CHAPTER SIX
Brothers Clash
The Emperor rode like a man possessed.
Tenchi's nodachi bounced against his back as his steed galloped through the blood-streaked gates of the capital. His elite guard followed close behind, hooves pounding like war drums across the broken stone bridge.
The sight that greeted them stopped Tenchi cold—a grotesque portrait of ruin unfurled before them, each detail more savage than the last.
Tenchi's breath caught in his throat, a knot of horror tightening in his chest.
His capital—his people—lay in heaps. Children's toys were stained with blood. A mother's severed hand still clutched her infant's blanket. Fires smoldered across the temple square. A headless noble guard was draped over the statue of the first king like a grotesque banner.
Tenchi's jaw clenched, rage blooming like wildfire in his chest.
A vein pulsed in his temple. "Burn them all," he said, voice low—dangerous.
Then he shouted, voice raw with fury:
"KILL EVERY LAST ONE OF THESE DEMONS! MAKE THEM SUFFER FOR EVERY DROP OF BLOOD SPILLED HERE!"
The ground itself seemed to tremble as his elite guard erupted forward, their blades singing vengeance. The storm didn't begin—it unleashed.
Bodies lay scattered across the courtyards and alleys—some in armor, many not. Women and children torn apart, goblins laughing with meat between their jagged teeth. A hulking ogre gnawed lazily on a severed leg, crunching bones between molars.
Tenchi did not hesitate.
He leapt from his horse mid-gallop, his blade already drawn. Flame erupted with his first strike, incinerating three goblins in a single sweep. Wind followed his second, slicing through an ogre's head like paper.
"Clear them out!" he roared.
His men answered with steel.
What followed was not just vengeance—it was a reckoning wrought in steel and fire.
Tenchi led the charge like a wildfire given form. Each swing of his nodachi painted the streets in flame and ash. He did not hesitate. He did not spare. Goblins were bisected mid-laugh. Demons screamed as their innards were carved open by wind that sliced like blades.
He fought with no regard for elegance—only devastation. His roars echoed down the alleys, as if the Emperor himself had become wrath.
The Emperor and his knights tore through the streets, cleansing the capital of the lingering filth. Their blades did not stop until the last screech fell silent.
Among the twisted ruins, they found the abducted—royal cousins, noble daughters, guards. Most were bloodied. Shaken. But alive.
Tenchi's eyes scanned every face.
Not hers.
His breath hitched. His throat tightened.
"Where is she?" he asked—his voice barely above a whisper, yet carrying the weight of a thunderclap.
Silence.
Tenchi stepped forward, grabbing one of the soldiers by the front of his armor.
"Where is my daughter?" he snarled, his face inches away, voice breaking with fury and desperation.
"I—I don't know, Your Majesty. She wasn't among the captives," the man stammered.
Tenchi released him, staggering back. His vision blurred—not from injury, but dread. The worst had gripped him.
His mind spiraled—memories flooding like a crashing tide: Samara chasing butterflies in the courtyard, asking to train with a wooden sword, laughing stubbornly at his every stern word. He had failed her once, kept her locked away like something to be ashamed of.
Now… what if he had failed her again?
The thought of her lifeless, violated, broken—eaten or worse—gnawed at his soul until it felt like something inside him cracked.
His stomach twisted violently. His heart sank beneath the weight of images he couldn't unsee.
"Not her," he whispered. "Please, not her. Not my daughter."
His hands curled into fists. Fire sparked at his fingertips. Wind began to circle his legs.
Then—
A flash. Sparks in the distance.
From the tower.
Then—her scream. Piercing. Raw. It shattered the dam in him.
Something primal awakened. His limbs moved before thought could catch them.
In that moment, titles meant nothing. He was no longer Emperor. He was just a father—terrified, desperate, and burning with something raw and ancient.
Tenchi didn't think. He didn't strategize. He ran like hell itself was behind him—and something worse was ahead.
Through ash. Through ruin. His cape snapped behind him like a banner of war.
He didn't feel the smoke burn his lungs or the stone tear his boots. His legs were flame. His breath was fury. His soul screamed with one word: faster.
Every step up the spiraling stairs felt like wading through memories—visions of what he could lose.
He steeled his heart, preparing to see the worst.
But he never stopped.
The doors to the tower burst open.
At the center of the room, Samara knelt in blood and torn silk.
Tenchi's heart nearly stopped. The sight of her—crumpled, broken, and trembling—seared into his mind like a brand. The fire in him surged, but it wasn't rage this time. It was fear.
His daughter. His weakest daughter.
A thousand memories warred inside him. The first time he held her. The day she learned to walk. The look in her eyes when she asked, timidly, if he was proud of her.
He hadn't been then.
Now, he would give anything to answer her differently.
His hand trembled on his blade. He'd killed gods. Led armies. Carved nations from stone. But this—seeing her like this—undid him.
And yet, he didn't falter.
Because she needed him now.
Not as emperor.
As her father.
Xelvar loomed over her, his fist raised. Behind him stood another.
A second demon.
"Tendou," Tenchi whispered.
