RollBack

October 26th, 2221, 00:45 a.m.

Several vortices of celestial flames began to appear inside civilian residences throughout all of Tokyo. They were magical portals conjured by Miyamoto Nori, who had returned to Helios Headquarters fifteen minutes earlier and, thanks to the support of eight more summoners, was able to conjure several portals at once, from which Helios agents emerged with the mission of evacuating all civilians. This was the second operation of the night; the first had ended in failure, resulting in the neutralization of more than twenty Night Knights, fifteen injured, and five dead, all members of Squadron 1. Parallel to Helios’ ongoing operation, a rain of debris and ashes loomed over the streets of Tokyo as the result of a powerful Vitagia implosion originated at the Shibuya pedestrian crossing, where there was now a gigantic smoking crater from which mauve sparks of static emanated, as though lightning had struck the site. Several buildings leaned in opposite directions like twisted trees. The streets were cracked and fractured, and more than a dozen vehicles had been reduced to charred scrap.

All Night Knights had been forbidden from approaching the devastated zone until the evacuation process was completed; however, Shirotsuki Gin, unaware of the agency’s activities, unconsciously disobeyed this order, finding herself only a few steps away from the crater, contemplating with horror and revulsion that macabre scene which, fortunately, had claimed no victims, for she could not sense any Vitagia presence. Although she had several hypotheses in her mind regarding what had happened, Gin knew that, in order to reach the truth, she had to approach the crater, from which a faint Vitagia presence emanated.

She hesitated with every step, but in the end managed to touch the edge of the crater with the tips of her feet, and she was able to contemplate how, from amidst the smoke, a silhouette twisting chronically could be glimpsed. After taking a deep breath, she prepared herself to descend into the enormous hole, only to encounter a grotesque scene.

That creature lying within that sinkhole was barely recognizable as something that had once been human. It was like beholding a living corpse, despite the paradoxical nature of such a definition; however, his Vitagia signature betrayed him. It was none other than Gi Kaito, alive, but barely.

His body had adopted an emaciated appearance to an alien degree. His once prominent musculature had vanished, and now his figure was anemic, wrinkled, and soft. His eyes reflected no light whatsoever; they were nothing more than a pair of dark pits, and his dry, toothless mouth resembled a stone cave. His skin had turned gray like a stormy sky, and his limbs had contracted, reducing his height by half.

For an instant, Gin froze before the confusion and despair awakened by finding her beloved comrade in such a horrifying condition, until her survival instincts brought her back into the game, just in time to evade the slash aimed at her back with a backflip.

Once in the air, she was able to contemplate with revulsion and a savage, rising fury the enormous sadistic smile of Marius V Drácula, who stood bathed in human blood.

October 26th, 2221 – 00:30

Fifteen minutes before Gin’s arrival at the pedestrian crossing, a smaller crater occupied the place of the larger one that would succeed it and, before one of its edges, a portal appeared.

From the vortex of burning flames, a robust humanoid silhouette took shape, pulsating at a frantic rhythm as though it were about to explode.

The portal dissolved, but the flames did not, although they were not the same. These were scarlet in color and enveloped the body of a beast with reddish skin and smoking pores, whose wild mane waved in the air like the flame of a candle. That imposing being, who seemed to emerge from hell itself, was Gi Kaito, who had just opened the seal containing the Vitagia inherited from his ancestors, unleashing the powerful transformation known as the Avenging Phoenix, with which humanity achieved victory against the dark orcs, one of the most powerful races added to the enemy ranks of the Shedo. But not even a battalion of them could represent a danger greater than that of an ant if one intended to face a Tiran-specimen vampire, especially when dealing with one of the princes of the Dracula family.

Without a doubt, this would be the greatest battle this veteran would have to face.

It mattered little that Marius was currently reduced to a mass of flesh and blood within an asphalt sinkhole; as long as he remained alive, he represented a semi-maximum level threat designated D/C within Helios’ ranking system. Therefore, lowering his guard would be a fatal mistake and, above all, not attacking at this moment would be even worse.

Kaito raised his fist above his head. His wrist was tilted in such a way that his thumb pointed upward; it was as though he were a miner holding a pickaxe and were about to strike against a thick layer of earth to extract coal, and he began to conjure his attack.

“Your march upon the clouds resounds, awakening terror in mortals. We feel your power within the storms. Oh, lord of thunder, I ask that you grant me the power to destroy my rival and claim glory…”

Purple sparks began to emerge from his fist.

“…Punishing Hammer!” exclaimed Kaito, bringing his fist down upon Marius.

The impact of the attack sounded like the fall of lightning and likewise, like one, it resulted in a charred crater produced by a powerful burst of energy so bright that it forced Kaito to close his eyes, and when he opened them once more he was able to admire his destructive handiwork, only to be struck by unsettling disbelief upon realizing an inconsistency. However, his reaction time was insufficient to defend himself from what was coming and he received the attack unguarded: a powerful blow to the skull that plunged his body, from feet to chest, into the asphalt.

The confusion within Kaito’s mind, who was barely processing the situation halfway, left him vulnerable to an imminent counterattack.

