Author: Michael Menei | Banner: Matthew Williams

Berlin was completely devastated.

Just over a month ago, the extraterrestrial insect queen Legion made her presence known when she turned the city into her very own nest, allowing her swarm to flourish. She even went so far as to replace the Fernsehturm Tower with a large opulent flower. There were many casualties, no wonder in a city once home to three million people. She came without warning, and although Europe’s defense force did all they could do to stop Legion and her swarm, in the end they fell to her wrath leaving nothing but a deserted ruined city.

But this victory would be short lived and the dead would have their revenge.

Legion stood in silence enjoying her moment of peace as her children continued to work, growing the colony throughout the evening as the sun in the horizon began to slowly go down.

That’s when it happened…

The clouds in the sunset sky began to part in an odd way, catching the silicon lifeform’s attention. Suddenly, a beam of sunlight rained down engulfing the stunned queen and her surroundings in an atomic flash bomb. After what paradoxically felt like hours and moments at the same time, the light began to fade revealing a massive being of gold and silver before her.

Utsuno Ikusagami glared daggers at the monstrous insect. While Legion killed not out of spite or amusement, rather to give into her biological need to reproduce. The warrior beast nonetheless did not care about her reasons for slaughtering innocent humans; making the earth her breeding ground was a mistake the sky knight would make her regret. To Utsuno Ikusagami, anything that dared take innocent life away was an enemy to the gods and something he would not stand for. Although arriving too late to be their savior, he could still be their avenger.

Legion eyed this mysterious being warily. Whatever it was, it was surely a threat. She was soon proven correct when the warrior titan began the fight, firing his medallion beam, prompting the silicon insect to form a barrier with her ten front appendages in order to prevent the beam from hitting her. Upon seeing this, the paladin fired it again but was unsuccessful in shielding herself and wailed out as she backpedaled, scorched from Utsuno’s blast. Before she had a chance to retaliate, the divine warrior reached out and grasped hold of one of her petal-like arms, surging holy energy into it. The insect queen wailed out in agony as she felt the energy course through her and thrust her head up knocking Utsuno away.

Determined to land a hit she began parting her proboscis in two. When the electricity built up to its climax she launched her beam striking Utsuno Ikusagami head on in the chest, sparks cascading off of them as they took off into the air.

Utsuno Ikusagami clutched his chest. Never had he felt such force from an attack and immediately looked down to see if his armor was okay. Luckily except for a small dent it was rather okay. Utsuno looked up, he would not underestimate this foe again.

Legion fired another electric beam but at the last second, Utsuno called up his barrier, successfully deflecting the attack. As the divine paladin brought his shield down, he advanced on the silicon queen, delivering a swift punch to her face. The blow was little more than a weak slap to the face however for this heavily armored insect queen, not even forcing her to take a step back. Utsuno was about to attack again when Legion lashed out with her arms causing sparks to fly into the air as the arms slashed across the knight’s armor, but just like his punch to her, this did little to slow him down. Reaching out and grasping two of the nearby arms, Utsuno Ikusagami pulled with all of his might until…

SNAP!!

Legion screeched out in pain as pressurized oxygen spewed out from holes where her arms once hung. Greatly angered from this unwanted amputation, she blasted her electrical beam once again. Tossing the two still twitching appendages to the ground, the knight was quick to duck as the electrical beam soared over him, hitting an apartment complex and setting it alight. Utsuno Ikusagami returned the favor with his own beam, lancing it across Legion’s body before striking her right in the face. Legion wailed out as the force of the beam chipped pieces of her silicon face, leaving her forever scarred.

As Utsuno finished up his beam, he was caught off-guard as Legion charged, smashing her weight against him. The knight managed to anchor his feet at the last second before grappling her, slamming their full weight against each other. For the moment, they seemed to be in a stalemate until Utsuno pulled his fist back and slammed it into her chest. The raw power behind the blow sent her skidding through the rubble as debris and dirt flew into the air.

Utsuno was ready to fire his beam again, but before he had the chance, a large silver leg sprouted out from the ground, striking the warrior. The strength of his armor held however, and her leg was unable to pierce him at all. Grasping the large leg, Utsuno began sending holy energy into it, slowly beginning to weaken her as he pounded against it with his other fist. With one final blow, the divine warrior’s fist shattered the leg to pieces, resulting in more oxygen escaping from its owner’s body. Launching his beam, Utsuno tried to aim for her head for a chance at rupturing it and putting an end to this fight, but Legion brought up her signature barrier just in time again preventing the attack from having its desired effect.

Legion responded with her electrical beam, washing it over his body, and forcing him to bend the knee. She continued to shower him with more and more electricity until Utsuno’s entire surroundings erupted into a sparking explosion. Legion waited patiently for a response; after seeing what her foe was capable of, she doubted that he was dead. Again her instincts were proven correct when Utsuno emerged from the still clearing dust in the air with only a few scratches and dent marks on his armor.

As the fight raged on, the late evening light gave way to the dark purple and blue twilight.

