The Sovereign-V2: C59: Shattered Bonds

The Sovereign-V2: C59: Shattered Bonds

The raw, anguished echo of Juro’s scream echoed,
“I THOUGHT WE WERE FUCKING BROTHERS, TAKESHI!”
still vibrated in the Plaza’s oppressive air, a psychic wound ripped open high above the maelstrom of light and void below. Up here, on a narrow ledge formed by a grotesque, weeping statue of some forgotten Astralon champion, the air was marginally clearer, though no less foul. The stench of the mountain’s deep decay , wet stone, ozone, and the cloying sweetness of preserved rot, mingled with the metallic tang of Juro’s own sweat and the distant, muffled cacophony of battle: the
CRACKKKK
of clashing energies, Akuma’s resonant void voice, the choked gasps of the desperate.
Juro stood sentinel, his twin Frostguard axes, held loosely but ready at his sides. His knuckles were white on the leather wrapped hafts, his breath pluming in ragged clouds that vanished instantly into the chill. Two years. Two years since the exile, since the disgrace that shattered his world and severed the bond, he’d thought unbreakable. His gaze, sharp and wary beneath the rim of his fur lined helm, scanned the treacherous path leading to this isolated perch, a natural choke point formed by the statue’s massive, ice slicked base and the sheer obsidian wall of the Plaza’s inner vault.
A flicker of movement. A shadow detaching itself from the deeper gloom near a fissure in the rock wall. Juro tensed, axes coming up instinctively, muscles coiling like springs in the frigid air. Then, recognition slammed into him, harder than any physical blow.
Takeshi.
Not a Blackcloak apparition, not a void phantom. His
brother
. Just 10 days older, but the separation felt like centuries etched in frost. Takeshi moved with the familiar, economical grace Juro remembered, the same lean build honed by fathers drills, though now clad in the stark, unadorned black leathers of the Void Guard, devoid of insignia save for the subtle, chilling shimmer of void touched thread at the seams. His face, once open and quick to smile beneath the shared dark hair, was a mask of controlled neutrality, but the eyes… the bright defiant ruby eyes Juro had known since infancy, eyes that had held shared secrets, shared scrapes, shared dreams… they were different. Colder. Distant. Like glaciers calved from the same source but now drifting apart in a frozen sea.
For a heartbeat, a treacherous, impossible warmth bloomed in Juro’s chest, pushing back the Plaza’s chill.
He came. He found me.
The old nickname, forged in childhood camaraderie, escaped Juro’s lips in a rasp, rough with disuse and the Plaza’s dry air, but carrying an echo of that lost warmth:
“Take…”
He didn’t lower his axes, but the aggressive stance faltered. Hope, fragile and stupid, flickered
. Had Takeshi defected? Had he come to fight beside him? To explain? To apologize?
The questions tumbled through Juro’s mind, a desperate counterpoint to the battle raging far below.
Takeshi stopped a few paces away, just outside immediate axe range. His expression remained unreadable, but he offered a slight, almost imperceptible nod. Not hostile. Not yet. He took another step, closing the distance slightly, his posture relaxed, almost… conciliatory? His right hand rested casually near the hilt of the void sword sheathed at his hip, a Malkor blade, Juro noted grimly, its pommel a simple, dark sphere that seemed to drink the faint light.
“Juro,” Takeshi’s voice was calm, level, devoid of the void distortion that marked Akuma’s speech. It was just his brother’s voice, slightly deeper than he remembered, but achingly familiar. “It’s been a long time.”
The sound of it, so normal amidst the cosmic horror surrounding them, was almost disorienting. Juro’s grip on his axes loosened another fraction. The frozen knot of two years worth of betrayal and loneliness threatened to crack. “Too long,” Juro managed, his own voice thick. “What… what are you doing here, Take? How did you find this place?” He scanned Takeshi’s face, searching for any sign, any flicker of the brother he knew.
