” Lazaro roared into the crowd.

The shadow demon unleashed its first weapon; its bladed arm of shadow blasted down from the sky at an unrivaled speed. The blade slashed through the air at a high altitude, so Lazaro jumped up and swung his shield to intercept the attack. The shadow blade struck his black shield without piercing it, but the impact hurled him backward at a high speed. His backside slammed into several people as they tried to escape, knocking them to their knees.

The Interfectus did not retract its sword of shadows; it instead stabbed its blade through the wall right above the opening. The monster slashed its shadow blade vertically upward, tearing straight through the wall, forcing to collapse. As the wall crumbled and fell upon the people trying to escape, Lazaro grabbed some civilians and threw them aside before they could get hurt. Despite his efforts, the crumbling wall crushed eight people and injured several more as it sealed the hole shut.

“Vaida, this is a bloodbath! How are we supposed to get anyone out of here? Everyone’s trapped,” Hatasuko said as he coughed through the smoky air.

“We just have to trust that Lazaro will smash another hole in the wall. I guess we’ll try to bring people to him,” she suggested.

Hatasuko glanced over his shoulder. Vaida looked just as miserable as he expected. The eyepatch covered the right side of her face, but her blue left eye looked somber. A thin layer of cold sweat covered her body. Despite her sorrow, she still ran toward the southern gate and the nearby crowd.

“The world will knock us down, but the important part is that we stand back up. My mother always said it, I’ve tried to remember it, but Vaida’s living it.”

            Vaida and Hatasuko were just a few blocks from the southern gate in the city wall, but the Interfectus glared at the gate as if it were waiting. If he tried to herd people toward Lazaro, it would certainly spot them.

            “Vaida, this is never gonna work. We need a distraction! I will find a catapult; I’ll draw its eyes! I won’t be able to send you a signal, so just keep an eye on the monster,” Hatasuko said.

            “You’re going off on your own? Are you sure? You’ll get killed,” she exclaimed.

            “I won’t die. Don’t worry! I have a secret weapon. I have the tempest.”

            “Please don’t die. I’ll never forgive you if you die,” she said with her quiet voice.

            Hatasuko showed a small smile, nodded, and then ran off to the north. He ran at full speed, distancing himself from Vaida and the civilians, but every step was a fight against his urge to flee. Even after all these years, his mind was scarred by the brutality of the Interfectus; his heartbeat spiked whenever he saw its glowing eyes. The shadow demon levitated over the rooftops with a veil of smoke. The transparent blackness in the sky churned with waves the size of ocean swells.

            “How am I supposed to get out of here? I’m never gonna get out alive,” whispered a man who crouched behind a wagon at the corner of this block.

            Hatasuko knew that the Interfectus saw both him and the forlorn man, but the monster chose not to attack. It simply watched the four gates. The man behind the wagon weakly clenched a large staff.

            “I will try to distract the Interfectus; you must run to the gate! Tell me, sir, is there a catapult anywhere around here?” Hatasuko asked while glaring at the monster.

            “Of course not! This is a walled city; all the catapults are on the walls. I’ve got a staff sling here, which is like a handheld catapult, but-”

            “Please, sir, I need to commandeer your weapon. If I can distract the Interfectus, then countless people can escape. You can escape,” Hatasuko reasoned.

            “I have nothing to lose. I was damned in the moment it attacked.”

            The man who crouched behind the wagon tossed his staff sling, and then he ran off to the south. After catching the weapon, Hatasuko ran north toward the Interfectus, though he was still several blocks away.

Dust and smoke plagued the streets. Terrified people crouched in the shadows. Hatasuko knew that many people still hid in their homes. They could survive for a short while since the Interfectus guarded the gates, but if no one ever tried to run, they would all eventually suffocate or burn. The people hiding in the streets were totally helpless; their wide eyes watched Hatasuko run, but they all looked like they were waiting to die. Their frightened faces and anguished whimpers felt like a precursor to the anguished souls in the tempest—the screaming spirits they would inevitably become.

            “Madeline, I have chosen to take your advice. I will fight back against the Interfectus even though it’s said to be impossible. We can’t just run away from it; we must become strong enough to tear it down.”

