Natsuko gathered up some food items of both the buffing and healing variety, her sword Taiyouken, her questing outfit, and the photo of her old teammates. Everything else, including her alternate outfits, weapons and accessories, photos and memorabilia from her time with her current team had to be left behind. Saddest of all was a mostly-full bottle of Moonwater she had been saving for when she had her drinking habit under control. But whether things went well or poorly, there would be no coming back. Either she escaped Po-Lin or died trying.
The artificial lights of the Selenian Capitol flipped on to simulate sunrise just as she was done packing. She scratched out a quick note to her teammates about where she was going, hoping there would be time later to apologize for her swift exit once they were all free. However, this ended up not being necessary. Awaiting her in the living room were her teammates. Koyon and Ailing looked tired and haggard, while Boulanger was awake and impatient. All three were dressed in their questing outfits.
“H-Hi guys… I um… I have something to tell you,” Natsuko said.
Ailing stared at her. “You’re not…”
Natsuko nodded. “I am. I’m going to turn the Yishang down. I still have some things I need to do in Po-Lin. I’m sorry that I won’t be able to join you all, but—”
Ailing’s lips quivered and she walked up to Natsuko and slapped her across the face. “You selfish bitch!”
Natsuko stood in shock as Koyon ran forward to pull Ailing back. Boulanger fixed his gaze on Ailing.
“Enough, Ailing. Zhidao didn’t explain everything,” Boulanger said in his quiet, authoritative voice.
“Didn’t explain what?” Natsuko said.
“They’re taking teams, not Heroes,” Koyon said in a tone of false calmness. “Zhidao told us either we convince you to come too, or they’ll find another team.”
Natsuko felt sick. “Why the hell does it need to be a team!? That makes no sense! What does—”
“When have we ever known why the fuck the Yishang do what they do!?” Boulanger screamed, shedding his quiet, controlled demeanor for the first time Natsuko had ever seen. “I don’t care what their fucking reasons are. You’re coming with us.”
Koyon still had his usual look of disinterest, but Boulanger and Ailing’s masks had slipped entirely. Natsuko had suspected but not known for sure that their doting had ulterior motives, but the speed with which they dropped the act frightened her, as well as the speed at which Ailing re-adopted it.
“Darling, I’m so sorry! We’re just scared, that’s all. We want you to be with us in the other world,” Ailing said, stepping forward again and grasping Natsuko’s arm gently. The soft touch felt like an electric shock. “I’m sure you have time for whatever you need to do, we would just all feel more comfortable if you told Zhidao you were coming with us.”
Natsuko wrenched her arm free. “Listen, we— I mean, Shuixing and the others, they have a plan to save everyone from being wiped out by the Yishang! Even if we did migrate over to their new world, so what? They would just be using us to draw in Celestials at the start and then once they create more Heroes, we’d be forgotten at the bottom of the food chain again! Either we fight back or we’ll be struggling to keep our heads above water forever! I’m sorry, but I won’t do it. I’m not going.”
Boulanger curled his fists and looked away as he swallowed the hot rage burning away in his throat. Then, his angry eyes flicked back to her. “That’s the wrong answer.”
“Boulanger, you stubborn ass, would you just listen to me! We don’t have to go along with them, we can—”
In the space of a blink, Boulanger cleared the distance between them and slammed his fist into Natsuko’s kidney. The force of the punch knocked her through the interior wall of their home and into the Capitol Building’s titanium skeleton. A second after the dizzying impact, blood shot into her throat and spattered out of her mouth in breathless hiccups.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“As I’m sure you are aware,” Boulanger said, “there are ways to make your life unpleasant without permitting the comfort of a temporary death. I do not plan to roll over and die for some spoiled bitch who got to the top through a fluke. So if I have to stand here and make every second of the next two weeks a living fucking hell until you tell Zhidao you're on-board with the Yishang, then that’s what I’ll do. And I’m sure the other two teammates you’re fucking over would be happy to help.”
Still half-closed in pain, Natsuko’s eyes darted between Boulanger and Ailing and Koyon. Their faces were a mixture of fury and terror, the same as herself only hours before. She couldn’t blame them for being angry, but she also wasn’t going to let them win.
