Chapter X- Curses

Opening her eyes, Sada looked up to see the back of Akuma who had the ax blade in his right hand. Akuma's right forearm was covered in red scales as it twisted like a snake upwards to his back shoulder blade. His left forearm was covered in the black liquid. Akuma held his scythe in his left hand with the scythe being diagonal behind his back. Akuma's right eye glowed red with his pupil being almond shaped and his left eye was completely black. The orc's right arm had slid off from his shoulder. The orc screamed out in pain, falling to the ground with his left hand trying to keep more blood from squirting out. Akuma tossed the arm to the ground, sitting on top of the orc. Akuma placed his right hand in front of the orc's heart. The orc noticed a dragon's head with its mouth open in the middle of Akumas palm, with its neck going down towards Akumas wrist. Akuma's palm burned black, his fingertips kept the flame away from touching the orc's skin.

"Who the hell are you looking for and why?" Akuma asked, the orc was too nervous to speak.

"W-We're looking for you. You have a b-b-bounty on your h-head, and o-our boss. T-T-They were the one who w-wanted us to bring you to them," The orc stumbled in his words as Akuma pressed his hand down on the orc's chest. The Flame began to expand as it touched the orc's skin.

"Your boss, here I was thinking you were the boss," Akuma said a bit sinnesterly, the flame was burning through the orcs skin, only a bone from touching the orcs heart.

"So, who's this boss of yours?" Akuma asked, and the orc was quick to respond.

"W-We don't know, the only thing we know is you h-hear a chainsaw when they're nearby, and a g-girls laughter," The orc replied as Akuma rolled his eyes

"Where can we find your boss?" Akuma asked, pulling his hand backwards a bit.

"Up north, towards Santonia. It's an underground party town. They like all things party related. Like raves, drinking, and drugs," The orc replied quickly, rambling on a bit.

"Good to know, then we don't need you anymore,"Akuma spoke, the flame in his hand dissipating as he grabbed the orc by his head. Akuma placed his scythes blade under the orcs neck.

"If we let any of them get away they'll tell their boss. Jago, Sada's down. Can I trust you and the other people here who are still alive to take the goblins down? They're weak, just aim for their chest since all their organs are mashed together. But if you don't want to kill them, then trap them and leave them for someone else," Akuma spoke as he let go of the orcs face, who tried to sit up but was stopped by Akumas foot. Akuma slowly pushed down, the orcs neck slowly began to bleed from the blade.

"Yeah," Jago said a bit sadly, with Akuma proceeding to stomp the orc's head down past the blade, killing the orc. Blood squirting up, covering Akuma's leg and a bit of his chest. The goblins began to run in all different directions, with all the robbed people taking a book made from what seemed to be flesh of pig. After they took their books out, they began chanting which closed off all of the exit, trapping the goblins inside, with the goblins trying to climb up but failing. Meanwhile the cyclops had brought down his spiked club onto Akuma. But Akuma had dodged by jumping backward. Akuma grabbed Sada, carrying her bridal style as he began to run off towards the edge of the dome.

"Akuma, how are you on your feet?" Sada asked

"This power, it's what keeps me from passing out," Akuma replied, arriving at the edge of the dome, laying her down with her back against the wall.

"Now, just watch, I'm gonna get the cyclops done quick," Akuma spoke out, turning his back to Sada, twisting his scythe in the middle. Akuma began walking forward while the chain spilled out, a devilish smirk plastered across Akumas face.

"Let's end this. I want to go back to sleep," Akuma spoke, snickering as he began running towards the cyclops, tossing the right side of his chained scythe backwards. Akuma jumped towards the right when the cyclops brought down its club, this time sliding it to the right towards Akuma. When Akumas feet touched the ground he jumped upwards to the air before the club could hit him. Akuma brought the end of his chained scythe towards and past him as his blad dug into the cyclops' left shoulder. Akuma tugged on the chain with his left hand, pulling Akuma forward with Akuma letting go of the chained blade. Akuma rolled his arms back as if he was about to do a pushup, his hands in a tight fist and burning with black flames and red lightning.

"Now, die," Akuma spoke once arriving in front of the cyclops' eye, remembering what Malca had said to him. Akuma brought his fist towards the cyclops eye, opening his palms on contact. The black flames burst through the cyclops' eye all the way to the other side. Lightning came from every direction outwards from the cyclops' head, spewing out brain matter as the cyclops fell backwards. Akuma falls to the ground, with the black liquid and red scales disappearing, with all of his symbols coming back. Falling and crushing the rubble from under him.

Hours had passed, the goblins were all dead and the tunnels were back open. With everyone that was alive taking the injured through one tunnel that led to a medical storage center. Sada and Jago were sitting next to the sleeping Akuma in the medical center. Sada had bandages around her left ankle, Luna checking Akumas body with her hands glowing green with a white tint.