The newcomer turned slowly. His skin was pale grey, his hair long and white like snow-drenched ash. Twin black horns curved back from his temples. His robes bore the mark of the Demon Lords—crimson sigils that pulsed with living ink.
But it was his eyes—those cold, familiar eyes.
"You've grown," Tendou said, smiling at Samara. "My dear niece."
Samara blinked. Her lips parted. "What...?"
Her mind spun. What did he say? Niece? But… how—?
Samara's voice trembled as she looked to her father. "Who… who is he?"
Tenchi's jaw tensed. He looked at her—really looked—and there was guilt in his eyes.
"Tendou is my brother," he said. "Or he was. He gave up his humanity long ago. Sold his soul to the Demon Lord for power."
Samara swallowed. "But… he's a Demon Prince?"
"In title," Tenchi replied. "The Demon Princes are not bloodline heirs. They are chosen—fourteen of the strongest, most loyal to Makaius. Tendou is one of them."
Xelvar's smile faltered. "You know this thing?"
Tendou turned his head slightly. "She's family."
He stepped between them, blocking Xelvar's fist with his blade.
"She is not yours to break, brother."
Xelvar's eyes narrowed. "You're defending a human?"
Tendou's hand moved like lightning. A slash of red tore through the floor, forcing Xelvar back. The tower trembled from the impact.
"She's not ready," Tendou said. "You don't play with prey that still has teeth."
They clashed.
Tendou moved like a phantom. Xelvar met him with a roar, Chaos mana crackling around his fists as he drew twin hooked blades.
But Tendou's blade sang with ruin.
Xelvar smiled. "You were always good at betrayal."
He parried Xelvar's strike, turned his momentum, and drove a knee into the demon prince's gut with enough force to rupture stone. Xelvar coughed dark blood but retaliated with a wide slash, missing only by a breath. Tendou was already behind him.
Steel carved into flesh.
Xelvar screamed.
He spun, wild now, flinging tendrils of dark mana that burst into jagged spikes across the walls. Tendou advanced through them like they were dust, blade flashing once, twice—carving Xelvar's shoulder, then thigh.
"You are power wasted," Tendou hissed.
Xelvar lunged in desperation. He struck Tendou's ribs, mana exploding from his palms in a wave of Chaos.
Tendou didn't flinch.
He absorbed the blow with a grunt, then twisted Xelvar's arm mid-strike and snapped it with a sickening crunch.
Xelvar dropped to one knee.
Tendou brought the pommel of his sword down hard against the back of Xelvar's neck.
The tower shook from the impact.
Xelvar collapsed, unconscious. Blood pooled beneath him.
Tendou stood over him, not triumphant—only quiet. Cold.
"As always," he muttered, "you disappoint me."
Tendou's blade lowered slowly as silence filled the chamber—only the crackle of fading Chaos mana remained.
A sound echoed through the room—a pulse of displaced air, a sudden gust.
Tenchi's eyes widened.
Tendou vanished.
In the blink of an eye, he reappeared inches in front of his brother, between Tenchi and Samara, the tip of his blade still dripping blood from Xelvar.
"Step aside," Tendou said, his voice calm but unrelenting. "Give her to us."
Tenchi didn't flinch. "You'd take your own niece to the slaughter?"
Tendou's eyes narrowed. "This isn't personal, brother. It's the future."
"She's your blood!" he roared, his voice cutting through the haze. "You would stand by and let her be ravaged? Bred like livestock by the demon army?" and let her be ravaged? Bred like livestock by the demon army?"
Tendou didn't flinch. "I no longer bleed as you do, brother."
Tenchi's voice cracked. "Is this what you've become? A pawn to Makaius?"
Tendou looked away for a heartbeat, then back, cold again. "My allegiance is with strength. With survival. With the new world."
"You were a man once," Tenchi said, his voice laced with grief. "You were my brother."
"And now I am more," Tendou replied. "And she—Samara—is a tool. One the Demon Lord will use to create a new generation."
Tenchi's fury ignited. Fire and wind enveloped his form, his cloak fluttering like a phoenix's wings.
"You look old, brother," Tendou said mockingly. "Frail. Like the wind might finish what time started."
Tenchi's eyes narrowed, voice laced with steel. "And you look like a corpse painted in ink. You always wanted to cheat death—now look at you. Empty."
Tendou chuckled. "You envy me. I haven't aged a day. While you've grown slow, sentimental... soft."
"I've grown human," Tenchi spat. "You abandoned that for power you didn't earn. You turned your back on your people—on me."
"I turned away from weakness," Tendou hissed. "From pretending that morals make strength."
Tenchi took a step forward, nodachi humming at his side. "You want her to suffer for your ideals? For Makaius? Will you really stand there and watch your niece—your blood—be devoured by your own kind?"
Tendou's lips curled downward, unreadable. "My allegiance is no longer to blood. It's to the world that's coming."
He drew his nodachi.
Tendou exhaled, stepping forward.
They faced each other.
Two brothers. One is human. The other was once human. Now enemies.
Their blades moved.
TO BE CONTINUED