Galerius stood in long blades of wet grass. The wind howled along with an intense downpour.
The rain falls on the necromancer's body.
It slowly beats down on the smoke, eventually dissipating, revealing his body.
Galerius looks over as the necromancer stands up…
The necromancer, now completely shirtless, his pants beyond ripped but still keeping his dignity, his body thrashed, rain pattering against his thin frame.
His left arm had vanished—a deep cavity carved through his shoulder, though the wound itself seemed to have been closed.
Did he cauterize the wound?
The necromancer just stands patiently, the rain beating on his chest, while Galerius, opposite just stares while growing incredibly impatient.
"Well, necromancer, are we going to end this or what?!" he yells.
"Galerius… I will be honest."
"You made me realize a lot of things about myself… weaknesses… weaknesses that I didn't want to admit I had."
"But facing you, I realized there's no escaping that fact…"
"That fact being that even with all my spells, I still couldn't dominate you…"
"This was a somewhat humbling experience, but it helped me understand myself more and what I need to do going forward."
"For that... Galerius, warden of this city and strongest of this region, I thank you."
"It's too late for amends. It's time to end this, necromancer…" Galerius says, his tone cold and indifferent.
I can only feel that smirk coming… my blood is boiling already just thinking about it!
But the necromancer does the opposite...
His face and demeanour completely change to something plain and serious. His eyes lose that glint, and instead they dull over.
The necromancer doesn't blink, nor does he move. His body is completely still, like the rain. Like he's not there at all.
Why is his face like that... it's so uncanny…
For a moment, silence can be heard—not a single raindrop.
The necromancer starts his run straight at Galerius.
Galerius didn't react at first, but as the necromancer got closer, he snapped out of it.
As he thrust his fist, all sound rushed back to him.
He could hear the squashing of footsteps against the grassy mud and the intense rain splatting against the wet grass.
When he thrust, the necromancer dodged him and appeared behind him. Though he was able to follow and attack again, the necromancer simply jumped over it.
Galerius kept trying to hit the necromancer. They twisted and turned, but the necromancer seemed to follow a pattern of movements.
What the heck? When did he learn to start dodging like this?
The necromancer dodged, jumped over, slid under, weaved, even feinted attacks.
All calmly, his expression completely unreadable.
He then backed away from Galerius and spoke.
"If you're wondering, I learned it from you."
"I'm not wondering anything!" he says, rushing toward the necromancer.
"There's six of them: intention, movement, timing, prediction, breathing, mental state."
Galerius grits his teeth, lunging at the necromancer. It doesn't matter if he learned rhythm, because even if he did, it doesn't change anything. I already proclaimed that I will end him by my fist.
He swipes his fist at the necromancer, who dashes past him.
He tries to turn around instantly to face him, but the necromancer is already going for an attack, which makes Galerius flinch into a block. But nothing happens. Huh? A feint!
He immediately tries to strike, but the necromancer repositions, and before Galerius can even try to land one move, the necromancer escapes, making space between them.
They kept fighting like this, and Galerius would continue to fall for repeated patterns of fighting that the necromancer was doing. But Galerius, filled with so much emotion, couldn't see it. He stopped rationalizing, stopped trying to figure things out. He just fought, and he fought hard.
They didn't stop.
Their silhouettes fought in the night continuously, both exhausted—one a silhouette of rage and desperation, while the other of acceptance and finality.
The only witnesses to their battle were the rain and wind.
"Necromancer, come here! Stop doing that damn pattern! YOU KEEP DASHING AND THEN FEINTING, THEN REPOSITIONING, THEN ESCAPING! STOP IT! I SAID STOP, DAMMIT!" he shouts, saliva loose from his mouth.
Galerius is now completely hunched, his body drenched with rain.
The necromancer stands tall, his figure also drenched, but he doesn't blink—not once. Thunder and lightning illuminate his grim, expressionless face.
The clouds roar.
A deathly gale starts to swirl around the necromancer as he slowly walks toward Galerius. A large gale rushes past him, stealing the warmth from his body, numbing his limbs.
"Is that my gale? Huh!.. answer me." Galerius's voice is completely worn out.
He's holding on by sheer willpower.
But Zero only stares back, raising one arm wide as the gale coils around it.
