08-16-2016, 11:58 AM
The indigo star piece lay buried deep in the earth. The crater it had made with its impact was deep and the ground around it burned clean. Perhaps in deference to the strange power held within the piece, the life of the swamp had not dared to encroach on it; nor had water soothed the scar in the terrain that its presence caused. There it remained, protected from discovery only by the fact of its incredible distance from any other worthwhile locations.
The torches provided flickering, inadequate light – but the indigo glow of the missing piece, radiating up through cracks in the earth, provided a serviceable guide. When the party finally emerged from the swamp, on the edges of the deep crater, Justin let out an excitable whoop. After so long, to see his work validated first hand – it made the trip completely worthwhile!
Immediately, he pushed forward, intent on scrambling his way down the crater and to the prize at the bottom. Instead, Gabriel’s hand grasped his shoulder, pulling him backwards.
“Let us go first. It might be dangerous.”
Justin hesitated, clearly wanting to go down and be the first to get his hands on the fruit of his labours… but he couldn’t deny that Gabriel had the more sensible notion.
Rosalia smiled, “I’ll stay here with you, boss.” She said to the disappointed astronomer, “The others can retrieve it and bring it back.”
Sliding down the side of the crater wasn’t exactly the most dignified way down for most of the party. Goku hovered a little, but stuck with the rest – which meant that Gabriel could see the disappointed expression on his face.
“What’s the matter?” He asked, “We’re almost done! Once we’ve got the star piece, we only have to worry about the journey back!”
Goku shrugged his shoulders, “Well, I guess I’m a little disappointed.”
“Disappointed?”
“I was hoping that we’d run into another strong guy! With the Dragon Balls, things usually got interesting when someone was really close to getting their wishes, so I thought…”
The ground began to shake, splitting and cracking all around the star piece. A bright lance of indigo power burst upwards, shooting into the sky where it was reflected by the clouds, and one enormous hand reached up from the growing fissure in the ground.
Each finger was the size of a man, and as the creature hauled itself from the ground, the sheer scale of the creature became horribly apparent. The flesh of the creature had been mummified by the swamp, pulled taut over ancient, grotesquely oversized bones.
Legend had it that some of the first beings to walk the world were the giants, sons and daughters of the titans, long before the gods overthrew that race and raised up humans in their place. Certainly, some of the giants were cunning or cowardly enough to flee, to find some quiet and forgotten corner of the world to live out the rest of their long, long lives. But most? Most were proud, and brave, and strong. They had fought. They had died. Their bodies left on fields of battle which then, as the ages turned, swallowed them whole. They might have laid there forever, if the indigo star piece hadn’t buried itself in their ancient grave instead.
The monstrous creature was thirty feet tall, clad in ancient armour which it had once worn into battle against the heavens. Even after so long, the breastplate still gleamed and the axe at its hip was still disturbingly sharp. The head of the axe was easily ten feet across, and as it hauled itself into the open air, milky eyes looked down on the gathered party. Bright indigo light played about its form, and it draw its axe out, hefting up above its withered, ancient head.
“You just had to jinx it, didn’t you?”
Gabriel’s sour expression did nothing to dim the excitement now spreading across Goku’s face. The enemy was huge! And there was no mistaking it as the reanimated monstrosity swung its axe around with a deep groan; this was not going to be a confusing or tactical battle, it was just, pure and simple, a matter of whether they could beat the hell out of it before it managed to land a good, solid blow on one of them!
The axe cleaved straight into the ground where the group had been, and even though they had all managed to scatter before it made impact, the shuddering shake still knocked most of them off their feet. Goku, flying as he was, merely let out a wild cry of excitement.
“Now this is more like it!” He declared, “Let’s fight!”
The bodyguards were less enthusiastic about the sudden new opponent – but they formed up, intending to follow in Goku’s wake… were it not for the fact that the broken and splintered ground was now cracked wide open, and from it, another pair of hands grasped the earth, a second looming, misshapen face pulling its way from its deserved grave and up into the world once more.
The Omniverse had a sick sense of humour. Of all the places that the star piece could have landed, to have found the resting place of not one but two of these colossal monstrosities?
