The initial shockwave from their first clash still reverberated through the grand hall, a physical force that rattled the very foundations of the Vermillion palace. Dust and debris rained from the ceiling, and the intricate tapestries lining the walls fluttered violently as if caught in a gale. Shards of crystal from the shattered chandeliers continued their descent, catching the flickering torchlight like falling stars against the growing darkness. In the center of this self-made devastation, Saturu and Lord Kaito stood locked in a primal struggle, a contest of pure will made manifest in the screaming protest of their blades. The air crackled around them, thick with unleashed spiritual pressure and the promise of imminent death.
"So that weakling father gave his crown to you?" Saturu taunted, his voice a low, guttural growl that cut through the chaotic din with unnerving clarity. He leaned into his blade, forcing Kaito back a step. "That just makes this better. It means I get to erase his entire legacy in one night."
From the shadows of a collapsed archway, Nozashi emerged. His face, pale and slick with sweat, was a grotesque mask of rage and disbelief. "How dare you speak of our father that way!" he screamed, his voice cracking with the strain. His eyes were wide, darting between Saturu and the lifeless form of his brother, unable to fully process the reality of the scene.
In response, a grim, almost imperceptible smile touched Saturu's lips. With a brutal, contemptuous kick, he launched the headless body of Lord Kaito. It slid wetly across the blood-slicked marble, the head detaching and rolling in a macabre dance until it came to a final, staring rest at Nozashi's feet. The sight seemed to suck all the sound from the room for a moment, leaving only the pounding rain outside.
"So this is your revenge, huh?" Nozashi whispered, his voice trembling with a volatile mixture of horror, grief, and incandescent fury. He tore his gaze from his brother's dead eyes and fixed it on Saturu. "To become the very monster they always said you were? Then allow me to set you free, brother!"
A violent, bloody crimson aura erupted from Nozashi's body. The air around him shimmered with intense heat, warping the light. He was channeling his power to its absolute limit, tapping into reserves of strength and rage he never knew he possessed. He became a red comet of pure, undiluted hatred, charging at Saturu with every ounce of his being, his remaining sword held high for a final, desperate strike.
But Saturu didn't move to meet the charge. He didn't even shift his stance. He simply stood his ground, a statue of calm amidst the storm. As Nozashi reached him, a blur of crimson energy and screaming metal, Saturu's left hand shot out with a speed that defied the eye. He caught his brother's face mid-charge, his fingers digging into the flesh of his cheek with brutal force. The impact sent deep cracks spiderwebbing across the marble floor beneath Saturu's feet. With a contemptuous, almost lazy twist of his wrist, he slammed Nozashi headfirst into the nearest stone pillar. The impact was thunderous, sending fragments of ancient stone flying like shrapnel. Nozashi crumpled to the ground, dazed and bleeding from a deep gash on his forehead.
"Nozashi," Saturu said, his voice chillingly calm, devoid of any emotion save for a cold, analytical focus. He looked down at his half-brother as one might examine an insect. "Last time we did this, I left a scar on your face. A reminder of your failure. But now... now I want the wound to be painful. I want it to be the last thing you ever feel."
Enraged beyond reason, humiliated and in agony, Nozashi pushed himself up, using his sword as a crutch. Blood streamed into his eye, painting half his world red. With a raw, wordless scream, he speed-blitzed toward Saturu once more, his sword aimed in a wild, killing arc meant to decapitate. But in the space between one heartbeat and the next, something impossible happened. There was no grand, visible movement from Saturu, only the subtlest shift in the air, a whisper of displaced space. Then, Nozashi's sword arm, still desperately clutching his weapon, was tumbling through the air, severed cleanly at the shoulder. A moment later, a fountain of arterial blood erupted from the wound, painting the nearby silk wall hangings and shattered finery a gruesome, dripping crimson.
