Title: The Swordsman's Adventures
Premise/Rough Summary: A man awakens in a world he doesn't remember traveling to or being in with abilities he doesn't remember having or asking for. What else should he do but wander, meet new people, and have the laidback life he always dreamed about?
Extra Info: OP MC with Absolute Swordsmanship, which entails a lot of other powers/abilities which I take from SuperpowerWiki, who will travel from world to world doing whatever he wants for as long as he wants before moving on. There is no real story besides me putting him in situations I want to see.
MC Appearance: Younger Sasaki Kojiro from Records of Ragnarok, but due to his abilities, one of which is Body Supremacy, he has complete control over his body which means he can change his appearance whenever he wants to whomever he wants. Sasaki Kojiro is his real appearance, however.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In the vast unending reaches of the universe, there are millions of superclusters, trillions of galaxies, and an almost uncountable number of stars and planets. But in one corner of the universe, lies the Milky Way Galaxy which houses a small planet.
Earth, a beautiful and vibrant planet that when viewed from space displays a striking combination of blue, green, and white, representing the oceans, landmasses, and clouds, respectively.
But this Earth was not that.
The once vibrant planet was now desolate. No longer were there blue, green, and white, only brown, gray, and red. The ocean was drained, the landmasses were no longer intact but scarred and splintered, and gray storm clouds and black ash replaced the white clouds.
Humans were once the predominant species on the planet but were long gone. The only living things that remained were whatever adapted to survive the harsh planet, and even they were far few.
Despite that, two towering white edifices stood tall in the wastelands, and in between them, ran a river of blood in which a giant statue of Lady Death stood.
The reason why such an enormous statue was erected could be found in one of the two white towers, knelt in front of a smaller statue of Lady Death in a temple dedicated to her honor.
The big bearded purple alien covered in golden armor knelt before the statue and laid a black rose at its feet. He looked up at the statue with eyes full of love and reverence.
"Are you watching, my love?" asked the alien with a deep voice that seemed as if it had experienced everything the universe had to offer, and more, "Do you see what I have done for you? Do you see what I am prepared to kill to be-"
"Old man!" shouted a voice that the purple alien turned to look at, which turned out to be a younger version of himself.
"Enough! Thanos waits for no one! Not even Thanos!" said the younger Thanos as he entered the temple full of anger and bravado and walked up to the older Thanos, "You leave me to play errand boy with your fool servant while you laze away playing dress-up in some-"
"Silence!" said the older Thanos as he drew the sword at his side, igniting it as he placed it at the younger Thanos' throat, "I have suffered more than enough of your impatience and disrespect in my own halls, boy! But not here! Not in her temple! One more insolent word from you and I will open your throat and kill us both."
The young Thanos who was full of impatience and anger, quelled his emotions and focused his eyes on the flaming sword, which brought a smile to his face.
"This is Surtur's Twilight. The Sword of Doom."
"It certainly used to be." replied the older Thanos with an identical smile.
"I see my temper burns as ever in my doddering old age."
"On occasion, yes. The edge of war is almost upon us, and I am..."
"Scared?"
"Anxious to be rid of you." he said as he sheathed his sword.
"I do apologize for my tone, Lord Thanos." said the young Thanos as he walked past his older self and made his way to the statue of Lady Death, "It's just that you are rather a disappointment to me. Surely you must understand I come from a time where I have renounced the Black Lady. I am no longer her fool. And to come here and see you still pining after-"
"Ha!" loudly laughed the older Thanos as he sat on one of the pews, "Is that right? Tell me then, when you looked into the Rider's eyes this morning, what did you see staring back at you?"
Hearing his words, the younger Thanos turned back to look at the older Thanos with a look as if he had been caught.
"I thought so. You were always her fool, boy. Always will be. You think you have given her up but no one walks away from death. Not even you."
"And when exactly was the last time you saw your great love?" asked the younger Thanos.
"Oh, hundreds of years ago? Thousands? I don't recall time anymore ... it was after I killed that gold-skinned boy. What was his name? Aaron something?" he said with unfocused eyes as he tried to recall long-buried memories.
"Adam?"
"Ah, yes, perhaps it was. She was waiting for me after the battle. But, she ... just stood there. Not saying a word. As if she were waiting for something ... something ... more. I didn't know what it was ... it took me so long to see it. I gave her everything. My enemies. My allies. My children. Everything. And yet..."
"Maybe she doesn't like you." said a male voice, causing both Thanos' to turn in the direction the voice came.
