Chapter 19.5- And so the Dragons Danced

Everything around him shook as Natsu watched all his traps come undone. The ground rose to the Old King’s will in a way and manner far from what Natsu had ever seen before. The threads holding is traps snapped as they were pushed by stone and unsettled. Natsu thought to use the King’s evident distraction to get the better of him as he jumped in the air with a fist of flames held high, aiming right for the old man’s old bald head.

Bumi moved with speed that completely bellied his age as he dove under Natsu’s punch and sprang up with a punch of his own. The wall mirrored his motion as Natsu was forced to dive for his life lest his insides find themselves splattered across the floor. 
When he rolled up again, it was top meet the King standing still, watching him. “I see that you won’t let me leave without making a nuisance of yourself.” Bumi said with a smile on his face that Natsu was sure did not bode well for the next few minutes of his life.

A resolute look then replaced the King’s previously entirely amused appearance. “I hope you have said your goodbyes. I did not look forward to killing one so young today.” Those words acred like a sort of starting bell as both men dove at each other instantly. One aged and creaking with decades of experience, while the other was full to the brim with the boring passion of youth. It showed in how they moved. Natsu was quick and agile, while the old king was measured in his approach, but bold. Not a trace of hesitation could be seen in either of their movements.

They met with the younger attempting to smash the King’s head off his neck with a punch glowing red with power. The old king dodged out of the way with almost contemptuous ease before his own hand lashed out. As it moved, the ground rose with it, surrounding the limb in stone and multiplying his striking force. Not anticipating the change in speed, the younger man was caught off guard as a punch he could have previously tracked accelerated beyond his estimation. Years of training allowed him to dive backwards with the punch as it slammed right into his midsection.

That same training rang warnings in his head that forced him to dive out of his previous position instead of staying still, curled on himself in pain. Those instincts proved right as spikes of stone rose from the ground he’d let mere seconds after he’d left it. A boulder sent sailing for his head was smashed in smithereens as his red horn fist lashed forwards in a wide haymaker. The dust cloud from the destroyed stone was just what the Old King had ordered as he appeared out of nowhere. Like an Old God from the mist, he appeared. Cloaked from top to bottom in stone, he looked the part of an old God out for vengeance.

His young opponent attempted to lash out with another supercharged punch, but hit nothing but air and found said air knocked out of him as the old king’s retaliatory punch hit him dead centre. This time, the young man had been unable to bleed off the force with a controlled jump, and had to take the entire force of the punch as it was. He collapsed to his knees, spoilt upbringing not accustoming him to the pain that tore through his body. Hands clutching his ribs, the young man looked prepared to vomit, or to call it quits. The Old King, all out of mercy from the thought of his precious city under attack, grabbed a hold of the young man’s hair to pull his head up.

“You know, you remind me of another man I once fought. A pale copy, however. Prince Azulon had fire that I could feel even behind my stone. Your fire lacks the passion, the heat. Sure, it’s explosive, but that’s not what makes the element special. It saddens me that I shall be the one to snuff out a flame like yours.” The Old king said, still lifting his opponent by his hair.

He reared back and unleashed a powerful rock backed punch straight to his opponent’s head, sending him flying into the opposing wall. When he landed, the old king watched him for a few seconds. “So you managed to survive that, ey? You’re not in any state to cause any trouble to anyone so I’ll let you have some time to make peace with yourself before the spirits accept you.” Bumi said, laughing afterwards, stomping his right foot on the ground and converting the ground his opponent lay on to quicksand.

He walked off, sure in his victory.

XXXXXXX- COLONEL SHINSUKE

If there was one thing he’d learned in his years in the Fire Nation Military, it was that no plan survived first contact with the enemy. Especially when the enemy was made out of earth benders who were more stuboorn and unyielding than the stone they forced to bend to their will. He’d, for some foolish reason, expected this to be the exception. He knew that Major General Sung was a genius without equal. When it came down to it, his plans almost never went wrong. He was just so good at it that it was almost a given that things would unfold just how he intended them to.

And for the most right, the Major General had been spot on with his predictions. They’d set off an hour after the brat, marching in the cover of darkness and trusting the false sense of security on the part of the scouts and guards of the Kingdom of Omashu, from years without attack to hide their approach . It had worked. Major General Sung had been proven right as they’d made it all the way to the City’s walls with no one being any the wiser. Shinsuke supported that the Major General had taken other measures to ensure their success than he’d let on, but it was not his job to question.

The brat had sent the signal, and the attack had begun. From the beginning, things had gone smoothly. Whatever members of the city’s guard that sought to hinder them did so from an obvious Blackfoot. They’d been caught with their breeches at their knees, and Shinsuke relished in taking advantage of their weakness. Unable to organise into a committed defence, there was little they could do to prevent the Fire Nation Army from sweeping through the city. Of course, it was as they took their first major foothold, that everything went to the dogs.

Like a vengeful dark spirit of legend, Omashu’s king- for who else could it be- landed in their midst, clad in stone from head to toe. “Wasn’t Natsu supposed to be holding him back?” Shinsuke heard one of the men next to him say as the King began the butcher’s work.

The two men closest to the point where he’d landed were picked up by their heads. As they struggled to free themselves, the Earth bending master smashed both heads into each other, dropping the bleeding and broken bodies immediately after.

Shinsuke cursed his luck. This fool plan, trusting an idiot brat to kill one of the most dangerous benders on the planet, had been Sung’s idea. But now he was the one being forced to deal with the effects of it. A brave man, an infantryman, ran right at the King with his spear thrust forward. The metal failed to find purchase in the stone that clad the king. With speed that belied his over a century of age, the King snapped the spear and lunged for his attacker. The fist of his stone gauntlet shifted in form to become a blade as he stabbed the man through the head. Shinsuke silently thanked the man for his bravery and marked his face. He would see that his family got their due.

In an action that made Shinsuke’s heart swell with pride, the fire nation soldiers noticed the behemoth that had dispatched three of their own with contemptuous ease, and they did not hesitate. They turned right to him and they swarmed him with bodies. Shinsuke credited their bravery, but he would not be joining in that wild charge. He watched as man after man ran at the old king. Whether they did it in groups of two, three, four or six, they died all the same. The old man proved why generations of the fire nation had been raised to fear him. “Eat your vegetables or Bumi of Omashu will come for you” Shinsuke remembered being cautioned when he was growing up. Now, he was an adult, and he still felt just as afraid of the Spectre of death now as he had back then.

Slowly, but surely, the tide of men began to ebb. More and more men began to hesitate. Began to slow down, as they saw that no matter what they tried, their comrades were having no chance in making it through the King’s defences. It got so bad, that the last man to run at the king did so alone. And the punch that killed him echoed across their silent gathering. The sound of the man’s chest caving in as he wheezed out his last breaths would haunt Shinsuke until his dying day.

Shinsuke quaked in his boots as after what felt like an hour of slaughtering, the King turned to him. All around the King’s stone form lay bodies. Men that had been his friends, his partners, his subordinates. Men that he had trusted to have his back, and who had in turn trusted him to do the same for them. Now, they all lay dead. And the man who had done the killing was staring right at him.

A/N; I apologise for the unannounced hiatus. Had, and still have a lot on my plate.