Rise to Greatness [CH]

His eyes briefly narrowed at the sight of that ugly mug forming a grin. It was a sore sight to see, nevertheless but he did not seem highly bothered by some wounds. He had been put through worse before, and the form of the ape itself made the experience a little more annoying. It was not even a regular monkey, but he guessed that made her easier to recognize amongst all of these.

But Rosemary began to gradually shift into something else, in his eyes at least. The smug was gone and oddly a little more humanity was there in that ape, but not ‘humanity’ in the kind sense of the word but there was something intelligent about the way she stood before him now.

“What?”

He said. Did she agree with him? He was pretty sure that he had just told her most of what he did to try and school her about her heritage. At best he expected another attempted hit with that club, but instead Rosemary took his words quite seriously. Apparently, at least.

Rosemary only knew her mother. In a way, he was not surprised however. She did say it herself, the identity of the father was unknown and a Demon could also be residing in Hell without any kind of issue. They could travel back and forth much like the Shinjin could, there would not be any point in trying to find somebody with those kinds of abilities up his sleeve.

“Good for you.”

He narrowed his eyes briefly. There was no way that Nasu could fight ‘like a Saiyan’, mostly because he was born far away and elsewhere. He was raised as a Knight and later made himself his own martial arts, and therefore he had very little affiliation to a Saiyan’s fighting style. But there was something he possessed that was Saiyan all right: his genes. She directed his gaze at the moon, without himself even realizing it. The moment he said it, his head almost turned by itself.

He did not know why, neither would he grow to ask himself in the near future. Perhaps her capabilities had come into play or it could have just been a distraction or a coincidence, But the eyes met the moon. Clouds or not, its light rained upon him and silence followed briefly. For a brief moment, nothing could be heard. At least from Nasu’s part. Seconds later, however, from the silence the man pulled away and into himself, as he lowered his entire chest and body down. One hand reached out for his forehead, he was holding himself.

He was in pain.

His body did not shiver, but his arms were trembling. It was not just out of fear, it was a pain that was traveling across his person and had him hide himself. The very dragon inside his soul was struggling, as if a gigantic hand rose from the depths of the ground below and closed its grip around the creature and continued dragging it down. His arms grew in mass in a heartbeat’s moment, they grew larger. But that was only the beginning.

His very voice began to be audible once more, it was a painful hiss. Before his arms could no longer hold himself and fell down, a voice that could perhaps be trying to climb itself out of this hell grew far more menacing as his body rose once more and revealed blood red, deadshot eyes. His pupils were no longer visible, and his wide open mouth revealed large canines.

His arms spread, much like his earlier pose but this time even his fingers were bent and pulled nearly like actual claws and his very arms and body continued reaching new levels of bulk as each and every time they grew larger, and now his head rose in full, his chest throbbing to no end. His voice was no longer a man’s, but that of a beast that continued to growl its struggle to reveal itself to the world out of that humanoid form.

One moment passed.

And the ground split and cracked itself around him to the point where a couple of levels beneath him exploded, a cone of yellow energy and electricity wrapped itself around him as his strength continued to explode. As his face began to mutate into the one of a monster, the aura around him exploded and left only his silhouette to be shown before a blinding white flash came over and a brief earthquake signaled the end of his transformation.

Now a towering monster stood in the place of Nasu. He was larger than most other Great Apes. Perhaps it had to do with the fact that he was not entirely a full blooded Saiyan himself. His fur was not dark but light brown, nearly a blonde. The beast braced himself, his teeth closed tightly against one another while his breath came running out of his mouth, as visible as a cloud could be.

There was no sign of conscience from the beast.

And at the same time, somewhere and deep down in the beast’s mind, an individual rested with both feet down. A strange place, or perhaps not a real place at all. It was dark and yet it felt like he was walking on the waters themselves, he looked around and clueless. Where was he?

What a strange place.

It was empty. But somehow it felt familiar all the same, not because he had been there before but as if he was now exploring the depths of himself. Not that there was much to see, and thankfully it was not some kind of physical trip. He guessed, at least. He would have expected to see some disgusting stuff otherwise, such as organs and whatever you would find inside a body. But even more importantly, his memories were fuzzy.

What was going on just a moment earlier? He could remember he was fighting somebody and yet, all of a sudden somebody pulled the plug. He did not remember much else, and now, all his eyes could see were the nothingness. And himself, of course. It was lonely. Or perhaps he felt lonely. There was no one out there or here, right? He would have sensed them or perhaps somebody would have come to him, as he wandered across this unknown ocean.

