Chương 119: 118: Fists

The wilderness tore itself apart around them. They had been fighting for almost an hour. Time had lost all meaning here, in the space between the facility's collapse and the world's ending. There was only the forest, the storm they had become, and the slow, patient work of killing one another. Ankou's form flickered. Clock's answered. They had consumed each other for so long the boundaries between them had begun to blur.

DELETE had stripped away the erasure that defined Ankou itself, leaving behind only drifting wisps of oblivion clinging to his fists and a purely physical body. Clock, meanwhile, had been pushed to the brink. His Gloom reserves were nearly exhausted, too depleted to wield properly. The Void Maw's power had faded. His fists no longer erased outright. Each strike merely staggered him, bruising and tearing Clock instead of removing him from existence. Clock's situation wasn't any better.

Every punch from his remaining arm carried enough force to stagger planets, yet striking Ankou felt like hitting dense rubber filled with water. Every ounce of impact disappeared into his biology. He absorbed blunt force with terrifying efficiency, reducing world-shaking blows to little more than love taps. A snake devouring its own tail. A question that had been asking itself for so long it had forgotten what the answer was supposed to be. Their fists collided again. BOOOOM!

Both were blasted apart, skidding backwards through shattered earth. What remained of Ankou...... was a man. Sophisticated enough to resemble a history professor at some prestigious university, one who happened to spend every spare hour beneath a barbell. His body looked carved from stone, broad shoulders, a barrel chest, powerful arms that seemed built for lifting mountains. He still wore a cobalt-and-white three-piece suit, the colours of the Void Maw he had once been, the colours of endless hunger.

The tall hat remained perched neatly atop his head. He removed it first. His jacket followed. His shirt came after. Each piece was folded and set aside with quiet care, as though laying old burdens to rest. Finally, he unwound the tie from around his neck and wrapped it tightly around his right fist. His knuckles were scarred. They were the hands of a man who had been fighting for a very long time, and had never once asked whether there had been another way. Clock truly looked at him for the first time. Tall.

Dark-skinned. Handsome. Without the jacket, Ankou looked less like an eldritch horror and more like a man sculpted by impossible discipline. Lace-like white markings shimmered across his skin, running from his neck over both shoulders and down his powerful arms to his wrists, silver against dark flesh. Thick brows framed stern, refined features above a neatly trimmed goatee and moustache, while tiny black hole-shaped earrings rested beneath carefully cut waves of dark hair. Clock stared for a moment.

"…The Syndicate's barber deserves a raise." Ankou's mouth twitched.

"He is exceptionally talented." They stood apart amid the ruined clearing, where centuries-old trees lay splintered across a landscape gouged into a scar that would outlive them both. Ankou flexed the scarred fingers beneath the tie wrapped around his fist.

"I may have underestimated you." Clock smirked.

"You're welcome."

"You accomplished what no one before you has." Ankou glanced at the wisps of erasure still drifting from his knuckles.

"You tore the Void Maw away from me. You reduced a certainty into flesh."

"Sounds like I won."

"You survived."

"There's a difference?"

"There is." Ankou stepped forward.

"The concept is gone. The hunger remains. I no longer erase existence." The faintest smile touched his lips.

"I merely have to beat you to death." Clock laughed.

"That almost sounds disappointing."

"You've exhausted yourself." Ankou's gaze settled on the ruined arm hanging inside its crude Gloom cast.

"Your greatest techniques are spent. Your arm is ruined. Your reserves are nearly empty."

"You're doing a lot of talking for someone who got turned into a bloke."

"That was your victory." His expression never shifted.

"This will be mine."

"You still think I'm trapped here?"

"I know you are."

"You've got confidence."

"I have certainty." Ankou surveyed the shattered forest before meeting Clock's eyes once more.

"Transport has failed. Your regeneration falters. Every path of retreat has been stripped from you."

"You will not leave these woods." Clock rolled his shoulder.

"Funny."

"What is?"

"I've heard speeches like that before."

"And?"

"They usually come from people about five minutes away from becoming a memory." Silence settled over the clearing. Clock's gaze drifted into empty space. For an instant, he considered drawing the guitar. No. His pride refused. Reaching for it now would mean admitting he needed a weapon to defeat a man standing before him with nothing but his fists. His hand fell back to his side. A grin spread across his face.

