***I'll be traveling for the two days, so I'll see you all when I get back.***
Darkness thickened until it felt like breathing tar, the shattered ground groaning beneath the weight of two forces that had no business existing in the same space. Kurai stood with Erebus Fang in her grasp, its silver-and-black edge thrumming with a violent hunger. Across from her, Baldr held No Name steady, though his breaths had grown uneven.
Their last exchange had left sparks still burning in the rubble, both fighters bleeding, both scarred — but only one smiling.
Kurai tilted her head, her hair shifting like a shadow's veil. "Tiring already? I expected more from one of the all-powerful thirteen darknesses. Oh, wait, it's now twelve, not thirteen."
Baldr's golden eyes narrowed. He raised his blade into guard. "And I expected more loyalty from one who once called herself a member of the thirteen darkness. Instead, you sound almost… human. A pathetic evolution if I must say."
"Human?" Kurai smirked, the word tasting sweetly bitter. "No. I am beyond human. Beyond you. That's why this ends here."
And she moved.
The clash didn't relent—it worsened.
Kurai surged forward, Erebus Fang arcing down with a weight that split the air like a guillotine. Baldr brought No Name up crosswise, catching the strike, but the sheer force drove him half a step back, boots carving trenches in the stone. Her follow-up came instantly, glaive reversing into a stabbing thrust meant to skewer his heart. Baldr twisted, the blade grazing his ribs, close enough to rip his cloak.
He swung back, No Name's edge trailing black flame. Kurai leaned in rather than away, shadows wrapping her torso as armor. The blade cut across her side, peeling blood, but the armor drank much of the force. She answered with a brutal rising sweep, the glaive's serrated edge whistling up toward his chin. Baldr barely jerked his head aside, the strike severing several strands of his pale hair instead of his throat.
Every exchange was lethal. Each blow, each dodge — had either faltered by even a heartbeat, they would have been eviscerated.
Baldr drove a knee forward, aiming to crush her sternum. Kurai dissolved into shadows and reformed at his back, glaive spinning for a decapitating slash. He pivoted with impossible speed, No Name whipping around to parry, sparks bursting as steel howled against steel. The recoil rattled their arms, blood already slicking both grips.
Kurai snarled and unleashed Dark Firaga point-blank, black fireballs erupting between them. Baldr caught two on his blade but the third exploded against his chest, scorching through fabric to burn flesh. He answered by planting No Name into the ground, sending a jagged shockwave tearing upward. Kurai leapt, but the blast caught her ankle mid-air, spinning her off balance. She righted herself with a shadow platform, only to meet Baldr already lunging upward, blade first.
Her glaive snapped back to dagger mode, intercepting his thrust just inches from her neck. The impact numbed her arm. She hissed, twisting the weapon back into glaive form mid-block, the sudden change forcing Baldr's guard wide. Her counter cut a gash down his forearm, black ichor spattering the ground.
"You bleed like the rest," she taunted, shadows licking her lips.
Baldr's golden eyes burned brighter. "And you seem bound to that flesh. That means you can die if it dies. Unlike me, if you kill this body, I will simply find another."
He lashed out again, his blade carving arcs that howled with darkness, each swing heavy enough to split stone. Kurai evaded narrowly, the ground exploding wherever his strikes landed. She flickered between afterimages, Eclipse Mirage blurring the battlefield with shadows. One false body took a direct hit, erupting into mist — giving the real Kurai her window. She lunged, glaive poised for the spine.
Baldr anticipated, pivoting mid-swing and cutting horizontally. The edge came so close it tore fabric from her stomach and peeled skin raw. She pressed on, spinning and catching him across the thigh. His leg buckled, but he refused to fall.
The fight devolved into savagery. Cuts multiplied. Her left arm dangled broken, but she kept fighting, reforming her weapon into her good hand. His chest was seared with burns, and his leg trembled with each step, yet he pressed forward, unrelenting. It was no longer skill alone sustaining them — it was an obsession with killing the other.
And then Kurai raised her free hand.
