3d.) Darkness of Rage

"There. Let it all out."

This time however the bandages on Derkholm's back fluttered outward and braced themselves in the air behind his priestly robes. Instead of hitting Derkholm the bandages were rended and yet ertr steady enough to stop the blow before it could pierce all the way. The bandages themselves once again shown with hieroglyphics before turning into data and fluttering towards Iko's body. They would indeed need to be torn off, though in their current phase it wouldn't take more than cutting them down the middle to destroy them.

Derkholm moved in a fashion so that his bandages broke into a more cloaklike form, to prevent his back from remaining open fur. He shrugged off the priestly sort of robes which used to run over the bandages as well; they were too mauled by the blow to be of use at the moment.

"And now perhaps you start to see a little insight into me. Obviously I'm not really a mummy. These bandages are one of my abilities: Ankh Seals which restrict the strength of a body when they latch on. I meant what I said; we're more alike than you know. I know how good it feels to give in to power, like letting a warm wave carry you away..."

Anticipating that the seals would keep him busy long enough to prevent immediate counterattack, Derkholm held out his hand and let his arm stretch into a long-distance fist made of sand, aimed for Iko's head.

Iko raised his good arm, which took the brunt of the heiroglyphic data, before activating a single crescent blade, instantly slashing through the glyphs created on his arm. In that same instance, he punched outward, cleaving cleanly through the sand, before cancelling the blade and letting out another roar, charging again at Derkholm.

It would be slightly different this time, however, as Iko leaped to tackle this figure with a constant roar, bringing him into a grapple, with Derkholm likely on the bottom.

Currently, Iko's eyes were now glowing red, his figure becoming darker as the white fur began to turn black...

Derkholm let himself fall backwards as his punch was scattered to avoid the imminent roar; and kept on falling, right into the glassy ground below. The sand of his scattered hand fell through as well, and the lot reemerged from the ground a fair distance behind Iko.

"I can sense the other will taking shape... That means I may continue, the cycle will not simply break down from reason now."

Derkholm waved his arm and the shining glass, mixed with just enough sand to maintain easy control, speared up sharply around and under Iko like stakes.

"Strength was never a problem for me. All I needed to do was give in and everything almost handled itself: anyone who tried to hurt me, anyone who got in my way, they dropped like leaves in the fall. Life seemed good. For a while, I was happy."

He spoke in the tone of storyteller speaking around a campfire.

~As long as there's sand...~

The spires of glass broke, the darkness from the shadow between the grains of sand expanding again, becoming useless shrapnel in the ground.

~You have... no moves that can even touch me...~

Iko grasped his head after this manuver... this red darkness was painful to use, and against his inner will. Still, he pushed on, looking at Derkholm once more. This time, however, he seemed to be set on focusing, rather than attacking him directly...

The bandages around Derkholm began to unravel, and the lower area of his "cloak" turned into a long whip that flowed from his hand and glowed with a turquoise birght enough to prevent them from casting a shadow. The whip lashed out to tangle around Iko's waist. Due to the fact that it was still attached to Derkholm, if parts of the whip were severed the individidual parts would break off into data to try to land on Iko a second time before being destroyed by a second blow against them.

If the seals successfully landed Iko would feel as if a giant weight had been placed upon him. The attack couldn't be fatal or very damaging unless large amounts of the seals were placed on, but once the seals had set in they were almost impossible to remove and would slowly sap the targets strength.

"But after a while, even success grew dull. I would rush in against stronger and stronger opponents, lusting for the thrill of a challenge and finding it nowhere. Soon it wasn't just enemies I lashed out at; simply being was enough to become a target. What had once been giving in no longer gave pleasure, I wanted more than the hollow feeling that a shallow victory gave me. And yet I persisted..."

The coil rebounded due to a stronger power being released: a dark, red light appeared; when it dissipated, Iko's B-rank figure appeared before Derkholm.

Quickly taking to the sky, Iko focused again on the ground under Derkholm... there would be no physical way for a D-rank to escape this next attack...

"And in my persistance I gained heights most DaCre only dream of. I was known by a different name then..."

The bandages swirled around Derkholm, completely seperating from his body and swirling around him in a still open sphere. It was notable that Derkholm hadn't summoned any new bandages the entire battle; and indeed he couldn't, for the bandages had come from an ability far above his current rank.

