The clouds darkened, and a massive storm swept across the entire planet. The streets flooded in moments, the water swallowing the cars. From within a cloud, an imposing figure leapt down. The Hunter had arrived in the country. He scanned his surroundings, making sure no civilians were nearby. Without wasting a second, he pulled out a bomb and hurled it into the sky, where it exploded. The clouds began to shift, spelling out the words "I'm Here." From a rooftop, the protagonists saw the message. They pulled on metal gloves and clenched their fists, then jumped from the building. As they hit the ground, a rush of air rippled around them, and they raced at full speed toward the Hunter's location.
The enemy smiled and drew his katana, running a finger along its sharpened tip. The blade gleamed in the rain, its light so intense that the raindrops could not touch it. The protagonists arrived, and Sone was the first to attack, curled into a ball. The Hunter raised his katana and blocked, and Sone slammed against the blade. The weapon held against the force, but the impact pushed the enemy back a step. Kiro slipped behind him and threw a punch, but the Hunter pulled out a smoke grenade and set it off. A huge cloud of smoke flooded the city. The enemy's blade shoved Sone backward, and Kiro coughed. Worh, who was close by, was completely blinded by the smoke.
The enemy threw three slashes, each one finding its mark on the protagonists, but then a gleaming blade burst out of the smoke. An iron sword, gripped in a hand. The Hunter glanced over his shoulder and spotted it. A quick slash came at him, and he stopped it with his katana as the figure pressed the sword against it. The enemy used both hands to keep his balance under the pressure of the new weapon, and with a flick he dropped a grenade from his pocket.
It exploded right where they stood, and a great ring of fire lit them both.
The sword's owner was Eduin.
"I see you're new. Let's find out how your sword does against my katana," the Hunter said, his voice defiant.
Eduin's sword pushed back harder, and the Hunter was briefly startled by the sudden surge of strength. Without another thought, he swept his right hand in a circle. Grenades flew from the corners of buildings in other cities and converged on them, exploding against Eduin.
He lost his balance, but he drove his sword into the ground, vaulted forward, and slashed the Hunter across the entire chest, leaving a line of blood running down his torso.
The Hunter closed his eyes and unleashed 400 slashes in a matter of seconds. Eduin's eyes went wide. Without wasting a moment, he blocked the cuts with his sword, though a few grazed him. The Hunter leapt into the air and hurled a grenade. It detonated the instant it touched Eduin's head.
Steam poured off Eduin's body, which was badly damaged, but the sword was untouched. Slowly he opened his eyes and looked at the Hunter with calm. Eight slashes landed in the blink of an eye. The Hunter spat blood, stunned by the speed. Eduin began to inhale all the steam in the city until his lungs were full of smoke. He raised his gaze and moved right and left at the same time, creating illusions of himself.
The Hunter watched warily, curious. Then, suddenly, he felt himself running out of air. Eduin had made those movements to distract him and force all the smoke into the Hunter's lungs. The Hunter began to cough, and Eduin took the opening and attacked. Slash after slash tore into him, and the enemy could only take every blow, bleeding from head to toe.
Out of nowhere, Eduin stopped his assault, turned, and fled. The Hunter's body released hands of white energy and they set off after the protagonist.
"I knew that wasn't the real one," Eduin muttered to himself.
As he ran, he spotted a nearby sea. Without hesitating, he hurled his sword in that direction and jumped onto it, riding it at full speed. Quick slashes carved through several buildings, and they collapsed behind him, stalling the energy hands for a moment. They tore through the rubble, but Eduin had already escaped.
"Damn, looks like my plan didn't work on him," the Hunter said from the darkness.
He snapped his fingers, and the hands vanished.
"You can't hide, bastard," Worh said from behind him, his tone grim.
The Hunter turned his head and took a punch to the face that sent him flying backward. He spat, touched his face, and drew his katana, but Worh hit him without a moment's hesitation, with so much force that it nearly sent him into another country. The Hunter crashed to the ground, bleeding. He pulled out a syringe filled with green liquid and injected it into his arm. His body began to heal rapidly, returning to its original condition.