"One arm's enough." Ankou gave the slightest nod.

"So be it." KRAAAAAK. Somewhere beyond the shattered clearing, a massive tree was ripped from the earth.... Ankou moved first. His foot struck the earth, and sand exploded upward, swallowing the clearing in a blinding cloud. Clock's eyes closed. The sand wasn't the attack. The tree was. It burst through the haze like a battering ram, its trunk thicker than Clock's torso and moving fast enough to shriek through the air. Clock dipped beneath it in a low sprint.

The trunk skimmed his back before crashing behind him with a deafening- KRAAAAAK! The forest shook. Ankou was already airborne. He launched from a nearby tree, the trunk exploding beneath the force of his leap. Distance seemed to collapse around him as his movements skipped forward in jagged bursts, the remnants of the Void Maw distorting space itself. His knees drove toward Clock like twin spears. Clock rolled beneath them. WHUMP! Ankou cratered the earth where he'd been standing. Clock came up beside a boulder.

Planting his boots, he hooked his good arm beneath it, twisted through his hips, and ripped it free in a single motion. HRNNNN! He spun once and launched it. The stone screamed through the air. Ankou smashed straight through it. CRAAASH! Fragments erupted around him as he charged without slowing, arms spread wide to seize Clock. Clock slipped outside the grab. Capoeira carried him in a flowing sway, his body weaving around Ankou's reach.

With only one hand free, he relied on footwork instead of parries, letting Liuhebafa guide him around every grasp while Chuo Jao turned each step into another angle of attack. He never stopped moving. His heel whipped around. FWACK! The kick cracked across Ankou's jaw hard enough to flatten the surrounding grass beneath the expanding shockwave. Ankou grunted. His head snapped sideways. He stayed standing. His hand shot out. Iron fingers locked around Clock's ankle. Clock's momentum died instantly. Ankou yanked.

The world inverted as Clock was dragged toward him. A grin spread across Ankou's battered face while his free hand reached for Clock's other leg. You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

"I don't need to catch you..." His grip tightened.

"... I only need to keep you." HRAAAAAAGH! He hauled Clock closer, shifting his weight to fold him in half. Speed had ruled the fight until now. This was Ankou's territory. Grappling. The brutal art of breaking anything agile enough to escape every other way. Clock moved before thought. His body flowed through ginga in one continuous wheel of motion. SWISH - THWACK! A kick slammed into Ankou's ribs. BOOM! Air burst outward. SWISH - THUD! A knee struck his chest. KRAK!

A heel snapped across his jaw, sending another shockwave rippling through the shattered trees. Each strike landed exactly where Ankou's balance lived, nudging him inches at a time. By the fifth strike, Clock's trapped ankle slipped free. By the seventh, he was upright. By the ninth, both men were breathing hard. Ankou never fell. HUFF... HUFF... The former Void Maw raised his guard again, broad shoulders rolling. He'd been a wrestler long before he'd learned to consume light. That instinct had survived everything.

They circled. The clearing had become a crater. Clock feinted left, spun right, his heel already climbing toward Ankou's temple- POW! A left hook detonated across Clock's face. His vision burst white. He staggered. Ankou was already inside his reach. Too close for Capoeira. Too close for space. Both hands clamped onto Clock. THUD! A brutal headbutt split his lip. Blood flooded his mouth. Ankou dropped his hips. His shoulder buried into Clock's chest. This was wrestling now. He lifted. Twisted. WHOOOM!

Clock slammed into the earth hard enough to send concentric shockwaves racing through the forest floor. The crater deepened. Ankou collapsed onto him, every kilogram becoming a prison. One hand trapped Clock's only usable arm while the other reached for the joint, preparing to tear it apart. HAH... HAH... Clock couldn't breathe. His free hand shot upward. His thumb drove into Ankou's eye. GRRK! Ankou recoiled just enough. Enough. Clock slipped free. He rolled. Ankou's fist struck empty ground. BOOOOM!