Takeshi took another step. Now he was well within striking distance. His calm facade didn’t waver. “Following orders,” he said simply. His gaze flickered past Juro, towards the ledge overlooking the distant fight, then back, meeting Juro’s eyes directly. There was something in that look… not warmth, but a weary sort of acknowledgment. “Just like always.”
The words were neutral, but the implication hung heavy.
Orders.
Void Guard orders. Juro’s flicker of hope dimmed. “Orders?” he pressed, the edge returning to his voice. “Orders to what? Bring me in? Kill me?” He hefted the axe on his left slightly. “You know I won’t go quietly haha.”
Takeshi sighed, a soft exhalation that plumed in the cold. He looked almost… sad? Or was it just exhaustion? “It doesn’t have to be like that, Juro.” His hand, resting near his sword hilt, moved. Not a draw. Just a subtle shift. A settling of his grip. “ It’s… complicated.”
Complicated.
The word was a spark landing on dry tinder. Juro’s eyes narrowed. The familiar gesture, the tone… it was the same tone Takeshi used when trying to talk him down from some reckless childhood stunt. But this wasn't a stolen apples. This was exile. Disgrace. The shattering of everything. “Complicated?” Juro’s voice dropped to a low growl. “What’s complicated,
brother
? You were exiled. You wear there fucking colours, Malkor, while they’ve always branded us Fujiwara worthless !” The old fury, banked but never extinguished, began to heat his blood, pushing back the cold dread.
Takeshi’s expression hardened, the mask of weary neutrality cracking for the first time, revealing a flash of something colder beneath. “You brought it on yourself, Juro. You always did leap before you looked. You never considered the consequences. For anyone else.” His hand tightened definitively on his sword hilt. The movement was still casual, but the intent was suddenly, horrifyingly clear. It wasn't a settling grip. It was preparation.
The treacherous warmth in Juro’s chest froze solid. The flicker of hope died, replaced by a cold, sickening certainty. Takeshi hadn’t come to reconcile. He hadn’t come to fight beside him. He’d come
for
him. The betrayal wasn't just in the past; it was happening
now
, right here, on this lonely ledge.
The realization was a physical blow. It stole his breath. It tore through two decades of shared blood, shared laughter, shared pain. It reduced the unbreakable bond to ash in an instant. The raw, wounded fury that had fuelled his scream moments earlier surged back, amplified a thousandfold by the fresh, intimate knife twist of this deception.
“WE WERE FUCKING BROTHERS TAKE!”
The roar ripped from Juro’s throat, raw and primal, echoing his earlier cry but infused with a new, devastating layer of personal agony. It wasn’t just a question; it was an accusation hurled across the chasm his brother had just carved between them.
As the final syllable tore from his lips, Takeshi moved. The conciliatory posture vanished like smoke. Calm became lethal intent. In one fluid motion, too fast for thought, his sword cleared its sheath. Not with a ringing cry of steel, but with a chilling
hiss
. The blade itself was a shard of darkness, forged from the same obsidian material as the Plaza, but its edge… its edge gleamed with a sickly, luminous blue sheen.
Venom.
It licked out, not in a wild slash, but in a precise, calculated thrust aimed straight for Juro’s weapon hand, a disarming blow, swift and merciless, exploiting that microsecond of heart shattered hesitation.
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“A brother doesn’t disgrace the other and then leave him exiled, Juro,” Takeshi stated coldly, his voice devoid of any warmth now, only a chilling finality as the poisoned blade sought its mark. “You made your choices. This is the consequence.”
Instinct, honed by years of survival in the frozen hells beyond Astralon, overrode the paralyzing shock. Juro didn’t think; he reacted. The axe on his right came
down in a desperate parry.
CLANGGGG!
Frost forged steel met void touched obsidian. The impact jarred Juro’s arm to the shoulder, sending needles of cold agony up his nerves, not just from the force, but from the unnatural chill radiating from the venomous edge. Sparks, white hot and defiant, flew and died instantly in the frigid air.