"His body seems to be completely fine. It's a matter of time until he wakes up," Luna said, her hands stopped glowing. Luna brought her hands down, walking towards the back of Akuma's head.

"Did you find anything strange in Akumas body? Besides the tracker," Sada asked, watching Luna

"Yes, I found two curses on the boy's body. One that's all around the innings of his heart,

the other one on half of his frontal lobe," Luna quickly replied, Sada was about to speak but Jago had asked first.

"Is there anything we can do?" Jago spoke up, with Luna giving a small nod.

"Yes, but there are some problems if I try to break the curses," Luna replied to Jago with Sada asking another question.

"What would be the problems?" Sada asked, with Luna placing her hands on the sides of Akuma's skull. Luna spread her fingers as far as they would go while answering Sada.

"If I tried to do his heart, your friend Akuma could die. But with his brain, there would be less of a chance of him dying. Instead, he may lose all of his memories, and be paralyzed. But I could also die with the boy," Luna replied as she continued to go on.

"Magic like this will make what happens when I go in there a reality. What happens to my body there will affect me out here. The magic that allows us to do this is forbidden magic. But, no one in our village except for me and one other that I know how to use it. It's rare to find people who can use forbidden magic," Luna finished her speech as she pressed her palm firmly into Akumas head.

"Who's the other person, could they help you with the heart?" Sada asked but Luna shook her head no.

"No, even with two, it would only make it harder with the heart and brain. Trying to break curses on vital parts of the body is strainius. If either of the two people trying to break the curse were to lose their footing, or didn't break the curse correctly. Then everything that could go wrong will go wrong, from the cursed death to your death. The brain is already hard with one person, but trying the heart with two people. That would be asking for all the misfortune you could ask for," Luna explained as she brought the question up again.

"So, do you two want me to go in and try to break one of the curses in his body?" Luna asked.

"Yes," Sada replied with Jago quickly shaking his head yes as well.

"Good, you both agree. Then, let's see what I can do about those curses," Luna said with a bit of a cheerful tone and a smile on her face. Luna began enchanting in what sounded like her making random noises. Luna's hands and eyes began to glow a dark purple. When Luna closed her eyes and opened her eyes up again, everything around her was black. But looking down to her feet she saw a road made of blood leading her to a mountain of bones and skulls.

"What is this about?" She spoke, with her voice echoing throughout the infinite darkness. Looking behind her she saw that the red road kept going. The road behind her ends at a door with multiple signs saying not to enter, and locks all around the doorknob. Luna turned her back to the mountain of bones and skulls, beginning to walk towards the door. When she arrived at the door she tried to unlock it, but none of the locks would budge. But as she continuously tried to open the door two voices were heard from behind her.

"Why are you here, old hag?" The voices spoke curiously. Luna turned around, seeing the figure that Akuma had seen moments before he transformed.

"I'm here to help the boy. Why are you here?" Luna replied, asking a question back.

"We are Akuma's fear, his anxiety, his sadness… Or maybe, we are the true Akuma. But we don't want to be here," The voices replied, with Luna asking another question.

"Why don't you two leave?" Luna said

"We can't. Every Time we've tried we failed," the voices replied, walking to Luna's left side, placing their left hand over her shoulder.

"Why are you trying to help another weakling like yourself?" They asked, pressing their fingertips into her shoulder. Sharp black claws came out from their fingers, causing blood to spurt out of her shoulder.

"He helped me, so I thought I would exchange the favor," Luna replied, gritting her teeth, feeling the hand pushing her body down to her knees.

"Let us give you a tip, weakling," the voices spoke, walking in front of her. They took their hand off from her and placed both their palms right under her eyes.

"Don't try helping the boy. We want his body, the more people try to help him to grow stronger. The less chance we have of taking his body over. This world isn't made for the weak people who rely on others to gain strength. Only the strong who are more terrifying than monsters will rain supreme," The voice spoke with a wicked grin on their face, placing their thumbs on her eyes as black flames bursted into her. The black flames bursted out around their thumbs. Reality goes back with Luna left shoulder bleeding and her eyes bursting out in black flames. Moving back pushing things over as she fell backwards to the ground screaming in pain with Jago rushing to help Luna.

"What happened?" Jago panicked as he pulled his book out, flipping a few pages pulling balls of water out and splashing them onto Luna's face. Sada had a few seconds of confusion, then quickly got to helping to try to stop the flames. But the flames only kept going until her eyes were completely gone. Luna breathed heavily, muted by the immense pain. Noises from the bed were heard, looking back to the couch they saw Akuma sitting up, breathing heavily with his face, eyes looking to his hands.

"W-W-What did you do?" Akuma said, looking back to Luna as he got to his feet, walking towards Luna.

