Chapter 37: Liquid Gold

I pull my fist back, Primal Energy and Ki swirling beneath my skin as my entire arm is swallowed by a spinning torrent of blue and white.

And with a shout, I punch.

The world trembles on the impact, and a resounding shockwave passes through the air. Winds befitting of a typhoon sweeps across us all, and the flames on Kagutsuchi's feathers are temporarily smothered out as he goes crashing into the planet.

But I'm not done. Primal Energy fills my legs, and I kick the air itself as I blur down towards the earth. Kagutsuchi's fast to move, opening his beaks and sending a beam of fire at my chest.

I don't move out of the way. I let the beam crash onto my chest and burn out my back, plowing a melted hole straight through my torso. The god looks surprised, but that shock gives me time to finally inch my way down, and by then, my other arm is already cocked back, swallowed by an even larger swirl of blue and white.

Three things happen all at once.

My fist crashes into Kagutsuchi's avian skull. The swirling focus of Primal Energy and Ki is shot forward, drilling into Kagutsuchi's head as he screams. The sheer density of energy I'm releasing causes the flesh from my arm to tear, sending blood flying out through the small slits in my armor.

The 'mark' I placed on Kagutsuchi activates, and that second impact strikes at the same time as the first. Even more Primal Energy and Ki crashes onto the downed god, and I grit my teeth as agonizing heat floods through my veins.

The hundreds of 'Exploding' Ofudas hidden in the slits of my gauntlets light up, their blood-drenched characters glowing a bright white as Primal Energy crashes out into the world en masse.

A moment later, the world turns white as a tremendous explosion comes into being. A ball of pure white, slowly expanding outwards as it sucks in air. Anything inside the ball is vaporized. Any person unfortunate enough to be caught inside is turned to ash in an instant. The soil and stone below are pulverized, turned into specks tinier than the eye can see.

It was as if a miniature star had crashed onto the planet.

A second later, the air that'd been sucked in explodes outward in a terrific shockwave, washing over everything not caught by the explosion itself. What few buildings are left in the village are flattered. Anyone caught unprepared are killed, their insides crushed from the sheer pressure. Anyone else was blown away, and crash back with horrific injuries.

Smoke fills the area. Silence reigns in the now flattened village. All forms of movements cease.

And then, the smoke is blown away as Kagutsuchi rises back up with a screech, flames burning across every feather. He looks none worse for wear; the injuries I'd dealt to him gone in mere seconds.

But he then freezes as more smoke clears, and he finds me standing just a distance away. Half of my armor is destroyed, but I'm unharmed. My fractured arm is perfectly fine, and the burns and scars that explosion should've dealt are nowhere to be found.

I smirk, and though his current avian form can make no expression, I can feel his shocked fury through my eyes.

It's not actually true, of course. That explosion had definitely damaged me. In the moments after, my entire arm had been blown to smithereens, with nothing but my bones remaining. Half of my torso had been burnt, and I'd lost sight in one of my eyes.

But my Primal Energy had quickly gone to work, flooding the injured parts of my body and beginning reparations. My Ki further bolstered that, working in tandem to fix what was lost. And by using Senjutsu to heal myself, I'd also sucked in some of the corruption hanging in the air. The corruption was then assimilated and turned into Primal Energy.

Even now, I'm still sucking in more corruption as I heal my damaged insides, gaining more and more Primal Energy as it assimilates the corruption.

By the end of it, I'm as good as new. If anything, I'm even stronger, having gained more Primal Energy from the corruption I took in.

The only thing I'm worrying about is my slowly deteriorating lucidity. I can feel the beginnings of the euphoric high in the back of my mind, and it'll continue to grow the more I use Senjutsu to fix myself up.

But that's fine. My enemy is a god; I can let myself loose.

Kagutsuchi screeches in anger, and he sends out a rain of flaming feathers. They rush towards me faster than bullets, turning into needles of red to the common eye.