Sitting on a pew, looking at the two Thanos was a well-built and handsome young man with black hair pinned up wearing a faded t-shirt and pajama bottoms with bare feet.
"Who are you? A ghost come to haunt me?" asked the older Thanos.
"Just a wanderer." said the young man with a smile.
"A wanderer, you say? I see. Then be gone." said the older Thanos who flicked a ball of energy at the young man, expecting him to disappear into nothing.
Instead, the ball of energy split into two and blew up behind the young man. Oddly, the young man made no movements, yet the ball was cut into two.
"It seems you have some skill, but nothing is ever enough in front of Thanos." he said as he unleashed a full blast of energy at the young man, destroying the pew he was sitting on as well as the terrain behind him.
"A nuisance." said the young Thanos.
"It has been a long time since I've experienced one. It almost felt nice." said the older Thanos with a shadow of a smile.
"Cough, cough."
Hearing the coughing, the two Thanos' again turned to see the young man unharmed but naked.
"Come on guy, dust almost got in my lungs. And you ruined my only pair of clothes." said the young man as he waved the dust away while something else similarly swayed with his movements.
"Fine, color me intrigued, Wanderer. Who are you and what do you want?" asked the old Thanos.
"I said I was a wanderer so I wandered here. At first, I was just intrigued at the time and place I found myself in, but after talking to your flaming and hulking friends, I decided it was best to do something." said the Wanderer.
"They are not my friends, they are just fools and pets I keep around to keep myself entertained." said Old Thanos.
"Well, either way, I helped them out with their insanity problem before making my way up here. Your flaming jester told me he brought your past self to the future so he could help you with something. That's good news for me and bad news for you."
"Do pray tell why is that bad news for us?" asked the young Thanos, a look of ridicule on his face.
"Because now it saves me the trouble of having to go back in time and kill you." he said, causing the two Thanos' to look at each other before bursting out laughing.
"Boy, it seems you are not only naive but ignorant. We are Thanos. No matter the injury, we will return. We are immortal. Beyond gods or anything you can imagine. And we tire of your stupidity." said Old Thanos as he unsheathed the sword at his hip, igniting it once more, before rushing at the Wanderer and swinging the sword down at his head.
Instead of the scene of slaughter the two Thanos expected, they saw the Wanderer stop the sword in between his two fingers.
"You call that swordsmanship. You're no better than a monkey swinging a stick." said the Wanderer as he took the sword from Thanos' hand before he could even react.
"Let me show you what real swordsmanship looks like." he said as he swung the sword faster than either Thanos could see much less react.
The older Thanos, having seen things beyond most being's wildest dreams, and having been bored with life for the last few millennia, thought that one sword swing from the naked human was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. So beautiful that for a split-second he forgot all about Lady Death's beauty, and what that sword swing meant for him.
Thanos stilled in front of the Wanderer after the swing until a gust of wind blew through the temple and caused his body to split into two halves, revealing young Thanos' face of complete and utter shock.
"Beautiful wasn't it?" asked the Wanderer as he inspected the Twilight Sword, "When brought to its absolute limit, swordsmanship can cut through anything. Even that not thought cuttable."
"What are you?" asked Thanos, his face now taut with focus after having seen his future self brought down with a simple yet profoundly beautiful stroke of the sword.
"Just a man who's decided to wander and live a carefree existence till the day he's decided he's had enough." he said as he casually waved his sword once more resulting in all four of Thanos' limbs being severed, causing his limbless torso to fall to the ground.
With limbs severed from his body, one would expect blood to flow freely, but there was no blood flowing from the wounds. It was as if the wounds were cauterized as the sword cut through the flesh.
"I thought you wanted to kill me." said Thanos through gritted teeth.
"Not a single yell of pain, impressive." said the Wanderer as he walked up to the fallen Thanos, "I do, but I know that once I do this timeline will cease to exist and I wanted to have a talk with a certain someone before that happened."
The Wanderer then turned around to see a beautiful pale black-haired woman dressed in a very elegant black gown with a grey veil.
"Death." said Thanos with a surprised, yet enchanted look on his face, expecting her to turn to look at him whom she favored so, but instead all he saw was Death looking only at the Wanderer.
"So you're the infamous Death this guy is so infatuated with that he would kill the entire universe for your favor?" said the Wanderer, giving the physical embodiment of Death a once-over before looking into her eyes with a smile, "I can see why."
"Thank you for the compliment, Wanderer." she said with no change in her impassive attitude, "I could not feel your existence until you killed Thanos and even now with you standing before me, it feels as if you are not real. Why?"