Galerius meets his gaze.
Silence.
The wind howls. Rain patters. Thunder rolls.
Then—
Galerius doesn't even try to resist. He straightens, mirroring Zero, and speaks.
"Just do it… I concede… Zero."
Galerius realized, that he had lost.
There was nothing left. He had nothing left to fight with. He tried everything, but his loss was inevitable.
So, as the clouds roared, only thunder, the rain, and wind witnessed the finality.
Zero slices a large gash vertically in Galerius, from his torso to his shoulder.
Blood splatters as he falls to the ground.
Zero stands over his body, blood covering his face.
He still doesn't blink, and his face stays expressionless.
He looks at Galerius, then slowly walks to Galerius's side, falls to his knees, and looks up at the rain as the blood is washed off him.
Galerius coughs, opening his eyes, seeing Zero.
He gazes at him for a while.
"Oh, you're just a kid. I didn't realize that before. Not to say it would have changed how I felt, but I might have been a little gentler. Haha." He coughs, breathing heavily. He looks at Zero more closely. "You know, you look just as young as my daughter."
He lifts his arm with painstaking effort, placing his hand on Zero's head, ruffling his drenched hair.
Zero flinches a bit in pain but continues to look forward into the distance, unbothered.
Galerius smiles and takes his hand off.
This time he looks off into the distance with Zero. "Listen, kid, I don't know where you came from or what happened in your past, but..."
He looks back at Zero, his face slightly concerned. "I can tell you're hurt. But hey, aren't we all, in the some way?"
Galerius looks to the sky. "One thing I can tell you, though, is running away from it won't help. It will always catch up to you."
Zero opens his mouth. "I don't care. I live to dominate. I will gain power and control, and I will dominate more and more until everything and everyone—this whole world and even the next, if there is one—lives under, me.
Galerius laughs. "Haha." Then he coughs out some blood. "We all said something similar to that at one point, until we met…" Galerius's face lightens up. "That reminds me—you should meet Alco—"
Zero, with no remorse, plunges his hand infused with deathly gale into his throat.
"I heard enough."
Then, as Zero is about to pull out his hand, Galerius grabs onto it, holding it in.
Zero looks at him and doesn't even try to struggle against him.
"One more thing."
"My daughter—her name is Freya. If you're planning to attack that provincial capital next, the only thing I want is for you to spare her. Please."
Zero just looks at him, expressionless, not saying a single word.
"Zero, I trust you. Galela, my fay, knows her whereabouts at all times. She should be inside me, resting near my soul."
He slowly relaxes his muscles. "I know that you're not completely evil… Bye, Zero."
Galerius smiles one last time and breathes his last breath.
Zero rips his hand out. Blood sprays upward, turning the rain into blood rain briefly.
Lifting his head up to the sky and closing his eyes.
He embraces it… fully.
After the blood rain stops, Zero looks at Galerius's body. His hand extracts the soul of Galerius out of his body and grabs it. Slowly, he sucks the life force from it. This regenerates his hand, shoulder, and arm, heals all damage on his body—bruises, cuts, broken bones, everything—as steam leaves his body while he heals and his body rebuilds.
But Galerius's soul gets smaller and smaller.
Zero has one last long cut on his chest, but he looks at Galerius's soul and instead decides to let it fly away.
"Go and pass on with the little you have left, Galerius."
"Goodbye…"
Falling on his back, the rain pattering on his restored body, he exhales slowly.
He closes his eyes, then opens them again, and there stands Augustus riding on Arceus. "Sir, are you okay?"
"I thought you didn't have a lot of mana left?" Zero asks.
"Well, I barely used any spells, so I was able to keep reserves."
"So this whole time you could have been healing yourself and saved me the embarrassment…"
"Well, yes, but when I'm shattered piece by piece, sir, unless you're restoring me, I would have to put myself back together piece by piece too, as each bone is fundamental to my stability. Hence why me and Arceus decided to reserve mana instead."
"Whatever…"
"Sir, we have a lot to do. Why are you just lying there?"
"Augustus, just let me lie here. I'm tired.... Let me breathe for just a moment."
Augustus remains quiet. He and Arceus look off into the distance while Zero closes his eyes, the rain washing him clean.
Finality.