Hatasuko pulled a large rock from the sack that bumped against his ribs. While still running onward, he stuck his rock into the sling at the edge of his staff, and then he grabbed the other end with both hands. He stopped halfway through a street which was flooded with smoke, and then he swung the staff forward with all his strength; the sling launched the rock into the sky. It flew quickly and aimlessly, but this made no difference against the massive Interfectus. When the rock struck the monster’s knee, it crumbled into gravel. The Interfectus was unharmed, but its golden eyes turned toward its attacker.

Hatasuko armed the sling with a second rock, pulled the weapon back again, and then swung his mighty arms. This time, the rock struck the black armor on the Interfectus’ chest. The starlight faintly revealed his harmless strike.

            “Now as I stand upon the boundary between life and death, I hear the screams of the tempest louder than ever. If I am to fall and become one with the abyss, then humanity itself will pay the price. I will be swallowed by agony and carried through the hollows until it is all that I know. All their weight is on my shoulders. I am the emissary of our final endeavor. This is not futile, and this is not frivolous. I will draw the golden eyes of the demon, set free the people huddled by the gates, and then defeat the Interfectus beneath the glow of starlight,” Hatasuko vowed as he set another stone into the sling.

            With a forward lunge and a powerful swing, Hatasuko launched the rock from his staff. The projectile shot into the sky with incredible speed; it looked like it would hit the Interfectus in the face. But in a swift movement that startled all onlookers, the monster slapped the rock away with its shadow sword. The demon had drawn its weapon, and then everyone took off running. Every evacuee who waited near the gates seized the chance to flee. An uproar echoed through the city as countless people tried to escape.

Hatasuko started sprinting forward, and as he ran, he loaded a fourth rock into his staff sling. However, the Interfectus turned its gazed toward the runners; it unleashed an attack with its bladed arm of shadows.

            The demon’s diamond-hard blade slashed through the sky and tore into the large crowd which scurried through the eastern gate. The wails of the victims echoed through the city. The Interfectus then spun its blade-arm and swung its weapon at everyone else near that gate. Countless lives were lost; several screaming souls simultaneously surged into Hatasuko’s mind. They empowered him with adrenaline and a sense of desperation, so he launched a rock as he raced through the streets. The rock flew so fast that when it struck the monster’s stomach, its golden eyes shifted back to him.

Hatasuko said, “Keep your eyes on me! I won’t give you the chance to kill them.”

The Interfectus employed its third weapon and summoned a scattershot of shadow spheres. Hatasuko predicted that the evacuees at the other gates would pause to watch the scattershot, since they all had a one-third chance of being its target. Nevertheless, he swung his staff and launched a rock when he saw the shadow spheres. His rock struck the scattershot before it shot off, so the entire cluster erupted in front of the Interfectus. The blue inferno engulfed the demon and knocked it backward; a fiery shockwave engulfed the rooftops beneath the monster.

Sparks and embers scattered the Interfectus’ black armor. The smoke that lifted from its massive body smoldered with a blue glow. But through the smoke and the dim city light, Hatasuko saw the demon’s gold eyes glaring at him.

The Interfectus then attacked with a quick lunge of its shadow claw; it moved so fast that it summoned a gust of smoky wind. Hatasuko let out a quiet shout, kicked off the nearest wall, and dodged its claws by a matter of decimeters. He lost his balance as the demon’s arm destroyed a building behind him, and then he then landed on the dirt street with a double-somersault. He had to drop his staff as he rolled, but he managed to land on his feet. A nearby wall crumbled as the Interfectus opened the finger-daggers on its claw, and then its shadow daggers slashed at him again. He dodged this attack by kicking off a wagon in the street; the claw sliced cleanly through the wagon and left it in shambles.

Hatasuko pulled out his whip, forced it into motion with a swift flick, and wrapped its end around the doorknob of a nearby home. The Interfectus attacked again with its shadow claws, but he yanked on his whip and flung himself out of the way, right before he would have been killed. The claws came so close that their wind spun him around and forced him to hit the ground. With a groan, Hatasuko pulled on the whip and used the tension to help him stand. Surprised that the Interfectus did not attack again, he glanced up and saw a cluster of shadow spheres. The Interfectus had him trapped; he had nowhere left to run.

