Title: The Nine-Tailed Awakening
Shiva stood silent.
His bare feet rooted in the cracked earth, blood splatters on his jaw, his grip tight on the towering blue totem. Wind howled around him, yet he stood unmoved.
Dakun's muscles tensed. "He's summoning something."
"From the totem?" Ravenfeather asked.
"Yes" Cain muttered. "From the spirit realm."
Shiva's hand slid down to the fox-shaped engraving on the totem's lower half.
His eyes gleamed silver.
"Totem Deconstruct," he whispered.
The fox symbol twisted, glowing deep amber like it was alive.
Shiva raised his hand.
"Appear—Nine-Tailed Fox: Kitsune."
A pulse rocked the air.
The sky dimmed in an instant.
From the heart of the totem, the earth cracked with a tremor that felt like something ancient waking beneath their feet.
RUMMMMMMMMBLE.
From the fractured ground exploded a massive column of white flame and wind. The terrain shuddered violently,Shockwaves rolled across the battlefield.
Cain, Dakun, and Ravenfeather instinctively threw their arms up holding there ground against the wave, stepping back.
But it wasn't enough.
The wind struck them like a cannon. Their feet skidded. Dust flew. Cain cursed as he stumbled sideways. Ravenfeather's cloak snapped behind him like it wanted to flee.
Then it emerged.
The fox.
No the god.
A towering white beast, at least eight storey tall, fur gleaming like obsidian under moonlight. Its nine tails spiraled behind it like living scythes of shadow, each movement of them stirring hurricanes. Its burning golden eyes locked on them with hollow fury.
Ravenfeather's breath caught.
"I'm seeing it… the Nine-Tailed God Fox. In real life."
Dakun didn't look away. "Yes. It's real. One of the gods of our clan the Anumari. Its power is sacred. Bestowed only to the king."
The Kitsune raised its head.
And roared.
Not just a sound a pressure,The roar burst outward in a massive wave, slamming into them.
Dakun's Nijumon Gate flared to life, forming its intricate three-faced shield in front of the group just in time.
The Kitsune's roar struck it
CRASHHHHHH.
The gate shattered. Shards of spiritual glass exploded outward.
The three warriors were thrown like ragdolls.
Cain flipped in the air, crashing shoulder-first into a slab of stone.
Dakun landed on his side with a bone-rattling grunt.
Ravenfeather slid across the dust, carving a trench with his back.
Above them, the Nine-Tailed Fox lifted its head again, fangs steaming.
Its breath swirled into its mouth charging.
The next attack was coming, a sphere began forming between its fangs.
Not ordinary flame white-hot and massive, rotating in spirals, eating the air around it. The wind across the battlefield died into vacuum silence.
Then, the earth began to shake.
It was charging Fox Fire.
Cain's eyes snapped open as he pushed himself on one elbow. "No, no—"
Dakun couldn't stand. "I can't block that… I need time"
Ravenfeather, blood trickling from his temple, stared in frozen awe. "We're not going to move in time."
The Kitsune launched the flame.
A colossal fireball roared forward, almost the size of a small hill. It didn't fly it devoured. Trees, rocks, shadows gone in a blink as it charged toward them.
And then
A shape blinked into existence in front of them.
"SungMo?!"
Cain's voice cracked.
The spirit stood upright, her tiny frame flickering, already scorched from an earlier strike. But her smile didn't shake.
"I won't let it take you."
She raised both spirit arms elongated now, spiritual blue light shimmering and caught the flame with her bare palms.
FWOOOOOSH.
The impact flared across the sky.
SungMo's feet slid backward, her arms shaking violently. The heat was unreal her spectral hands immediately began to burn.
Cain pushed forward, crawling. "SUNGMO! Let go!"
She didn't answer.
Her eyes were locked on the fire.
"It'll kill you," he shouted.
She looked back tears already slipping down her cheeks.
"It'll kill you, Cain."
The fire grew hotter.
Her palms blistered. Her arms cracked.
