Traveling across the mortal lands, the Brave-swift Impetuous Protagonist remained shrouded in a pouting mist. The small physical form hidden by a thick stormy gray cloak which billowed out past those clawed feet in the cloudy wind which carried the Protagonist over the landscape. The truth of the matter was, this stormy child wasn't as happy as a lone wanderer anymore.
Colourless kitsune ears fell forward as that head of silver hair bent down over a river while the fog reached out from under bare feet. A pair of chopsticks drifted in the currents, knocking against the reeds which attracted that lightening yellow gaze. Moving with the wind, the Swift Protagonist turned to follow the river up it's source knowing that people couldn't be far off.
And drifting down over the water's surface was the sound of crying.
Inquisitively, the Impetuous one came upon an old house where an old couple huddled with a beautiful young girl between them. The soft mist spilled thoughtfully over them with the wanderer's approach.
"Why are you crying? What is the matter?"
The old man looked up, tears staining his face as his worn features turned towards the stranger in the doorway. "This is a sad day for us: Today, a great monster shall come here and devour our daughter. Once we had eight daughters, but this great serpent came every year to eat one, and seven years and seven daughters have passed away. This is our last."
"I see," the Impetuous one said looming with the breezy mist which toyed at the rim of the long cloak dancing upon the threshold. Thoughtfully regarding the situation, that moon yellow gaze fell upon the fair lady in danger of being eaten, and the Brave Protagonist thought that perhaps she could be the cure to the loneliness. "That is a sad story, I shall protect your daughter if she will be my wife once she is safe. Now, tell me what this beast looks like so that I may recognize him."
While the girl looked up with hope in her eyes, the elderly couple blinked at each other wondering how anyone could not recognize a beast when it came.
The old woman was busying herself with brewing eight vats worth of alcohol as the cloudy stranger had instructed while her husband built a fence of eight gates outside. Meanwhile, the fair raven locks of the young woman's hair danced in a swirling wind as she sat near the river with the stranger. He loomed, his body tall and hidden in a stormy cloak while a fog remained ever beneath the rim of billowing cloth. Cloudy hair glistened in the sun as he turned to her with intense yellow eyes.
She smiled in return to his gaze, thankful that such a brave hero had come to save her from her terrible fate.
"Ah-ha-ha-ha!" a squeaky sound rang out as a streak of red grew across the stranger's face, eyes squeezed shut, and a line of wind rushed over the girl as the Swift Protagonist backed away suddenly, laughing like a fool, "Eh-heh heh! Beautiful lady, ha! ha! ha!"
Her eyes widened in surprise at his reaction.
"Umm . . . let's start over again . . . Hi! I'm here to protect you, how about I offer you a token of my good will to prove my honor." The cloud beneath the cloak moved forward once more to carry the Brave one towards the girl.
Her smile returned, but meeker and she nodded.
Holding out one hand to gently touch a lock of her hair thoughtfully, a whisper carried on a soft wind to gently caress her ear, "How about a beautiful comb for my beautiful bride-to-be?" And upon the touch, the lady disappeared and was replaced by a beautiful hair comb. Eyes widening, the Impetuous Protagonist picked up the comb that was once a girl, blinking, "Oops . . . "
"My daughter! What have you done to my daughter?!?" the old man ran up in terror, having just finished the eighth gate.
"Umm . . . Why, I'm protecting her, of coarse! See!" the comb was hidden in that cloudy hair, and a bright smile was flashed with fake confidence, "Nobody shall harm her now! Ha ha ha!"
Eight heads tangled and writhed with eyes like winter cherries. A body so long it spanned across eight valleys and eight hills as it slithered upon a belly so enflamed it bled, moss and conifers growing upon it's back. And eight tails thrashed and thundered in the beast's bloody trail.
The skies grew dark as a ceiling of cloud cast over it, the winds whipped across the lands and greeting the approaching beast, causing the green needles and cones to rattle.
The Brave-Swift Impetuous One stood in waiting just beyond the eighth gate. A misty pedestal caused the thick cloak to billow about the ground, eyes like narrow slits of lightening yellow.
Coming upon the first gate and the first vat of alcohol, the first head dipped greedily into it and drank. Then the gate was broken as the beast tore forth with the intent of having the eighth daughter, but was confronted by yet an other gate and an other vat. So the greedy second head drank the second vat then began to sway in drunkenness with the first head. But that gate was broken through as well only for an other to be presented.
This trend continued until the beast had seven sets of glazed over cherry eyes and seven drunken heads and came to the eighth gate only to find that . . . there was no alcohol.
A misty tornado swirled, at it's center a cloaked figure with rosy cheeks looked to the beast with a mischievous gleam in those lightening yellow eyes, rain coloured hair pulled up and held in place by a beautiful comb.
"Ah, my beautiful princess! There you are! The old couple have indeed saved the best for last, and lavished me with such a welcome. I did not expect that I would be greeted this way nor that you would be so much more beautiful then your sisters!" Seven swaying heads and an evenly placed eighth spoke in unison, though the last blinked concentratedly at the cloudy figure in the billowing cloud of cloth.
"Hey! I'm not the princess, you stupid beast! I'm protecting her! And I shall slay you to avenge her sisters, and claim the girl for myself!" colourless kitsune ears folded back upon the head of twirling gray tangles which slacked away from the comb as each eye narrowed with insult.