Takeshi didn’t pause. His movements were a chilling blend of familiar Frostguard efficiency and a new, predatory void touched fluidity. He flowed into the opening created by the parry, his blade becoming a blur of dark, venom tipped lethality. A low sweep aimed at Juro’s ankles, forcing him to leap back onto the precarious ledge. A high feint followed by a vicious thrust towards his ribs. Juro blocked, deflected, gave ground, his twin axes whirling in defensive arcs, the clash of steel on dark ice a brutal counterpoint to the distant battle sounds.
He was fighting defensively, driven back step by step by the ferocity and precision of Takeshi’s assault. The initial shock had cost him. Takeshi pressed the advantage, his face a mask of cold focus, his defiant ruby eyes reflecting only the Plaza’s jaundiced light and the lethal intent of his strikes. Each blow was economical, aimed to disable tendons, joints, weapon hands. He wasn’t trying to kill immediately; he was trying to break, to capture.
“Still relying on brute force, Juro?” Takeshi taunted, his voice cold as the venom on his blade as he forced Juro into a tighter space near the weeping statue. A swift disengage and a flick of his wrist sent the poisoned tip slicing towards Juro’s leading forearm. “Some things never change. You never learned control. Never learned to think before you shattered everything.”
The taunt, laced with a brother’s intimate knowledge of his flaws, stung deeper than the near miss. It ignited the battle hardened fury beneath Juro’s grief. The defensive posture snapped. With a guttural roar, Juro stopped retreating. He planted his feet, grounding himself against the yielding ledge. Left axe slammed in a brutal overhead chop meant to shatter Takeshi’s blade, while the right one swept horizontally in a disembowelling arc.
CRACKKKK! WHOOOOOSH!
Takeshi flowed back, deflecting the chop with a circular parry that sent shockwaves up Juro’s arm and sidestepping the horizontal sweep with unnerving grace, the poisoned edge missing his abdomen by inches.
The fight erupted into pure, visceral chaos. No longer defender and aggressor, but two titans of equal strength and skill, their movements a deadly dance written in steel and shadow. Axe met sword in a furious exchange, sparks flying like frozen stars. They grappled briefly, strength against strength, before breaking apart with grunts of effort. Juro used his axes weight and leverage, powerful sweeps and crushing blows fuelled by rage and betrayal. Takeshi used speed, precision, and the insidious threat of the venom, his void touched blade darting like a serpent’s tongue, exploiting openings Juro left in his fury.
They fought across the narrow ledge, boots scraping on ice slicked stone, ducking beneath the weeping statue’s frozen tears, their shadows monstrous and warring on the obsidian wall. The air filled with the grunts of effort, the sharp
clang
and
hiss
of clashing weapons, the rasp of their breath. Below, the battle seemed momentarily forgotten; this was a personal apocalypse.
During a brief lull, blades locked near the statue’s base, faces inches apart, breath mingling in frozen plumes, Takeshi’s mask slipped again. Not into sadness, but into something darker, uglier. His defiant ruby eyes burned with a hatred Juro had never seen directed at him before. It wasn’t just duty; it was personal, searing loathing.
“You think exile was the worst of it, Juro?” Takeshi hissed, his voice thick with venom that had nothing to do with his blade. He shoved hard, breaking the lock and forcing Juro back a step. “You think
you
know, WHAT IVE BEEN THROUGH?” He launched a furious flurry, forcing Juro onto the defensive once more. “They stripped me of my rank. Took my command. The respect I’d earned, the future I’d built… gone! Because of
you
! Because I shared your blood!” His next thrust was savage, aimed straight for Juro’s heart. Juro barely deflected it, the venomous edge screeching along right axes haft. “I lost
everything
, Juro. Everything I worked for. Everything I
was
. Because my brother was THE FUCKING FAVOURITE!” The words were flung like daggers, each one finding its mark in Juro’s already shattered heart. The hatred in Takeshi’s eyes was terrifyingly real. A mask, perhaps, but one crafted from genuine, festering resentment.
