This time he meant to fight, but each death he revived from he was punched full of holes. In the border of life and death, he heard the echoes of the phoenix’s laughter and the birth of the rainbow flames that would revive him.

The flames of revival blew out, and the red spear pierced through his shoulder, pinning him into the stone ground. Kagami grabbed the shaft of the spear, trying to free himself. The spear did not budge from Luke’s grip. If he had his strength, the spear would bounce off of him like a dull side of a needle. If he had his strength, he could pull the spear free from his shoulder.

“Weak.” Luke wrenched the spear away easily. “So weak. Where is your vigor from our training sessions, Kagami?”

Those words pierced through his head like Luke’s spear.

He had died again.

Why was he still so weak? All that training he did for a year, was it meaningless? Getting back up, fighting, getting strong enough to crack the shell of those giant spiders. Why couldn’t he win? Why couldn’t he bring the strength? Why did he have to suffer like this?

Why wasn’t he strong?

All those times, where he fought Luke. All those times when he killed those spiders. From those days where he would train until he threw up.

Did any of it mean anything?

I will stay here and fight.

Those words he proudly proclaimed to Walnut meant nothing, but the giant’s response lingered as he died yet again.

Only the strong could say something like that.

#

At the dinner table where they ate, Kagami frowned at the answer his wife gave him. They were drinking coffee, and he had asked her a question about weakness. He had a conversation earlier with one of his employees, and it had wormed his way into his brain.

She had given her answer and he mulled at it for a pregnant pause.

You can only become strong if you know weakness.

“I don’t get it,” Kagami crossed his arms. He wanted to understand but he couldn’t. For as long as he could remember, he was strong. He never struggled against anyone, and defeated anyone that stood in front of him.

“It’s alright if you don’t, but it a shame though, Kagami.” She smiled. “I think if you understood, you would definitely grow stronger than you are now.”

Kagami shrugged at that.

“There’s no way anything could kill me. You used a magic sword and that only left a scar.” He patted his chest, feeling a phantom throb.

“You don’t know danger and while you can’t understand, that’s weakness itself.” She gazed at him with those ruby red eyes. “I worry that some day you might die for not taking better care of yourself.”

Kagami laughed that off.

“Only a god could kill me.”

#

Kagami didn’t know what he was feeling right now. That memory spilled open like a cracked egg and for the first time, he understood.

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He had said he was weak, but he still hadn’t understood those words. He still believed within him that he could defeat anyone that he faced.

But he now knew that was not true.

Asa had trained hard. He had seen her practice every morning, drenched with sweat, and with resolve as sharp as steel. The effort she placed and the effort he placed were night and day. She had told him she had honed her skills from a master.

Kagami had never needed any of that. He just punched. If he missed, he punched harder and faster, until his punch connected and they wouldn’t get up.

In front of the Great Phoenix, the feeling finally hit. Tears pushed out of his eyes from sheer frustration and the pain of being weak gripped his heart like iron.

The Phoenix’s chuckle rumble the very air.

“Do you understand now brother? Your weak. Hand over your body, and I shall use it better.”

He lifted his head, meeting its fiery gaze.

Then, he gave a slight nod.

The Phoenix’s cry reached the very heavens.

Kagami didn’t know how anyone could fight with this body.

#

For a moment, he had wavered when he stood up. There had been something different about him, but his fear were buried when he stabbed him through his eye, and past his brain.

He hadn’t tried anything.

The Prince was engulfed in that same rainbow flame. Luke pulled out his spear, but was stopped by Cedar’s hand.

“Haha.” His laughter started small and his body trembled, before he threw his head back filling the very air with his hideous laugh. “Hahahahaha!” Then, he gazed at Luke with the one eye that was still good. A blood tear trickled down his face. “Thank you. I would not be here if not for you. Thank you.”

A chill went down his spine, and Luke leapt back. The spear in his eye melted and the flames of revival formed a new eye in its place.

“Ahhh! It’s been so long since I’ve been free. How wonderful to smell the blood soaked air of a battlefield. You couldn’t know how much I wanted to be out here, how I watched your every fight with him. Your hatred of me was something I wanted to face myself.” The Prince gave a wolfish smile.

Luke watched the Prince. An image of the one he met at his village’s burning, and the one in front of him interlapped.

“Cedar!!!”

He formed a new spear using one of the blood balls floating in the air. He plunged his spear into the Prince’s chest with every ounce of animosity he could muster.

It did nothing though. The Prince stood there with a smile as if he were basking in the morning sun. With a touch of his finger, the spear melted like butter. Luke backed up and flicked his finger. The blood ball behind Cedar erupted, blowing a hole through the Prince’s head.

It did nothing.

He wore the rainbow flames like a royal mantle. The flames ebbed and flowed as the hole formed new flesh.

“What is this? Why are you able to control those flames!” Luke yelled. This was different from the previous immortality. The flames were active the whole time now.

“It’s because it’s my ability. For I have been remade into the Phoenix. The previous me you bullied did not have this gift. I allowed him to use it.”

“The Phoenix?” That was…it couldn’t be…Luke shook his head. “That’s a lie!” The two blood balls rained down a hail of blood bullets, cutting through the Prince like wet paper.

The madman laughed, when it was all done, even with the giant pool of blood, he reformed back just like he was before, clothes and all.

“Is this all you can do?” Cedar shook his head in disappointment. “Is this all your sister’s death amounted to?”

“Don’t speak of her-”

“I loved how she screamed when I lit her on fire. She truly turned into a beautiful flame.”

Luke screamed and Aura erupted from his Gate. He pulled all the blood on the ground, weaving each and every one into a dense black spear. He ran the spear through Cedar’s chest.

This time the spear did not melt.

“Magnificent.” Cedar said once he tried to melt it. Steam sizzled where he had touched. “That’s what I wanted.”

“I’m going to kill you.” He injected the blood in him. His blood rampaged within Cedar’s body. Blood vessels burst. Organs snapped. The heart exploded.

The Prince took all of that without a hint of pain. If it weren’t for the blood that dripped from every hole on his face, Luke would have that it had done nothing. A rainbow flame wrapped around Cedar like a blanket. Protecting him from death.

“That was quite something, Luke.” The rainbow flame converged in his hand, forming into a blazing sword. “For that, I shall end you myself. As a form of respect, from someone who thinks you could have killed me before my immortality.”

A bead of sweat dripped down the side of Luke’s face.

“You got to be kidding me.”

It was the last thing he said before the blade cut the very space around them.

And then the time bubble crashed.