"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHH!!!!!!"
Nox's scream was swallowed by the wind as Meimei tore through the skyline. He was a blur of terror, fingers buried so deep in her midnight fur that his knuckles went white. Below them, the city was a smear of neon and shadow.
Meimei's ears swiveled, locking onto a frequency only a predator could hear. She banked hard, hovering for a heartbeat over a jagged gap between buildings, then plummeted.
The landing was a bone-shattering thud. Nox didn't just lose his breath; his vision went black for a second as the G-force hammered his ribs. Meimei dropped low, and Nox rolled off her back, his legs turning to water the moment they hit the asphalt. He caught himself on a rusted dumpster, his stomach heaving.
A torrent of bile hit the pavement. Meimei's massive, warm paw pressed against his spine, steadying him as he gasped for air.
"...huff...huff... Never again," Nox rasped, his voice raw.
"You survived, didn't you? One is almost impressed!" Veil drifted out of Nox's chest like a ghost. Nox didn't even have the energy to glare. He leaned his forehead against the cold brick of the alley, waiting for the world to stop tilting.
When he finally looked up, the air felt different. Heavy. Rotting.
"...An alley?"
Meimei's pupils were blown wide, shimmering with a predatory hunger. "Master, I smelled a feast." She gestured with a flick of her tail toward the darkness.
"'Listen up, brat,"' Veil hissed, his voice dropping the playful tone. "'One must teach you the Authorities before you're slaughtered. Baloev is for eating, but Tzel... It is the shadow made manifest. Will it to bend, will it to sharpen, and it will become whatever your soul demands. Now, move.'''
Nox felt a cold shiver that had nothing to do with the wind. He stood, his gaze landing on his own shadow. It looked darker than usual, rippling like a pool of ink in the moonlight.
"It's there," Meimei whispered, her body coiling into a spring.
Nox looked. Coiled in the filth of the dead-end alley was a nightmare. Twelve meters of pulsating, cerulean scales. It was a serpent, but its head was too wide, crowned with three bulging, milky eyes that remained shut. A jagged wound ran along its side, weeping a thick, iridescent fluid that hissed when it touched the ground.
"...Meimei, stay back," Nox commanded, his heart hammering a frantic rhythm against his ribs. "Unless I'm being torn apart... stay back."
Meimei let out a low, respectful chuff. Nox stepped forward, his pulse thundering in his ears. He closed his eyes, reaching for that ink-black pool beneath his feet. He tried to picture a gun—something modern, something distance-based—but the shadow hissed and collapsed. It felt wrong.
Then, a jagged shard of memory sliced through his mind.
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Nox's POV
The floor was cold against my palms. I was eleven, gasping for air as my practice spear lay snapped in the dirt.
"Pathetic,"
A voice like grinding stones echoed above me. My father.
"To think an Arur would be this fragile."
Anger, hot and liquid, flooded my chest. I didn't think. I lunged, grabbing the broken, splintered shaft of the spear and driving it toward his throat. The wood stopped an inch from his pulse, held firm by his iron grip. He didn't look angry; he looked interested.
"Better." He chuckled.
"At least you have the instinct to aim for the kill."
------------------------------
Present Day
Nox's eyes snapped open. He stopped overthinking. He reached into the shadow and pulled.
The darkness surged upward, solidifying into a sleek, obsidian spear. The weight was perfect. The balance was lethal. He twirled it once, the shadow-blade humming as it sliced the air.
"Time to eat," he whispered.
The Ruach Ra'ah's eyes snapped open—three pupils of burning gold. It lunged.
It was a blur of blue scales and predatory instinct. Nox didn't retreat; he dropped into a low slide, the asphalt scraping his hip as he passed under the creature's belly. He drove the spear upward.
HISS!
The blade tore through scales like parchment. The serpent wailed, a sound like grinding metal, and smashed into the brick walls. Dust and debris rained down. It recovered instantly, its massive tail whipping around with enough force to level a car.
Nox threw his spear up in a desperate parry. The impact sent a shockwave through his arms, snapping his head back as he was hurled six feet into a pile of crates.
Before he could find his feet, the world went dark.
The serpent's maw clamped over him. Nox felt the wet, suffocating heat of its throat. The muscles began to constrict, a rhythmic, crushing pressure designed to liquefy his bones. Panic set in. Then the image of a man looking at him with disdain flashed in his mind.
'I am an Arur!' he thought, his teeth bared in a snarl. 'I refuse die in the dirt!'
He willed the shadow spear to grow. 'Sharper. Longer.'
HIISSSSSSSSSS!
On the outside, the moment Meimei saw Nox being devoured, her pupils constricted. She shot forward, claws gleaming and ready to strike down the Ruach Ra'ah. The creature's neck suddenly erupted. A black blade burst through the blue scales from the inside out. Nox grabbed the shaft and dragged it, tearing open a wound from the creature's neck to it's belly.
He tumbled out of the side of the serpent's neck covered in black blood. He had a cold, hollow light in his eyes
The Ruach Ra'ah thrashed about. Nox didn't give it a second. He lunged, driving the spear through the central golden eye, pinning its head to the pavement. He twisted the blade until the thrashing stopped.
Silence returned to the alley, broken only by Nox's ragged breathing. He leaned on the spear, his body trembling as the shadow began to dissolve back into his feet.
"...Baloev..."
The shadows rose like a tidal wave, swallowing the twelve-meter corpse in seconds. As the energy flooded back into him, the gnawing ache in his stomach eased.
Nox's knees hit the floor.
"I... did it..."
He collapsed and Meimei was there in a heartbeat, her tail curling around him like a velvet rope. She hoisted him onto her back, her intelligent eyes scanning the rooftops for any other threats before she turned and began the quiet climb back toward the sky.