[@Floodtalon][@Cu Chulainn][@Argonaut] [@Seirei No Hai] [center][h1]The Sensei[/H1][/center] [center][img]https://i.imgur.com/Flfan1p.png[/img][/center] [center][h1]Miyama Native District - Assaulted Yakuza Safehouse[/h1][/center] He knew of their approach before they came, the shift in the attention and movement of the masses clear as day through the eyes of his familiars.The butchering on the streets paused as the mobs were directed towards a target. The place where they were held up. He had returned to this first initial safehouse to rest as the streets no longer held anyone struggling to escape or in need of shelter. There were people still who were stuck in their homes, but they were somewhat more protected than the people who were stranded out on the streets earlier. Ah, this was quite problematic. His body was recovered but this was a force that he could not defeat even in his prime. He forced the creeping sensation of fatigue away, burying it beneath his convictions as he set off to prepare for this assault that likely was the last. But if it could be broken here, then perhaps the mob would lose its power. But that would mean an extraordinary amount of death at this point.. But he already made his choice. The people with him were the ones he sided with. Even if that meant the death of those who assaulted this bastion. He took a knife in hand and brought it down upon his arm. “Hey, what’re ya doin?!” cried out one of the men who had earlier held a glum expression, pale fingers clutched around a gun. One of the yakuza-men. The cries of those who had been murmuring to themselves, calm for a time due to his work shrieked out in terror. After all to them it seemed like a sudden act of self-mutilation. In turn he held up a palm, unshaking and firm to encompass their fears and quell them. “It is fine.” he murmured as he raised his arm so it would drip upon himself. Anointing himself. There was no fear in using one’s blood. After all the body of one’s self was the greatest catalyst, and blood was a fluid that held great meaning in many cultures. Especially in the one he left. The safehouse he prepared was a shrine, a place where a god could temporarily manifest. He already had worked on preparing the space for various means. But now with the conflict coming to such a head there was the need for more. It is said that the sun has a cycle of 52 years, that the night was kept away due to the works of a god. A god who brought victory, a god who brought defeat. In war he was invoked and in times of celebration he was offered sustenance in the form of human blood so the world may continue on. His name was Huitzilopochtli. Flames were born as the spirits were invoked. His arms became wreathed by a set of two serpents. Snake spirits transformed and colored into Xiuhcoatls, the fire-serpents of Xiuhtecuhtli, the firelord who represented the needs of people. Plenty and sustenance when they starved, light and illumination when all was dark. The father who gave birth to the gods, the one who slept within the hearths and flames in the homes of their people. With his blood as a catalyst it became a wreath of burning flames that fed upon the blood, combining the serpentine nature of the Xiuhcoalts, and the duality of Xiuhtecuhtli as a god of flame and water. With the Xiuhcoatls coiling around them, his arms became the weapons of the sun which came to dwell in this shrine. But that alone would not be enough. To simply strike down man after man would not be enough. The weight of so many men was simply not something that a human could overturn. So he simply needed to show them that this was a battlefield of a war, that they were no warriors who would stand in such a place. It was said that as a sun Huitzilopochtli was too brilliant even for even the greatest of warriors to look upon. Of course the Horse of Fuyuki could not bring such a brilliance that equalled a higher-order being, or a divine spirit. But the glow of the sun was one that demanded bravery to see through. The bravest flew with him, in the glory of the sun as birds. So the birds would carry that light and show it to those who did not know of it. The brave spirits that carried all that they did not would fly and show them their mistake. The fact that they did not recognize that they were weak. They lashed out because they were weak. Fearful. It was not a display of strength, but merely their inability to cling to even hope, their failure to endure. He took a hold of a wooden stick he had grabbed earlier while out and carved it into a beak-like spear. It transformed into a ray of the sun, a small piece of its radiance carried by bird spirits as one by one they filled the spear. As the doors opened, giving way to the siege of the crowds he threw the beak , the sunbeam roaring through as a burning missile that pierced through the first two men, setting them ablaze before it exploded in a radiant burst of hummingbirds that pierced into the hearts of the mob. They were no warriors, they were not strong. Simple fearful children in the eyes of the sun that pitied them and yet scorned them. The sun reminded them of their nature. This was no quest for justice, no campaign for good. A rampage that was born out of fear, a rampage that did not even have the strength to unapologetically commit crimes. Dressed up as a crusade with the flimsiest excuses they came to attack the weak in the name of “punishing the Yakuza” Even if they chose not to acknowledge it and buried the truth within their hearts the sun would illuminate it. Chased by the birds who carried the light of courage, many fled. There were only two gang members with him at the Safehouse, and despite their awe and incredulity at the works of the American their pride and self-preservation instincts kicked as the doors were battered down. The explosive noise of gunfire filled the building as those who pushed through the doors were shot down. The horse charged into the ranks of the rioters that were reminded of their fear, the light illuminating the darkness that was their hearts. His fists lashed out, crumbling man after man. Crush the heart, shatter the neck, crack the skull. The flame of the serpents spread, man after man set ablaze by the fists of the defender of those innocent. The entrance into the safehouse was turned into the gate of hell, with those few who slipped past the horse shot down by the two men who fought with him. You don’t belong on this battlefield. To those who created a hell, and yet could advance through the flames. The lesser of normal men who let themselves ruled by their animalistic instinct and fear. No warriors were among them, no brave souls. Only the desperate defined by their weakness. If it were simply a matter of rioters who charged into the fray like animals then it would be a simple matter. But there was a problem that showed itself all too clear when a man before him suddenly fell to the ground, the back of his head burst open by a bullet. They too had guns. Bullets rained down upon the shelter itself, the walls holding up by virtue of the spirits that reinforced it. He heard a cry from one of the Yakuza. Odashii was his name. His body collapsed, his knee collapsing under him as a shot ripped through his leg. Flames and spirits sparked up to aid and defend those in the safehouse, but the power of those modern weapons were too much. Perhaps if he had more time, perhaps if he was a greater practitioner like that man... even if their own men blocked the way, giving him more cover than the two men with him. With the enemy gunmen firing without care or restraint it would only be a matter of time before he too was shot down. The wound of Odashii was mending, the shrine that was the safehouse allowing the influence of Ixtlilton and Piltzintecuhtli to heal and ease those under his protection. But even with that a gunshot was a crippling wound, and no amount of magical healing would help against a fatal shot in the head. So he bid the serpents to search out for those who brandished such weapons of death. To scorch them, to devour them. With the horde of men beaten back by his fists, and more and more burning and panicking as the flames already born from the serpents in their time augmenting his fists and lashing out at those who moved to strike him, the ability to lay down fire upon the martial artist was already hampered to the maximum. The engulfing of the gunmen in flames as the serpents targeted them specifically only added to that. Madness could only take one so far. Even if it brought one beyond their common sense there was only so far an existence that was so unpolished could go. The fear that returned to them, no longer suppressed by indulgence, violence and the chemicals that rushed through their brains created doubt. The death dealt out by those who defended the safehouse and the flames created panic was as demoralizing as the events that led to the riots, all the more powerful with how it was directed specifically at them. It was no grand catalyst that would end a world. It was no great event that threatened to separate Fuyuki into it's own texture. But. To advance further, to advance towards him was to be enveloped in a hell that would absolutely burn them. Ah, how easy it was to take lives. Men scattered and broke, warring among themselves, caught between those who still wished to push on, and those who wished to escape. How terrible. He hoped then that, for their sake and his own sake that they would all flee soon.