Chapter 1

Blood slowly drips to the ground as the two contestants prepare to make their final move. With his goals pushing him forward, Guts lifts Dragonslayer with great speed, flinging some of the entrails still lingering on the blade off in one swift motion. covering those who were lying on the ground behind him. The so called angels bested by one who wore their own brand, laying dead on the ground. Only the last, Femto, had kept up with the assault. He stands alone amidst the remains of the former God Hand, his own sword covered in the blood of his long time enemy. Cuts and deeper wounds covered Gut's form, but he didn't care. He couldn't be bothered to care, because rage filled his heart as his inner demons forced him to move forward, past even his own limits. His vision clouded and his sword ready, this next swing would decide all their fortunes. He could see Femtos' resolve as his face harden, both remembering their last battle for an instant, faces set in ragged determination. In their minds, they remember a similar scene long ago. Before all of this. But now isn't the time. The hellscape of faces in agony quivers as the two combatants prepare.

As Guts raises his sword he leaps forward at speeds only Femto can only just perceive. Femto matches his charge, speeding towards his enemy. In less than an instant the distance is gone and Guts brings down his sword in a massive slash as Femto thrusts his deadly sword at Guts' neck. There's a loud clash and Gut and Femto seemingly reappear on the other side of each other. There's a sound of something spinning through the air and the top half of Femto's sword impales itself into the eye of a nearby head. Icor sprays from the top and bottom half of Femto as his upper body falls in half. Choking on his own blood he coughs out...

"Damn you!"

Femto's voice trembles as his strength bleeds out of his body. Guts turns and charges him, Dragonslayer tight in his hand. Femto draws on the last of his power for a desperate final attack. Midswing, Femto blasts him with a wave of hell fire, stopping him cold. As the wave burns his very soul, as Femto channels the last of the energy from his fallen God Hand into him, Guts' veins burn with infernal fire breaking the berserker's rage from his mind. Screaming in agony as the helmet retreats back to Guts' cloak, reason slowly lights his eyes again. Femto chokes out a slight laugh. Guts glares at him, his anger mounting again.

"What have you done!"

Femto's laugh gurgles to a close. His incongruous smile betraying his seeming lack of concern. With a look of resignation and acceptance he spells out his revenge. .

"Fool. You think you have won? I was the last, when I die...it….falls to..."

As he dies, the brand on Guts slowly fades with him. He is FREE!. Guts feels the power Femto forced on him fill his every cell. Soon the hellscape peels away layer by layer to reveal the crumbling ruins of Falconia. Laying next to him, Femto's body slowly returned to normal as the hellscape faded.

The people looked upon Guts and the corpse of their fallen leader, the people start to gather around Guts. There's anger apparent on all of their faces. People start booing and jeering Guts, as well as throwing stones and anything else they can get their hands on. Gut's looks around, trying to find his friends. He looks behind himself and sees them walking up to him. Guts relaxes for a moment before he sees anger on their faces as well. Casca is the first to reach him and when she does, her hand flies through the air and land itself on Guts' face with a loud smack.

"What have you done! Because of your actions, these people are Homeless in a world full of monsters! You've condemned them to Death!"

Guts recoils from Casca's strike. Grief fills his face as he watches her seethe with anger. A tear runs down his face. Before he can respond, a tear opens on the world behind him and he's pulled through it by some unknown force. Casca and the crowd gasp at this event. When the tear closes back up everyone stares at where it used to be.