I suck in a breath, and I move. I twist and swerve around the incoming feathers, letting them crash to the earth behind me and explode into brilliant sparks. And as I do so I kick off the air, lunging further and further towards the airborne god.

In no time, we're inches apart from one another. Kagutsuchi's eyes burn, and he screeches as giant flames rise from his body. The temperature of the air rises dangerously, and I wince as my skin begins to burn.

In response, my healing kicks up another notch, and my skin is healed the moment they burn.

We begin trading attacks in the air. I strike him with my fists, and then follow it by activating the various 'marks' I place on him. Kagutsuchi fights back with his talons, turning in the air and swiping the burning talons at me as he continues to increase the heat.

I don't bother dodging; more injuries only means more corruption I'm taking in as I heal myself. And more corruption means even more Primal Energy, which leads to even more healing.

But Kagutsuchi does the same. Using the tremendous well of Divine Energy contained in his avian body, he fixes what damage I deal to him. The feathers he spent are returned in seconds. The talons I break are regenerated in moments.

And it truly is incredible. When Kagutsuchi descended into the Vermillion Bird, he infused his avian body with a fraction of his Divine Energy. The thing I'm fighting now is nothing but a fragment of the true god, and yet he contains a staggering amount of Divine Energy.

Even now, after several minutes of trading blows, he's only spent about a tenth of his Divine Energy.

However, that's exactly what I wanted. If Divine Energy was anything less than this, I would've been disappointed.

But my time for playing around is soon to come to an end. I've assimilated too much corruption, and I'm beginning to actually feel high. My motor functions aren't any worse, but my thoughts are slipping.

So I take a breath, and with Kagutsuchi's eyes on me, I send a burst of Primal Energy out of my arm. It causes the unused gauntlets to shatter, revealing hundreds of 'Explosion' Ofudas stuck onto my arm. The god's eyes go wide, and he quickly opens his mouth to fire a beam to sever my arm.

I smile.

I slam my leg onto the lower beak, and my other arm into the upper beak. And before he can fire out the beam, I reach my hand into his mouth and push another burst of Primal Energy through my arm. It comes out as a shock of wind, and it sends the hundreds of 'Explosion Ofudas straight into the god's mouth.

Then, I leap back and kick his beak shut. Kagutsuchi's eyes are wide, and he tries to open his mouth to offload some of the impact.

He's too late. I feel a wave of Primal Energy explode through his body as the Ofudas activate all at once.

Moments later, he lets out a silent scream as hundreds of explosions tear through his insides. Like any living being, the insides of the Vermillion Bird is fragile compared to its outer body. Unprotected flesh, bones, and organs are all burnt, swept and drowned by the cascade of explosions.

This was the first time the god had experienced a pain like it. Not even having his head beheaded by his own father compared.

He falls, and he crashes dully into the carved earth below. I land right next to him, and his lidded eyes glare at me balefully.

The injuries this time are truly immense. He won't die, but it'll take him time to heal back. Not long; just below a minute or so. It's still tremendously quick for injuries that would render anything dead.

A minute of immobility.

It'll have to do.

I bend towards him, and I hold out my hand right over Kagutsuchi's right eye. He glares at it, and I smile behind my fingers.

At my command, Primal Energy and Ki rushes towards my hand, going further past it and into my fingers. And from my fingers they go to my nails, causing them to glow white.

Then, his eyes go wide as my nails suddenly sprout out, growing several inches longer in moments. I keep smiling to hide the jolt of pain I felt.

Then, pinching my elongated nails together, I rear my arm back. Kagutsuchi's eyes are wide, clearly knowing what I'm about to do. But he can't do anything; his inner flesh has yet to heal enough for him to move.

And so he can do nothing but screech as I drill my nails into his right eye. Dark red blood gushes out, completely covering my fingers in deep red. I push further, and before long my entire hand has dug into the god's right eye.

He continues to scream.

But his other eye continues to glare at me. He's thinking that I'm trying to torture him, to find some sick sort of pleasure from bringing down a god. He laughs at me in his mind, trying to wait as he continues healing his insides.

He thinks he knows me.