Stone exploded. Clock sprang upright- WHUMP! A hook buried itself into his kidney. The impact folded him in half. The shockwave shredded nearby boulders into gravel, pelting the forest with razor-sharp fragments. Clock's knees nearly buckled. Ankou's knee came screaming toward his skull. Clock dropped and rolled beneath it. KRAAASH! The impact cratered the earth where his head had been, stone erupting skyward beneath the force. Clock surged back to his feet, breathing through clenched teeth.

His vision swam, and fire lanced through his side with every breath. Across from him, Ankou drew a single steady breath. Both men looked exhausted. Neither cared. They exploded forward again. Clock's remaining fist became a blur, chaining a jab into a cross, then a hook. Every strike cracked like artillery, blasting expanding shockwaves through the forest. THOOM! THOOM! THOOM! Ankou absorbed every blow without retreating. He simply kept walking until, in one impossibly fluid motion, he slipped behind Clock.

An arm coiled around Clock's throat. His massive frame locked against Clock's back. The choke sealed shut. Ankou's world had finally become small enough to control. GKK- Clock clawed at Ankou's forearm, his fingers digging into corded muscle as the choke crushed his windpipe. He pulled, twisted, and strained with everything he had been taught to do when another man tried to choke him to death. Nothing. Darkness crept into the edges of his vision as his elbow slammed into Ankou's ribs. THUD! He struck again. CRACK!

A third blow landed with enough force to send a booming shockwave rolling across the shattered clearing. Something shifted. The crushing hold loosened by the smallest fraction, and Clock ripped himself free, dragging burning air into his lungs before he could even recover. POW! Ankou's fist detonated against his jaw. Clock staggered sideways, his balance breaking beneath him, but before he could strike the earth- WHOOOM! Ankou caught him, hoisted him overhead, and drove him straight into the ground.

The crater deepened beneath the impact. Stone erupted skyward in great slabs as agony ripped through Clock's spine. Ankou wasted no time following him down. THOOM! A fist crashed into Clock's face. THOOM! Another buried itself beside his head, cratering solid rock. THOOM! A third split the bedrock beneath his shoulders. Each impact rattled his skull harder than the last, until his vision blurred and every muscle in his body screamed. THOOOM!

Clock answered with a rising punch that exploded into Ankou's jaw, snapping his head sideways as the shockwave blasted debris across the clearing. The larger man's weight shifted just enough. Clock rolled free. Almost. Ankou's hand clamped around his throat again, lifting him effortlessly until he dangled above the ruined ground, boots kicking uselessly through empty air. Clock's free hand darted toward the inside of Ankou's elbow. THCK! His thumb buried itself into the exposed nerve. Ankou's arm spasmed.

Clock dropped. The instant his boots struck the earth, he drove forward. THUD! His forehead smashed into Ankou's nose. OOF! A knee buried itself deep in his stomach. CRACK! An elbow hammered into his spine. The larger man dropped to one knee, and Clock pivoted sharply. THWACK! His heel slammed into the back of Ankou's skull, driving his face into the dirt and sending another shockwave racing through the forest. Silence lingered for the space of a heartbeat. Both men staggered apart, breathing hard.

Neither remained down. Without a word, they raised their guards again. Ankou stepped inside Clock's defence and cracked a fist into his ribs. CRACK. The breath fled Clock's lungs. Another punch found him. His vision burst into stars. He stayed upright. He had to. If he fell now, he wasn't getting back up. Ankou struck again. Then again. The first punch split Clock's cheek. The second hammered his temple until the entire world rang like a bell. An uppercut exploded beneath his jaw. WHOOOM!

Clock hurtled backward into a massive tree. The trunk shattered around him, splinters erupting in every direction. Before he could draw another breath, Ankou was already there. THUD. A kick smashed into his face. Again. Again. Each blow splintered more of the trunk until the final kick blasted Clock completely through it, sending him tumbling across the clearing in a shower of bark and shattered wood. His thoughts dissolved into instinct.

As Ankou advanced, Clock's hand flashed out, fingers hooking the small stabilising bone behind his ankle. CRACK. It tore free. Ankou grunted as his balance finally gave way. Blood flowed from him for the first time. Clock was already airborne. THOOOM! His knee crashed into Ankou's jaw with enough force to flatten everything nearby beneath the expanding shockwave, launching the larger man clean through another ancient tree. The trunk exploded into splinters. Ankou disappeared into the ruined forest.

