Perched high atop the Tokyo Tower, Suzuki looked out over the sprawling metropolis. Wind whipped through his dark blue hair, framing his sharp, light green eyes.
A broad, sardonic smile stretched across his face—a malicious, arrogant sneer that bared his teeth to the open air. As the light hit his face, a brilliant, metallic glint flashed dangerously off one of his upper teeth.
"A beautiful city like this always deserves a battlefield," he murmured, his eyes sweeping across the endless sea of neon.
Battles always happen in places where humans don't even belong anyway. Might as well enjoy the beautiful view while it lasts.
Glancing straight down through the steel lattice, his gaze locked onto a solitary figure standing directly beneath the massive tower. It was a woman.
Suzuki narrowed his eyes, his sneer twisting into amusement. "Hmm... strange. What the hell is she doing down there?"
A low, mocking laugh escaped his throat, cutting through the high-altitude wind. "Is she jealous that I'm sitting up here? Hahaha."
"Why the hell is she just standing there?" Suzuki muttered, watching the distant swarm from his high perch. "The devils are coming to devour her. Does she honestly think some hero is going to drop down and save her?"
A mocking smirk twisted his lips. God, humans are pathetic. Mikaro wasn't lying when he said the world's major cities are full of brainless fools.
Suddenly, the woman moved.
Unslung from her back in a swift, violent motion was a colossal warhammer. She lunged forward, swinging the massive weapon with bone-shattering force directly into the incoming devils, completely obliterating the horde into a heavy spray of black mist.
Suzuki's smug grin vanished, his light green eyes widening in genuine shock. "Holy hell... what just happened? Who is this chick?"
Before he could even process the sight, the woman whipped her head up, her sharp gaze locking instantly onto his position.
"Get down here, you piece of trash!" she screamed, her voice tearing through the high-altitude wind. "I'm going to show you exactly what happens to scum who betray our clan!"
Suzuki's expression turned dead cold, his playful amusement instantly evaporating. Are you kidding me? What do these absolute primitives want from me now?
Leaping from the edge of the Tokyo Tower, he plummeted through the empty air before executing a heavy, precise landing directly in front of her, the impact echoing through the deserted street.
He straightened up calmly, brushing a strand of dark blue hair out of his eyes. "What do you want, Tao? A woman with a guy's name... Just goes to show how clueless your clan leader is. The idiot doesn't even know the difference between a boy and a girl."
"Shut your mouth!" Tao barked, her knuckles turning white as she gripped the handle of her hammer. "I am here to slaughter you by the direct order of Grandmaster Tuyama Zukisa. Prepare yourself!"
Suzuki froze for a split second before bursting into a loud, mocking laugh. "Seriously? Right now?"
Thrusting her weight forward, Tao lunged. She unleashed a ferocious torrent of high-speed karate strikes, her hands and feet slicing through the air with a violent, whipping rush of wind.
Suzuki glided backward effortlessly, his body tilting fluidly as each lethal blow missed his skin by a mere fraction of an inch.
He settled into a loose, low stance, a dangerous, familiar spark igniting in his eyes. Heh. Fair enough. Let's settle this the old-fashioned way.
Pressing her karate assault, Tao unleashed a relentless barrage of strikes, her limbs cutting through the air in violent blurs. Suzuki simply glided through the storm, effortlessly evading every single blow without breaking a sweat.
"You do realize I don't take you seriously at all, right?" Suzuki mused, a cruel smile returning to his lips. "Your clan is so utterly broken, you idiots don't even know who your own mother is."
Tao froze mid-strike, her weapon lowering slightly as her expression hardened. "You mean the woman our Grandmaster executed? He threw you into the deep ocean right along with her while you were still floating in your mother's womb. You truly should have died down there."
The arrogant smirk vanished from Suzuki's face, replaced by a terrifying, dead silence. The playful light in his green eyes completely died out, leaving a gaze as cold as ice.
"Utter my mother's name again, and I will erase your very existence from this world," Suzuki whispered, his jaw clenching so hard the muscles in his neck strained. The only thing keeping you alive right now is Akos's words.
Tao let out a mocking laugh, shaking her head. "Akos? What is he to you, anyway? He's nothing. He doesn't even see you as an assistant, let alone an equal."
"The man you're talking about is nothing to me?" Suzuki's fingers slowly curled, his palm locking into a tight, dense fist. "You've got it all wrong, you moldy witch. He's my brother."
Sensing the sudden, overwhelming pressure spike in the air, Tao lunged forward in a desperate attempt to shut him down.
But it was already too late.
Suzuki snapped his hand open. A massive, roaring blast of dark blue and emerald green energy—a condensed hand-bomb of raw, volatile flame—erupted from his grip.
[HAND BOMB]
The explosive shockwave slammed directly into Tao, launching her body backward at a terrifying velocity. She smashed straight through the thick concrete wall of a nearby skyscraper, tearing a path of destruction through the entire interior before blasting out the opposite side of the building in a shower of shattered stone.
Exploding outward from the ruined building, Tao burst through the debris, sending chunks of shattered concrete and stone flying into the street. Her face was twisted in sheer fury.