"Way too much thinking for me. Just take it as something that is because it is." said the Wanderer.
"Where did you come from?"
"I do not know. All I know is I wandered here." he said, winking at her.
"I see." she said before finally taking a glance at the incapacitated Thanos, "And you seek to kill Thanos?"
"Truthfully, I couldn't give a rat's ass about him. I have no plans to involve myself in anything that is none of my business. All I want to do from now on is go where the wind takes me and live a carefree life." he said as he closed his eyes and felt the wind blow before looking back at Death, "That being said, I've already involved myself in this and I plan to see it through."
"And if I were to intervene? Thanos is my Chosen after all." she said, staring into his eyes while her face seemed to blur, revealing a silhouette of a skull.
"Then I will have no choice but to kill Death." said the Wanderer with the Twilight Sword on his shoulder while a carefree smile adorned his face, not backing down from her stare.
But the smile was anything but carefree for Death. Instead, she felt a tremendous pressure on her and her very being that let her know that one move from the man in front of her would truly spell her end. Not the end of her Manifestation-Body, but the end of her.
The end of Death.
Feeling that immense pressure from the man standing in front of her caused Death to break out into a cold sweat for the very first time since she came into being. She felt fear, yes, but more importantly, she felt death, and it made her smile.
"Okay." she said her impassive attitude switching to that of an upbeat girl who had found something fun to play with.
"Okay?! I am your Chosen! I am Thanos! You cannot do this to me!" shouted Thanos from the ground, fury filling his face and spittle flying everywhere, "I have razed planets for you! I have killed countless beings for you! You can't throw me away!"
Death then turned to look at the fallen Thanos, but gone was the visage of the beautiful woman she took when appearing before her Chosen, and in its place was a skull, the form she chose to manifest in for regular beings.
"Says who?" she said impassively, turning to look back at the Wanderer with her beautiful visage restored before clinging to his arm, "Okay, you can do it now."
"Thanos does not yield!" he shouted as he shot beams of energy from his eyes at the Wanderer who simply stood there as the beams split apart and did not touch him.
Realizing that any attack would be useless on the Wanderer, Thanos decided that escape was his next best hope. He turned his head to the side and unleashed a full-powered eye blast in the hopes that the force would send him flying from the temple, granting him time.
Unfortunately for him, he was in the presence of one being who could react to virtually anything and one who could react to anything.
The Wanderer appeared in the trajectory that Thanos was hoping to launch himself and stopped the limbless alien's momentum.
"Nice try." said the Wanderer before thrusting the Twilight Sword at Thanos.
Instead of the sword impaling him as Thanos expected, it passed right through him. But his confusion was short-lived as he felt all his power disappear. His strength and his ability to manipulate energy and matter, all gone as if they never existed.
"Why didn't you just kill him?" asked Death, appearing right behind him and peering over his shoulder at the once mighty Thanos.
"Because there are others who wish to see him dead more than I." said the Wanderer right before a tremor was felt all throughout the world and an explosion shattered the remaining windows of the temple.
"Oh goody, more fun." she said clapping her hands as she skipped out of the temple while the Wanderer followed behind her while dragging Thanos who he had chained up by creating a whipsword to drag him.
Outside, the desolate sky had ripped open and was spewing out an army of odd insectoid creatures who were being led by a very dark-gray figure on a surfboard. It was clear that the figure on the surfboard had come with a vengeance but after seeing the Wanderer standing outside with a limbless Thanos, his mind blanked.
He had arrived at Earth knowing that this was his last fight. He had spent countless years planning and plotting for the day when he would finally take the fight to Thanos. Seeing him limbless before the fight could even start made his mind go blank.
Unfortunately, the army of insectoids that had once belonged to Annihilus did not receive an order to stop and continued their attack.
"Sto-" said the Silver Surfer, about to command the army to halt their advance but before he could finish uttering his command, the entire army disappeared into motes of dust.
"You took them out so fast, don't tell me you're afraid of bugs?" said Death teasingly, having rewrapped herself around the Wanderer's arm while running two of her fingers across his arm, mimicking a bug.
"What can I say, they give me the heebie-jeebies." he said to her before looking at the Silver Surfer who had stopped in front of them.
"Where is Thanos?" he asked, getting straight to the point.
"Right here." said the Wanderer throwing the limbless Thanos on the ground in between the two parties while dispelling the whipsword used to bind him.
