#the blazing fox wyvern himself (about me)

[vizutsune]

tags post p.1 of who knows.

[regina-del-cielo]

Fanfiction - Reflections of an Underworld Judge

So. This was the first thing I wrote and published on Saint Seiya, in my native language, a couple years ago... and last week I translated it in English thinking ‘why the heck didn’t you do it sooner, girl’.

Basically, what I think Rhadamanthys thought during episode 132, when Pandora suddenly decided that the Generals of her army should listen to a lyre concert instead of being in the battlefield doing, you know, their job.

Enjoy!

Rhadamanthys landed in front of Giudecca’s palace with a grace unexpected from one of his body size; the wings of his Surplice folded soundlessly over his back.

The Underworld Judge raised his amber-coloured gaze to the doors of Hades’ palace, wondering for the umpteenth time during his short flight from the First Prison what could have passed through Lady Pandora’s mind when she sent those Specters to summon him to Giudecca.

The only explanation was that Hades...

He felt the dark Cosmos of Garuda and Griffon reach him, soon followed by their owners. The other two Judges landed beside him and turned to look at him.

“Any idea as to why we’ve been summoned?” Minos asked him, observing him from under the edge of his helmet, falling over his eyes.

“Lady Pandora’s messengers didn’t tell me and it’s clear that they didn’t tell you either” the Wyvern replied, moving without hesitation towards the door decorated with low relieves.

He hoped that whatever had caused that sudden gathering could justify having been recalled from the battlefield.

The scene that appeared in front of them caused him an immediate shudder of irritation, concealed only by his enviable self-control: Lady Pandora was standing, the trident representing her power over Hades’ Army on one hand, in front of an open chest; beside her, Lyra Orphée, the Silver Saint that had come to the Underworld years before to stay with his fiancée, was on his knees.

Rhadamanthys had never liked that servant of Athena that wandered, alive, in their territory and so near to his Lord.

“What the hell is he doing here?” He found himself thinking, while Aiacos and Minos questioned Pandora over the reason of their summoning.

“Nothing wrong has happened” the girl answered, smiling. “I just thought that today you too would have liked to listen to Orphée’s melodious music, together with Lord Hades.”

The Judge blinked, wondering for a long moment if he’d heard right.

“She summoned us with the utmost urgency for a concert?”

He couldn’t stop himself. “Lady Pandora, I don’t understand. Why should we stay here and listen to music when there are Saints of Athena invading the Underworld?”

Had she forgotten that the Holy War had started?!

“Watch your tongue, Rhadamanthys! Lord Hades knows nothing of what is happening and you won’t do anything to alarm him... there is no reason to worry him!” Pandora hissed, her violet eyes blazing with fury. “You’ll stay here and listen to music.” She commanded.

The Wyvern clenched his jaw but lowered his eyes. Lady Pandora was above him in the Underworld’s hierarchy, he had to obey her.

This didn’t stop him, however, from seriously questioning her strategy choices.

He sat on one of the chairs purposefully brought to the throne room and while bending he felt the hollow on the chest plate of his armour scratch his skin.

A pang of fury made him grit his teeth, while Orphée got ready to play.

When the first notes started to fill the room, Rhadamanthys decided that at least he could use that time to reflect. He had many things to think about and music had never really interested him.

That Holy War was not going as he’d imagined it when he’d first felt Hades’ call.

Starting from the fact that the Great Pope had reached the Underworld barely a few days after the apparition of Athena’s Cosmos on Earth. And five Gold Saints had joined him, all together, only a few months before. Then Poseidon had woken up, in the wrong era, for the act of a mortal.

In all previous Holy Wars, the Glaukopis had shown up on the battlefield with the majority of her Saints, if not with the entire army; the Gold Saints had always been worthy opponents and Lord Hades had often led them personally in battle.

This time however, Lady Pandora had immediately taken the lead of the Underworld army and, when the seal had definitely broken, had ordered for the deceased Gold Saints to be brought back to life, with the offer of eternal life in exchange for Athena’s head.

Sending against the enemy the ex-members of its army hadn’t looked like a good idea the first time he’d heard it and the sensation had even worsened as the mission went along.

His instinct had proved right when his spies hadn’t come back while, on the other hand, two of the six fallen Saints had returned with barely a scratch and had started demanding to talk to Hades.

Sending them back into their infernal placing had almost been a pleasure.

The other four had disappeared at the toll of the twelfth hour and at Pandora’s castle had arrived the three surviving Gold Saints... it had been a disappointing battle. The barrier had weakened them, but it had been almost too easy grabbing them by the neck like chickens and throwing them into the Cocytus.

Had he had to acknowledge them a virtue, he’d had pointed out their stubbornness. After having received blasts that had cracked their legendary Cloths, they’d kept on raising, obstinate, burning that bit of Cosmos they could use.