With his back against a house just a few blocks from the monster’s hovering feet, Hatasuko pulled another rock from his bag. The Interfectus launched its cluster of shadow balls; they blasted down from the sky while he threw his rock with careful aim. The shadow spheres flew much faster than the rock, so when they collided with an azure eruption, the fiery shockwave blew Hatasuko through the door. The door exploded into a shower of splinters and woodchips; he crashed onto the floor of the house as every window shattered.

            Hatasuko’s body roared with pain as splinters pierced his bloody skin. He felt a giant woodchip in the side of his lower back, but he had no way to rip it out. He climbed onto his feet as ashes and smoldering debris landed on the street outside. He then kicked his whip off the ground and into his hand as he trudged toward the doorway. His ears were still ringing from the explosion. The blast of blue fire had stained the front half of his body. When he stepped out into the street, he saw a blue glow illuminate the north side of Sentia. The whole city shook from the explosion. Hopeless screams echoed across the city walls.

“My whole life has been a reiteration of the same damn message; it’s like the universe is trying to beat into me that I’m too weak. It has always been this way. I had the chance to save my mother from the demon, but I was too weak to do it. I’ve been running across the world for years just trying to fight back, but I’m still too weak. I was always too weak.”

“But the strength is waiting inside you. It is time to unleash that strength upon the world! Are you ready?” Madeline asked from the edge of the tempest.

“I have never been more ready for anything in my life,” he answered.

“Then I will become your strength. I will sacrifice myself on the array and set my soul on fire for you. I am the catalyst. You will awaken as an Astrodeus.”

As Hatasuko stepped into the smoldering street with his whip in one hand and a rock in the other, he asked, “Why would you sacrifice yourself for this? If any lost soul can pay the price, it shouldn’t be you.”

“I never wanted to be this, and I never meant for anyone to know my pain. But the reality is that this is my destiny just as much as it is yours. I was broken from the very beginning! My purpose was stained in my soul since the day I learned the truth of the Interfecti. If nothing is done, then this whole world will end in tragedy! But I can stop it because I was created in tragedy. Only misery can defeat misery,” she whispered.

            Hatasuko said nothing as he stepped into the middle of the ashy street. Flaming debris danced in the air around him. Smoke lifted from the dirt and the nearest buildings. A flash of blue light emanated from the hopeless city as another scattershot engulfed a crowd of desperate people.

Madeline said, “Goodbye, Hatasuko. No one deserves this power more than you.”

The tempest fell silent. In the very next moment, an intricate symbol appeared on the ground beneath Hatasuko’s feet. The gold-flashing symbol circumscribed his body on the smoldering street; a sudden burst of black fire lifted from the symbol and engulfed him, but the flames did not sear his skin. He felt the heat swallow his body, but the black fire took nothing from him; it instead burned through the voice that belonged to Madeline.

When the last of her soul succumbed to the flames, it unleashed an extraordinary energy. The black fire disappeared, and then every building began to tremble. The city started shaking. The temperature in the air plummeted to something wickedly frigid; every ember and spark died at once. The air pressure on this street then disappeared. Every window shattered. Hatasuko pilfered the pressure and temperature in the air, and he forced them to become the ingredients for his new body.

            From the heart of this extraordinary convergence of light and energy, Hatasuko watched as every wound faded. He watched his body grow taller as every organ in his body tore apart and then changed form. As he grew three feet taller than before, he felt every muscle swell with power. His hands and feet grew larger by the second. A layer of smoky frost coated every surface on this street. When the transformation ended, he had gained the form of the first Astrodeus.

“I can feel it. I can feel the weapon that Madeline mentioned. I can feel my Astrodeus power at the forefront of my mind,” Hatasuko whispered.

Hatasuko was now so tall that the top of his head reached only slightly beneath the nearby rooftops. The whole icy street shimmered from the light of the stars. It exhilarated him just to control a body this powerful, but he knew that he could not miss his opportunity to strike. The Interfectus prepared to attack elsewhere in the city, unaware of his new strength.

“I TOLD YOU NOT TO LOOK AWAY FROM ME!” Hatasuko shouted with extraordinary volume as he pulled back his right arm.

