Dust spun in hazy shafts of light, and every heartbeat felt like a drum as Helios and Zack stood squared in the ring. Their blades gleamed, sweat already marking the effort of the first exchanges.
Helios' breathing was steady, his stance calm. Zack's grin, by contrast, had split wide—too wide—and the faint shimmer of shadow clung to him like heat mirage. When the crowd screamed his name, the answering twitch in his jaw made Helios narrow his eyes.
'The darkness is stirring him. Not possession—closer to an amplification, Helios noted, tilting his stance slightly. Strength up, restraint down. Berserk onset. Curious. This must have been due to Hades when Zack fought Terra.
Zack lunged. His blade struck like a hammer, a diagonal arc that would have cleaved a lesser fighter clean in two. Helios caught it on the flat of dark sun blade of Equilibrium, pivoted his hips, and let the force ride past him before snapping a counter-kick into Zack's thigh.
Zack staggered back a half-step—then laughed. His next flurry came faster. Sonic Blade—one rush, two, three—each a blur of steel. Helios slipped the first with Aero at his boots, turned the second with a parry that rattled his wrists, and intercepted the third by locking hilts. Their faces were a breath apart, blades shrieking.
"Not bad," Zack growled, dark fire flickering in his eyes. He shoved off with surprising force, using the lock to spring into a backflip. His sword dragged across stone as he landed, sparks trailing like fireflies in a storm.
The crowd exploded, chanting both names now. "ZACK! ZACK!" against "HE-LI-OS!" Dust spiraled with every impact, the arena itself a drumbeat of violence.
Helios advanced. The daul blades of Equilibrium slashed in a controlled trio, every angle measured. Zack blocked high, but Helios flowed with the rebound, shifted his grip, and slid in a low cut meant to sweep Zack's stance. Zack answered with raw muscle—jumping, turning the force into Climhazzard, blade plunging down with meteor weight.
Helios twisted, Reflect blooming into a spherical shell. The descending strike crashed against it and detonated outward, sparks rattling like fireworks. Zack laughed harder, rolling with the recoil, and lunged again.
His speed rises the longer he sustains it. But coordination falters. Patterns widening, Helios catalogued coolly, stepping in with a sharp slash and following with a shoulder-check. Zack absorbed it, then erupted in a string of furious cuts—Cross Slash, each blow dragging darkness in its wake.
Helios blocked the first with blade, the second with a pivoted elbow braced against his weapon's spine, the third by stepping inside and hammering his palm against Zack's guard. He then let his free hand flare with magic—Thundaga infused into Equilibrium's dark half. The black blade screamed with lightning as he lashed across Zack's block.
The crackling shock blasted through Zack's arm even as he parried. He snarled, teeth flashing, body trembling as the voltage scorched nerves. Still he pressed, swinging harder.
The crowd gasped at the sight of lightning running along both blades, crackling like a storm trapped in metal.
Helios smirked faintly. 'So even resistance wanes if the lightning current is fused with darkness. Useful.'
But Zack's frenzy spiked. His aura darkened further, his laughter turning ragged. He teleported, a blur of shadow, and the Reverse Omnislash began—slashes from impossible angles, each one a killing line of silver. Helios braced, cloak flaring.
He parried the first four, steel ringing like anvils. The fifth he deflected with a spin, boot planting against Zack's chest to shove him off. The sixth tore shallow across his shoulder before Helios raised Aero in a whirling burst to blow Zack back.
Zack landed in a crouch, grin feral, breathing harder but aura hungrier.
The Colosseum thundered, half the crowd screaming Helios, half screaming Zack. The dust rose like smoke, every cheer vibrating through the fighters' bones.
Helios drew a slow breath, eyes narrowing. If I let him continue, instinct overrides training. Every strike will aim to kill. He won't stop until collapse. Then again… perhaps that's worth studying.
He stepped forward, blade rising into guard. "Come on, Zack," he murmured under the roar. "Show me how deep your darkness goes. Don't hold anything back."
Zack blurred forward again, the shadows whipping like banners in a gale. His blade didn't just swing now—it dragged with such weight that sparks flared across the stone every time the edge kissed the ground. Each strike came as if he wanted to carve through not only Helios but the entire arena.
Helios braced, adjusting his stance to conserve energy. Their blades collided, the clang rolling like thunder across the stands. Zack pressed in, forcing a clash of hilts; Helios twisted his wrists, let the pressure ride, and then snapped his knee up into Zack's gut. Zack grunted, but instead of stumbling back, he grinned wider. The darkness crawling over his aura thickened, and his counter was a savage backhand slash that scraped Helios' ribs before the keyblade caught it.