"Lord Luxor the Grimm. An unquestioned reaper passing judgement as he saw fit. I had others scuttling to please me, and challengers would come from near and far only to be cut down like the wheat at harvest. Attempts to kill me, whether out of greed or anger, became the everyday."

He was visible inside the sphere now, a four foot or so DaCre with blue-purple fur and the majestic figure of a jackal; standing on two legs but with paw-like hands and feet, and with two eyes of a deep turquoise that seemed innocent and yet wise. An intricate series of hieroglyphs glowed turquoise all over his body, but only occasionally, so that they projected a feeling of emanating mystique.

"And then one day, a man came before me. He must have been one of the earliest humans to arrive here; or at least to my knowledge. And he came up to my palace, and do you know what he did? He sat down, pulled out a crumpled script from his pocket, a SCRIPT of all things, and he lectured me for three hours straight. Three hours. And dumbfounded, absolutely astounded, I listened. And at the end of the lecture he folded the script up, put it in his pocket, walked up, and gave me a hug and said "Luxor, I'm your tamer. And you have been a jackass.""

"He had no strength, no special qualities; he was just a sack of meat like every other human out there. I had abandoned humans, had abandoned him, long before for such weakness, forsaking device and tamer alike. And yet he came to me, he crossed worlds, to tell me the simple truth that I had become a jerk. And that's when I realized I didn't want power, or obediance, or to destroy things, or to be better than everyone else. I wanted a friend just like him."

"Because when it comes right down to it, power isn't strength, it isn't beating others, and it certainly running away from them. You don't want to hurt your friends? Well that's exactly what you're doing. They're worried about you. Your tamer is worried about you, and your friends are too. They need you, and you need them. All you're doing is trading in the excuse of your power hurting their bodies for the very real one of hurting their hearts."

The seals circled with renewed intensity, swirling so fast that it looked as if the entire sphere was on the verge of overloading.

"And I'm going to prove right now which power is truly greater. So go ahead and listen to your power; AND I SHALL LISTEN TO MY HEART! SOUL RHAPSDOY!"

The seals exploded outwards in a massive wave, engulfing everything in a turqoise light as the lingering power they held from Luxor's Lord class form released all at once.

"Iko isn't listening... that puppet of a DaCre was using everything he had, even the morals you spoke of, to hold me back," a voice echoed from Iko, similar to one that came from a basic quasit or imp. "Smart ass, though... coming this far away and getting himself lost... I can't trace those friends you speak of..."

With renewed vigor, this DaCre stared straight into this explosion, his helmet filtering out the negative effect of the light to his eyes, seeking out and sensing the few created shadows, to keep himself trained on Derkholm's exact location.

Surprisingly, when the light from the explosion was cast away completely, Derkholm would find himself likely, in midair, surrounded by three spheres of darkness, of varying and increasing density, the darkness trailing from the sand shortly below, which was less affected by light techniuqes of a D-rank, especially considering that this darkness was B-ranked. On top of that, Derkholm was far from a light type...

"I really don't want to deal with another explosion right now... so how about I just make it impossible for you to reform!"

He added lascerations to the inside two spheres, and began contorting them to spin at an increasing rate, which would make it impossible to regain footing without being sliced again... and again... and again...

"While that's going on... I'll begin working on destroying the sand that composes you..." the 'imp' taunted, the inner sphere beginning to turn red, and crackling inside, able to destroy any inanimate or weak data that touches it.

"All I have to do is increase the power... using this puppet's heart energy, of course..."

At that point, six dark shapes outlined sharply against what seemed like a wall of light appeared on the horizon, and grew more rapidly than should have been possible. As the distance closed, the shapes would define into six piranhas, muscles pumping fiercely, and the light into thousands of tiny firefly-like creatures. They seemed to be racing toward the target.

The fish slowed as they saw Iko, hesitating as they saw strange, unfamiliar facets of data and body language in him. The fireflies crowded together, seeing the strange signals, almost as though in a huddle...

As Iko began to focus the darkness to harm the sand inside, the fireflies instantly, having reached a general consensus, attacked.

Three beams of light lanced out from the huge sphere of fireflies, focused to an incredible degree. They targeted each of the three spheres, moving so fast as to barely be seen. The light would pierce the spheres to the core, cutting a thin slice all around the rapidly spinning spheres, leaving Derkholme a few brief seconds to launch as much of his data as he could out and away from his pending doom before the darkness could close over the slice.