Clock landed heavily, chest heaving as he fought to steady his breathing. He was still standing. Then it clicked. Blunt force wasn't hurting Ankou. Every punch, every kick, every collision bled harmlessly into him like water striking the sea. The bones. That was the weakness. Both men remained where they were.... For the first time in nearly an hour, neither attacked. Their chests rose and fell in ragged rhythm, steam curling from battered bodies as the ruined clearing settled around them.

Splintered trees groaned beneath their own weight while dust drifted lazily through shafts of broken sunlight. Ankou took a single step. His right leg buckled, only slightly. The missing stabilising bone behind his ankle forced the faintest hitch into his gait before the surrounding muscle compensated. He paused, more irritated than pained, calmly tightening the cobalt tie wrapped around his scarred right fist with practised fingers. Once satisfied, he stroked his neatly kept beard in quiet thought.

"I can no longer feel Warpfluff." Clock spat blood onto the shattered earth.

"You won't." A crooked grin tugged at his lips.

"I killed her." Silence lingered between them.

"She was... troublesome," Clock admitted.

"Too troublesome. For a while there, I honestly thought she was going to kill me." He rubbed the bruised side of his jaw and let out a quiet laugh.

"That concerned me." Ankou's eyebrows rose. It was the first genuine surprise Clock had seen cross the gentleman's face.

"I see." His gaze lowered briefly.

"Then I suppose I shall have to kill you... to avenge my friend." His voice remained perfectly courteous.

"Though..." A faint softness touched his expression.

"She was never entirely well." Clock blinked.

"No?"

"No." Ankou smiled faintly, absentmindedly stroking his beard.

"I spent rather a great deal of time ensuring she didn't wander into catastrophes of her own manufacture. She possessed extraordinary brilliance... and remarkably poor judgement." His smile deepened ever so slightly.

"She would have considered those complimentary observations." Clock snorted.

"Sounds about right."

"My parents raised me to look after others," Ankou continued.

"To carry burdens that did not belong to me simply because I possessed the strength to do so." His eyes drifted towards the ruined forest.

"They died in a motor accident. I was still young." The words carried no bitterness. Merely history.

"So I worked. A teacher. A wrestler. A barrister. One profession after another. One city after another... until the Magpies discovered my rather unusual biology." He glanced down at his hands.

"The Syndicate became my home." Clock studied him.

"You don't exactly sound sentimental about it."

"I am not." Ankou's tone never changed.

"The capacity for sentiment largely departed alongside my parents." He looked up towards the grey sky.

"I never particularly cared for humanity after that. They die. They suffer. They disappoint. That is simply the nature of the species." His fingers drifted thoughtfully through his beard once more.

"What interested me... was etiquette." Clock frowned.

"Etiquette?"

"Yes." A small smile appeared.

"We all expire in the same bed eventually. One might as well conduct oneself with proper manners whilst occupying it." Clock barked a laugh.

"You're the strangest monster I've ever met."

"I've been called worse." He lingered in thought for a moment before looking back at Clock.

"There is something I have wondered."

"Hit me."

"Why did you attack the Syndicate at all?" Clock leaned back against the shattered trunk of a tree, resting the back of his head against the bark.

"Lucien's idea." Ankou studied him for a long moment.

"I have the distinct feeling you are not joking."

"I'm not." A quiet silence settled between them.

"Does Lucien truly exist?"

"Yes." Clock looked up at the broken canopy toward the sky.

"Impossible to prove, though. Lucien can only be seen if he wants you to see him." He shrugged.

"For all we know, he might be watching us right now." His eyes remained fixed on the clouds.

"You'd never know." Ankou followed his gaze for a moment before speaking again.

"And what are Lucien's motives?" Clock let out a quiet laugh.

"That's like asking why the sun rises." He lowered his eyes to Ankou.

"It doesn't rise because it has a reason. It rises because that's simply what it does." A faint smile crossed his face.

"Lucien's the same. Trying to understand his motives is like asking a hurricane why it blows or gravity why it pulls." He shrugged.