Two thirds of a second before receiving Kaito’s attack, Marius, in the span of opening and closing his lips, pronounced a very short word of one or two syllables. At first, Gin thought it was merely a groan or an unimportant babble, until she felt a weak emanation of Vitagia being released from his body and understood that it was a spell and that, whatever he had said, it was a conjuration. Therefore, during that fleeting instant he was partially immune to the Punishing Hammer, at least to the flow of Vitagia transmuted into energy, for under the bindings of universal order, a sorcerer is immune to attacks during a conjuration or prayer. As a result of this tactic, he delayed the inevitable and Kaito’s Vitagia recoiled and spread in an invisible orbit upon colliding with the conjurer’s shield. However, he still had to worry about the incredible strength of the Avenging Phoenix.

That was when the inexplicable occurred.

Marius disappeared from his position within the span of a blink and appeared twenty feet in the air, falling through it. By the time he was three meters from the ground, he had already managed to reconstruct the lower half of his skeleton, becoming capable of delivering that kick and propelling himself upward once more through the rebound. Once his momentum for ascending was exhausted, he began to descend. His entire body had completely regenerated and he prepared himself to attack his opponent once again with a knee strike, managing to hit Kaito in the face and fracture his nose.

A large jet of blood burst out from Kaito’s nostrils and Marius caught it with his mouth. Thanks to this, Marius was able to accelerate his recovery; however, an attack like that, lacking intentions beyond inflicting pain, was a window of opportunity for his enemy, and that was exactly what happened. The vampire’s arrogance worked against him, for Kaito seized his leg with both hands and wrung it like a rag, shattering his bones and ligaments.

“This is a fight to the death, little prince!” he growled. “Every attack counts!” he scolded. “So stop playing around!” he exclaimed, slamming Marius against the ground and making him bounce off the asphalt.

Within the two thirds of a second in which Marius’ body separated from the ground after crashing and bouncing against it, Kaito delivered a kick to his already shattered ribs, turning them into powdered milk and sending the vampire flying into the sky.

Kaito made a powerful jump that propelled him in an instant to where Marius was, positioning himself beneath him. The gazes of both men, burning with hatred, met; they raised their fists and began striking at one another, unleashing a barrage of intersecting punches that blocked and deflected each other, preventing any of the attacks from landing and causing the air itself to receive every blow, releasing powerful gusts of wind that pushed the clouds and floating lanterns away from them, creating a void in the sky. Each strike echoed through the walls and alleyways like bursts of fireworks.

As the seconds passed, between every strike Marius’ body regenerated faster and faster, and it did not take long for him to take advantage of his agility to add his legs and knees into the equation, forcing his opponent to likewise make use of his entire body in combat.

It seemed that their equal skills would keep the battle indefinitely static until gravity returned them to the ground, but then Kaito finally decided to make his move and sacrificed his abdomen to execute his plan, receiving Marius’ attack as the vampire stabbed his stomach with his claws.

“I’ve got you, old man!” he cheered.

Marius’ smile vanished when he felt the strong grip of Kaito’s abdominal muscles crushing his wrist, leaving his hand trapped within the old man’s flesh.

“What the hell?!”

Marius prepared to attack again, but Kaito caught his arm and broke it.

“Ahg! Damn you!”

He tried to propel himself away by bracing his feet against Kaito’s body in order to free his hand, but it was useless. Kaito brought his left hand to his mouth and formed a half-open fist before it, in such a way that it looked as though his hand were imitating the act of holding a trumpet.

At that moment, if Marius had still been capable of sweating, his entire body would have been drenched upon feeling Kaito ripping away his Vitagia using the Dragon Jaw in a manner nearly as voracious as that of a vampire sucking blood from its victim.

Kaito raised his hand toward the sky. The flames surrounding him concentrated within his palm and he compressed them until compacting them into his fist, and he began chanting his curse.

“Fire of vengeance, the burning fury of the fallen, unleash yourself and reduce everything to ashes. Bring hell to the earth and free my soul…”

From between the folds of skin formed by closing his fist began to emanate a black, tar-like liquid along with small clouds of smoke that scattered ashes. The fire that previously did not seem to affect him was now burning him.

“Exhale your breath and quench your thirst with the blood of my enemy… Níðhöggr!”

Marius writhed, attempting to free himself and escape what was coming. Kaito deposited that concentration of power into his half-open left fist, closing the conjuration. Marius did not waste this opportunity and, now with his arm healed, hurried to attack Kaito’s neck with his claws, empowered by his final reserves of Vitagia, with the intention of silencing him forever; however, he failed to arrive in time to prevent Kaito from executing his attack.

“Dragon Breath, third degree… Solar Flare!”

With a blow following the naming of the technique, Kaito released the power hidden between his fingers, unleashing a burning blast of fire whose blinding brightness would make the eyes of anyone who witnessed it burn.

The sky was dyed the color of autumn leaves and all the floating lamps in the sky melted.

Marius received the attack directly and his body carbonized instantly until only a smoking skeleton remained, which fragmented into pieces and dispersed through the air.

