The minister's accusation saturated the throne room with heavy poison. Ren could feel his blood freeze, then boil. His fists clenched until his knuckles cracked. "Why?" he asked, voice shaking with fury. "Why kill him? He has done no wrong!"
The emperor's stare was icy. "It is my will. Kill your brother. It is your duty."
Anger boiled in Ren, and he wanted nothing more than to strike the throne itself. This is the path of myth; he told himself and beat the urge back inside himself. "Father..." That tasted like ash. "I cannot. He is my brother. My blood."
"I AM YOUR EMPEROR!" The emperor bellowed, throwing a priceless vase at Ren's head. Ren dodged just in time, hearing the porcelain crash behind him. "OBEY ME OR BE BRANDED A TRAITOR! Ousu no mikoto!"
Ren's eyes were burning red. "Duties have choices, Emperor! It is my life pledged!"
The emperor's laugh was cruel. "Choice? Childish nonsense! The State endures above all else! Your whole life is for the Empire!"
The twisted truth cut into Ren like a blade. He made his fists tighter; sharp nails drew blood that dripped off his hand and splashed onto the polished stone floor. Drip. Drip. Instantly the guards had spears fixed at his heart. "A subject's highest duty to the State."
Ren conceded, the words bitter. "But show me proof of his treason!"
A grinning Minister strode forward. "Proof! He conspired against the throne! Kill him! Osu no Mikoto," the man's grin turned dangerous, "if not, we will hire someone else, and you will die on the traitor's pyre too."
Ren's path disappeared. Saying no means they die, too. Saying yes means killing his own brother. The chains of the myth pulled tighter. "Fine," Ren said emptily, "I will kill him tonight. Alone."
"If you fail," the Emperor grinned deeper, malice flashing, "you will die screaming next to him."
Ren nodded, curtly, in silence. Turning on his heel, he exited the oppressively rich royal chamber, abandoning the smell of his blood and the Emperor's malice to the air.
It felt to Ren as if he were walking to his own death. Every footfall echoed the heavy dread in his chest. He opened the door, his mind filled with courage for the confrontation, only to find himself frozen in the entry way.
Ren pushed the door forward to his brother's doorway. A peal of thunder split the air. Lightning flashed brightly enough for Ren to see his brother sitting poised in the room's gloom... barely a knife gleamed on the table before him. The room returned to darkness.
His brother stood, lighting paper lanterns. Their soft glow revealed their serene acceptance of their tragic ambitions and circumstances. "I know why you are here, Little Brother."
Shame crushed Ren, and he looked at his feet. "I'm sorry... I let you down."
His brother's slap jerked his head back, hard and stingy. "Have you lost your mind? Don't you dare cry!" His brother hissed, fierce love burned bright in his eyes. "Swear it! Swear you will live! Completely! For the two of us!"
Ren swallowed down the sob and rubbed his cheek. He met his brother's unyielding gaze. "I swear, I will live."
Another thunderclap rattled the walls. "Walk with me, little brother," his brother murmured. "One final time."
Silently, Ren followed him into the storm-soaked night. The rain immediately drenched them as they walked towards the empty training grounds. The familiar smells of the oiled metal hung heavy in the wet air, strangely suffocating tonight. Why me? Why him? Why this nightmare? His thoughts screamed.
He kicked something hard. A discarded practice sword lay half-sunk in mud. Dread gripped him. "Big Brother, please! Don't—!"
But his brother's movements were lightning swift. He yanked the fallen sword and shot forward faster than Ren could reposition. Steel whistled around and cut through the air toward Ren's throat! He was purely acting out of instinct.
He yanked the sword at his feet free, parrying the slash just in time. The force staggered him back.
"Big Brother?" Ren yelped, aghast. A new assault ensued, again he sidestepped, not quick enough. Heat ignited his neck—a narrow line of blood began to bubble.
"I have learned by emulation," said his sibling, blade once more raised, sadness warred with determination. "So finish it, brother. Kill me now. Or I swear, I'll kill you, and then myself."
"NO! STOP!" Ren screamed as he desperately parried a hail of heavy, legitimate blows. His cries felt lost in the storm.
The last time they fought, his big brother fought with barely restrained rage, but now—now his brother fighting with an unyielding earnestness synonymous with his own deliberate, lethal style, and all he wanted was to fight an end to his soul.
Shadows flitted like rats high on the student-leader mind, raining the wall of the palace. Assassins. "His Grace's insurance," one whispered. "Prince has bite after all."
Ren opened a window in his grief. Duty hardened to arctic resolve. "Then if this is your will..." he repositioned into a ready stance—the 'Falling Petal'. "...I will accept." He sprang forward, blade flashing silver, first to end it clean.
His brother traversed Ren's attack. He did not seek to avoid the rupture, his brother baited him with a motion, blade climbed unhurriedly in a dying, frustrated arc.
Ren screamed. He stared, disbelieving, at the bloody stumps were his hands were. Blood fountained, into the mud. "AAAGHH! GODS!"
His brother was looming over him with his blade raised high. The look on his brother's face was one of deep regret, but unheard words lingered. "Now... it ends."
Ren turned his face from the mud, pain and anger becoming one in a manifestation of monstrous proportions. "Sorry, Brother..." Blood began bubbling on his lips. "Not today."
[BALNC]
As he muttered that word.
An impossibly wet sound. Ren's severed hands flew through the air, landing back onto his wrists. Flesh sealed shut. Bone knit. He grasped at his sword on the ground.
"W-What sorcery is this, Brother?" He stuttered, taking an instinctive step backward. The sword in his hand began to waver. "What ar—"
The question died in his throat as Ren exploded. The blade shimmered once in the air—a single perfect cut.
THUD.
His brother's head fell heavily into the mud, and his body stood for a heartbeat. Then, it crumpled.
Ren stood over him, the rain now washing away his brother's blood. "Thank you... for everything," he muttered, tears mixed with the rain. "I loved you. But I was never really your brother."
Lightning struck a tree nearby, and set it alight, consuming it in a writhing fire. The light illuminated the assassins on the wall, frozen in absolute terror.
Ren's attention snapped to them. Crimson lines opened across their torsos. They looked down - then their midsections sheared apart, and their remains fell away into darkness.
The monster in him dissipated. Ren fell to his knees, retching. The agony inside him gutted him like a knife, deeper than flesh. This - this screaming void - is the cost of killing love?
Ren tilted his face to the raging storm. "No more bonds. Only the myth. Only the end." A blinding pain lanced through his skull. His sword fell from his fingers. He clutched his head, then fell into the blood and mud, a weeping, shaking mass - a broken person in the heart of the storm.
Unseen, behind the wall of the whole training area a shadowy figure standing there.