Dropping into a rigid karate stance, she pulverized the ground beneath her feet before lunging at Suzuki. A violent barrier of compressed wind erupted from her movement, forcing him to take a step back to stabilize his weight.
Taking advantage of the sudden distance, she unleashed a fierce, relentless torrent of strikes.
[Karate Rain]
Dozens of blinding, high-speed blows rained down like a storm, hammering mercilessly against Suzuki's guard. The sheer weight of the assault battered his arms, the bone-shattering force bending his limbs at unnatural, distorted angles.
Yet, the ironic smirk never left his face.
Staring at his broken arms, Suzuki casually twisted his joints, snapping the fractured bones back into perfect alignment with a dull, internal pop. He rotated his wrists effortlessly, as if he felt no pain at all. "Oh, good, good. Not bad, not great, not average either."
Tao bit her lower lip until it bled, her frustration reaching a boiling point.
She lunged forward for another strike, but Suzuki moved faster. A brutal front kick planted squarely into her stomach, folding her body in half and knocking the wind completely from her lungs.
Before she could recoil, he seized her wrist. With a swift, merciless twist, he snapped her arm backward, pinning it brutally against her spine.
An agonizing scream tore raw from Tao's throat.
Suzuki chuckled, a dark, mocking sound that offered no mercy. Winding back his fist, he channeled his energy into a single, finishing strike.
[Smash]
The heavy punch connected dead center, the sheer force of the impact instantly knocking her unconscious as her limp body collapsed onto the pavement.
Turning on his heel, Suzuki prepared to walk away without a second glance. Behind him, a ragged gasp cut through the quiet as Tao forced her battered body back up onto the pavement, her chest heaving violently.
"Either you kill me, or I kill you!" she shrieked, her voice tearing raw from her throat. "Those are my absolute orders! Do you understand?!"
Stopping in his tracks, Suzuki looked back over his shoulder. A heavy, profound pity settled into his features as he stared down at her ruined state. "You have no idea how tragic you look right now. Honestly, you're pathetic."
Tao's knuckles turned white as she squeezed her trembling hands into tight, desperate fists. "I am always trapped between barbaric brothers and madmen who refuse to respect me," she spat, her bloodshot eyes locking onto his. "This is my chance. Finally, they will respect me! They will know exactly who I am!"
She took a sharp, ragged breath, her posture rigid with desperation. "In a family that shows no mercy to infants or the elderly, there is only one absolute truth: you kill to survive in this filthy world!"
Suzuki met her manic outburst with a cold, completely detached gaze. The last remnants of emotion drained from his face, leaving his light green eyes hollow and bored.
"I pity you," Suzuki said, his voice flat and empty. "You're nothing but a wounded dog barking in the dark, completely blind to the fact that you've already lost."
Screaming with every shred of her remaining strength, Tao unleashed a furious barrage of strikes, sending massive walls of compressed wind hurtling forward. Suzuki simply stood his ground.
The gale-force currents violently dragged at his clothes, threatening to rip him from the pavement, yet he remained utterly immovable in his spot.
"Die already! Ahhhhhhh!" Tao shrieked, driving dozens of high-speed blows toward him.
The sheer atmospheric pressure ripped surrounding skyscrapers from their foundations and tore the asphalt to shreds. Her frantic cries grew louder, the immense physical strain causing the skin across her knuckles to split and bleed.
Airborne cars flew through the air like missiles straight toward Suzuki. Slipping through the flying wreckage with a chillingly detached expression, he easily evaded the debris, his cold gaze locked onto her without even shifting his stance.
"I always wanted—! Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!" Tao shattered the air with a desperate, ear-splitting screech that tore at her lungs.
Beneath their feet, the entire street convulsed and split cleanly down the middle. The section under Suzuki violently thrust upward into the sky, while her side plummeted into the collapsing trench.
"I always wanted to be the strongest woman in Ninjitsu!" she roared. Rocketing forward at terrifying velocity, she aimed a lethal karate strike straight for Suzuki's head.
A colossal, swirling vortex of wind materialized around her, grinding the remaining buildings and everything in its path to absolute dust.
Locking her eyes onto him, she whispered her final, manic obsession. "I always wanted to be the strongest..."
In a seamless blur, Suzuki vanished, materializing directly beside her mid-air.
Leaning close, his cold breath brushed against her ear as he delivered a flat, mocking whisper. "Next time, go slow."
Tao's eyes widened, a breathless gasp escaping her lips. "Eh...?"
The air split in two as a colossal column of volcanic fire erupted from the abyss directly beneath her.
The apocalyptic inferno engulfed her entirely, instantly melting away her flesh and skin. Within a single heartbeat, the roaring flames subsided, leaving nothing but a scorched, lifeless skeleton to collapse into the ash.
Stepping over the scorched debris, Suzuki simply resumed his march down the silent street without looking back.
"Do you still think your screams have any meaning?" he whispered to the empty air, his voice cold and flat. "That your pathetic will can bend the laws of this world?"
He paused for a fraction of a second, his boots grinding a piece of ash into the pavement. "This world was built only for the strong, not the weak."
A bitter breath escaped his lips as his light green eyes scanned the dark horizon. "We live in the era of The End of Existence, the era of The Chosen One. And people like that? They are always the first to die."