Gabriel and the others began to hack at the titan as it emerged, and great ribbons of rotting flesh were carved off in awful, foul-smelling strips. The creature groaned and batted at them, as though trying to brush annoying insects from its path as it clawed its way back into reality.
Well, Gabriel thought, If he wanted a good fight so much, let him deal with that one on his own.
“Kamehameha!”
The exultant cry was coupled with a swift burst of light from his cupped palms, and the swinging axe glanced through it, knocked off balance just enough that it passed in a whisper over Goku’s head rather than cleaving him in two. The mummified corpse was huge, and powerful, but very, very slow, and without any real brains with which to direct its tactics – drawing its axe seemed to be about the best it was capable of. Goku was pleased to seize on the advantage that offered him. He was going to need to play it to the full!
His fists and feet thudded into the great colossus’ torso again and again as the monster tried to correct its swing. The impacts had no visible sign of hurting the creature, dead flesh proving quite apt at soaking up the rapidfire impacts that Goku could dish out. With another loud moan, the axe was raised overhead, and came down a second time intending to bisect Goku straight down the middle.
The axe lodged deep in the earth, and the slow monster groaned, steadying one boot against the ground as it strained, struggling to free the axe once more. All the while, Goku circled around it, punching and kicking as fast and as furious as he could.
The bodyguards were having a more successful time with their monster, having started at it the moment it appeared and refusing to let up. The sharpness of their blades helped them try to hack through the vital parts of the corpse, and one arm already hang limp at its side, vital tendons having been targeted and severed. The loss of its arm did not seem to bother the ancient warrior that greatly, however, and it still laid about itself with its cudgel in wide, sweeping motions which made it difficult to coordinate the attack.
The cudgel caught Gabriel square on the shield, and the warrior was sent hurtling backwards at the same moment as Goku’s adversary wrenched the axe free from the earth. Goku had been planning to evade the strike, but suddenly, the arc of the flying Captain meant that wasn’t an option! Dark eyes widened in shock, and he gritted his teeth. He hoped this worked!
Both hands came together in a sudden clap, and he caught the blade of the enormous axe between his hands. Dead flesh was forced to a sudden halt, and for a moment, even the zombie looked confused – rotten brow furrowing as it found itself halted by the saiyan’s hands. Bright white light poured out around Goku as he pushed himself against it, sweat bathing his features and – just as the axe began to touch him, Gabriel made an impact.
Literally.
The heavy armoured warrior slammed into Goku’s side, and both of them were sent hurtling to the ground, where they carved deep furrows into the dried, cracked earth. Goku’s gi was torn and ripped, Gabriel’s shield badly dented.
“Okay.” Gabriel said, picking himself up from the ground, “Any other secret techniques you’ve been holding back? Now would be a great time to show them.”
“I do have one idea. But I don’t think you’re going to like it.”
Both warriors were forced to jump backwards as the axe carved another path through the air, crossing the trenches they had made and carving more dirt into the air.
“Try me!”
Goku caught Gabriel’s eye, and smiled. “Okay then. I need you to keep them off me for as long as you can. About … twenty seconds, I think that’ll be enough. Whoa!”
Goku dived up into the air, and took a firm stance, feet rooting as though there were solid ground beneath his feet. Gabriel didn’t ask what else the saiyan had in mind – he didn’t have time, he needed to make sure that the giant didn’t notice, or care, that his primary quarry was now otherwise engaged.
There were fighters, Goku knew, who preferred to have a technique for every situation. A wide body of techniques allowed for one to have a specialised tool for the job. Goku wasn’t like that. Oh, sure, there were tricks in his repertoire that he would have liked to have access to… but he largely relied on one technique, he just learned to apply it in different ways. It had been with him since he was a boy.
“Kaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa…”
This time, his voice started low. Pooling his power, he was pulling out the vast majority of what he had left. He wasn’t going to be able to do this again; if this missed, he was going to have to hope that Gabriel had some tricks of his own in his bag. Right now, the Captain was barely able to prove an annoyance to the giant warrior, though. Diving, rolling, and performing acrobatics in that armour which no man should have been able to pull off… he was playing for time, and putting all his hopes in the strange outside who had been so instrumental in getting them this far.