He doesn't.

Now that my hand is inside his body, I can physically feel his Divine Energy running across my skin. It feels…cold. It's vastly different compared to the electricity of Primal Energy, or the warmth of Ki. It feels uncaring, unreachable. It reminds me of the nights I used to spend sitting on my roof, staring at the unreachable stars in the night skies above.

Except it isn't unreachable by any means, because it's right here, brushing past my blood coated fingers. The dichotomy is making my head hurt.

I decide to shelve that philosophical debate for a later date.

I take a deep breath, and with my Primal Energy as my conduit, I reach into the colossal well of Divine Energy, and I pull.

And I feel pain. A pain I've never felt. It's agonizing, and it feels like every inch of my bone is slowly being torn apart. But I keep going, pulling more and more Divine Energy into my body, biting my tongue to keep myself silent.

Unseen to all but my eyes, a pattern of blue begins glowing across my hand, and it slowly creeps up my arm and towards the rest of my body.

Kagutsuchi continues glaring at me, not knowing that I'm draining his energy. He doesn't feel it. At least, not yet.

And then, seconds later, he does. He can feel his consciousness shrinking. It's small, barely noticeable, but it is shrinking. It isn't long before he finds out that I'm somehow draining him of his Divine Energy, and his anger rises to new heights. But he can't do anything; he hasn't healed enough yet.

I pull more and more and more, flooding my body with this new foreign entity. My Primal Energy quickly goes to work, trying to consume and assimilate what it can. But it isn't fast enough, and some Divine Energy inevitably begins leaking to the rest of my body, seeping into my very cells and being absorbed.

But strangely, a large amount of Divine Energy is being diverted towards my eyes, as if pulled by some invisible force. A massive amount of Divine Energy enters my eyes, swirling into my retinas.

Then, my eyes begin to die, and I scream.

I'm being literal; the cells that make my eyes are dying one after another, their walls exploding and painting the insides of my skull with blood.

Kagutsuchi somehow grins, laughing at the mortal's pathetic attempt to control a god's power.

That inner laughter quickly dies away when he looks back at my face.

Because, just as the cells in my eyes die, they are reborn, recreated from the broken fragments and stitched together by the Divine Energy. The golden glow of my iris glows even brighter, and my previous black pupils shift to a jagged, white star.

A lot of things happen after that. New information floods my mind. I learn of new applications of the Eyes of God, and of further functions that are still locked away.

But more than anything, the moment this new form of my eyes settle, something in me changes. The Divine Energy that'd previously been so reluctant to leave Kagutsuchi's insides suddenly stop their resistance, flowing into my body giant waves.

Kagutsuchi can feel this. He sees the change in my eyes, and he screeches as he tries to heal faster.

Time is ticking. The minute is about to pass.

Kagutsuchi passes a certain threshold. He becomes able to thrash, and his feathers begin burning.

More and more Divine Energy floods into my body, merging with me and changing my very being.

Then, inevitably,

The minute is up. Kagutsuchi is fully healed, and he screeches as he takes off into the skies, his feathers burning with red and yellow flames. His injuries heal, his torn eyes are repaired, and he glares down at me with unmasked vitriol.

I stagger back slightly, wincing as I weather the storm of information in my head. I then look up at the baleful fragment of a god, and staring at his flames, I grin.

Because it's clear to me that his flames are smaller, and the heat in the air has fallen slightly. And using my eyes, I can see that the previously tremendous well of Divine Energy in his body has significantly shrunk. The god has just below half of the Divine Energy he started out with.

I've taken a lot of his Divine Energy, but it isn't enough. Not yet. My eyes demand more. The Primal Energy coursing through my veins demands more. And I'm happy to oblige.

So I grin, and with a breath I crouch. Strength floods my legs, and the earth sinks entire inches down as I leap into the sky. In a second, I'm floating right in front of Kagutsuchi's face. He glares at me, and I grin back.

His flames grow brighter, and his talons catch aflame. I rear my arm back.

And our battle begins anew.