Without any trace of his Lord-class power left, and in his D Rank, he wouldn't be able to survive that attack.

As the fireflies prepared to attack, Triumph raised his left hand, and around each and every firefly, a ball of condensed darkness, like Iko used to attack, formed.

This would block their attacks and prevent escape.

Barely an instant later, Triumph swung Catastrophe, the single pass of the blade unleashing thousands of tiny Entropy Blades, each one precisely aimed at one of the trapped fireflies.

"I want to see this fight take place." Triumph called out to whoever listened. He was now beginning to take an interest in Iko as well.

Luxor, for there was no use in sticking to his assumed name after the mummy-disguise was gone, broke into sand and whizzed in all directions.

"Soul Sonnet. Runic Force."

A ball of turquoise energy fired out of the sandmass and hit the barrier, making a round hole. The sand glowed turquoise and shot out through the gaps made by the fireflies before Triumph silenced them, and fading elements of his own burst. The the natural glow emitted by each particle aiding a small bit as the dark tried to reseal over his entire area. Shooting into the ground the glowing sand bolted in all directions; as long as a small part prevailed he could worry about reformation later.

~I suppose the years have made me complacent... Very well then. White bishop to E-7, black knight to E-7. The first piece is lost. But a bishop is only small of scale in the grand scheme of things... I'll put you straight yet Iko.~

"The thrill of this hunt is lost..." the 'demon' voice from Iko said, seeing the power of Luxor escape through a small hole, created by his own glowing. Although the fireflies did not damage the spheres, Luxor's own glowing created a small part where a few specs of his body could escape... however, the rest of his form was rended into scrap data, as well as all of the glyphs of the remnants of Luxor's A-rank bandages.

Taking this advantage, Iko's eyes narrowed, relaxed, as all of this red scrap went towards him, absorbed into his own frame... the A-rank remnants of power actually made this much more interesting and rewarding of a fight then simply totalling a D-rank.

Standing on the ground, the darkness that was keeping him aloft dispelling, Iko opened and closed his hand in a tight fist. Something powerful had just awakened in himself... his own A-rank potential...

"His leaving will only bring more suitable offerrings for you to destroy, my Lords," the voice said, as Iko turned towards him.

The piranhas were not complicated creatures. They weren't given to introspection, or the questioning of orders. Still, the idea that their charge wasn't exactly in his right mind was certainly pressing upon their minds. His voice sounded wrong, his data signature was different, and his actions were anything but typical.

They hadn't understood much of what either of them had said, but the jackal seemed to be disapproving of their charge. They disapproved of him now, too. They wanted to know why.

This is why the piranhas took off in the direction of Derkholm's much-weakened data signature. DaCre on the level of Iko and the Lords would be hard pressed to find such an insignificant data signature, but the piranhas were very good at finding people. Iko had given them much practice.

"It matters not. We shall have everything in the end, or be ended." Triumph stated, in dismissal of the statement directed at him.

He resumed his methodical pattern of destruction with Catastrophe providing the destruction.

Iko would likely get very bored very quickly just watching Triumph walk this way and that destroying earth.

~When it becomes interesting, again, then...~ the phantom thought to himself, now moving in the direction of Triumph's created castle.

~More importantly... I need to get out of this sensing area... this frame can't maintain B-rank forever...~

With that, he moved on to the castle, where he would be able to downgrade, and go back to at least C, with somewhat of a guard around himself.

Luxor's body begin to rematerlialize a good distance away, though farther into the desert instead of back in the purple forest; it was easier to reform with more sand readily available. He found he was a bit out of breath.

"It seems I've taken more damage than I thought... Hmph." Luxor began to stand but fell down; his reassembling legs were taken longer than he was used to and he had rushed it.

"If I return to the base none of them will recognize me... and if the kitsune does it would only be recognition of a negative sort. Still, it seems I have little choice in the matter..."

He thought about it for a moment and then nodded to himself. "I'll just have Gyro handle the telling for me... Smart enough to follow instructions but not enough to question them." Luxor sighed. "I'm turning right back to Lordly habits... I guess it can't hurt to scheme just this once."

Luxor sensed that the piranha's had gotten onto his trail. Not yet knowing whether they were friend of foe he thought it best to redirect himself before they could reach him, and set off back to the minion base.