Goku was determined not to let him down.
“Meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!”
The bright indigo light illuminating the battle suddenly had a competitor in Goku. Bright blue energy spilled from between his fingers as he strained to compress the power. This was his own stupid fault, after all. If they’d just stopped and rested overnight, he’d probably be in a much better position for this fight! But as it was, his whole body trembled and shook under the stress of the energy, fingers locked dead in position.
“HAAAAAAAA! MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!”
Both giants stopped in their fight, milky white eyes slowly turning as they became aware of the miniature sun swirling into being between Goku’s palms. The bodyguards did their best to keep up the fight, stabbing at each as best they could.
Goku’s own eyes were wild, even ferocious, now! He had all these people relying on him! If this journey was to have any meaning at all, he couldn’t afford to let them down! He had to give it all he had! To prove he could overcome even this challenge, in this bizarre world!
“EVERYBODY! GET DOWN!”
Gabriel’s warning was timely, the bodyguards throwing themselves to the grounds a matter of seconds before Goku’s hands thrust forwards and his voice raised in a hoarse bellow, completing the incantation they had seen before – but taken to the limit of what he could achieve.
“HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!”
No interruption this time, no defence. The beam of energy was twenty feet wide, and even the axe that the giant braced against it was no defence. The hateful creature wailed as the beam collided forcefully with its chest, and it was knocked off its feet, carried backwards to crash bodily into the second enormous abomination.
The explosion was immense, completely engulfing both guardians of the star piece and swallowing them in heat and light. The ground shook, the shockwave enough to knock Rosalia and Justin – who had merely been watching until that moment – to the ground.
In the aftermath of it, Goku hit the ground hard, crouched and panting for breath. A second crater joined the first, with no sign at all of the ancient creatures that had risen from the ground… until a whizzing sound above caused all to look upwards.
And there was a heavy CHUNK as the axe-head, separated from the haft, buried itself next to the comparatively tiny chunk of glowing indigo material.
Finally, Justin stopped cowering behind his protector, peeking out into the suddenly-deeper hole.
“Is it… is it over?”
The torches provided flickering, inadequate light – but the indigo glow of the missing piece, radiating up through cracks in the earth, provided a serviceable guide. When the party finally emerged from the swamp, on the edges of the deep crater, Justin let out an excitable whoop. After so long, to see his work validated first hand – it made the trip completely worthwhile!
Immediately, he pushed forward, intent on scrambling his way down the crater and to the prize at the bottom. Instead, Gabriel’s hand grasped his shoulder, pulling him backwards.
“Let us go first. It might be dangerous.”
Justin hesitated, clearly wanting to go down and be the first to get his hands on the fruit of his labours… but he couldn’t deny that Gabriel had the more sensible notion.
Rosalia smiled, “I’ll stay here with you, boss.” She said to the disappointed astronomer, “The others can retrieve it and bring it back.”
Sliding down the side of the crater wasn’t exactly the most dignified way down for most of the party. Goku hovered a little, but stuck with the rest – which meant that Gabriel could see the disappointed expression on his face.
“What’s the matter?” He asked, “We’re almost done! Once we’ve got the star piece, we only have to worry about the journey back!”
Goku shrugged his shoulders, “Well, I guess I’m a little disappointed.”
“Disappointed?”
“I was hoping that we’d run into another strong guy! With the Dragon Balls, things usually got interesting when someone was really close to getting their wishes, so I thought…”
The ground began to shake, splitting and cracking all around the star piece. A bright lance of indigo power burst upwards, shooting into the sky where it was reflected by the clouds, and one enormous hand reached up from the growing fissure in the ground.
Each finger was the size of a man, and as the creature hauled itself from the ground, the sheer scale of the creature became horribly apparent. The flesh of the creature had been mummified by the swamp, pulled taut over ancient, grotesquely oversized bones.
