"Mmph! Mmph!" (Daddy! Daddy!)
In the middle of the road, enveloped in the dust of the fall, two golden points shone intensely through a gap in the white bandana. Afro was there, swordless, his hands stained with blood and with the expression of someone who had just woken from a nightmare... Toshi stared at those golden eyes in the dust and then looked at Himari who was skipping happily.
"Don't tell me this is your father..." Toshi thought, cold sweat running down his face. "How did he get here?"
Armed with courage, Toshi quickly drew his sword, but before he could steady his grip, Afro disappeared. In a microsecond, he appeared in front of Toshi. Afro grabbed the arm holding the weapon and, with brutal pressure, broke the bone. The crack was sharp.
"AAAAAAH!!!" Toshi screamed, "Son of a bitch..."
Toshi's sword slipped from his hand, but before it touched the ground, Afro spun his body and, with a violent slap on the hilt, sent the weapon flying backward. The sword flew like a dart and pierced the throat of a raider attempting to attack from behind. The man fell clutching his neck, blood gushing out.
Toshi staggered back in shock. Afro took only one step and delivered a powerful blow to the center of Toshi's chest. The movement was precise and devastating: Afro's heel pierced Toshi's sternum and ribs, sinking into the thoracic cavity as if the body were made of clay.
The energy of the impact didn't stop at the flesh. An invisible shockwave, generated by the pressure of the blow, expanded from the point of contact. Ren, who was right behind, and the horse he was riding, were struck by the repulsive force of the air.
The impact was so violent that both were thrown ten meters backward. They crashed against the trunk of an ancient oak tree with a crash of breaking branches. The impact against the tree caused Ren's and the animal's bones to shatter simultaneously; entrails and blood gushed from their mouths and nostrils due to the sudden compression of their internal organs. The horse and the man collapsed at the base of the tree like a shapeless mass of flesh and broken carapace.
"Seven," said Afro.
The horses thrashed about in panic, their hooves pounding frantically against the ground.
Afro put his hand to his head and ripped off his bandana. His eyes were wide open. For three seconds, the world lost its color; everything turned black and white, as if reality had stopped to process its existence.
The horses froze instantly, their manes stiff, their eyes rolled back in the pure white of terror.
The Porcelain Master stood atop the carriage, his posture rigid. For the first time, he was truly paying attention.
"Animals have a keen instinct for supernatural danger," the Master thought. "The horses realized that any sudden movement would attract the attention of that entity. They remained motionless out of submission. They are not calm; they are surrendered to the will of the strongest predator in the area."
Suddenly, one of the swiftest raiders lunged forward. "Mount Kume Lightning Style: Reiki Palms!"
The man moved with absurd speed, his palm enveloped in bluish lightning, aiming to pierce Afro's back. To the attacker's complete surprise, Afro did not move, but his hand was already there, clenched like an iron gauntlet around the raider's wrist.
The Masked Man, observing from above, felt a chill: "When did he turn around? I didn't even see the movement."
The rays of human technique vanished. He had gazed into those golden eyes, and absolute terror collapsed his mind. The Dao does not manifest under intense emotions.
Distraction was his death sentence.
Afro did not hesitate. He enveloped the man's head with his left hand, his fingers gripping the skull like the claws of a predator. He began to squeeze. The pressure was so sudden and violent that the looter's eyes were the first to pop out of their sockets, bulging out before the bones even gave way.
An instant later, Afro had already closed his fist completely. The looter's head exploded into fragments of bone and brain matter, leaving only a decapitated body that fell heavily to the ground.
The other children, huddled together and trembling, didn't know whether to feel relief at being alive or paralyzing terror for the man who had saved them. To them, Afro was a demon as terrible as the kidnappers.
Except for Himari.
She bounced around inside the cell, letting out muffled sounds of pure joy. Due to her severe vision problems, which became almost total blindness under the weak autumn moonlight and the night mist, Himari couldn't see the mutilated bodies or the exploded heads. To her, the world was a collection of shadows and blurs. What she saw was the golden smudge of her father's eyes and the familiar figure moving with the strength of a giant. She didn't smell the iron of blood; she smelled freedom.
The surviving looters were no amateurs. They regained their composure, suppressing their fear under the mental command of their leader.
Afro ignored their preparations. He calmly bent down and retrieved the sword of the man whose head he had just crushed. The metal was still warm from the dissipated Dao.
In the silence of the mist, the Porcelain Master's voice echoed telepathically in the minds of his subordinates: "Ignore him. Attack carriage three. Kill the girl!"
The order was executed in the blink of an eye. One of the raiders stretched out his hand toward Himari's cell, conjuring a Fireball that illuminated the forest with a destructive orange glow.