Kaito was now deprived of the Avenging Phoenix’s Vitagia, in addition to having lost nearly all of his base Vitagia as payment for conjuring the power of the dragon Níðhöggr, with which he achieved victory; but he had needed to use more than half the power residing within his seal in order to contain it, which consequently caused the tattoo on his chest to become more translucent.

That had been an enormous sacrifice, but it seemed it had been worth it… until a sharp pain in the veteran Night Knight’s entrails proved otherwise. That familiar sting which had saved Kaito’s hide more than once by warning him of mortal danger; a danger sense inherited generation after generation among the Berserkers and which the old man had sharpened after decades of combat, bearing the name: “The Stinger”.Quickly, Kaito managed to locate the latent threat that was literally falling upon him, raising his arms and crossing them in the shape of a cross, shielding himself from Marius’ diving kick.

The vampire jumped by pushing off Kaito’s arms, sending himself back into the air, where he maneuvered his body until positioning himself in the best possible way to land, managing to place his feet gracefully upon the ground.

Kaito remained like a statue, consumed by confusion and fear, to which Marius reacted by letting out a sharp little laugh.

“T-Thi…! This…! It’s…! But, but…! Impossible!” Kaito stammered. “You were dead…! I killed you!”

In response to that statement, Marius burst into laughter.

“Stupid human!” he exhaled between laughs. “Your confusion is so adorable…” He raised a finger and shook his head like a teacher correcting his student.

“What you saw was the future you were approaching, but that future no longer exists and, therefore, the self you killed is nothing more than a residue of a destined future that never came to pass.”

“What the hell does that mean?!” Kaito questioned, furious and frustrated. “What was it that you did?!” he asked desperately.

“Your weak mind is incapable of properly processing exposure to temporal variations and it has played a trick on you, poor old fossil,” he responded with an arrogant smile. “As I said, you contemplated the future toward which you were headed; however, I rejected that destiny by causing myself a "RollBack", and now that future has changed”

“Are you saying you turned back time?!” Marius burst out laughing while clutching his stomach with his arms.

“Stop laughing, damn you!” roared Kaito while beginning to concentrate Vitagia in his fists in order to charge against the vampire.

In response, Marius extended his claws and adopted a hostile stance.

Kaito prepared to throw himself against his enemy, analyzing his rival and attempting to guess how he would respond while at the same time trying to make sense of what he had explained in order to understand what kind of magic or spell he had used. His mind wandered while his body remained in a combat stance. However, before the Night Knight could make his first move, he felt a terrible burning sensation in his ribs. He looked downward to find his entrails protruding outside his body through a massive tear in his skin. There was no doubt that such a wound was the work of a vampire, but when he raised his gaze, Marius had vanished. Nevertheless, he had not left, but instead stood behind the old man.

“Behind you, gramps!” he pronounced in a melodic and slow manner, in contrast with the speed of his movements, for before he finished pronouncing the last syllable, Kaito was already on his knees after receiving two kicks to the backs of his knees.

Kaito immediately turned around to see Marius licking the blood covering his hands.

“Not bad, although I’ve tasted better,” commented Marius.

“How do you do this? It isn’t teleportation or super speed, it’s something else. It’s as though you move through a different time than the rest of the world!”

“This is the power of the future, old fossil!” Marius answered him with a grinning expression of arrogance. “And I’ve barely shown you a fraction of its power. You’ve only seen the tip of the iceberg.”

The vampire extended his hand and placed it upon the kneeling Kaito’s head, who remained stiff and attentive toward his opponent, for with his back exposed he was an easy target for a lethal attack. However, he had already learned that this was not Marius’ style; the sadistic bastard would take his time torturing him before ending the life of his “prey,” and he could use that somehow to turn the situation around. Nevertheless, those ideas would be stripped of meaning with the arrival of the unexpected.

A halo of pale light, as fleeting as a blink, crossed before the sight of both men like a flash of sunlight reflected upon glass. Neither understood at the moment what it had been; it was not until they heard the sound of liquid dripping that their minds fully comprehended the event. What was dripping was blood: Marius’ blood spilling onto the ground from his arm, which had been severed in two at the point where the wrist ended, while his hand lay palm-up upon the ground.

Marius and Kaito then felt several sources of Vitagia appear around them and began looking to their sides, finding more than twenty Night Knights. Kaito recognized them as Squadron 1, led by their captain, Aoki Akira, those in charge of Shinjuku.

“How wonderful, it seems tonight I’ll have a feast,” celebrated Marius. “Idiots!” growled Kaito. “Get out of here! You have no idea who you’re dealing with!” he scolded them.

“Silence!” roared the captain. “By what right do you say that crap when not only were you reckless enough to try facing a damned Dracula alone?!” he criticized, pointing at him with disdain. “I recommend you shut your mouth and stay on the ground so that us young people can take care of resolving what you failed at.” The twenty members of Squadron 1 unsheathed their weapons and prepared themselves to attack the vampire together when their captain gave the signal, while Marius, their target, did not even flinch as he stared directly into Akira’s eyes, drooling and licking his fangs.

“You will be the main course,” declared Marius with a gaze of desire pulsating with ecstasy, for he had finally found worthy prey.