Legend had it that some of the first beings to walk the world were the giants, sons and daughters of the titans, long before the gods overthrew that race and raised up humans in their place. Certainly, some of the giants were cunning or cowardly enough to flee, to find some quiet and forgotten corner of the world to live out the rest of their long, long lives. But most? Most were proud, and brave, and strong. They had fought. They had died. Their bodies left on fields of battle which then, as the ages turned, swallowed them whole. They might have laid there forever, if the indigo star piece hadn’t buried itself in their ancient grave instead.
The monstrous creature was thirty feet tall, clad in ancient armour which it had once worn into battle against the heavens. Even after so long, the breastplate still gleamed and the axe at its hip was still disturbingly sharp. The head of the axe was easily ten feet across, and as it hauled itself into the open air, milky eyes looked down on the gathered party. Bright indigo light played about its form, and it draw its axe out, hefting up above its withered, ancient head.
“You just had to jinx it, didn’t you?”
Gabriel’s sour expression did nothing to dim the excitement now spreading across Goku’s face. The enemy was huge! And there was no mistaking it as the reanimated monstrosity swung its axe around with a deep groan; this was not going to be a confusing or tactical battle, it was just, pure and simple, a matter of whether they could beat the hell out of it before it managed to land a good, solid blow on one of them!
The axe cleaved straight into the ground where the group had been, and even though they had all managed to scatter before it made impact, the shuddering shake still knocked most of them off their feet. Goku, flying as he was, merely let out a wild cry of excitement.
“Now this is more like it!” He declared, “Let’s fight!”
The bodyguards were less enthusiastic about the sudden new opponent – but they formed up, intending to follow in Goku’s wake… were it not for the fact that the broken and splintered ground was now cracked wide open, and from it, another pair of hands grasped the earth, a second looming, misshapen face pulling its way from its deserved grave and up into the world once more.
The Omniverse had a sick sense of humour. Of all the places that the star piece could have landed, to have found the resting place of not one but two of these colossal monstrosities?
Gabriel and the others began to hack at the titan as it emerged, and great ribbons of rotting flesh were carved off in awful, foul-smelling strips. The creature groaned and batted at them, as though trying to brush annoying insects from its path as it clawed its way back into reality.
Well, Gabriel thought, If he wanted a good fight so much, let him deal with that one on his own.
“Kamehameha!”
The exultant cry was coupled with a swift burst of light from his cupped palms, and the swinging axe glanced through it, knocked off balance just enough that it passed in a whisper over Goku’s head rather than cleaving him in two. The mummified corpse was huge, and powerful, but very, very slow, and without any real brains with which to direct its tactics – drawing its axe seemed to be about the best it was capable of. Goku was pleased to seize on the advantage that offered him. He was going to need to play it to the full!
His fists and feet thudded into the great colossus’ torso again and again as the monster tried to correct its swing. The impacts had no visible sign of hurting the creature, dead flesh proving quite apt at soaking up the rapidfire impacts that Goku could dish out. With another loud moan, the axe was raised overhead, and came down a second time intending to bisect Goku straight down the middle.
The axe lodged deep in the earth, and the slow monster groaned, steadying one boot against the ground as it strained, struggling to free the axe once more. All the while, Goku circled around it, punching and kicking as fast and as furious as he could.
The bodyguards were having a more successful time with their monster, having started at it the moment it appeared and refusing to let up. The sharpness of their blades helped them try to hack through the vital parts of the corpse, and one arm already hang limp at its side, vital tendons having been targeted and severed. The loss of its arm did not seem to bother the ancient warrior that greatly, however, and it still laid about itself with its cudgel in wide, sweeping motions which made it difficult to coordinate the attack.
The cudgel caught Gabriel square on the shield, and the warrior was sent hurtling backwards at the same moment as Goku’s adversary wrenched the axe free from the earth. Goku had been planning to evade the strike, but suddenly, the arc of the flying Captain meant that wasn’t an option! Dark eyes widened in shock, and he gritted his teeth. He hoped this worked!
Both hands came together in a sudden clap, and he caught the blade of the enormous axe between his hands. Dead flesh was forced to a sudden halt, and for a moment, even the zombie looked confused – rotten brow furrowing as it found itself halted by the saiyan’s hands. Bright white light poured out around Goku as he pushed himself against it, sweat bathing his features and – just as the axe began to touch him, Gabriel made an impact.