"He acts because it's in his nature. I don't think even he could choose otherwise." Ankou studied him for a moment.

"And you believe that excuses him?" Clock smiled to himself.

"No." As a psychic, he knew exactly what Lucien's only gift truly was. Memory. On paper, it sounded almost laughably one-dimensional. No reality-warping. He simply remembered. Until you understood what perfect memory did to a mind. Lucien devoured libraries because forgetting nothing made learning effortless. Every book remained with him forever, every conversation, every observation, every mistake.

As fresh evidence disproved old conclusions, he quietly revised them in his own mind, carrying an ever-growing model of reality that never stopped evolving. Knowledge only made him hungrier for more knowledge. Curiosity became less a personality trait and more a biological imperative. Most of Lucien's actions were driven by a need to know. He might shoot someone in the foot simply to observe how they reacted, heal them moments later, apologise sincerely, and walk away having learned exactly what he wanted.

To anyone else, it would seem monstrous, arbitrary, even insane. To Lucien...... it was perfectly ordinary. Clock's smile lingered.

"Lucien doesn't wake up and ask, 'How can I ruin someone's life today?'" His eyes drifted toward the sky.

"He wakes up asking, 'I wonder what would happen if...?'" He looked back at Ankou.

"And once that question exists... he can't leave it unanswered." Ankou retightened the tie around his fist, smoothing his beard afterwards.

"Tell me, Clock. Do you understand how the Void Maw truly functioned?" Clock rolled his aching shoulder.

"Not really. I figured it erased things."

"That was the consequence."

"Not the mechanism." Ankou nodded slowly.

"My body absorbed negative emotion. The greater the misery... the greater my strength. Hatred. Envy. Lust. Rage. Regret. They accumulated within me." He spread his hands.

"Alone, I possess little beyond an unusually resilient body and... respectable physical strength." A polite smile returned.

"I am, in essence, a sponge." Clock folded his remaining arm.

"So you needed people."

"I needed their ugliness."

"The Nest rarely provided sufficient quantities. The people there..." He sighed almost fondly.

"... were rather pleasant."

"So I often walked into nearby cities. I would stroll through crowded streets for an afternoon." His smile widened.

"By the time I returned, I had absorbed enough emotional residue to power a civilisation." Clock's grin faded.

"They're that bad?" Ankou met his gaze.

"They smile whilst imagining each other's ruin. They embrace whilst nurturing resentment. They proclaim compassion whilst secretly delighting in failure. They cloak hatred beneath civility. They call lust love. They mistake prejudice for conviction. They lie so frequently they eventually mistake performance for identity." He let out a slow breath.

"And the remarkable thing... they believe themselves sincere." The forest settled into silence.

"That," Ankou said softly, "is why I have never hated you." Clock looked up.

"You're arrogant. Insufferably so. But your arrogance has never been... discriminatory." A faint smile touched his lips.

"You think yourself cleverer than everyone." He paused.

"Not worthier."

"There is an important distinction." Clock smirked.

"I'll take that as a compliment."

"You should." Ankou's expression grew thoughtful again as his fingers traced the edge of his beard.

"I found humanity... disappointing. When one can perceive what lies beneath every smile... the species loses much of its charm." His scarred fingers slowly curled into a fist.

"DELETE stripped away that reservoir. It carved the storage from me." He looked at the wisps of oblivion drifting from his knuckles.

"But therein lies the beautiful part."

"They were never the source."

"Only the fuel tank." A smile spread across his face.

"I may refill it." Before Clock could answer, Ankou moved. His body lurched into the forest with that same impossible, lagging motion, as though reality could not decide where he occupied from one instant to the next. Clock blinked. Ankou was already at the tree line. No. He was beyond it, hundreds of metres away. The intervening distance had simply ceased to matter. Clock's pupils narrowed.

"No..." Understanding struck him all at once. The nearest city. If Ankou reached it... Millions of people. Millions of minds. Millions of reservoirs of hatred, fear, lust, envy, grief, and despair waiting to be absorbed. Clock's jaw tightened.

"You're not running." Ankou's voice drifted back through the trees, clear, cultured, and almost amused.

"I am going to have breakfast." Then he accelerated again.