Chapter 11 The flames of darkness, Verde Vs. Cinder
Verde quickly rushed down the halls searching for vanilla dashing through intently, as he went down further and further it got darker and he stumbled across a lone room in the middle. Verde stopped and opened the door as his heart suddenly began to beat ever faster as he clinched on to it " w-what's happening to me? it feels like my life force is being stripped away from my body! " Verde did not notice but behind him in the shadows was a hand stretched out and a black hole like substance was pulling him in from the back. Just then a voice shot out in Verde's speaking to him " Verde someone's attempting to strip my soul from your body, if this person succeeds There's a huge possibility that you could come close to dying! Borrow some of my power and destroy that device! "
Verde's left eye turned purple as a black aura appeared around his body, he swiftly turned around and swung his blades vertically cutting at the area where the device was from as a small Grimm bug was shown turning to ashes. Verde's eye returned to normal color as he jumped back sensing someone was there and yelled out " show yourself! " the figure appeared from the shadows in the form of a woman as she spoke " well I would be very disappointed if it was that easy to kill you. Verde puzzled by the woman's appearance asked her a question " who exactly are you? " the woman smirked placing a hand on her hip as she answered his question " my name is cinder fall it’s a pleasure to finally meet you Verde."
" C-cinder! The one who team RWBY fought against several years ago!? " cinder smirked once more speaking " my reputation proceeds me….yes im cinder and you must be Verde son of Morning and Azure." Verde was utterly shocked hearing his parents names from her mouth as he quickly raised his voice shouting at her " you know something about what happened to my family….TELL ME EVERYTHING THAT YOU KNOW! " Cinder smirked once more and stood firm as she crossed her arms smiling as she responded " of course…I'll tell you but first I want to see what you are really made of." Verde looked at her puzzled as he spoke " what do you mean really made of? " cinder turned on the lights and slowly walked around him as she responded " as you are now you will never be able to take on the black zodiac's, but I'm sure you already know this from your encounter from them before. You have improved a bit but you still have so much locked potential in you…which is why I'm going to snuff it out of you with a slight hint of pain."
Verde was mildly angered by her words but he knew some of her words she spoke were true and realized that if he couldn’t at least put up a fight against cinder he had no chance of winning, so he took a deep breath and prepared for combat. Cinder smiled as flames glowed within her eyes and she materializes two glass swords in her hands as she dashed forward with quick speed swinging her right sword from a left angle to the right side of Verde's body, Verde blocks the attack by placing his blade right near the area she was aiming for. Verde aims to attack her near the back with his left blade but cinder intercepts it with hers and kicks him in the back launching him and causing impact into a wall.
Verde stood up trying to recover from the attack until a blast of flame flew straight at him as he quickly leapt and rolled out of the way, the flame kept following him as he ran. Cinder smirked and taunted him as she continued the Assault " you're like a mouse running from a big cats claws…and unlucky for you this cat has two claws." Cinder shot out a second blast of fire in the direction he was running to box him leaving no room to escape as she once again taunted him " oh my I do believe not even your own aura can save you from all this heat little boy." Verde backed into the wall nervously but smirked as he became transparent and disappeared from sight reappearing behind cinder and prepares to deliver a blow as he swings his sword downwards, however before the sword could make contact a barrier of flames shot up around cinder knocking him down to the ground and slightly damaging his hand screaming in pain from the burn.
Cinder turned around with a smile on her face placing her hands on her hips as she spoke to him " that was a cute little trick…very unexpected and pretty handy in battle. But I hate to break it to you like this but you had no chance of winning the moment this battle started, you're really out of your league little boy…even without the maiden's power I can simply burn you alive. So you have two choices here either you can get back up and foolishly try to win a battle you cannot ever hope to win…or I can make this a very quick and painful death so choose wisely." Verde sat there starring nervously and breathing slowly starting to realize that even if he continued fighting it would be pointless to think he even had a chance of winning. But, Verde also couldn’t just give up he was completely backed into a corner with no clear path of victory or survival…slowly he was starting to panic how would he get out of this dire situation.
" Verde snap out of it! " the other soul that resides within him shouted as his heart rate returned to normal calming him down and spoke " I know I know panicking isn't going to do any good at all but what can I do she's more experienced than me and has more power how am I supposed to compete with that!? " the voice sighs but calmly speaks to him to answer " you have me….although it may not be a bright shining light I can give you my darkness to help power you up, it might make you a little blood thirsty but its do or die here we cant take any chances…are you certain you are ready to take on that responsibility? " Verde remained silent for a bit and thought hard about what she said and quickly made his decision " I'm not ready to die in a place like this if it's the only way to remove her from my way then I'm willing to take that chance! "
" Good answer…lets show this witch what we're made of let darkness take you! " Verde's aura began to radiate from his body with a dark purple color his expression changing to a violent frown and his right eye pupil turns purple in color as well. Cinder smiled gazing upon his sudden boost in power " looks like he's getting serious…never thought such an innocent face could be so evil, this should be really fun after all." Verde spoke in a dark lower pitch tone with a hint of magenta's voice in the mix " The real battle starts now! " he dashed forward in a quick burst of speed swinging his sword downward against cinder as the clash of the two blades caused a shockwave shaking the ground. Cinder aimed to hit him on the left with her other sword but Verde used his semblance to avoid the hit and appear to her side kicking her away, cinder threw out a pillar of flame at Verde pushing him back while he blocked damage while guarding with his sword.
Cinder stood out of stance to analyze the situation carefully " so instead of a soul link he preformed a darkness merge…I guess I should have expected this for his first time since he literally already is connected to another soul. It may not be what I was trying to achieve with this but this form has brought out his true blood lust, heh if I wasn’t older I'd be madly in love with him right now…but now's not the time for that it's time to truly test him! " Cinder dashed forward summoning both her swords attacking Verde with a barrage of swift strikes as he struggles to keep up blocking her hits before one final hit launches him into a wall and she launches a blast of flames into the wall keeping the pressure on him. Cinder smirked believe she had this won until suddenly her flames were blown away by Verde as even more dark aura leaked from his damaged body, he uses his semblance to move forward with quick speed.
Verde then appears all around cinder with his semblance moving faster than before as he strikes her all around at once with both swords knocking her back with a hard blow, he then combines the two swords together as it as it transforms into a scythe. Cinders eyes widen in shock remembering what ruby did to her years ago as she quickly holds up her blades to defend herself from his next attack. Verde charged the scythe with the wind dust and slashed vertically breaking cinder's swords knocking her down to the ground but, cinder smiled laughing as she quickly got up with a sly smirk on her face. " I haven't had this much fun in years…but sadly, all good things must come to an end! " cinder reconstructs her two swords creating them in her hands as an orb of fire appeared around her body, Verde glared at cinder and emitted a dark orb of aura around his body. " lets end this! " cinder rushed forward getting ready to unleash her final strike at the same time Verde also charged forward unleashing his final strike. The two fighters clashed together causing a massive explosion that shook the area and caused a large smokescreen.
As the smoke cleared Verde appeared on the ground damaged bruised and unconscious while cinder remained standing only receiving a bloody scratch on her cheek as she touched it and smiled " well now for someone who wasn’t in the same level you have definitely impressed me…you truly are Morning's son but, you have a long road ahead of you and much to learn and I'm going to help you walk that road. This was just the first step I have much more in store for you my precious verde."
To be continued
Against all odds even with the mysterious voice guidance Verde was unable to defeat the former fall maiden cinder and is now held captive, but even if he survives cinder he still has to deal with vanilla. We are finally approaching the end game whats going to happen in this epic clash and how will this all play out? Find out in the next and last chapter of VAST Tales!