Apparently, they’d taught that particular skill to the Bronze armoured boys; young, reckless and so soft in the head to actually believe that they could defeat the God of the Underworld.

And yet...

...something didn’t fit. Could it be that this incarnation of Athena had been so foolish as to not fill up the lines of her army in time for the war, confiding only in the Gold Saints (not even the entirety of them) and four Saints of the lowest rank? Where had the tactic skills of the Goddess of War gone?

There were two options: either Athena had gone mad...

...or the warriors that had invaded the Underworld hadn’t shown their true strength yet.

The fight with the Bronze boys at Pandora’s castle made him tend towards the second hypothesis. They’d been hit twice by his Greatest Caution and they’d raised again, wounded and battered, but still with a Cosmos to burn. That damned Pegasus had even been able to chip his Surplice!

And then there was Gemini Kanon.

A loose cannon, as sly as a fox and that didn’t answer to any order except those of his Goddess and of his own conscience. He’d deceived Poseidon for years, had almost made Lune go mad before killing him with a mere snap of fingers...

And had managed to hit him, to paralyse him, with his damned Genro Mao Ken... ready to use him as a bomb against Hades. He was completely different from the others and this made him infinitely more dangerous. Rhadamanthys couldn’t stand sitting there losing time while he should have been outside, trying to neutralize him.

Pandora believed Athena to be dead, this meaning that she’d also be somewhere there in the Underworld. Another detail that didn’t seem right at all. It was too naive jump in the middle of the enemy’s territory without protection, especially in a state where she’d have to follow Lord Hades’ rules...

Only in that moment Rhadamanthys noticed that the music had stopped. He felt the presence of his Lord, behind the curtains, but the Cosmos of Minos, Aiacos and Pandora appeared to be... slumbering.

“How come they’ve fallen asleep?” the Wyvern wondered, immediately feeling Orphée’s Cosmos becoming hostile, while the Silver Saint rose and moved...

...towards Hades’ throne.

“Where do you think you’re going, you miserable strummer?!” He thought, jumping to his feet and attacking him from behind.

The hit made the Saint falter and pierced his Cloth. The Saint turned and Rhadamanthys saw surprise and fear in his blue eyes. He smirked like a snake that has caught its prey.

“My ears aren’t honed enough to distinguish the undertones of your music... even the hostile ones! I’ve always known that sooner or later your real nature would show up; I’ve never believed that you’d truly devoted yourself to Lord Hades!” He growled, watching him closely.

“Surely, I must admit that your reputation of surpassing even the Gold Saints is widely deserved... you managed to put to sleep two Judges and Lady Pandora. I alone have resisted to your power. But if this is all you can do... it won’t be enough! Greatest-”

“Rhadamanthys!” The voice of the young Pegasus Saint echoed as the boy appeared in a swirl of petals from inside the chest. The Judge turned, caught by surprise, and couldn’t avoid the Pegasus Ryu Sei Ken thrown at him.

The blow sent his helmet flying, cutting out one of its horns.

His enemy, together with the Andromeda Saint, urged Orphée to go and Rhadamanthys saw the Silver Saint run towards his God’s throne, the lyre tight in his hands.

“No! STOP!” He roared, following him.

Halfway through the stairs Orphée stopped abruptly and Rhadamanthys noticed that Lord Hades had raised on his feet, showing himself for the first time: the Specter recognized his delicate features and his red hair, while the three Saints seemed thoroughly confused by his appearance.

The perplexity, however, didn’t last long, since Orphée moved again. The Wyvern moved to hit him, commanding him to stop, but once again the Pegasus Saint distracted him with his repeated attacks.

He barely had the time to see the strings of Orphée’s instrument clutch his Lord’s body, before he disappeared completely.

“NO! It can’t be!” He gasped, in a moment of panic, while his enemies cheered at first, then wondered how Hades’ body could have vanished like that.

Taking advantage of their hesitation, Rhadamanthys reached the sacrilegious musician, hitting him again on the back with a furious growl, then caught him by the neck and used him as a shield.

“Anyone attacking me will hit Orphée too!” He shouted in a menacing tone to the two Bronze Saints.

“And you” he added, turning to his prey, “wake Pandora, Aiacos and Minos up immediately!”

As an answer, Orphée started playing again, imprisoning him with the strings of his instrument.

“Seiya, attack Rhadamanthys, don’t worry about me! I’d never survive with this wound anyway!” He shouted, while the Wyvern managed to free himself.

“Deluded insolent!” the Judge roared, throwing the lyre away and hitting him repeatedly on the open wound. “If you don’t wake Lady Pandora and the other Judges up you are of no use to me!” He hissed, while the other kept encouraging the boy to attack them.

And in the end, the Pegasus Ryu Sei Ken crushed them. Rhadamanthys let Orphée go and was thrown far away, feeling  that the boy’s punches had a strength far superior than all the previous times.

