The Calm

Inari hid best she could in the bushes, fearing that it might've seen her. An intense aura hung in the air, choking her and making it hard to breath, but the aura was not human. It was something purely evil. She concealed her own aura as much as she could, praying it would not sense her.

She peered through the bush, barely able to see the being that the aura was coming from. It stood at over nine feet tall and had long limbs and was covered head to toe in chains. Metal stakes were nailed into its body at seemingly random places and a deep, blood red aura swirled around it. Two large, tattered bat-like wings extended from its back and long talons protruded from each finger.

It's face was covered by a metal mask nailed to its head and you could see its luminescent red eyes through four thin slits in the metal. Two large, curling horns protruded from its head like ram horns and a long tail that came to a whip thin end swung low to the ground.

Inari could only assume it was one thing; a demon. For some reason, it's aura reminded her of Akuro. 'This... isn't good..' she thought to herself as the demon hissed, clenching and unclenching it's talons. 'Why is this thing here?' She wondered, 'Is it hunting us Deities? Maybe that's what it's after...'

Then the demon spoke in a raspy, bone chilling voice, "He has awoken..."

This statement not only frightened Inari, but it perplexed her. Who was the demon referring to, and what did it want with them.

"The Dreadful Lord has returned, soon, soon this world will fall into chaos and we shall be one step closer to slaying the gods!" The demon hissed, then spread its wings wide before forcing them down, a powerful burst of air being pushed from them as the demon launched into the sky.

Inari, even though the demon was gone, didn't dare move, out of fear that it may come back. She just lay there in the bushes with her thoughts going wild. 'Dreadful Lord? Slaying the gods? Who is the Dreadful Lord...?' Then something struck her. She thought it was odd that the demon's aura was so familiar to her.

'Akuro...'

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Akuro and Darius had decided to walk through the city after Akuro had agreed to his terms. While they walked Darius went further into detail about his powers, explaining more how they work.

"To start," he said, "I can manipulate my aura to cloak me and cover my body and reflect my surroundings in such a way that makes me invisible to the naked eye. Along with this I can also see even the faintest amount of spiritual energy. Let me ask you, do you know how aura materialization works?"

"Aura materialization? Can't say I do, never even heard of it."

"It would seem Raijin neglected to tell you some things. Not surprising, I'm guessing he also lied to you a lot to slow down your growth. No matter, spiritual materialization is when you increase the amount of aura you give off by a large degree. When aura gathers together in mass, it becomes visible and often has a color based off of one of three things; elemental aptitude, emotions, or spirit type. For example your elemental aptitude is darkness, so your aura appears black. You already know how to materialize your spiritual energy, you do it whenever you fight actually, that shadow cloak you have is a perfect example. Do you know why your appearance changes when you release your pressure?"

"I'm guessing it has to do with how much aura I give off." Akuro guessed.

"Precisely, when you give off enough aura it will naturally cling to your body and when your body is exposed to a certain amount of it the aura will change your physical form as well as materialize around you. For some it may appear as an armor, or in your case those horns and that cloak. Not to mention you seem to manipulate your aura with your arms."

"I do, but one question, why do you want to know my power? If you ask me it already seems like you know it."

"Well our powers are kinda like a class in a video game, each one has a passive. I know your attacks, but not your passives. Get it?"

"Yeah, makes more sense than most things you've said I guess. But what does this have to do with your powers?" Akuro asked, bumping shoulders with a stranger who did not seem to care whether or not they were in anyone's way.

"Watch it?" The stranger yelled.

"Fuck off." Akuro replied bluntly, not even turning to look at the stranger.

Darius laughed, "You really got no chill, do you?"

"What? I got chill. Go screw yourself, you're the annoying one." Akuro retorted.

"Yeah sure. What was your question again?"

"What does this spiritual materialization have to do with your powers?"

"Well let me ask you this, can you see the aura of any of these weaklings?" Darius asked.

Akuro looked around at the flooded city, trying to see any form of aura emitting from any of them. "No, I can't."

"Of course not, their spiritual energies are so small that they couldn't materialize it if they wanted to, but I have the ability to see their auras, their colors, their aptitude's, their personalities, all of it. For example the guy you just told to fuck off was in a rush because he was scared of something."

"So your ability lets you see spiritual energies no matter how minuscule, meaning you can also see someone's aura no matter how hard they try to conceal it." Akuro observed.

"Exactly. It's actually quite useful. It's how I found you, actually. Did you know your aura appears as a dark mist in a four meter radius around you? Even when you are concealing it?" Darius pointed out.

"What? Seriously?"

Darius nodded, "yeah, and it multiplies when you aren't concealing it. When you fought with Onoma before I was still deep in the city, not even near the park, but when it happened all I could see was a black mist in the sky as far as the eye could see. That's how I know you're strong." Darius went serious. "But there was a bit of red mixed in with it. Meaning Onoma is just as strong. You should be wary of him."

Akuro bowed his head in thought. 'He's not wrong, if I weren't immortal I would've died before.' Akuro touched his chest where Onoma had pierced him. 'What does he want? What is he really after? I don't understand, there's no way he's just fighting me because I'm strong. There's gotta be a deeper reason.'

"And then there's one more ability that comes with my powers." Darius held the dagger in his left hand then, "This is the only part of my power that allows me to go into combat. If I envelop an object in my aura," a faint green glow that was hardly visible in the daylight emitted from the dagger, and then the knife suddenly vanished, reappearing in Darius's right hand. "I can transfer it to any location with in my aura's range."

Akuro's eyes narrowed. 'If he wanted to he could've killed me easily just by having that dagger teleport into my throat. Maybe I can trust him. At the same time, his powers normally wouldn't be much of a threat to me, but with that knife, he becomes quite dangerous. I should still watch my back, he does have the powers of Loki after all.'

Darius returned the misshapen dagger into his coat pocket. "Your turn now. I've shown you my cards, now what're yours.?"

Akuro sighed. "Oi, well, how to explain it. Well, I guess to put it simply, I'm Death."