Afro didn't hesitate. He lunged at the carriage. His sword began to release sparks of red lightning. In a precise movement, he intercepted the flaming projectile with his blade, deflecting the fireball into the sky, where it exploded harmlessly against the treetops.
But he knew the attack was a distraction. The other four were already moving along the flanks.
"Etheric Art, Henshin Style: Soul Dash (Incomplete)."
Afro's body trembled, but this time what erupted from him wasn't red. Three souls shot from his body. They were translucent, icy figures that moved in opposite directions with a speed that defied physics.
The figures passed through the four raiders before they could land a single blow.
The sound of steel tearing through flesh and bone was a single, dry chord. The four bodies fell, divided into symmetrical pieces, the parts sliding over one another even before the blue ether copies dissipated into the cold air.
"Three," said Afro, fixing his golden eyes on the last survivors.
"Use your Onni Masks," ordered the Porcelain Master, before taking a step back and disappearing into the dense forest mist, leaving his subordinates behind.
The last two raiders didn't hesitate. They brought the dark wooden masks to their faces. CRACK. The sound wasn't of wood against skin, but of bone piercing flesh. The masks bit into their faces. GRRRRAAAAA! The screams turned into guttural roars. Spinals cracked, muscles swelled, tearing through their robes. Black veins bulged in their arms, pulsing with an artificial, malevolent energy.
Afro watched it all without moving, only stretching his neck, preparing himself. He braced his body for a Dash.
"Use the Divine Dust," said Afro, his voice calm amidst the chaos. "Didn't your masters teach you that only this can kill a demon?"
The raiders, now fully onified, obeyed their survival instinct. They poured the shimmering dust onto their blades. The steel began to vibrate, emitting a high-pitched hum and a purifying white light that burned into the surrounding air.
Afro lunged forward. The ground exploded beneath his feet.
The onni reacted. The one in front clasped his hands and shouted, his voice distorted by the mask: "Kaze ni...!" (To the Wind!)
A wall of compressed air crashed against Afro. The impact was like hitting an invisible rock. His speed was drastically reduced, his feet dragging on the ground, creating trenches in the earth.
Taking advantage of the opening, the two monsters advanced in a perfect combo. The first delivered a horizontal slash aiming to decapitate Afro. Afro, still fighting against the wind, cushioned the impact by tilting his body to the side, the blade of light passing centimeters from his nose.
The second came from above, a devastating vertical slash to split Afro in two. There was no time to dodge. "Etheric Art: Dash in Souls (Incomplete)."
A silhouette detached itself from Afro's body. The "soul" intercepted the sword of light. The clash of energies, Ether against Divine Dust, created a wave of repulsion. BOOM! Afro was pushed back, but before he could steady his step, the ground beneath him gave way. Roots of energy gripped his ankles, and the ground instantly burst into flames.
The last onni, ignoring the flames, leaped through the fire to deliver the final blow. The sword descended... and cut only smoke.
Afro wasn't there.
The onni looked up. Afro was crouched atop Himari's chariot, his sword sheathed in a quick-draw stance.
"Sword Art, Kubasake Style: Thousand Lotus Leaves."
He drew. It wasn't a cut. It was a flowering of death. Hundreds of invisible cuts projected into the air, drawing the shape of a lotus around the onni.
SLASH. SLASH. SLASH.
The onni tried to resist, but Afro's oppressive presence nullified the artificial magic of the masks. The wood of the masks cracked. The glint of the swords faded. They fell to their knees, spitting black blood, the transformations violently reversing.
Afro landed on the ground, staring at them earnestly. His golden eyes gleamed, and he unleashed a wave of spiritual pressure so dense that the raiders rolled their eyes and fainted, their brains shutting down from sheer instinctive terror.
Silence returned to the forest. Afro relaxed his shoulders.
"Father... be careful..." Himari's voice came out weak, muffled by the gag.
Afro felt a chill down his spine, but his body didn't respond in time.
SHLACK.
A damp, muffled sound. Afro looked down. A silver sword tip, covered in shimmering dust, protruded from the center of his chest. The blade had entered through his back, piercing his lung and tearing open the right atrium of his heart.
Behind him, the Porcelain Master materialized from the mist, gripping the sword's hilt firmly.
"You are not human... you demon," the Porcelain Master whispered in Afro's ear.
Afro tried to breathe, but only blood surged up his trachea. He coughed, expelling a dark liquid. The Divine Dust on the blade reacted with the hybrid blood. It wasn't just a wound; it was a corrosion. The skin around the hole in Afro's chest didn't turn red. It began to turn black, necrotizing instantly, as if his body were rejecting the very existence of that sacred blade. Afro's neck veins darkened, drawing black spiderwebs beneath his brown skin.
Afro opened his mouth to scream, but only a "Ghh-kkhh" came out. The sound of blood boiling in his trachea, a dry and painful drowning.
He fell to his knees. His golden vision darkened.