To Utsuno, Legion had proved herself to be a rather challenging foe and he decided he needed to bring out his ultimate weapon. Stretching his arm out into the air and holding out his hand, a sword of enchanted holy energy suddenly appeared, and he swung it, testing its weight. Satisfied, the warrior began to advance on Legion. The silicon queen continued to fire more of her beams, yet, despite the forming dents in the warrior’s armor, he ignored them, continuing his approach. Worried, Legion turned to attempt a retreat, but didn’t have that chance as Utsuno was now within reach and, with a swing, chopped off another of her frontal arms, earning a wail of agony. He swiped again, this time leaving a deep gash under her head. Reaching out, he grabbed a hold of one of her lower mandibles and with a yang tore it right out. Legion screeching became louder than ever with this onslaught of pain. If she didn’t do anything right now she’d be finished.

Knowing she had only one other option, she sent out a command to her children to deal with Utsuno.

Suddenly, clicking sounds caught Utsuno’s attention, stopping his assault on his foe. Confused as to what was going on he glanced around and found his answer. Faster than he could anticipate, numerous black shapes began to emerge from buildings, around city blocks, and from underground. Like Legion, they were insectoid, but not as big as their queen. But what they lacked in size they made up for in numbers. Hundreds of Legion’s soldiers armed with deadly claws and jaws marched forward, responding to their mother’s call to squish her enemy. Before Utsuno had a chance to react, they began crawling up him, clinging to every side of his body, covering him head to toe, and forcing him to drop his sword. Thanks to his armor, pain was not the problem, the problem was getting these creatures off of him. Utsuno violently shook around to dislodge them but couldn’t manage to. He even went as far as to smash his fists against his body, while some were crushed and fell off, this did little to help as more continued to crawl on top of him.

Legion watched with satisfaction to see her foe struggle. Deciding to tip the odds even more in her favor, she unleashed more of her swarm from her egg sac in her chest, the baby Legions flew towards their target joining their siblings.

Even though he could barely, Utsuno did hazily get a look at Legion sending out more of her army from her sac. He continued to plow his fists against his body, killing a few for every blow he delivered but it was no use. They just kept coming and attempting to tear into his armor but just as he was having with them they were in no such luck. Knowing there was no other way out of this, Utsuno Ikusagami did the only other thing that was possible for him to escape.

Focusing, the divine paladin allowed holy energy to course throughout his body and suddenly, without warning, a shock wave of intense energy erupted from his body, sending Legion’s entire swarm falling by the thousands littering the streets with dead as they collapsed on top of vehicles and other things on the ground below.

The remaining soldiers who had yet to crawl onto Utsuno, managed to avoid getting caught in the crossfire of his pulse attack, but the divine warrior took care of them by shooting out his medallion beam, razing it across the ground, hitting every soldier. After this barrage, not one soldier managed to escape the beams as their firepower disintegrated them to nothing.

Legion watched with horror and wailing seeing her children murdered and her foe escape from her clutches.

Having dispatched the remainder of Legion’s brood, Utsuno located his lost sword and reached down to grab it before turning his attention back to Legion…. only to be struck in the face by another one of her beams and, before he could recover, was struck immediately by another.

Legion began to slowly approach, continuing to fire her beam. Just as the next beam was about to hit Utsuno Ikusagami, he suddenly summoned a pair of golden bladed wings on his back, each tip with a red orb. Legion halted, shocked by this unsettling turn of events. The massive warrior seemed to defy gravity, lifting himself into the air. Legion’s final beam just missed him by mere inches as his feet left the earth.

The divine warrior looked down at Legion as energy began to build up from within his medallion before launching a massive sun beam. As the beam struck Legion, she wailed out, as more beam hit her. When the final beam struck Legion, she looked up to see Utsuno soar above and land behind her. Suddenly, she felt a sharp pain jab into her body earning a painful wail from the silicon insect queen.

Utsuno, slowly, pulled out his sword, upon leaving Legion’s body, causing a spray of oxygen to flare out of the deep wound. Quickly turning with rage, the silicon queen released her electrical beam.

At the last minute, Utsuno activated his shield, preventing the beam from hitting him and started to advance on Legion, keeping his shield up. As he neared closer, Legion continued to shoot out her beam but at the last second Utsuno took down his shield, with near perfect timing to Legion ceasing her beam. Legion expected Utsuno to attack her with his sword, but he had other plans.

Having seen where her swarm had come from earlier and their numbers in the city, the warrior definitely knew there’d be a good chance she’d summon more of them again and the time was now to rid her of the source of her colony. Legion screeched out when she felt Utsuno plunged his hand into her egg sac, ripping it completely out from her body. Backpedaling and screeching, she watched with despair as the warrior smashed the egg sac to the ground and stomped on it, shattering it to hundreds of pieces, just as she did to the people of the city.

Grief filled Legion’s core as Utsuno had now destroyed her final chances of creating another colony, not only were they her soldiers, but they were also her children, her own flesh and blood whom she cared deeply for. The rage inside her had never felt so strong, the final line he had crossed. She’d make her foe regret going this far.