Since when could he walk on something as feeble as water? Strange. Did he die? No, that was unlikely. He would have probably remembered that much. But by now, something else began striking through his mind: a voice. He recognized it all right, so she ordered him to rise. Undoubtedly in a serious manner or not, the man responded. In this emptiness, therefore the response would never reach her.

“I am already standing. Are you blind?”

But soon enough a mysterious reaction came: he began feeling ‘weird’ until that sensation began to translate into something he could not quite explain. His throat began to feel dry and soon enough he was pretty sure he was suffocating, and yet nothing held his throat or nothing was acting as an obstacle in the air’s path. Was there even air out here? The feeling rose and became burning, it left a wisp of fire all across his back. But he could tell, as it turned out, it was coming from his tail.

He looked behind himself and tried to grasp it, but before his hands could reach it, she spoke again. And the struggle continued and grew in intensity, to the point where he fell to his knees. Both his hands kept his hand from falling in the water, as he was on all fours now. At first he believed the pain was a form of punishment for his comment, but now he could tell this was something entirely different.

The man could not control his body. The Saiyan…

The Saiyan…

What was he born to be? Nasu’s form began to slowly not find a solid hook upon the waters anymore and his body began to slowly descend in the sea itself. But he did not react, rather stared down ahead. He tried to catch a glimpse of himself in the water, but he could not see anything. Did he even exist? He could not remember. If he had already forgotten, maybe it was all a dream.

And so the dragon had completely disappeared from sight, and every second he sunk further down the infinite ocean. Light was dim and slowly his eyes closed.

On the surface, however, there was very little of a reflection. If none at all. The Great Ape simply stood there in its beautiful dirty blonde fur, his large face and mouth expressed nothing more than silence at first. Soon enough, his head looked up at the crimson ape.

He did not seem to be willingly making a stand or trying to throw anything more at her, rather, as her hand came, even if reluctantly (not due to hesitation but rather he felt a little stupid about taking one’s hand in this form) but he took the hand.

He spoke no word.

Nasu felt confused with this whole facade, what was even supposed to be? Where was he? It was already a lot if he could somehow muster up his own name, but how did he even end up in a situation like this? One side of him wished to panic: it was not normal that he could not remember or know how to feel, right? And yet, that was precisely how he felt.

Strange feelings were being harbored within his heart: destructive sensations that only wished to finally rampage after having been laid dormant for many years. But he did not know that. Nasu was gone. The magical influence of Rosemary having flipped his soul all over the place together with the shock of his first transformation: but it was not even the effect of Rosemary’s influence over his Great Ape state, but the man within the ape himself was gone.

That Nasu had been pulled down in the abyss of his soul, overwhelmed by it all. His memories were lost, somewhere. And so, the man only had his feelings left to follow. The first thing he did was of course charge right through for the hook, the moment the battle began to grow heated once more and continued, for hours even. Battles that were so chaotic and messed up that he would not even manage to remember one detail of it.

The day continued, in a strange way. Celebrations, they called them. People were just letting themselves go pretty easily, and quietly even Nasu joined and spent the rest of the night along with the others.

By now, night had come and nearly passed. It was morning already, but there was someone who could not sleep no matter how much he tried to shut his eyes. It was as if images he could not recognize or voices called for him in his sleep, and yet any sight or clue was walled off by flames.

As if every single bit of memory was burning and anything he could have heard was nothing more than noises he could not make sense of, with the never ending static in his mind that was consuming his mind.

The silhouette of the tall man wandered the halls until he found himself by a balcony and by there, he just leaned forward and rested himself and his frame onto the rail with both his arms folded.

He could not shake away how strange it was. To wake up all of a sudden, in a place he did not recognize, people he did not recognize and with nothing left in his memories. Even his childhood was still as vague as it could get in his mind by now.

He had to have heard something about Tuffles during the celebrations. What were those? The man pondered to himself quietly, as he just stared lazily down the streets of this capital. He guessed it did not matter that much, whether things made sense or not by now.

Nasu only knew that something deep inside him was burning; a beast that had perhaps been asleep for far too long or perhaps it had never awakened to begin with, and in his eyes that were now clad in a mysterious and obscure crimson tint reflected just slightly above his black orb, he only sought to satisfy the beast’s desires now.

It was what he had been born to be, right?