The East PacificBoard

Sca smiles and nods, as the body of the Ice Demon Mother collapses and explodes into a burst of ice blood and flames, as the flesh burns away. Sca says "Well, didn't expect to unsheathe the Fire, but, I guess, it was needed. That was, interesting..." He looks around and says "The blizzard is lightening up. If I remember correctly, we were just a couple kilometers away from the next station. We'll go there and both get a new train, report to Malice, and tend to our wounds and exhaustion..." He then says "So interesting why Demon Whisperer would put it out of his way to have a whole horde of the undead when he knew what he was facing..." He thinks, and then he says "DUCK!" He dives right infront of Aozora, as a gunshot is heard, and the bullet, instead of hitting Aozora, hit's Sca right in the heart. He collapses onto the ground after his jump, blood spurting from wound. Soon after a voice is heard in the blizzard. "Damn you Fire Keeper. Your senses of time have not failed I see... but it is too late for you." The cackle is heard, as Demon Whisperer disappears into the Blizzard, not even have being seen.

Aozora continued to take deep breaths in the aftermath of the battle. The blizzard is letting up? Good. It’s probably a good idea to tell Malice about this madness, just in case more clean-up is needed. Aozora spoke, though her voice was a little faint from the harsh breathing, and couldn’t overpower the blizzard, even in its lightening form. “It is interesting. I guess he underestimate our-“ she heard the command to duck, and instantly did so, burying her face the front of her body into the snow as a gunshot echoed across the ice. She noticed the man, bleeding, and heard a voice. That voice. His voice. As he cackled, Aozora raised her own handgun and fired into the cold snow, hoping to get a fortunate hit. However, she had no such luck.

She rushed over to Sca, and saw the bleeding chests wound. Chances were good that he was already dead from such a shot, but she was determined to do her utmost to save him. The thing was, she didn’t care. Not really. Fighting together and been fun, and he’d gone and risked his life to save her own. But she didn’t care. She was too caught up in her fury to care. Yet she wanted to save him. Not just to preserve his life, not just out of empathy, gratitude or basic human decency, but mainly simply out of a desire to spite her enemy. Aozora placed one hand over the wound, not caring that blood spurted into her face and then all over her arms. She forced an arcane flame to burn to cauterise the wound. She’d done this before, even to herself. Bleeding out was the immediate concern. If she could stop that...perhaps he stood a chance...

With that done, she began to drag his body through the fallen snow, using the direction the train pointed as a guide of which direction to follow. She trod through a graveyard of shrivelled remains as she did so. Carrying him in this state was too inefficient, so dragging was the best she could do. As she continued her journey, her anger reached its peak, and she shouted out into the empty snow. “Hey! Demon Whisperer! I thought you liked to play with your victims! Ha! Doesn’t look like it to me...” She spoke not in a tone of frustration, but in bitter mockery. Normally, she’d have burning rage or cold, simmering anger. This time, she had neither. “What fun! Set a bunch of your little toys on us, did you? Took one shot and run away, did you!?” She laughed a little. That shot was meant for me. Ahe didn’t know whether bring targeted first was a compliment or an insult. “And you couldn’t even get that right! What, can’t hit a stationary target? Idiot! Coward!” She laughed again, still dragging Sca’s body behind her.

“What’s the matter, Demon Whisperer? Can’t be bothered to finish the job? Get back here! Get back here and do your own accursed job properly! You took a shot at me, come and take another. See how that ends for you! Come on! What’s to be afraid if! I’m just a little plaything to you, right, like my children are to me? Oh, you can kill by striking from the shadows! I’m so scared! Gah! Shinokage did a better job than this! At least he didn’t miss!” Shinokage had been one of the nine Densetsu, tenshi who had followed Aozora before she’d proclaimed her divinity, before most of them had...fallen. Shinokage had been the fourth, a young man who hid in darkness, striking down countless criminals and traitors. So mysterious was he that he’d gained the nickname of the Shadow of Death, treated like a kind of vengeful ghost of justice. So frustrated was Aozora that recalling her dead comrade didn’t stir a single emotion aside from further hatred of the Demon Whisperer.

“If you want me dead, come and do it! Oh, they call you a murderer. A terrorist. You’re nothing more than a ventriloquist! Using all those dead bodies to do all the work for you. Come on, get back here! Come back! Or are you too afraid I’ll cut the skin from your face and wrap it around your neck and strangle with your flesh!? What is it you want, anyway? Power? Ahahaha! You should try find some. The power to hit, for one thing! Trying to master life and death?” She let our a cackle of her own. “Tell you what! I’ll spare you having to find out how to summon the dead. I’ll teach you. I’ll help you. I’ll help you learn from the rest of the fallen of this world as your body falls to the ground, lifeless, and you enter the world of the dead for yourself. How do you expect to master death if you’re not even dead yet?” She laughed more, and more, almost hysterically. “You know what?” Aozora raised her scythe, placing her marked arm against the blade. “I’ll keep count! I’ll keep track of all the times you failed to kill me, you cowardly piece of wretched demon filth!” With Thant, she plunged her flesh into the blade, making two gashes, forming another “x” shape in her arm. She the.pn placed her hand against it and burned it, laughing at the agony. “Murder however many people you want, demon-spawn. Learn all the necromancy you want. Laugh at our suffering all you want. It won’t save you from death at my hands when I finally wrap them around you and shatter every bone in your broken, pathetic, bleeding, dying body!”

Aozora continued hysterically laughing as she dragged Sca’s body behind her, approaching the station up ahead.

He finally shakes himself out of his staring bout and looks sheepishly away.