Triton Prism - 5. The Ramei

CHAPTER SIX: THE RAMEI

After another dreary funeral behind the distant groves they left Kanra buried beside Elise. While the others seemed to be in a numb sadness, Douglas felt only fury. He hated Reburn, but he was mad at his elemental too. Hunting down the Titania leader should've been their top priority the moment Elise died; they should've done more.

They all trudged back to the house, a long walk. Training was cancelled that day. After they gave Lysander their report of what happened they were left to do what they liked with their day. Douglas was too mad to do nothing, he left the house and walked back to the distant forest to train by himself.

It was in the trees where he jumped between branches, slashing at trunks with dual blades. Practicing his agility, twisting and flinging chains. He tried swinging like Shari but again one of the links broke and he fell to a branch. His landing was too rough and it snapped, he hit the ground in a sprawl. Climbing up with a wince the black-haired teen spat grass from his mouth, then looked around for the weapon he'd dropped.

A lightning bolt struck somewhere in the direction of the house, probably his elemental teleporting over to see him.

Moodily Douglas picked up his scimitar and faced the nearest tree, determined to keep practicing his stances and ignore his creator. His black sword cut quick lines through the bark as Douglas's strikes blurred. The blonde man walked over and came to a stop a few paces back.

"Douglas."

A final furious swipe through the tree before the black-haired teen looked over his shoulder. Lysander stared with his different colored eyes - one blue and the other red "I need to know that you aren't going to sneak off and try to fight Reburn again."

"At least someone's trying to stop him!" Douglas shouted.

"I'd have never sent you all to fight someone Mark Five. None of you are ready for that yet. Reburn suddenly became powerful, there's more going on than you realise."

"Elise and Kanra are dead! Don't go thinking we're just replaceable!" Furiously Douglas leapt at him with his scimitar overhead, knowing it'd be impossible to hurt Lysander but possessed with rage anyway. His vision flashed yellow and he could see the man's attack before it happened, Douglas was too shocked to react and Lysander's metal palm hit his chest and threw him several metres back. Douglas's sword landed by the tree and he lay winded on the ground.

When he sat up Lysander's expression looked shocked before returning to the somber state he had at the funeral "I value all my crushers. And sadly, there's no way for me to prepare you for everything that's out there. That's why you need to become stronger. Elise and Kanra made a difference with their lives, they weren't wasted."

Douglas looked down sadly and clenched the grass beside him.

When his mentor spoke again his voice was careful in a way that made him look up "Douglas… when you attacked me just then, your vision went yellow didn't it?"

"Wasn't that you?"

"No. Did it happen while you were fighting Reburn yesterday?"

Douglas tried to recall. After Kanra died and the dragon Lucifer appeared, he remembered his vision being blinded by yellow as lightning bolts fell from the sky. While he stared off and thought, Lysander strolled forward until he was standing in front of him, Douglas looked up as he spoke.

"I think you just awakened the Ramei."

Silence passed between them, Douglas couldn't talk. The Ramei? They always talked about who'd be the first to awaken it, if anyone. They'd all thought it'd be Elise. Douglas thought that if possible it'd still take him years of extra training before he could do it. Even though he was more skilled due to extra training, his power wasn't as remarkable as the other crushers.

"Are you sure?"

"Close your eyes and focus your energy to them, then open and will them to activate." Lysander instructed.

Douglas closed his eyes and pressed his hands together, moving the flow of his energy to his eyeballs. They felt like they were blazing with power. He opened his eyes and everything around him was a monochromatic yellow-gold. His mouth dropped as he climbed up to his feet and looked around. Everything that moved was shimmering, the leafy trees in the breeze. Paths of yellow light arced overhead before birds flew through them and they disappeared. Douglas turned back to face Lysander in wonder.

"The Ramei," he smiled "Oracle eyes. They reveal future pathways but only for the purposes of combat. By seeing what will happen seconds before it does you now have an enormous advantage in battle. You'll be able to dodge and counter-strike, escape every threat, if there's any possible move available to you, you will see it."

Douglas could feel the golden vision depleting his energy. He closed his eyes and willed it to stop, when he opened them his vision was normal again.

"Incredible…" Douglas stared at his hands before clenching them, resolved.

"I will focus on training you solo for a while," Lysander began "The others will need to train with each other and Lucifer. But even after more intensive training I won't send you all after Reburn. As he's Mark Five and nobody else can handle him yet… I'll have to."

"You're going to fight Reburn, Lysander?"

He nodded "But first you need to come with me, I have something to report to all of you about Reburn."

Douglas followed his elemental out of the trees and they walked back to the tall house once more. When they were indoors all four crushers were gathered on the bottom level, sitting on the leather furniture or standing by the granite counter.