The ground split, darkness erupting into writhing tendrils. They lashed like serpents, dozens of them, coiling around Baldr's arms, torso, and legs. He roared, tearing through two, three — but five more bound him, pulling him down. They stabbed into his flesh, anchoring him in place. His knees hit stone.
Kurai stalked closer, Erebus Fang blazing with condensed shadow. Her smile was sharp, merciless. "Now kneel. This is your end. Rejoice."
She lifted her weapon overhead. A massive amount of darkness condensed, shrieking as it coiled tighter, shaking the very world they stood in, forming a blade of abyss so sharp the air itself seemed to bleed.
"This is the end," she whispered. Her voice was ice. "Abyssal Cataclysm."
The glaive came down —
Baldr ripped free at the last instant, shredding tendrils with an eruption of dark fire. Baldr screamed, darkness tearing from him in violent waves. In a last, desperate act, he split the ground beneath him, shadows rising like a shield. He twisted aside, his keyblade No Name raised. The glaive tore through, shattering the barrier and ripping a trench through the battlefield. The explosion of darkness was so great it turned night to pure black, swallowing light itself.
The Cataclysm had still grazed him. The blast had also carved across his chest and shoulder, ripping blood in sheets. The ground exploded beneath him, stone vaporizing into a crater of writhing void.
Smoke choked the battlefield. When it cleared, Baldr staggered from the wreckage, bleeding heavily, his clothes half destroyed. His breath was ragged, but his eyes — blazing gold — were locked on Kurai with something worse than fury.
Obsession.
"You…" he rasped, voice breaking between human and the alien cadence of Darkness. "You've found a way to adapt a body to darkness in a way that has never been seen before. You wield more darkness than even a member of the Thirteen Darknesses; that is impressive, mind you, but that body even more so. I will have that power and that body. I will consume you."
Kurai tilted her head, her smirk cruel and cold, hiding the strain that the attack had put on her body. "Then come try again, 'little brother.' Next time, I won't let you crawl away."
Baldr's gaze lingered, madness and hunger mingling. Then shadows swallowed him, retreating into his corridor. The battlefield fell silent, only the scent of blood and burned stone remaining.
When the smoke cleared, only ruin remained — jagged fissures glowing with lingering darkness. Kurai lowered her weapon, her breath steady, her expression unchanged.
A trail of blood and shadows led away from the ruins. His body was failing, shredded and broken, but his golden eyes had burned with something Kurai recognized all too well — obsession.
Then Baldr was gone. Vanishing into the distance. He had fled through a corridor at the last possible instant, abandoning the battlefield but not without a cost.
Kurai stood alone, chest heaving, darkness curling from her like smoke. Her wounds knit slowly as the black veins on her body receded, but her smile remained.
For the first time, she tested her power — another member of the Thirteen, and they were shown to be beneath her. Even though the Darkness possessed a body that was superior to hers, as it was already trained to the level of a Keyblade master, she still dominated it. It seems that Helios had been right in his thinking that the Thirteen Darkness' choice to relinquish their heart and body, leaving only the mind, had been a foolish decision.
Far away, in the sanctuary of his lair, Baldr staggered through the portal, collapsing to his knees. His body was mangled — burns, cuts, shadows still eating at his wounds. He coughed, blood spattering against stone.
Yet his golden eyes still burned with something else — hunger.
He pressed a trembling hand to his chest and laughed, hoarse and low.
"That strength… that control… she is wasted as she is." His grin split wide, feral. "Her darkness will be mine. I will consume her. No matter what it takes."
The laugh grew louder, echoing in the cavern until it was almost unhinged, a vow carved into the void itself.
And in the ruins of the battlefield, Kurai stood alone, gazing into the place where Baldr had escaped.
Her smirk returned, cold and sharp. She turned back toward Helios's unconscious form, the glow of moonlight and shadow wrapping around her, sovereign and unbroken.
Helios stirred, bloody and pale but conscious enough to see her standing triumphant in the ruin. His smirk was weak, but it was there.
"Where is he? Did you kill him?" he rasped.
Kurai didn't look back. Her eyes lingered on the horizon where Baldr had vanished.
"No, not yet," she murmured. "But next time… he won't escape."