Then the center of the flame pushed through
The fire pierced her body.
"Noooooooooooooooo!"he screamed out
Just as the flame was about to pass through her completely
A blur struck the center of the flame.
CRACKKKK!
A staff slammed into it from the side. The fireball shuddered
"Expand!" came a deep voice.
The staff instantly grew in length, its impact splitting the fireball into two halves both diverting to either side, spiraling away into the mountains.
In the wake of it, standing still wasHanuman one of Sakamoto summon.
Muscles flexed, one foot forward, staff extended like a tower between the trio and the monster fox.
Behind him, SungMo collapsed in a wisp of smoke.
Hanuman caught her before she fell completely, tucking her gently under his arm.
He turned.
The Kitsune stared back surprised for the first time.
Hanuman's staff spun and
BOOM.
The next strike slammed into the Kitsune's head, sending the beast flying backward like a crumpled mountain. It rolled past Shiva and landed in a thunderous crash.
Hanuman lowered his staff and then he threw SungMo backwards towards Cain who immediately caught SungMo's unconscious body, trembling.
Ravenfeather watched silently. "Is she…?"
"I don't know," Cain said quietly. "Spiritual fire burns even ghosts."
…..
Dust swirled where the Nine-Tailed Fox's body had been thrown.
Its massive form lay still, ribs heaving once before beginning to dissolve. Its fur, once gleaming white, unraveled into streams of glowing black mist like melting into liquid.
Hanuman took a cautious step forward.
But Shiva had already moved.
His feet pressed gently into the crater's edge. With one hand he knelt, touching the nine tail fox form as the mist rising from the fox's corpse.
It gathered.
Like a river reversing, the divine essence the Manna flowed into his hand turning out to be a fruit.
Shiva raised it to his lips and there he took a deep bite off it.
"Divine Manna Fruit," Hanuman whispered. "He's going to eat it raw."
Shiva's throat moved slowly as he swallowed the glowing white mass. It disappeared within him like smoke sucked into a void.
His body convulsed.
Then rose still.
His eyes opened, now white.
His hair lengthened, pouring down his back like silver threads spun by gods. His armor melted into flowing robes, draped in celestial embroidery. And behind him
Nine white tails unfurled.
Each one moved independently, glowing with a quiet pulse like breathing stars.
Hanuman's brow twitched. "A transformed state. Not just divine. Perfected."
Cain's voice cracked behind him. "What the hell is that?"
Shiva exhaled once, raising a single hand.
In front of his palm, a whirlpool of light began to form tight, focused, spiraling outward like a lens forming a singularity.
"Move," Hanuman snapped.
But Shiva had already fired.
The beam exploded forward.
A twisting spear of white and gold energy tore through the battlefield. Trees evaporated. Stone became vapor. The sky flinched as the beam cut through it like glass.
Hanuman didn't dodge.
Instead, he dropped low, slammed his staff vertically into the earth.
"Extend."
SHHHHRRRAAKKK.
The staff surged upward in a blink, propelling Hanuman high above the blast.
The beam collided with the staff's lower half.
But instead of shattering it split. The divine weapon divided the beam left and right, diverting the energy around it in two sweeping crescents that curved away and scorched the mountains behind them.
Hanuman balanced perfectly at the top of his pole one foot flat, the other folded like a meditating monk.
Behind him, Cain, Dakun, and Ravenfeather stared in silent awe as they remained untouched beneath the towering staff.
"He protected us again," Ravenfeather whispered.
Hanuman didn't speak.
He just looked down at Shiva.
The godlike figure stood motionless, tails undulating in silence.
Elsewhere
The world had become a storm of fire.
Missile after missile tore through the sky, trailing smoke, shrieking past shattered trees and scorched soil. They dropped in unrelenting sequence, boom, boom, boom raining death.
Madagascar, crouched behind a rising blade of red ice, shouted, "TO THE LEFT!"
Wei flipped over a chunk of broken terrain, narrowly dodging a spiraling missile.