Literally.
The heavy armoured warrior slammed into Goku’s side, and both of them were sent hurtling to the ground, where they carved deep furrows into the dried, cracked earth. Goku’s gi was torn and ripped, Gabriel’s shield badly dented.
“Okay.” Gabriel said, picking himself up from the ground, “Any other secret techniques you’ve been holding back? Now would be a great time to show them.”
“I do have one idea. But I don’t think you’re going to like it.”
Both warriors were forced to jump backwards as the axe carved another path through the air, crossing the trenches they had made and carving more dirt into the air.
“Try me!”
Goku caught Gabriel’s eye, and smiled. “Okay then. I need you to keep them off me for as long as you can. About … twenty seconds, I think that’ll be enough. Whoa!”
Goku dived up into the air, and took a firm stance, feet rooting as though there were solid ground beneath his feet. Gabriel didn’t ask what else the saiyan had in mind – he didn’t have time, he needed to make sure that the giant didn’t notice, or care, that his primary quarry was now otherwise engaged.
There were fighters, Goku knew, who preferred to have a technique for every situation. A wide body of techniques allowed for one to have a specialised tool for the job. Goku wasn’t like that. Oh, sure, there were tricks in his repertoire that he would have liked to have access to… but he largely relied on one technique, he just learned to apply it in different ways. It had been with him since he was a boy.
“Kaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa…”
This time, his voice started low. Pooling his power, he was pulling out the vast majority of what he had left. He wasn’t going to be able to do this again; if this missed, he was going to have to hope that Gabriel had some tricks of his own in his bag. Right now, the Captain was barely able to prove an annoyance to the giant warrior, though. Diving, rolling, and performing acrobatics in that armour which no man should have been able to pull off… he was playing for time, and putting all his hopes in the strange outside who had been so instrumental in getting them this far.
Goku was determined not to let him down.
“Meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!”
The bright indigo light illuminating the battle suddenly had a competitor in Goku. Bright blue energy spilled from between his fingers as he strained to compress the power. This was his own stupid fault, after all. If they’d just stopped and rested overnight, he’d probably be in a much better position for this fight! But as it was, his whole body trembled and shook under the stress of the energy, fingers locked dead in position.
“HAAAAAAAA! MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!”
Both giants stopped in their fight, milky white eyes slowly turning as they became aware of the miniature sun swirling into being between Goku’s palms. The bodyguards did their best to keep up the fight, stabbing at each as best they could.
Goku’s own eyes were wild, even ferocious, now! He had all these people relying on him! If this journey was to have any meaning at all, he couldn’t afford to let them down! He had to give it all he had! To prove he could overcome even this challenge, in this bizarre world!
“EVERYBODY! GET DOWN!”
Gabriel’s warning was timely, the bodyguards throwing themselves to the grounds a matter of seconds before Goku’s hands thrust forwards and his voice raised in a hoarse bellow, completing the incantation they had seen before – but taken to the limit of what he could achieve.
“HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!”
No interruption this time, no defence. The beam of energy was twenty feet wide, and even the axe that the giant braced against it was no defence. The hateful creature wailed as the beam collided forcefully with its chest, and it was knocked off its feet, carried backwards to crash bodily into the second enormous abomination.
The explosion was immense, completely engulfing both guardians of the star piece and swallowing them in heat and light. The ground shook, the shockwave enough to knock Rosalia and Justin – who had merely been watching until that moment – to the ground.
In the aftermath of it, Goku hit the ground hard, crouched and panting for breath. A second crater joined the first, with no sign at all of the ancient creatures that had risen from the ground… until a whizzing sound above caused all to look upwards.
And there was a heavy CHUNK as the axe-head, separated from the haft, buried itself next to the comparatively tiny chunk of glowing indigo material.
Finally, Justin stopped cowering behind his protector, peeking out into the suddenly-deeper hole.
“Is it… is it over?”
![[Image: x1oIYhu.jpg]](http://i.imgur.com/x1oIYhu.jpg)