"That is not the Thanos I speak of." he said after a quick glance at the young Thanos.
"Oh, that Thanos. He's dead back there." said the Wanderer pointing at the temple behind them, causing the Silver Surfer to look through the entrance where the body could be clearly seen.
"You killed him?" he asked, incredulity filling his voice.
"Yeah."
"Why?"
"Long story, not important. Anyway, this is the young Thanos whom Old Thanos brought to the future to help fight you. Kill him and this whole timeline is avoided." said the Wanderer.
"He will come back." he said, shaking his head, knowing that Thanos always comes back.
"No, he won't. Trust me. Even if he does, just the pure act of killing him guarantees that this timeline will cease to exist."
"How do you know that? Thanos is Death's Chosen." said the Silver Surfer.
"Not anymore." said Death, surprising the Silver Surfer who was unable to see her until she spoke to him.
"Told you. If he dies, he dies. Not even all the magic and scientific bullshit that's possible in this world will bring him back."
"So I can prevent all of this?" said the Silver Surfer, hope appearing on his face for the first time in millennia.
"Yes, you can prevent all of this death and destruction. You can prevent your friends from seeing each other fail and die. You can prevent your solitude and your guilt." said the Wanderer, staring into the Surfer's eyes.
"Then what is there to think about?" he said, raising his hand at Thanos and vaporizing him with a blast of Power Cosmic without hesitating for even a moment.
A moment passes and all is as it ever was. Followed by a cold wind.
"I do not know who you are, why you are here, or why you are naked, but thank you. I am unsure if I would have been able to take on two Thanos, a Rider, and a Hulk. Perhaps I too would have died in vain, joining the rest of my compatriots, but thanks to you, this will all be avoided." said the Silver Surfer to the Wanderer, holding his hand out for a shake while a genuine but weary smile appeared on his face.
And with the cold wind, the end of everything.
"No need for thanks." he said, shaking the Surfer's hand as everything around him and Death began to fade until there was nothing left except the two of them.
"What shall we do now?" asked Death, looking up at his face.
"Nothing. You shall continue to be what you are, and I will continue to be what I am." he said.
"And what is that?"
"A wanderer." he said as he brushed her hair back, "One who will wander beyond even your reach."
"I see. Then before you continue on your journey, let me leave you with something to remember me by." she said, pushing him onto a bed that had materialized out of nowhere before getting on top of him.
"Guess I could hold off on leaving for a while." he said with a smile.
~
After what could only be described as a long period of time, though how long exactly is unknowable, the two figures stopped their tryst and lay in the bed. Of course, given their strength, they were not tired at all since neither of them could unless it was the most dire of circumstances.
"That was fun." said the Wanderer as he looked over at Death, who had a smile.
"Indeed. Sex is perhaps the best thing to ever come out of mortal lives." she said.
"Just need a cigarette and this would be even better." he said before a pack of them appeared on his chest.
"They'll never run out. Consider it another goodbye present from me, Wanderer." said Death as she stood up from the bed.
"Well since you can do that, would it be too much to ask for some clothes as well? Don't really want to be naked all the time." he said as he took a cigarette, lit it with a flame he created on his fingertip, and took a drag.
"You have so much strength and ability and yet you can't do something as simple as make clothing?" she asked with a teasing smile and questioning look in her eyes.
"I can but you can do it faster. Probably." he said as he blew out the smoke and closed his eyes.
The cigarettes could not affect him, neither their normally intoxicating effect nor their potential side effects. But smoking cigarettes was a pastime for him, and reminded him of a vastly different time.
"Very well." she said as a black garment appeared on the Wanderer's body, covering from his torso down, "They can change to be what you want, and they're virtually indestructible. Though not for beings such as you and I."
"Thanks." he said before creating a pendant-sized longsword and handing it over to her.
"What is this?" she asked as he inspected the sword and saw nothing out of the ordinary.
"Communicator. Call me whenever you want to see me or if you need my help. I'll come." he said with a smile.
"Can you not stay for longer? This world has much to offer and there is much to see." she said, clenching the tiny sword in her hand.
"I don't doubt it, but I wish to continue to wander." he said, disappearing and reappearing next to Death with his hands at her face, "I'll be here in a heartbeat if you ever get lonely."
"Very well. I will settle for that." she said, kissing him one last time before disappearing, leaving the Wanderer on his own.
"Day oneish on my journey and I already made an all-powerful abstract entity fall for me." he said, scratching his chin with a troubled face before it turned into a smile, "Life is good."