Meanwhile, Eduin remembered his father. A shadow crossed his face, and then, far in the distance, he noticed a darkened silhouette. Red eyes, long black hair, elegant heels, a curvy figure, black pants, and black shoes. A strange connection stirred in his chest, as if this woman were his mother or something like it. She noticed his gaze and smiled, a smile that never reached her eyes, and her red eyes glowed brighter than normal. Eduin felt something inside him begin to awaken. The woman vanished without a trace, leaving him bewildered and full of questions. Who was she? Why did she feel so familiar?
A shadow appeared behind him and struck him, sending him down into the depths of the sea. A chain of red energy wrapped around his foot and dragged him down harder.
*Who was that? Damn it, how do I break free?* he thought.
Sone arrived in his ball form, racing across the surface of the water and kicking up powerful currents. Without hurrying, he leapt into the air, began to spin, and crashed into the sea, scattering the water around Eduin. Seizing the moment, Eduin cut himself free with his sword.
"Thanks, Sone," Eduin said.
Sone nodded and scanned the surroundings. He plucked a spine from his head and hurled it at something in the dark. A silhouette stumbled out of its hiding place. It was a man with a weapon mounted on his arm.
"Damn, I think they found me," the man muttered.
Without hesitation, the two charged. The man noticed and charged his weapon to maximum, then fired. The energy tore toward them in a powerful blast that ripped across the sky and reached near the moon. The planet shook with its force. Many homes collapsed, along with entire apartment buildings. Sone and Eduin dodged just in time.
"Damn, what is that weapon made of? Energy from the sun or what?" Eduin murmured.
Back with Worh, the Hunter was taking a beating. Every blow was meant to stop him and kill him at once. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the energy that had torn across the sky. The Hunter threw a grenade, but a punch destroyed it before it could explode. It was Kiro.
"You're not using your toys," Kiro said, his voice serious and threatening.
With that, he landed a punch on the Hunter's jaw and sent him flying upward. Kiro and Worh combined their blows. The Hunter felt certain he was about to die, but a mysterious voice cut off his thoughts.
"Trouble? Let me give you a pinch of power, about the size of a grain of salt," the unknown voice said.
Suddenly his body lit up, every strand of DNA being rewritten at the subatomic and cellular level. A blinding light poured from him, piercing the sky and the entire solar system. It was so powerful that it hurled Kiro and Worh backward without effort. The whole planet was bathed in light until it faded. The Hunter now wore a purple hood, his eyes glowing purple, the rest of his face swallowed completely by darkness. His black pants and black shoes crackled with purple energy. His katana glowed like his eyes. With a single sweep of the blade, he made Kiro and Worh bleed instantly, precise cuts across their arms, abdomens, torsos, and legs. He raised his sword, and a swift slash shot straight toward their internal organs.
Meanwhile, Eduin and Sone had defeated the man. Eduin handed the arm weapon to Sone and then surged forward at top speed. His body burned, but he would not stop. He threw his sword in a microsecond. The slash heading for the two protagonists was stopped in time by Eduin's blade. The Hunter simply pointed a hand toward Eduin, and a magnetic force yanked him in and seized him by the throat. Kiro rushed forward, but another slash caught his foot and stopped him. The enemy exerted a pinch of force, and a thousand cuts ran through Eduin, whose eyes trembled, paralyzed. Blood trickled from the corners of his mouth, and his arm dropped in front of Worh, who stared at the severed limb, helpless. A magnificent blast shot straight at the Hunter. It was Sone, wielding the man's weapon. The attack hit, but the Hunter caught it with one hand and crushed the energy blast. It left only a small scratch on his hood. He dropped Eduin's body and extended the same hand toward Sone. Inside, Kiro came up with an idea and gestured to Worh. Without wasting a second, the two threw a reversed punch together, forming the "Group Reverse Strike."
The strike broke through the enemy's barriers. The Reverse Strike works like this: you use your own energy to steal the enemy's power. It lasts barely a millisecond, but that is enough for someone fast.
Kiro and Worh seized the power for a millisecond and, without losing any potency, threw their punch together. It slammed into the Hunter's torso, his own power, doubled (x2), turned against him.
