[Black Void]
Nothing.
Not silence, not peace—just an absence. A swirling black mass, infinite and suffocating, like the space between thoughts. Then—A breath.A gasp.A body jerked upright.
[Misty Battlefield]
Ephraim's eyes snapped open, and he was standing.
His feet were planted on a battlefield soaked in mist, the ground soft and familiar beneath him. Grass mixed with mud. Smoke hung in the air like ghosts. The sounds of war were distant echoes—clashing steel, screeching beasts, cries for help.
It was a place he knew. Too well.
The battlefield from his childhood.
He looked down at his hands—scarred but not fresh, a child's hands, yet filled with the strength he had now. Was this a memory? A dream? A warning?
Movement—figures in the fog. Dark, skeletal soldiers in rusted armor emerged from the haze. Ephraim braced. No time to think.
He fought—quick jabs, dodges, magnetized slams. They were just as relentless as they'd been that day. But there were more of them this time, far more. They poured out of the fog like smoke from a broken engine. They surrounded him, their eyes hollow, their weapons dragging trails of crimson through the soil.
Sweat mixed with fear. Panic brewed in his chest.
"I've done this before," he muttered. "Why the hell am I doing it again?"
He staggered back, one hand on his ribs. A pike nearly clipped his leg. The battle twisted—time looped, repeating his childhood trauma like a cursed stage play.
And then—A voice.
[The Shift]
"WAKE THE FUCK UP, GOKU!"It cracked across the sky like a gunshot.
Ephraim's heart sank.The fog began to melt into flame.Fire bloomed from the edges of the world, licking the grass, devouring the battlefield.
"WE GOT A TEMPLE TO BURN!"
The soldiers disintegrated into ash. The sky turned blood orange. And there, in the center of it all, emerged a figure Ephraim had prayed never to see again.
[Burning Temple]
Homicide.
Tall. Crooked. Towering.Half-shrouded in black smoke, his red hockey mask grinned through the firelight—etched with a smile too wide, too unnatural. His locs hung wild and charred at the ends. He wore a half-melted blue suit and stark white gloves, like some demented preacher who had crawled out of the grave mid-sermon.
"Wha… no—" Ephraim's breath hitched. "No, no, no. You're not real."
Homicide tilted his head like a crow dissecting roadkill. "What's wrong, Goku?" he drawled, his voice oil-slick and slippery. "Scared?"
Ephraim didn't answer. He didn't need to.He ran—bolted across the temple ruins, past blazing prayer wheels and collapsing pillars.
[The Encounter]
But he didn't get far.
One step, two—Then—"Boo."
Homicide stood in front of him, having teleported—or maybe he never left.
Ephraim collided with him and bounced back hard, landing flat on his back. His head spun. Dust kicked up.
The masked man slithered around him, slow, deliberate, hands behind his back like a teacher observing a failing student. "Come on, Gokuuu... You know what this is. You even told Salt—you've felt it for a longgg time. The itch. The fear. The truth."
Ephraim shook his head violently. "No! No, the man in the forest—he was... he wasn't..."
Homicide interrupted with a low laugh. "Someone else? Another guy with a revolver? Maybe a stunt double?"
Ephraim rose to his feet, his breath ragged, fists clenched so tight his knuckles cracked.
"Then where have you been?" he spat. "You disappeared. You let me think—let everyone think—you were dead."
Homicide's masked face tilted, that painted-on grin never wavering. "Disappearing's what ghosts do, kid. I just took the liberty of staying gone longer than most."
Ephraim exploded. "I hated you! I buried you in my mind, my past. You were supposed to stay there!"
Homicide chuckled darkly, fingers twitching near the handle of the revolver slung low on his hip like a death sentence. "If you hate me so bad, why do you still dream of me?"
Ephraim launched forward—his fist a blur, magnetism humming across his skin. He threw a punch meant to shatter jawbone.
But again, Homicide caught it with one gloved hand. Calm. Effortless. Like snatching a fly from the air.
"I taught you better than to throw the first punch without a follow-up."
With a twist of his wrist, Homicide flipped Ephraim over his shoulder and slammed him into the stone floor. A shockwave rippled outward. Debris danced in the air like weightless ash.
Ephraim groaned, rolling over. "Why now?" he wheezed. "Why show up in my head now?"
"Because," Homicide whispered, crouching beside him, his voice dripping into Ephraim's ear like venom, "you're getting closer to the truth. Closer to me. And when that happens… we start to bleed together."
Ephraim swung again from the ground—more instinct than strategy—but Homicide was already gone.
Behind him now.
Always behind him.
"I'm not just in your dreams, kid. I am your dreams."
Ephraim spun and fired a pulse of magnetic force, trying to push him back. But Homicide held firm, boot grinding against the flame-ridden stone.
"Look at you," Homicide said, brushing soot off his sleeve. "Getting stronger. Smarter. Deadlier. You're not the scared little mutt from the slums anymore."
Ephraim narrowed his eyes, stepping into a low stance. "Then stop running your mouth and fight me like I'm not."
Silence.
Then Homicide laughed—loud, wild, unhinged. The temple cracked with it.
"That's the spirit, Goku Boichi."
He whipped out the revolver. No warning. No flourish. Just six cold chambers of madness and a trigger made for ruin.
BANG!
Ephraim barely ducked, the bullet grazing his cheek, exploding the wall behind him into molten rubble. Another shot—then another. Ephraim zigzagged, magnetizing himself to pillars, floors, whatever he could stick to, his body dancing through the inferno.
"You're still too soft," Homicide shouted, firing again. "Too scared to be who you really are!"
Ephraim reached the ceiling and slammed downward like a meteor, his punch colliding with Homicide's revolver arm. The gun clattered across the temple, skidding to a halt by a burning altar.
"I know who I am!" Ephraim barked.
Homicide's fist met his jaw.
"You think you do."
Ephraim staggered—then retaliated, slamming a magnetized knee into Homicide's ribs. The masked man grunted, but didn't fall. Instead, he grabbed Ephraim by the throat and slammed him into the nearest wall.
"You're the only one of my pupils that never finished his training," Homicide hissed.
Ephraim spat blood in his face. "Maybe that's why I'm still alive."
Homicide let go.
The fire went silent.
Even the world paused—just for a moment.
"I missed you, Goku, I'll see you soon."
Then the grin vanished.
And so did he.
[The Awakening – Cliffside Dawn]
Ephraim jolted awake with a gasp, the sharp scent of wet moss and burnt ozone filling his lungs.
He was still outside—half-buried in the dirt near the edge of the cliff where Titus had left him for dead. His jacket was singed, the ground beneath him cracked and blackened from the essence attacks. Morning light spilled through the forest canopy, casting gold and violet streaks across his scraped-up face.
Wind brushed past his skin, cool and sharp, like a reminder he was still breathing.
His ribs ached. His jaw felt loose. Blood crusted his eyebrow. But what rattled him most was the fading memory—the surreal pull of that dream, if it even was a dream.
"Homicide…" he muttered, sitting up slowly. His voice was hoarse, barely a whisper.
He stared out at the rising sun beyond the canyon and clenched his fists.
"I'm gonna need answers."
Behind him, the sound of birds resumed. A world waking up.
And somewhere, below the cliff and beyond the coliseum…
the tournament was waiting.
Created and written by Mateo Woodson
Written and Storyboarded by John Fallout