"She tried to b-break the c-curses," Jago replied, helping her back up to her feet.

"Well she failed. Whatever she did played things in my head I rather not see," Akuma replied a bit irritated with Jago coming to Luna's defense.

"She was trying to help you, Akuma. Why can't you be happy that she tried to help?" Jago said, putting his book back into his inner pockets.

"She didn't help, all she did was show my eyes more nightmares," Akuma answered, continuing talking.

"I don't need other people poking around in my mind," Akuma replied, turning his back to them as he left. Sada followed him out of the room into the tunnels. Sada grabbed Akuma by his shoulder, stopping him in his tracks and turned him to her.

"Akuma, what was that?" Sada replied angrily with Akuma eyes directed away from her.

"I was telling them the truth. She didn't do anything right," Akuma replied with Sada sighing.

"Akuma, she helped heal your body, and after you saved them she tried to bring you back to your old self. You need to go back in there, apologize and say thank you to her. What kind of nightmare did you see anyway?" Sada replied, trying to switch to a calm tone, but it felt hard to do.

"This is the new me, the old me burnt to ash like that hag. And to answer your question, I saw multiple bodies that stacked up like a mountain. With your's and Jago's heads on sticks in front of the mountain. At the top stood a blinding light, but there seemed to be a figure of someone. I don't know who he was but I've seen him before in my dreams. He tortured my body and mind for what felt like years," Akuma replied, turning back around, continuing to walk down the tunnel.

"Where are you going?" Sada asked, beginning to follow Akuma.

"I'm going to find my weapon, and get fresh air. Why don't you keep an eye on Jago?" Akuma snappily replied

"I have to make sure you don't hurt yourself again," Sada replied, they soon got to the outside where everything had gone down from rubble, to bodies and blood.

"Where the hell is it?" Akuma asked as he went through, picking up rubble as he tried finding his scythe. Sada searched around as well, staying on the opposite side as Akuma. On his search to find it he had seen two small orcs on their knees with their backs bent towards the ground. The two smaller orcs. The two were over the body of the orc that Akuma had killed. Looking closely he saw that the two were holding his scythe.

"Who are they?" Akuma said, making his way to them. Once he was a few feet behind them he spoke up.

"Hey, kids. Why are you on a used battlefield? And give me my weapon back," Akuma asked curiously with a demanding tone at the end.

"Were you the one who killed our father?" The girl asked Akuma with tears in her eyes.

"Yeah, he was going to hurt my teammates, so I had no choice,"Akuma replied, the girl getting up from her knees. The scythe had rolled out of her hands and she grabbed the daichi on the males back.

"You could have let him live, let him run away. He had a family," she said, taking the daichi out of the sheath as she tried to strike Akuma angrily from his left side. Akuma had dodge, using his right hand, curling it into a fist. When the girl tried to strike again Akuma dodged once again and swung a right hook, connecting with the girl's face. She fell backwards onto the ground with Akuma walking towards her, grabbing her left wrist. Akuma gripped hard, forcing her hand open with Akuma taking the daichi.

"Run with what you have, I'm pissed off right now. If you try to attack me again, you won't make it back standing. But if you continue I'll let you get a free hit in," Akuma said in a foreboding tone, switching it to a bit of a taunting tone towards the end. Akuma tosses the daichi to them.

"Come on, let's take father and leave," the boy had whispered to the girl, but the girl didn't listen. The girl ran towards Akuma.

"He has to die for what he did," The girl replied, piercing the blade straight at Akuma's lower left stomach. The blade went all the way until the base touched his stomach. Akuma grabbed the handle with his right hand, speaking.

"I'll end this quickly," Akuma placed his hand on top of the girl's head, black flames bursted out, the girl's body turning to a cube of black ice. Akuma pushed the block of ice to the ground, shattering it to pieces. The boy watched with horror in his eyes, Akuma walked towards the boy who was frozen in horror.

"I'll send you off with your sister and father as well," Akuma said, and the boy's body began to slowly move backwards. Akuma bringing his right hand up, direded to the boy and his father. Black flames had covered akumas hand with red lightning coming out first. The red lightning struck the boy in the throat and his legs. The flames blasted forward, turning the boy and his father to ashes. The only that stayed the same was Akumas scythe. Akuma picked his scythe up, transforming it to its original form. Taking the daichi out from his chest and burning the sword as his wound had healed. Akuma placed his scythe inside his pocket and began walking away from the stench of death Sada had come.

"Did you find it?" Sada asked, not wanting to question the smell. Akuma nodded yes.

"So are we going to go after whoever sent those guys after me?" Akuma asked.

"Yeah… We'll go and stop the boss," Sada replied, a bit hesitant with her answer, wishing she didn't have a sense of smell. They began making their way back to Jago.