The shockwaves from the Lagarakei's last descent lifted Kaito Ran off his feet and sent him flying into the air with the force of a tornado.
And then the beast fell.
It fell, releasing another shockwave that sent the young boy soaring even higher.
For the second time in what was turning out to be a very long night—Ran fell.
His motion slowed to a crawl again and all around him everything progressed at their normal pace.
Beneath him was a nearly dead Lagarakei—a Lagarakei no longer bound by its tendrils now it had fallen out of warped space.
A Lagarakei bound only by the chains of the Lords of Hell.
A Lagarakei lashing out with its tendrils, whipping them about in defiance to the death knocking on its proverbial door.
A Lagarakei Ran was about to land upon.
Not falling from a great height, Ran's fall did not take long.
He looked down in terror upon the beast he was about to crash into. Up close he realized just how huge it was.
A single head was as big as a small mountain, its tendrils were as wide and long as the rivers of Kurana. Its body was double the size of Everest.
It was a Titan unto itself, and Ran landed on it with a gentleness that defied the reality and physics of the height he'd fallen from.
Panting, from both terror and the exhaustion he'd built up from his run earlier, the boy shot to his feet.
He stood like a proud warrior on the back of the groaning beast. Said groan being so loud, it was like thunder rumbling inside one's eardrums.
Ran shook, finding it unable to maintain a steady balance everytime the beast groaned.
Walking on unsteady feet, he made his way through the mountainous flesh of the nightmare of hell, crossing the hills and valleys of its bulging muscles.
"Please don't notice me."
He hadn't even realized that shock had overcome him so much he was whispering like a mad man.
"Please, don't notice me."
He hoped by all the kin in existence that he felt like a fly to this behemoth. Hopefully his weight meant nothing, hopefully he'd be able to climb down and escape.
Hopefully...hopefully…hopefully—everything rested upon the strands of hope, especially his survival.
A chuckle echoed in his vicinity, making him swivel around in panic.
"It would take years to climb down this monster."
There appeared to be no one who could have made that sound.
It came again like a dark, whispered sound of amusement.
Once again Ran looked around him, but it was just him; him on a creature that could use a normal kaiju as a dumbbell.
He looked and found no one.
'Am I going mad?' He asked himself, mentally. 'Has terror driven me right over the cliff?'
Still looking around, he found nothing to hint at the presence of someone else aside himself.
"Down here."
Almost jumping three feet high due to how close that whisper had been, he looked around again then frantically looked down.
There was nothing there, just chains and the metallic flesh of the fallen leviathan.
"We are down here!"
"Where!" He yelled back, starting to get angry.
Couldn't they be quiet? Did they want to get him killed? What would happen should the Lagarakei hear him?
Nothing good, he knew. Nothing even remotely close to good.
"The chain, boy, speak to the chain."
Gazing down, Ran laid eyes upon the chain and released an explosive sigh for his stupidity.
The chain—same chain that was the Lords of Hell in another form, chains that burned with hellfire and glowing seals.
"What do you want?" He asked, wondering if he should bend low and get closer to the chain.
He decided not to, full of distrust for every thing of hell. Evil was their nature—betrayal, lust, pride, pleasure derived from causing pain were all part of them as kindness, selfishness, love, and hate were to man.
Even without the guidance of the Book of Calidation, Ran would know this. It was myth, it was lore, and it was legend.
Nothing can be gained from hell except the fortunes of evil—evil has no fortunes to give, only misfortunes.
So, with this in mind, Ran maintained his distance from the fiery chain of hell
"Your aid, we seek, royal servant."
As had been drilled into him, in his short time as a Knave, Ran bowed low. "What services do you require, masters?"
"We ask that you slay this beast."
Ran tilted his head to stare at the chain as one would a man out of his mind.
"Forgive me, Masters, but I believe I may have misheard."
There was a round of chuckles from all of them, and then another voice took over. He recognized it as the voice of the shrieking duchess, the first to have made the Lagarakei bleed.
"You did not, young mortal. Your aid is needed to fell this beast."
Doubt swelled inside him, yet Ran asked—he asked because he had to.
"How?!" He questioned, incredulity heavy in the tone of his voice.
"Nothing dead can slay anything already dead," she answered. "A law that has rendered everyone in Naraku technically immortal. Only the undead can kill us, and no, I speak not of the undead of Kurana's myths."
So she meant not vampires or zombies, but what was actually undead specifically as the word meant.
The meaning came to him immediately—his eyes widened as he went over the concept of it.
Undead—not dead yet.
"Only the living pose a threat to those who were born of Naraku," he voiced in realisation.
"Indeed, thus why your prophets, monks, and mages succeed every time against the forces of hell," the voice continued. "We can smell the stench of life in you, that vigor you possess that could easily be our doom. For you were given power over everything, the beasts of the sky, land, sea, and every creature of the Earth. You, mortals, have dominion, dominion that allows you power over us, power over the world made for you, power that flows as kin."
There was more than a little bitterness in her voice as the duchess spoke, her links burning brighter and hotter in the chain.
"So I ca…can kill the Lagarakei?" Ran asked, almost quivering where he stood but still full of curiosity.
"It is for you it came," another lord spoke, his links burning red. "It sensed your stench of life in the city and came to snuff it out. Its brethren, I heard, attacked upon your entry to Naraku, and this one struck down the tower you stood upon. When we bound it, we sealed its essence, which hindered its senses. It could not sense you anymore, still when it fell, it fell upon the exact spot it had last sensed you to be."
Ran was at the threshold of his sensitivity to terror. He'd felt so much fear today that he was now almost numb. His heart still quickened, but now he could not muster enough strength to be properly frightened of what exactly his presence meant to the denizens of hell.
He was that one weakness to every denizen in hell, a living and breathing silver bullet, a weakness in a realm of immortals who were otherwise invulnerable.
"What should I do?" Ran asked in a dead tone.
The duchess took up explaining again. "You are our Achilles heel, but that does not mean you possess the physical might to slay a beast of such greatness as a Lagarakei."
"What should I do?" Ran repeated, his determination echoing out of his spirit through his voice.
"You need a weapon beyond the natural to slay this creature. A mortal can kill a kindred of hell, but no mortal weapon can manage such a feat. Thus we shall change form again into a weapon common to your people."
He listened as they spoke as one now, paying attention to their careful words.
"But be warned, once the beast is unbound, its essence shall be freed, its senses shall return. It would take it less than a second of your time to notice you and smite you."
A shiver ran down his spine, but Ran strengthened his will and his resolve. He needed to survive this, he needed to survive anything Naraku fashions against him.
He needed to in order to get his father back.
"What should I do?"He asked for the third time.
And they told him.