As Nozashi fell to his knees, a scream of pure, unadulterated agony and disbelief tearing from his throat, his wide, horrified eyes focused on Saturu's pristine blade. His own blood was already dripping from its flawless edge. "When did he-?!" he gasped, his mind refusing to process the speed of the attack.
"Your scream," Saturu remarked, his voice still that same, unnerving monotone, "it brings back terrible memories, you know that. Memories I had long buried."
Terror, cold and absolute, finally overrode his pride and rage. Scrambling backward like a crab, Nozashi turned and fled, clutching the bloody stump of his shoulder. He stumbled through a hidden servant's passage, his breath coming in ragged, panicked sobs. "I must run... I must survive," he panted, his mind reeling, the world narrowing to a tunnel of pure survival instinct. "How? How did that brat become... this?" He burst out onto a high balcony overlooking the main courtyard. Below, a chaotic mass of people—servants, courtiers, and guards—were evacuating the palace grounds in a blind panic. In his desperate flight, he began cutting down anyone in his path, servant and guard alike, creating a bloody corridor through the chaos, his mind shattered, seeing only obstacles between him and survival.
"You fear death like it's not going to catch up to you," Saturu's voice echoed from directly behind him, calm and relentless as the tide. The sound was impossibly close. "It's useless to run. You are only prolonging the inevitable." Saturu moved through the carnage Nozashi had created with an eerie, dispassionate grace, his feet never once touching the corpses and wounded that littered his path.
Desperate, his vision swimming, Nozashi spotted a young maid frozen in terror against a wall, her eyes wide with horror. He lunged for her, his remaining arm hooking around her neck, pressing the edge of his blood-slicked blade to her throat. "Stay back!" he shrieked at Saturu, his voice cracking. "I'll kill her! Do you hear me?!"
"Do you think," Saturu challenged, never breaking his slow, deliberate advance, "that I won't end you because you're coward enough to use a hostage? That her life holds any value in this equation?"
"How dare you call me a coward!!" Nozashi screamed, and in his blind, sputtering rage, he swung his sword at the maid's throat, intending to take her with him. But the blade never connected. In that exact same instant, a silver flash cut the air. Nozashi's other arm and his head were cleanly severed from his body in one fluid motion. His head hit the rain-soaked stones of the balcony with a wet, final thud, rolling to a stop at the maid's feet, its expression forever locked in a rictus of fury and shock.
The maid, released from his grip, stood frozen for a moment before her mind could catch up. In a state of sheer, primal terror, she acted on instinct. She snatched up Nozashi's fallen sword with both trembling hands and pointed the heavy weapon at Saturu. But she was wounded, her body shaking uncontrollably, and the overwhelming, suffocating pressure of his presence made the blade waver and dip uncontrollably. Any movement, any decision, felt like it would be her last. She took the sword on the ground pointing to Saturu as fear followed in her eyes, her sword shaking from her trembling. It was a pathetic, hopeless gesture, the final act of a creature cornered by a predator it could not possibly comprehend.
Her legs finally gave out, the last of her strength fleeing her body. She collapsed to the cold, wet stone, one hand bleeding from where Nozashi's grip had torn her skin. Saturu looked down at her, his intimidating red eyes seeming to see straight through her soul, into the very core of her terror. His aura pressed down on her like a physical weight, a mountain of intent that stole the breath from her lungs. He walked closer, each step measured and final, the Divine Blade rising in his hand, its edge glinting with a cold, celestial light.
In her terrified, pleading eyes, he saw a reflection a ghost from a past life. A moment from centuries ago when he, too, had been the one on the ground, helpless and broken, facing an unstoppable force of annihilation. The vision was fleeting, lasting only the space of a single, shared heartbeat between executioner and victim. The sound of a single, clean slash cut through the pounding rhythm of the rain. The maid's eyes rolled back in her head, and she fell unconscious to the ground, physically unharmed but her spirit forever scarred by the encounter. Saturu stood over her for a long moment, his expression an unreadable mask, the storm raging around him as the last of the Vermillion bloodline was finally, utterly, wiped from the world.