Asger, her new blood-forged arms still steaming, dove behind a wall of her own blood, arms flaring with crimson whips to deflect stray debris.
The three reconvened behind a collapsing ridge, breaths heaving.
"He's not letting up," Asger growled. "It's non-stop."
Madagascar looked up, face tight with frustration. "We can't get close like this."
Zuolin stood far away on elevated ground, silent and terrifying.
And then
His mouth opened.
Not in speech.
Not in taunt.
But wide.
Unnaturally wide.
A gleam emerged from his throat.
It slid outward long, metallic, impossible.
A massive missile, eighteen meters in length, black as gunmetal, slid out from deep within his biomechanical throat, the surface etched with spinning runes and internal gears.
The earth beneath him cracked.
He raised it effortlessly, the missile now upright in his cybernetic arms.
Zuolin's voice echoed like thunder, as if the metal itself was speaking.
"Body Modification: Heavenly Missile."
Then
He launched it.
SHHHHHHRRRRRRRROOOOOOOOOOOM.
The ground shattered as it fired, kicking up a spiral of rock and smoke. The missile streaked straight toward the trio too fast to dodge, too big to outrun.
"SHIT!" Wei barked. "It's going to hit us!"
They didn't have time to react.
But something else did.
Wind split open.
A shadow fell across the sky.
CRACK.
Anuman dropped from above like divine thunder, staff in hand, striking the side of the missile mid-flight.
The contact didn't stop it.
It redirected it.
The missile's trajectory twisted sharply veering left and missing the trio by a narrow breath,The shockwave still sent them skidding, but they remained alive.
The missile which had disappeared beyond the ridge, carving a massive trench in the earth.
Madagascar landed on his feet, stunned.
Asger stood slowly. "Who…?"
Anuman turned to them with a bow. "Apologies. I'm late."
His voice was calm but firm. "The king sent me."
Wei blinked. "What king?"
"Sakamoto," Anuman replied.
Silence held for just a second.
Madagascar cracked a grin. "About time he returned the favor."
They barely had time to breathe.
Behind them
WHHRRRRrrrrrr.
A sound twisted the air.
The missile, once believed to be gone, looped back into sight its engine reverse-firing, steering like a predator that had marked its prey.
Madagascar's face fell. "It's coming back."
Asger's voice turned cold. "It's tracking us."
Wei stepped forward, one blade drawn. "Then let's put it down."
The missile began its return.
And time was running out.
Meanwhile The scene shifted.
No battlefield, No missiles, No fox gods or divine staffs.
Only a place soaked in silence.
An ancient subterranean chamber lit only by flickering red glyphs etched into stone glowing sigils of war, sacrifice, and old blood. The air was thick, damp, still.
At the center ,thirty-two monolithic pillars, carved from obsidian, arranged in a perfect circle like judges from an ancient trial. Chains hundreds ran from the tops of the pillars into the middle.
Where a man hung.
Shirtless, Blood crusted across his body. Eyes half-closed. Feet suspended inches above the black stone floor.
The prisoner's breathing was slow, pained. His face bore old scars.
His name
Shiki, of the Dusk family.
Suddenly, from the darkness beyond the pillar ring, footsteps echoed.
Deliberate,Unhurried.
Then a presence impossible to ignore.
Lord Arcade entered the circle.
He wore no crown, but his presence made the air bend. His robe trailed behind like it refused to touch the floor. His gaze swept the chamber like he owned time itself.
He looked at Shiki and chuckled.
"So," he said, voice rich with amusement, "those fools finally activated Satan 2."
He tilted his head slightly.
"No respect left for humanity, is there?"
He stepped closer, boots clicking softly.
"You always said they'd destroy themselves before I even finished my plans. You may not be wrong, brother."
Shiki didn't respond.
But his head tilted slightly upward.
That was enough.
Arcade smiled.
"It's been too long," he said. "And I've got something to show you."
His fingers ran once across a glowing rune on one of the chains.
The glyph pulsed. The whole room shivered.
"I think… it's time we spoke again."