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Grey clouds hung heavy on the sky above and droplets of rain were pattering down on the stirring waters.
The wind didn’t carry a bird’s call whilst it bit and gnawed at Kazuha, as if to to expose him to the wide open sea, vulnerable and small between the crashing waves framed with foam.
The rain dripped down his sides, his bangs cold and damp against his skin.
Slowly his eyes were drooping and soon enough he was encased by a restless sleep.
The air around him changed, the rain gone and warm rays of sun fell on his skin, too warm for his comfort, too familiar.
Sounds of water droplets were replaced by erratic steps of tenacity on the Raiden Shogun’s ground.
One might’ve said the ground to be blessed by the god’s divinity, but Kazuha with his unnaturally keen sense of smell and sound saw red when met with the wooden floor of Tenshukaku.
Blood, shed by ambitious warriors on death’s door was lacing the wooden tiles, an eerie sight for Kazuha’s eyes.
The warmth was getting to much for him again, as Tomo’s shadow covered the imaginary blood.
His dear friend’s expression made Kazuha nauseous.
A shivering hand coated with cold sweat reached out hesitantly, as if already knowing that there was nothing to reach for anymore.
Tomo was long gone the moment he declared to fight the Raiden Shogun herself, on a sunny evening not unlike the very one Kazuha’s memory is forcing upon him.
The electro vision at Tomo’s side flickered at his statement, if a warning or a challenge, only the electro Archon would know.
His hand was hanging pathetically and unsure in the air, his friend’s hand in a tight grip on the sword’s sheath.
Tomo raised his blade and after a few strikes, the crackling sound of lightning already faint in the air reached Kazuha’s ears.
With wide eyes and an awareness that wasn’t quite in the containment of his body anymore, he watched the Raiden Shogun unleash her ultimate attack, the Musuo no Hitotachi.
Kazuha had heard tales of this very move, a display of divine power which nobody could withstand.
A careful yet dangerous thought settled in the vast of his mind the moment he heard that phrase.
There must be one who could withstand it, but who this could be he didn’t know.
As Tomo raised his blade when the purple flash zapped through the air, a spark of hope lit in his chest, fragile, but there.
Could Tomo be the first one to withstand the Raiden Shogun’s divine punishment?
A silly question in afterthought, because after just a second of that indulgence blood spilled on the ground and Tomo’s knees fell with it.
The undeniable fate of one who’d dare to challenge a god.
A deadly silence made its way into Tenshukaku as everybody’s eyes were on the unmoving body laying on the floor.
Disgust and horror spread through Kazuha, the sound of electricity was droning in his ears, the humid warmth of the early autumn creeping on his skin and the smell of iron alarming his instincts.
Nausea crawled up his throat and in a rush of irritation and adrenaline he surged up to his friend. With the empty electro vision in his hand and a last look back to his lost dear friend, Kazuha ran.
If ugly tears rolled down his cheeks, shimmering under the unkind sun, then only the wind knew.
A memory still so fresh in his mind, even though months had passed since the day of the event.
The storm had passed and the wind was quiet this night, flowing past him as in an imitation of a comforting embrace.
Over the many weeks Kazuha has spent on the Alcor, he had learned to appreciate the cold of the night, and as he gazed upon the starry sky he heard the whisper of change carried by the wind, a promise of more to come.