            Before the Interfectus had the chance to move its golden eyes, Hatasuko activated his Astrodeus power for the very first time. An extraordinary surge of power flooded through his muscles and made them invulnerable; his body illuminated with power as he threw the rock with all his strength. This power enchanted his arm with so much force that when the rock separated from his hand, it shot into the sky a speed faster than sound. A deafening sonic boom shot off and shook the city. The rock crashed into the demon’s right shoulder and blew it apart. The rock and the shoulder both shattered at once; the Interfectus roared as its broken armor rained to the ground.

            Hatasuko knew that every eye in the city had seen this happen. Everyone had witnessed the Interfectus suffer a tremendous blow; countless people saw it roar out in pain for the very first time. Everyone watched with wide eyes, so Hatasuko grabbed one of his last few rocks and threw it again; he activated his Astrodeus power and unleashed an ear-splitting sonic boom. The Interfectus used its second weapon to block the attack, but it was too slow. By the time the demon summoned the shield of swirling shadows, the rock had already struck its stomach and blown apart its armor. Shards of blackness rained beneath the monster; it stumbled backward and forced the city to shake.

“My power is a flash of strength that overcomes even that of the Interfectus. It’s like my soul has carried the strength my body was too weak to show.”

“HATASUKO, WATCH OUT!” yelled a distant voice.

As soon as he heard Vaida’s distant voice, Hatasuko threw his right hand onto his sword, which was still holstered on his back. Before he got the chance to unsheathe his weapon, the Interfectus launched an attack with its massive claw of shadows. His mind flashed back to the day when he had the chance to save his mother from this very same attack. His golden eyes glared at the black blade which could easily rip him from life into death, but then he used his power once again.

Hatasuko felt the fuel burn away in his soul as his whole body glowed, and then his sheath blew to pieces in the blink of an eye. His mighty sword swung forward right before he would have been triple-impaled by the demon’s dagger-claws. His sword struck the claw with a deafening crash and an extraordinary force, throwing him backward. As he flew, he saw that his sword had blown the monster’s blade-arm to pieces. The Interfectus roared as it tried to retract the small fragment of its shattered arm.

A loud cheer arose from the circumference of the city walls; everyone had seen Hatasuko destroy the first weapon of the Interfectus. Many people stopped running and watched this momentous battle. No one had ever heard of someone standing against the Interfectus and succeeding.

            As Hatasuko charged toward the Interfectus with his sword in his hands, he said, “I’ve thrown away my humanity for good. I always knew this journey would make me a monster, so this is something I can live with. It’s always been my destiny to defeat the demon of blades and shadows. My heart was the cost, and their souls are the fuel. That is what it takes to defeat the harbinger of tragedy; this is what it costs to create a world without misery. I can accept my pain. I welcome the sacrifice.”

Hatasuko was stunned by the speed that his new body could achieve. His legs were so large that every step carried him significantly farther. He was even faster than Lazaro now; he arrived beneath the Interfectus in under a minute.

While countless people watched, the Interfectus used its third weapon and summoned a scattershot of shadow spheres. As the voices of the tempest whispered with wonder, Hatasuko pulled back his sword and activated his power. With an indescribable surge of energy pulsing through his body, Hatasuko twisted his hips, swung his arm, and threw his sword with so much force that it broke the speed of sound. Since it flew so fast, the sword struck a shadow ball before its own soundwaves; every shadow ball detonated right before the demon’s face. The massive inferno engulfed the Interfectus with a tremendous shockwave; the supersonic sword struck the monster’s neck as blue fire swallowed it completely. The blazing glow illuminated the city, overpowering the monster’s golden eyes and the starlight in the sky.

The transparent layer of darkness in the sky trembled. The Interfectus started to fade from the city as sparks and cinders fell from its broken body. Hatasuko watched the monster with his bright gold eyes.

A cheer went up from the crowd as the Interfectus’ body faded. The transparent layer of darkness began to disappear. Hatasuko watched in silence as the monster’s legs and stomach vanished. Its torso and its one remaining arm faded into nothing. Its head was the last to disappear, but the Interfectus closed its glaring eyes right before it faded. Hatasuko knew that it was still alive, but it had retreated from the city by retreating from existence. The sword that had been stuck inside its body fell from the sky and landed in the embers. Roars of surprise and joy emerged from the city walls.

Hatasuko whispered his mother’s words, “All that matters is that you stand back up. The world can knock us down, but it cannot hold us down.”