Natsuko waited for Boulanger to come closer and wind up for another punch before she grabbed his arm, pulled him towards her open palm, and activated Megaton point-blank into his face. There was a blinding flash and heat and then the sensation of falling and the next thing Natsuko knew she was looking up at the enormous gap she had blown in the Capitol Building from the seventh story to the roof. There was nothing left of their former headquarters except tortured girders and falling glass.
Natsuko had barely enough time to think about breaking her fall before a missile of rolling black flame burst out of the cloud of debris, barreling towards her. She wasn’t in time to draw her sword before Boulanger collided with her. His sword plunged through her stomach, inflicting a searing, fiery pain on her like her entire body was drowning in boiling water. Through the pain, she looked for an unfortunate victim among the terrified Non-Heroes and settled for a Mooncom soldier gaping up at her. With a silent apology, she swapped places with him, and what had been a Non-Hero a moment before became a shower of crimson mist as Boulanger slammed into the floor.
Natsuko scrambled for food to regain health, but before it reached her mouth, a stampede of ghostly horses struck her and knocked her to the floor where she was helpless to stop a scalding white light that made her flesh feel like it was peeling off. Her screams of pain were barely audible over the chaos of Non-Heroes running for their lives.
Through ringing ears, she heard Boulanger yell, “don’t let her die!”
Natsuko laughed, or maybe it was just clearing blood out of her throat, but there was something funny to the idea that they could just keep trying to kill her over and over and nothing would come of it. If they didn’t kill her, she would keep fighting, but if they did kill her, they couldn’t torture her into complying with them. It was all so ridiculous, Heroes fighting Heroes. She tried to stand and face them, but the moment she put her left foot down, she realized the entire leg had shattered. Even if she was still at half health it did her no good if her bones were fractured. Fixing it only required eating food, but they wouldn’t give her the time to do that. If necessary she could throw herself through the air like a ragdoll with her stolen version of Boulanger’s Black Fire, but with a broken limb, the landing wouldn’t be pleasant.
“Boulanger, this isn’t going anywhere,” Ailing said.
“We do what we have to do!” Boulanger said.
“Hey, big guy, we’re all mad,” said Koyon, “but let’s work smarter, not harder, okay? Didn’t she say something about her friends? The ones that think they’re gonna fight the Yishang? Beating Natsu up over and over is a waste of time. What we need to do is kill her and then go deal with them. Unlike Ms. Rank 1, we can take our time with them.”
Smeared across Koyon’s charred face was the most vile look of sadistic glee Natsuko had ever been subject to. Until now, Natsuko realized, Koyon had been as bored with the world of number-gathering as she was. But unlike her, his drug of choice wasn’t alcohol, but the pleasure of hurting and humiliating other Heroes in a way that bypassed the guardrails of “health points.” He had tried to do the same to Sofiane back in the day, and had done something similar to other Heroes since then like Jouchi. Boulanger and Ailing both looked angry and scared. Only Koyon looked excited.
“Don’t you dare!” Natsuko said, scrambling backwards on her broken leg.
Why wouldn’t her Desperation Art activate? It was all she needed to end the entire fight, but even with her friends’ lives being threatened, she still didn’t reach the threshold. Even worse, theirs probably had.
“Where would we find her friends?” Boulanger asked through grit teeth.
“Vermögenburgh, where else?” Koyon said. “That’s where she used to hang out before she cheated her way into a free ride to #1. Her friends are probably still there after she kicked them to the curb.”
“They’re not,” Natsuko said, blood dribbling from her mouth.
Koyon laughed. “Bullshit. Lemme kill her real quick and let’s get going.”
Natsuko’s body instinctively clenched as the familiar purple-and-green glow of Koyon’s Northern Lights descended towards her, as beautiful as it was painful, and by the time she woke up almost 24 hours later, she would be too late to save Shuixing. She got ready to make one last ditch sprint with a reckless use of her stolen Black Fire, praying it would carry her out of the Area of Effect in time. But then the lights disappeared as Koyon’s ability channeling was interrupted by a giant stone bird slamming into him.
Daisy tucked and rolled out of the collision, barely dodging the 300-foot-long pillar of black flame that followed. Peng was blown apart in an instant, but with a tap of her compass, a wall of feldspar erupted from the floor of the Capitol building, shielding her and Natsuko.
She gave Natsu a nervous little wave. “Howdy!”