"You do not have to tease me, princess, I know who you are! But if you wish to play, then by all means this may be as pleasurable as you wish. I am very tipsy from your parents gifts to me, perhaps I would have been drunk if there was an eighth drink. But I am not worried for I might have passed out before reaching you," the beast's heads bobbed and swayed, it's voice was a loud, slow shrieking like the sound of eight thousand cats getting their tails squished by rocking chairs one at a time.
The Brave Protagonist's flushed features crinkled as each eye widened a little with an awkward squeak. With a painful hiccup, it suddenly dawned on the Impetuous one's mind that perhaps giving in to the tempting alcohol hadn't been such a bright idea after all. Still, it was rather insulting what the beast was saying, and the winds rushed forth to threateningly pull needles from the conifers growing upon the monster's back with a loud choir of whistling, "I said I'm not the princess! I am the one here to protect her from you, filthy beast! She's my girl now, so get your drunken faces out of here before I slice them off!" The dark clouds above rumbled menacingly, their rims lighting up with yellow.
"What?" lightening struck and gleamed off of eight sets of cherry eyes, "You are not my princess? Then prepare to die! I shall kill you for this insult! How dare you mock me! You're death shall be a long and slow one, see how my heads thrash, crashing my sword like teeth together. My body is a fortress, my mouths are caves into which you shall be lost, and my insides are fire in which you shall burn! I shall kill you, and then you shall die!"
The storm began.
"Ha ha ha ha, you can't hide from me by flying around my back! My tails shall catch you!"
"Fool! I'm over here!"
"Wait, you have tied my tails together into a knot! Why you arrogant little fly buzzing around my heads, I shall rip you into eight pieces so that I may devour you with each of my heads and--wait! You have tied my necks together into a pretty bowtie! Curses!"
"Lightening claws!"
"No! That sting, could that be this warrior's claws? One of my heads feels as if it has been shredded and burned! Indeed it has! Does this small warrior truly possess thunder in his fingertips? Watch as he so freely moves through the air, avoiding my every attack as if the wind carried him! The clouds themselves pour forth a violently chilled rain, and the skies rumble with this warrior's own anger. This is no mere mortal I am battling, but what could it be? Is it a demon as I am?"
The fangs of the now seven headed monster crashed like the lightening jumping the cloud cieling overhead which flashed in enfuriated winter cherry eyes. The beast was arrogant, so much so that his own boasts and threats had prevented him from so much as touching the nimble warrior who darted this way and that over the tops of the conifers. The defender, however, had few words and much action.
At one point in the battle, the cloudy gray cloak parted just enough for a hand to slip forth as the eight knotted heads had surrounded the warrior and streaks of wild yellow flew forth from Impetuous fingertips slicing an escape through one of the beast's heads until it fell limp over the other necks.
As the swift warrior sailed through the air, however, a flash of realization lit the fighters eyes as trails of cloudy hair loosened and flew free. Turning to face the protagonist's own windy trail, wide yellow eyes noticed a small streak of movement fall past the thrashing seven heads and the charred eighth which dangled near the ground. Not wanting to take the chance of losing the princess to this clumsy beast, the hero sliced through the air, darting back past the conifers and distracted heads to land knelt at the beast's bloody base. One clawed hand touched the ground, hesitating only a moment before lifting the enchanted comb.
But as the hero did, the earth began to rumble and shake as much as the angered heavens above. One colourless kitsune ear curled up, lightening gaze soon following as a shadow rose above the knelt hero and the comb, the bloody enflamed belly of the beast exposed standing into a great looming wall.
The raucous voices of the drunken heads bellowed in laughter, "You are nimble and swift, but you are not strong! Catch me if you can, it will not save you!"
The great darkness began to descend upon the brave protagonist, and the long cloak billowed and fluttered as the cloudy figure leapt backwards towards the light. The enflamed meat of the monster dripped and sizzled as it touched the ground in a sort of roll like a wave of flesh.
Not swift enough was the escape, and the bloody darkness finalized its decent upon the stormy retreater.
Calm was the sky, the clouds stilling their movements, the wind growing hush. Excited was the earth, the ground rumbling with movement, the trees thrashing with sound.
"Now," seven sets of eyes as red as winter cherries searched the broken fence and cracked land, "Where is that princess I seek?"
But the only light which spilled forth from the clouds was a charge of thunder, thick as a tree, it stabbed down into the long body of the beast like a knife falling into a chopping board. Seven heads lifted into a scream of agony before they turned to the smoking, yet small in comparison, hole in the monster's vast body.
That was when the swirl of wind and cloud rose from the smoldering hole, and lifting into view was the brave, swift, impetuous hero holding high a blade from which the electrical current of the lightening still radiated even more strongly than from those narrowed yellow eyes. Foggy gray cloak billowing in the wind, colourless kitsune ears folded back, one clawed hand held the comb princess and smoothed back the rainy locks before securing them once more and locking both hands upon the gripless blade.
The power of the storm had not disappeared, it had simply began to pool and gather above the point of it's wielder's imprisonment. Lo and behold, the desperate stormy stranger had come across a blade hidden with in the enflamed flesh of the monster, and now the rage of the storm itself conducted from the steel.
"It is over." Eyes narrowing under the thrashing shade of cloudy bangs, claw tipped fingers laced, misty swirl of wind billowing the stormy gray cloak, the brave, swift, impetuous hero lifted the sword into aim prepared to dive into battle when . . . one drunken head after the other flopped and dangled and fell to the ground, glazed cherry eyes drifting shut, seven heads and seven tails fallen limp with drunkenness over a span of eight hills and eight valleys.
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