'Heavy, raw power,' Helios analyzed even as he slid backward in the sand. 'He gains momentum with rage. Accuracy falls, but impact… higher. This dark-fueled berserk form isn't sustainable, but if he were to learn to use it in short bursts, it'd be very lethal.'
He flicked the twin halves of Equilibrium—the Lightblade gleaming moon-silver, the Darkblade roiling with shadows. "Let's push you a little further," he muttered.
Zack roared and came at him. Helios answered by crossing the two blades, then flooding the Darkblade with Thundaga. The strike hummed alive, the normal yellow lightning turned black and crawled its length. He slashed diagonally, and when Zack blocked with his broad sword, the surge discharged.
The crack of impact was like the sky splitting. Zack jolted, teeth bared as the lightning coursed up his arms, muscles locking. For a half-breath, Helios almost thought he'd drop the sword.
Then Zack forced through it, snarling, the darkness cushioning pain into fury. He whirled, blade smashing against Helios' guard with renewed savagery.
The crowd screamed in unison, half cheering Zack's defiance, half gasping at Helios' clever strike. Dust rose around them in clouds, each impact rattling the barrier dome.
Helios spun into a spell-chain. He cast Blizzaga with the Lightblade, freezing a patch of arena floor beneath Zack's boots. Before Zack could compensate, Helios followed with Aero, transforming the slick ice into a whirling Freezing Gale—shards and wind biting upward in a storm.
Zack staggered as ice lanced his legs, but his berserk aura flared and he charged straight through it, scattering the storm with sheer momentum. His blade carved a meteor arc; Helios barely redirected with the flat of his Lightblade, boots skidding, shoulder rattled numb.
'Direct penetration. Resistance to environmental hazards heightened. Darkness insulates his nerves, weakening his ability to feel pain.' Helios noted it with detached precision even as he pivoted away from a killing stroke. 'Yes… fascinating. Not invincible, but resistant. Like an imperfect shield built of rage.'
Zack didn't let up. His sword blurred—high feint, mid thrust, a brutal low sweep. Helios parried high, skipped the thrust with a lean, caught the low strike on crossed blades—and then shoved off, planting his boot on Zack's knee to vault backward.
Zack followed with impossible speed. A teleport shimmer cracked reality, and suddenly Zack was at Helios' flank, blade screaming for his throat.
Helios spun, Reflect bursting just in time. The slash rebounded in sparks, but Zack hammered again, again, until the shield fractured. One cut slid through, shallow across Helios' arm, blood hissing on his dark blade.
The crowd erupted. A chant rose louder now, both names colliding into one pulsing rhythm: "ZACK—HELIOS—ZACK—HELIOS!"
Helios smirked despite the cut. 'So, your strength climbs when the crowd feeds it. Classic hero trait—even warped by shadow, the instinct remains.'
He retaliated with invention. Spreading his arms, he called both blades into a shared spell. Lightblade fired Firaga; Darkblade twisted it into shadow. The two merged midair into a Dark Solar Flare, a burning orb of inverted fire that pulled inward as much as it exploded outward.
It crashed at Zack's feet, sucking dust and debris into its core before detonating in a black-orange burst. The crowd gasped as the shockwave rippled against the barrier.
But from the smoke, Zack erupted, laughing, clothes shredded, eyes wild. His swings now tore shallow gouges into the arena floor with each pass as the blade was covered in darkness. One overhead smash rattled Helios' wrists even through guard, another clipped his side and sent sparks flying from Equilibrium.
Helios slid back, breathing steady despite the punishment. 'This is what berserk buys him: overwhelming offense, no thought of defense. Dangerous to spar with, suicidal in war. The longer it drags, the more this imbalance will show.'
Still, Zack's pace only increased. He blurred into Reverse Omnislash again, teleport slashes raining from impossible angles. Helios turned each as best he could, sometimes catching them with blade, sometimes letting Aero cushion his body when the keyblade couldn't reach. He bled from shallow cuts now—cheek, thigh, forearm—but his mind ticked on like clockwork.
'Yes. Exhaustion must be forced. His power is not infinite. He's burning through his stamina too fast.'
Helios crossed both blades, crouched low. As Zack came barreling in, Helios surged to meet him head-on, sparks exploding as steel shrieked against steel. The force rattled the arena itself, sending another roar from the crowd.
Neither yielded. Zack's grin was feral. Helios' eyes were cool fire.