The blow shattered him completely, and he collapsed unconscious and badly wounded. Kiro and Worh sat down, exhausted. Eduin's body still lay where it had fallen, but inside his mind, a power was rising faster. His Berserk mode was awakening. Eduin watched it begin to manifest, but he noticed it was unstable. He clutched his chest and made sure to keep as much mental control as he could.
From his body, Berserk 1 awoke. His eyes turned black with red pupils, and the arm that had been severed was replaced by a reddish, bloody one. The Hunter slowly rose and healed himself with a potion. A premonition that something was awakening forced him to regain control. He turned and looked at Eduin in his berserker form, and took a fighting stance, left arm forward, the other far back, his legs set to match. Eduin took the same stance, though with one leg drawn much closer to the other foot. The two lunged, their fists collided, and a gigantic gust of air swept the entire area.
"Hahahahaha!" Eduin laughed.
The Hunter remained grim. He drew his katana and unleashed 3,000 slashes in a single motion, but Eduin blocked them and leapt over them, reached the Hunter, and drove a hard kick into his face, forcing him back. Without wasting a moment, the Hunter held his weapon straight in front of him and blocked the slash Eduin had launched, thanks to his heightened senses. The air grew tense. The trees turned restless, and the flowers stopped moving. The sky went completely black, and the atmosphere shifted into something darker and grayer.
The greatest katana master in history against the finest swordsman of the present day. Powers never seen before collided, slashes carrying the energy of the sun against those carrying the energy of a dwarf star.
Their physical blows blurred under the sheer magnitude of their speed, which surpassed the speed of light a hundredfold, so that it seemed they were fighting on different planets. Their figures could be seen on Mars, on the moon, on Jupiter, on every planet. Their speed did not even let their own blur escape. Eduin hurled a powerful sword strike, and the Hunter countered in kind, releasing his katana to catch the blade by its tip and driving the pommel up under Eduin's jaw.
Eduin's head snapped back, but he simply double-jumped and launched an attack that split an entire planet in two, not Earth, but an unknown one near their solar system. The strike had transcended its own time and chosen where to land. The Hunter took the slash, but he quickly tilted his body slightly to one side, so that it cut his leg and shattered a healing potion that restored him instantly. His technique did not stop. It intensified and landed a mental slash on Eduin.
Eduin lost his Berserk for a single nanosecond, and the enemy exploited it to land a cut on his arm. The red arm caught the cut and consumed it, the skin devouring the attack as if it were nothing. Eduin regained his berserker form and drew a deep breath, then spoke.
"Adiós. That's 'goodbye' in Spanish," Eduin said in a low voice.
He unleashed a slash that made the entire solar system tremble. The Hunter watched helplessly as his body was consumed by the light of the blow.
"Noooooooo!" the Hunter screamed.
Back on Earth, Eduin collapsed to the ground, spitting blood, his body unstable from using Berserk. Kiro and the others rushed over to help him. Kiro hauled him to his feet and draped him over his shoulder, and Worh did the same.
Sone, with his heightened senses, felt a presence behind them and tapped all three on the shoulder. They turned and saw the Hunter, alive but damaged to the extreme, his face grim, stripped of the power he had been given. He pointed a finger at them.
"We'll meet again, heroes. And pardon the vulgarity, but you sons of b..." He never finished the word.
A train slammed into him and sent him flying, his body sailing through the air like a porcelain doll. The vehicle stopped, and two children climbed out.
"This train finally stopped! I thought I was going to die," the boy said with relief.
The children looked at the protagonists with genuine curiosity. Kiro, Worh, and Eduin turned to Sone, who simply whistled.
"The train was gone, and, well, I forgot that vehicle still existed. That's why I didn't look for the kids. I figured they had vanished along with the other two trains," Sone explained, flashing a thumbs-up.
Kiro sighed, and Eduin just smiled. The children walked over to them without hurry.
"Can you take us to our parents? Please," the girl begged this time.
Worh nodded, scooped them up, and set them on his shoulders. The children cheered and gripped his head with total trust. The group began to walk toward a safe place, leaving the chaos behind.