“This attack was never this powerful before!” He thought, confused and furious. He couldn’t believe that the Bronze Saint had become so strong in a matter of a few hours... even without the barrier, he shouldn’t have stood a chance against one of the Three Judges!

“What are these blasted children hiding?!” He wondered, waiting for the shock that was paralysing him to pass.

When he was able to raise, he saw that the two Bronze Saints were crying over Orphée’s dead body, sounding terribly pathetic. As soon as they got up, he placed himself in front of them.

“You again, Rhadamanthys? Are you immortal or what?” The brown-haired boy asked him, visibly astonished.

The Wyvern smirked malevolently. “Just because you’ve become slightly stronger, it doesn’t mean that you can beat me.”

“Your time has come” he added, his voice taking a menacing tone. “You’ll escort Orphée on his last, miserable trip!” He roared.

He was about to attack them when a melodious but commanding voice interrupted him suddenly.

“That’s enough, Rhadamanthys!”

He stopped, flabbergasted. “This voice...”

“The fight ends here. Calm down now.”

It was the Andromeda Saint speaking, a youthful boy armed with chains. He looked at him with a haughtiness that gave him chills, his back rod straight.

“It can’t be...” He whispered. “Not only he possesses the same features, but also his voice is incredibly similar to that of Lord Hades!”

“No. This is ridiculous. This stupid brat is pretending, obviously! Trying to deceive me pretending to be my Lord, he’ll pay for this!”

“My compliments, the similarity is incredible and you’re really good at mimicking my Lord’s voice, but it won’t be enough! You dared mocking Rhadamanthys and you’ll pay for your insolence!” He jeered, before lashing back to attack him.

Nobody could make fun of him, even less by passing off as Lord Hades!

“Shun!” He heard the other Saint shout, but he didn’t care. The aforementioned boy didn’t move an inch. He just stared at him with a look of veiled indifference.

“You keep fighting despite my prohibition, Rhadamanthys?” He said, his voice colourless.

Rhadamanthys blocked his fist, trembling once again at the sound of those words.

“His posture is so regal... so godly! No mortal could ever imitate it! Could it be that this boy is... my Lord?” He wondered, stopping in front of the Andromeda Saint and perusing his features, hoping to see the answer in those transparent eyes, in that face as pale as marble.

“Shun? Are you alright?” The irritating Pegasus Saint had approached them, staring in sincere puzzlement at his comrade. Rhadamanthys could feel an ancestral fear in the boy’s Cosmos, as if his instinct had understood that the one in front of him wasn’t his friend anymore, but his mind wasn’t ready to accept it yet.

“Pegasus Seiya, Saint of Athena?” The other asked, with the same uninterested voice.

In that moment his hair shifted from green to dark red, like the most precious of wines. His Cosmos became too powerful to belong to any mortal and Rhadamanthys recognized him.

He was his Lord, the King of the Underworld, Hades Aidoneus.

“Who would have thought that he’d reincarnate into a Saint?” The Judge thought, finding it quite ironic.

While the Pegasus Saint stammered nonsensical words, trying to convince himself that all was still the same, Rhadamanthys found himself thinking that his Lord’s sense of humour was quite twisted: re-incarnate among the lines of the enemy, in a member of the lowest rank... unbelievable!

When Pegasus made the gesture of resting his hand on Hades’ shoulder, the God turned to look at him. “Don’t touch me. I am not the one you talk about. The body and the features you see belong to me.” He turned to the Judge. “You are persuaded now, Rhadamanthys?”

The Wyvern nodded, dutifully. “I am certain of it, Lord Hades.”

“What?! Hades?!” The boy exclaimed, incredulous, before turning once again towards to the God and keeping referring to him as Shun. Rhadamanthys decided that he’d had enough. That irritating brat had already molested his Lord far above any tolerable limit.

“You’re too close to the King of the Underworld” he hissed in his ear, clutching his head with a hand and sending him flying with a Greatest Caution. The Bronze Saint shouted the name of Shun while ending smashed on the roof.

Rhadamanthys kneeled in front of Hades, while the Cosmos of his Lord broke Orphée’s sleeping spell, waking up Pandora and the other two Judges.

The confusion, the bewilderment and the frantic gestures that followed didn’t seem to bother Hades’ serenity in any way, and he let Pandora guide him gently towards his rooms, while the woman ordered Rhadamanthys to send the bodies of the two sacrilegious Saints to Cocytus, where they deserved to stay.

The Wyvern obeyed without hesitation, sure that finally, now that Hades had revealed himself fully, the Holy War would take the right turn, the one in their favour.

No matter what his instinct screamed at him, backed up by his doubts and the sensations taking the best of him when he felt the chips on his Surplice, caused by a mere boy.