As Utsuno turned back to Legion, she began to continuously assault him with a barrage of her beams that kept striking Utsuno down, screaming with rage at each successful strike. The divine warrior was surprised at his foe’s level of aggression, although he knew the reason was destroying her entire colony, he wasn’t expecting this. Deep down, Utsuno realized Legion was just a creature acting out of her primal need to survive and continue her species, requiring her to annihilate the city’s population to give her children a home. This was not an evil deed, but his pride was too hurt by it for letting all of those people die on his watch. Legion would wipe out every living thing on the earth, the very world and people he swore to protect, in order to breed, and he could not allow that to happen, evil or not. Begrudgingly, he felt sorry, life, no matter from where, was sacred; however her life threatened those of the lives he swore to protect and preserve, and he would do the only thing he could now, protect and avenge those he could not.

Legion, in all her rage, was suddenly surprised as Utsuno broke out from her attacks and charged head-on. Desperate, she continued to fire her beams, but the armored warrior paid little attention before slamming his fist into her proboscis, shattering it. Its pieces fell from her body as Legion then wailed out before falling face first to the ground, the lights in her eyes going completely dim.

Utsuno watched on cautiously to make sure his foe was dead. For a few moments, Legion didn’t seem to stir at all. He figured that at this point she was on the verge of death and decided to finish this and raised his sword to deliver the final blow.

For the time being, there was only silence, as the sun in the horizon disappeared, replaced completely now by the twilight sky.

But Legion wasn’t dead just yet…

Suddenly her eyes flashed, but instead of the usual blue, crimson red eyes replaced the glowing orbs. Suddenly Legion sprung up, strands of red searing energy formed from the stump where her proboscis once laid. Utsuno had no time to react as the strands struck him, willpower alone was what allowed him to keep a tight firm grip on his sword, as he was forced to backpedal from the immense blows. His armor was holding up for the most part, but to his surprise the strands were cutting slightly deep into it leaving burnt smudges and melting some of the armor causing small droplets of metal to drop like melted candle wax. Never had anything almost penetrated his armor like this. Even his nemesis, Orochi, couldn’t do such a thing. Sure his armor is holding up but how long before the strands pierced through his armor completely?

Legion continued her onslaught, sure that she now had her enemy at the ropes. It would only be a matter of time until she managed to blast completely through his armor and she continued her advance on him.

Although this foe’s power might have been great, Utsuno still maintained his mental composure. He knew she could not keep this up and was nearing the end of it. Despite countless battles and trials against a plethora of foes, he still achieved his title of the God of the Sun. He ALWAYS managed to prevail. He wasn’t about to let this simple space insect dethrone him. Utsuno felt his will surge and utilized this momentum to break free from the strands, bringing up his shield to deflect her electric whips, and taking flight into the air.

Legion watched on in surprise as Utsuno landed next to her and brought his shield down to deflect her attack and attempt a stab with his sword into her side. He successfully landed the blow and Legion wailed out, trying in vain to turn and continue her assault with her red strands but Utsuno didn’t give her that chance. He deftly swung his sword down, cutting through one of her back legs like a hot knife through butter. Legion shrieked and collapsed from the loss of her leg. Although still activated the strands were now useless since she could no longer move her body to get an angle on her target.

Swinging down, while carefully dodging her flailing strands, Utsuno sliced off two of her arms causing a shriek, then stabbed her once again in the egg sac causing another mournful wail. Utsuno Ikusagami looked on pityingly at his now helpless foe. There was no denying it now, try as she might, she was defeated. Utsuno Ikusagami decided this had gone on long enough and decided to end this. Dual wielding his sword up, the divine warrior reared it over his head before forcefully bringing it down upon the insect queen. One moment Legion caught on last glance at her would be home then her world went black as Utsuno drove his sword into her head with enough power to cause the tip to plunge through and out the bottom of her skull. The lights in Legion’s eyes dimmed and red strands disappeared as Utsuno Ikusagami pulled his sword out of the now lifeless corpse of Legion allowing her to collapse in an earth shattering thud.

Placing his arms to his sides just as the sun faded to bring the cool dark of night. The divine warrior was content in his victory, although he could not save Berlin, he was able to save the rest of mankind from Legion and avenge the innocents lost this day. However, he still couldn’t help but feel a pitiful sorrow. Legion wasn’t an evil monster, only an unfortunate outcome of a choice to make Earth her place to breed, forcing Utsuno’s hand. Hopefully he would never have to do this to another similar being again as long as it wouldn’t involve the very humans he’s been protecting for thousands of years. All he could hope was that Legion could have peace in the beyond.

There was one last thing to do however. Utsuno walked to the large flower, figuring it could stir trouble up as well, and washed his holy beam over it. The flower glowed for a second before exploding into a fireball, its burning petals turning to ash in the wind.

The knight looked around for a moment; with Legion and her brood gone, the once proud city seemed oddly peaceful. The gentle night breeze and the burning cackling sounds of Legion’s destroyed flower permeated through the silence. Now with his work finally done, he figured his time here on earth was coming to an end, until the next threat. Utsuno Ikusagami bent his knees and leapt up into the air returning to his realm as the light engulfed him before completely vanishing.

Winner: Utsuno Ikusagami