R(eiven) VS Azreal

      All around me stands Beta. Their twisted maleficence tingles at my spine. I have taken control from Fennis and dominated this body, but I can feel my power running out… yet I must defeat Azreal here if there is any chance to get my Eve to Queen. She has to regain her own mind if she is to stop the source of the Beta. Perhaps she will stop her for good this time. I would like nothing more than to run that harlot through and bring an end to my Eve’s long story. But it isn’t meant to be. Fennis was a good, strong man. He just hid himself too deep.

      Even then, he wasn’t strong enough to bring me here in full, nor strong enough to root me here permanently; and so I ready my blade, prepared to unleash the full extent of the power this world can draw from me. With all that I am, I change myself into my ideal power. My black hair, already teasing the ground, grows even longer and takes on streaks of red. That is right, my energy at its best is when it is Eve and I together.

      She, the innocent princess. Me, her Knight. I am Zero, and I will not fail here. I dash forward into the group of dozens of Beta. With one swing alone, I extend my blade dozens of feet and take out the entire group.

      Azreal swings at me from behind but I turn and block it. I shrink my blade and swing up, and sever his claws. Azreal is old and his regeneration is not like the young Beta. He is smart and strong as he was a human once. But he will fall all the same. We clash over and over between bouts of Beta. They are so weak but they are numerous. They are as unending as the stars that they snuff out. Whole worlds have fallen to the Beta. I know not what they seek, but they are a plague.

      My Eve watches me as she covers for her women. But that is okay. Let her believe they matter to her. Let her believe in her feelings for them. It’s fine. This does not differ from any other time. She always forgets who she is. But I am strong and will never forget her. No matter how many eons pass, no matter how many lovers she possesses, no matter how many stories pass where she doesn’t remember me... I will fade away each and every time, safe knowing that at the end of existence, I’ll be the one standing beside her.

      These kinds of thoughts never leave my mind, even as I wipe out hundreds of Beta; even as I slowly erode Azreal. He seems to pick up on my distracted mind, however, and catches me by surprise. I wouldn’t have thought him to slam his arms into the earth, only to resurface them later. His hold on my ankles is like steel, I feel bones starting to break. He sicks his horde of Beta on me while reveling in my vulnerability.

      I burn my body bright, eating a good half of my remaining power source. But it wipes away the encroaching Beta horde and destroys what remained of Azreal’s claws. In anger, he charges me using everything he can find- his trunk like arms, his skeletal legs, his severed horns. Further and further back I drive him until he is bloody and beaten. My reserves are almost gone as Azreal kneels before me cackling ominously. “You may kill me here child, but Queen Gehenna is forever. And as before, there is no thread for you to cut. You can not put me down for good. I chose this life. There is no mangled Fate to sever. I am forever.”

      He is right, in a way. I am not a Beta, I cannot sever one’s destiny. But I can end it. His eyes light up all the redder at my devil-may-care attitude. But that’s fine. It’s always fine. Bile pours forth from Azreal and grows over his wounds until his arms are made whole again.

      I run at him and dodge his swipes by diving between his legs. Behind him, I slice at his knees and sever them. I vault onto him and slice at his head over and over as the bile keeps rebuilding him. He manages to grab and fling me away. I land into a roll and right myself.

      “I’m ending this Azreal, with a gift from a man who tried.” I reach to my side and the very air trembles. There’s a shimmer, and then a void into all of time and space. Even as I am, I cannot obtain all the information there is to be had. So I focus on that which I seek and pull it forth. It follows my arm out of the portal and is given physicality as the portal closes. There, in my left hand, is a blade made of ice. Streaks of blue take shelter with the red in my hair.

      “As the rain will shape the mountains, so too will a thousand needles kill.” I let the blade go, and it flies towards Azreal. He has little effort smashing the blade of ice. But ice is ice, even in fragments. They immediately converge on Azreal, piercing him a million times in the blink of an eye. As they hold him in place, piercing through his very flesh, I move in and bring my sword down and cut the man in twain, severing him in half from head to crotch.

      I direct the ice from around his body, freezing him and halting his regeneration. All at once, I smash my fist into the man’s cavity and rip out the one thing that makes a human a human. With his still-beating heart in my hand, I destroy the one thing holding half of his existence together. I crush the ice, destroying his body, the part that is Beta explodes into an icy due. On this day… a battle, centuries in the making, ends.

      There’s now nothing remaining between Eve and Queen. “I’m sorry Eve,” I call out to her. “You’ll have to take it from here.”

      Her beautiful face twists in concern and she makes her way to me.

      “But, Rei… what do you mean? You’ll just be inside Fennis again, right?” She asks as much as begs.

      I shake my head and stare at my hand as it gains transparency. “There is no more, Fennis.” I turn and see the other women closing in. For the first time, in a very, very long time, I gaze upon them all in the flesh.

      “What do you mean?” Rose inquires.

      “All that he was, is gone. Two objects cannot exist within the same space. But that was the only way to physically bring me here- to use himself as a beacon.”

      “He was a dreadful man…” Charlie’s words taper off.

      “But I will remember what he did here today.” Mimi makes a fist as if holding on to something dear, and brings it close to her heart.

      “I almost didn’t think you were real.” Kay says.

      “Ah yes. The same trite lines as always.” Rei spits out. The anger seems, to Eve, unwarranted, especially against those women.

      “What’s with the attitude Rei? That isn’t like you.” Eve tells me.

      “As you are, Eve, you know little about me. None of you do. Except you Nar, hm?”

      They all look at where I'm talking, and there, behind a rock, Kyle appears from nothing. “I didn’t think you’d be able to find me with how little power you have left.”

      “You were here well-before us, writing in that damnable book of yours.” I chew those words and spit them out like something vile.

      “Kyle, what are you doing here? I thought everyone died.” Evangeline asks with a show of relief.

      “Ah, yes. Clive and the others are gone. Those Beta you all destroyed? Yes…”

      “Wasn’t he your lover? How can you be so cold?” Charlie looks personally hurt.

      I sneer at the man, Kyle. “That’s just the way of the impartial observer, yeah?”

      “I am not an Observer, Reimiel. I am the Scribe. You know this to be true, and you may even forgive me for it someday.”

      “Ignore the fool. There is no time to waste on him. I am fading, as I cannot be here. Per usual, the vessel isn’t permanent.”

      “But… what about you?” Eve asks me.

      “I will be with you forever, Eve, as I am your destined one.” I place my hand on her heart, earning glares from everyone present.

      “None of you know the truth, girls. None of you remember, save those deemed to, by a means I do not understand. But you all will remember, one day. There will be a reckoning in the coming years, and all your stories will be told.”

      Isn’t that right, Observer? Yes, that’s right. You. I may not know the whole story, but you do, don’t you? I know you exist. You look down on us as you read Narrator’s stories. We are playthings to you and yours. Our worlds exist as entertainment to you. You birth us for no reason than to make us suffer. But when I am done with the Beta…

      "I’ll come for you if it means finally bringing Eve peace."