Lysander paced the room with his hands behind his back "There are a few things to report based on the information you've given me. But first of all, it's good to know we got something out of that last encounter. Douglas has activated the Ramei." The other three stared at him with surprise.

Shari lowered her head "We all thought it'd be Elise. Then Kanra kept bragging it'd be him cause he's so strong. In the end Doug did it."

"I will have to focus more of my time on Douglas, we can't afford for him to die when he could master this new power with the right pointers and keep himself and you all safe." Lysander stopped by the counter and opened his folder, taking out a piece of printed paper and showing them all "I will handle Reburn, but first I need to know: is this the jewel you said you saw on his chest?"

"Yeah." Douglas answered while the others nodded.

"It's all beginning to make sense now. That crystal is an ancient magical artefact known as Cordaco's Prism. Similar to the Alquaida Crystal that lets Zorgon Fire-users create black fire, but it has a different ability. After bonding to someone it increases their natural power exponentially, but there are drawbacks. For one, the crystal imbeds itself into the host's chest and doesn't allow itself to be hidden, it can't be removed until the host dies. Afterwards it will attach itself to the next person who touches it with their bare skin."

"So Reburn is just your average Triton clan member after all…" Douglas murmured "Cordaco's Prism just made his power stronger."

"And that's why all of a sudden, a petty crime gang leader is now a Mark Five threat who can do things with his power nobody's ever seen before." Lysander continued "This planet, Haphestus is not even 300 years old yet, so it shouldn't be a haven for any ancient relics. My bet is that some rich, shady people were in possession of it and were trying to sell the artefact before Reburn caught wind and stole it. Whoever was trading Cordaco's Prism was probably the one who hired those three assassins to get it back."

"Woah…" Zao's eyebrows were right up into his messy hair.

"Now attacking Reburn in the city is sure to cause a lot of destruction, so I'll try to come up with a way to lure him out." Lysander stated.

The talk ended pretty soon after that. In the following week Lysander abandoned his other projects and research to focus completely on the threat of Reburn and training Douglas to use his new eye power. At the end of the week the two of them stood in a forest clearing at the base of a cliff. They were a kilometer or so away from the house. Douglas panted from exhaustion as Lysander crouched on the earthen wall.

"I know it hurts, but that's how you get stronger. You need to familiarize yourself with this power inside and out, it will save your life."

Still panting Douglas straightened and looked up. If he were ever to fight Reburn or somebody like him, he had to master this power. Lysander spread his arms and yellow electricity raced between them and over his shoulders. Clawing his hands into the rock, his lightning ripped apart the earth and sent boulders plummeting down. Spiked metal shoes formed on Douglas's feet, when he opened his eyes everything was yellow and he raced up to Lysander. Before him were multiple lines of yellow, the transparent paths became more solidly golden until the boulder they belonged to bounced on by.

Douglas evaded an overwhelming barrage of debris with ease. He dipped and dodged every pathway, side-stepping chunks that bounced in random directions, running directly at a bus-sized block because he knew the exact moment it would bounce overhead. He was much more confident with movement now, sidestepping cracks in the ground before they appeared, Lysander's lightning tearing apart the mountain from the inside. Douglas leapt up at a thin line that was getting brighter, positioning his hand and catching a chunk of rock that flew there, tossing it at Lysander who slashed it apart with his metal arm.

Douglas landed in a crouch and his elemental grinned. Aiming his two hands, lightning blazed out and condensed into human shape before morphing into clones of Lysander. The copies raced at Douglas and he sprouted black arm-blades attached to forearm plates. Blocking and striking. Thanks to the Ramei each of the clones had bright yellow limbs that seemed to drag the real ones after them. Douglas was able to block and dodge every attack. When suddenly everything was cloaked in warning yellow, Douglas back-flipped into the air just as Lysander shot a bolt of lightning that blazed through his clones and the place he'd been standing.

Douglas landed and hurled throwing stars one after the other. Lysander stepped to evade each one with a smile. Douglas ran at him and stabbed forward, Lysander stepped back then ducked away as Douglas slashed. He could see where Lysander's gold body was retreating to and his attacks got closer and closer as he aimed for where Lysander was escaping. But then a gold arm whipped through his face and it was too fast for Douglas to dodge. When the actual fist hit he spun back and tumbled with a grunt, getting to one knee and rubbing a bruised nose.

"A lot of your enemy's moves are made in response to the ones you choose to make," Lysander interrupted their fight for another speech, the blonde man strode forward "The Ramei will show you the most likely motion-path but as you're beginning to understand even this has limitations. Never let yourself be overconfident."

Douglas nodded and stood despite the aches in his body. With a power like this things were going to be different between Reburn and him. No more of their comrades were going to die.