Juro staggered, not just from the physical force, but from the sheer, unexpected vitriol. The fight raged on, perfectly balanced, axe against venomous sword, brother against brother, the ledge their crumbling world, the echoes of Takeshi’s bitter hatred hanging heavier in the air than the mountain’s stench. The consequence of disgrace wasn't just exile; it was the annihilation of kinship itself, played out in steel and venom high above the Plaza of Screams.
The Plaza’s oppressive hum faded beneath the brutal symphony of clashing steel. Takeshi’s venom tipped blade hissed past Juro’s throat, missing by a hair’s breadth as Juro threw himself sideways, left axe scraping sparks off the obsidian ledge. The cold fury radiating from his brother was a physical force, colder than the void venom, colder than the Plaza’s depths. It fuelled Takeshi’s relentless assault, precise, economical, void touched strikes exploiting every fractional opening Juro’s rage created.
Juro fought back with the raw power honed in exile, his twin axes, carving arcs of frost forged defiance. He matched Takeshi’s speed with brute strength, parrying the serpentine thrusts, deflecting the crippling sweeps aimed at his knees and elbows. Their movements were a deadly echo of a thousand sparring sessions in the Fujiwara dojo, yet twisted into something monstrous. Takeshi knew Juro’s favoured combinations; Juro anticipated Takeshi’s defensive pivots. They were mirrors reflecting only violence.
Juro blocked a low thrust aimed at his hip, the venomous edge screeching along the right axes haft, sending a fresh wave of unnatural cold up his arm. The impact jarred him, but it was Takeshi’s words that truly struck deep, resonating in the hollow space where brotherhood had once lived.
"You were always Father's favourite," Takeshi spat, his voice devoid of its earlier deceptive calm, now laced with a bitterness that felt ancient. He disengaged, flowing into a guarded stance, his defiant ruby eyes fixed on Juro with that terrifying, personal loathing. "Even when I bled on the dojo mats, pouring everything I had into every kata, every drill... his eyes always found
you
. The natural. The true
heir
." He launched forward again, not with a killing blow, but a rapid series of feints and probing jabs designed to wear Juro down, to find the crack in his defence or his spirit. "Did you ever even notice? Or were you too busy basking in his approval?"
The accusation landed like a hammer blow to Juro’s soul. It wasn't just anger in Takeshi's voice; it was a lifetime of perceived injustice, raw and festering. Juro deflected the jabs, the impacts sending shivers of cold venom through his axes.
"Why?"
The word tore from him, low and ragged, more a gasp than a question, lost in the clash of steel. It wasn't just about the Void Guard, the betrayal
now
. It was about everything.
Why this hatred? Why now? Why does it feel like I never knew you at all?
CRUNCHHHH!
Juro caught a vicious overhead chop on both axe hafts crossed above his head. The force drove him down onto one knee, the obsidian ledge biting into his armour. Takeshi loomed over him, the venomous blade pressing down, its sickly blue sheen inches from Juro’s face. Takeshi’s expression was a mask of pure contempt, yet… for a fraction of a second, as their eyes locked over the crossed weapons, Juro thought he saw a flicker. Not hatred, but something else, pain? Exhaustion? , deep within those familiar defiant ruby eyes. It was gone instantly, replaced by hardened ice.
"This isn't you, Takeshi!" Juro roared, straining against the downward pressure, muscles screaming. The proximity, the sheer intimacy of the violence against his own flesh and blood, was a unique torture. "What did they
promise
you? Power? Status? Revenge against Father? What poison did they drip in your ear to turn you into
this
?"
Takeshi’s lips twisted in a humourless sneer. He leaned his weight into the blade. "
Promises fuck that you think that’s why?
" The word was a frozen dagger. "I couldn’t give a fuck about their promises, Juro. I needed to
execute my vengeance, my fucking path, my fucking will and desire my only soul fucking goal
." He shoved hard, breaking the lock and forcing Juro to roll desperately away as the venomous tip stabbed down where his head had been. "Vengeance for the life
you fucking
stole. The future
you
shattered when they threw me out like garbage because of YOU!"

.
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V2: C59: Shattered Bonds