The smell of burning flesh filled the air. Fires rage and smokes fill the air as a war rages in a land that would be forgotten many thousands of years in the future. Thousands upon thousands of humans try to flee the chaos, while just as many pray to the goddesses for help. Around them, the demons, giants, fairies, and holy knights where fighting. The demons were slowly pushing the other clans back. On a nearby hill, a lone woman was looking over the conflict, a smile on her face. This event was perfect for her. She needed something like this to test a new spell that had been given to her by one of the goddesses. She knew the people's prayers were useless. The goddess had made sure that the lone figure would have the perfect chance to use the spell given to her. The figure began to build up her power in preparation for the spell. Only a few of those fighting below could see what she was doing, but by the time they knew about it, it was far too late. Large fires spread once the spell is cast, traveling across the crowds. If any of them could see the fire from an elevated plane, like the lone woman could, they would see it form a pattern that looks like two diamonds, one on top of the other, with a line through them and the diamond on top isn't connected. Once the fire is completed a purple goo creature manifests in the crowd. For every person it absorbs it only grow larger and more powerful. Only a few people are even able to last for a short while against the goo. But even them succumb to the creature after a while. The lone woman smiles and walks away. What she doesn't know is that once every creature has been absorbed it condenses itself into the shape of a chest sized egg with various facial features randomly placed on it.

3000 years later, a village was built on the grounds where the catastrophe took place. The event had long since been forgotten by almost everyone except for a select few who were very well learned historians. The village was a very small place, without a lot of people. Very few of the people had any scholarly knowledge. There were a couple of people with military knowledge, but the rest of the people were just farmers, blacksmiths, a medic, etc. One day, a small scout group from a band of thieves came to the village. They demanded that the village surrender all of their money and valuables. The thieves gave the village one week to collect all of their valuables and money so that when the thieves come in a week they'll be able to collect them easily. That night, many of the people wept. They knew they couldn't fight the thieves. They knew they'd be killed. They sent out someone on a horse to try to get the holy knights. However they didn't know that their need for a savior would awaken a great power. That night everyone had a dream of a black wolf, tearing through everything in it path.

It's early morning, the day after the people had the strange dream. There's a thudding sound coming from outside the village. It starts slowly coming towards the village. The doctor of the village is awoken by the sound. He puts on his coat and goes the see what it is. What he finds is a large man slowly walking towards the village. The man is covered from head to two in black armor and a large black cape. There's also what looks like a sword hilt coming off of his back. The doctor could see that the man's face is covered in cuts. The doctor runs over to the man.

"Sir! Are you okay?!"

The man looks at the doctor with a single eye. His right eye was closed while his left was open. He looks at the doctor with a blank eye, like he isn't all there. The man smiles and then passes out. He falls to the ground with a loud thud. The doctor started to panic. He grabs the man by the shoulders and starts to pull. But the man is to heavy and the doctor lets go. He starts running back to the village. He gets a few people together and they help him get the man to their very simple clinic. Once he's there they take off his armor and they also see that he was carrying a giant sword. A couple of them gasp. When they take his armor off they see that his entire body is covered in deep wounds that are bleeding very badly. They set aside his equipment and quickly take him to, what constitutes, an emergency room. The doctor quickly works to sew up all of the wounds. After a couple hours the doctor has managed to close all the the strange man wounds. He exits the room and takes a deep breath to calm himself. One of the villagers walks up to him.

"Is that man going to be alright."

The doctor looks to the room and then back to the villager.

"He was very lucky. I'm surprised he was even able to walk with all those wounds. By all rights he should be dead. But I was able to close the wounds and he should pull through."

The two of them head back to the entrance of the clinic. They look over his equipment. When they get close to his armor, they can feel powerful negative magic emanating from it. The villager turn to the doctor with worry in his face.

"Whoever this person is, they must be very dangerous. I feel like I've seen him before. Like I've seen him in a dream."

The doctor looks over the metal arm the man had, looking for how it functions.

"I had that feeling as well. Perhaps this is a sign."

After the two had looked over the rest of the man's equipment the doctor decides to stay with the strange man. He ask the other villager to go get the sheriff so that when the man wakes he'll be able to get answers to who this person might be. Once the sheriff arrives the doctor takes him over to the sideroom where he's keeping the strange man's equipment. The doctor grabs the mechanical arm first.

"This is some kind of mechanical arm. It's make is very advanced. We're not sure who could have made it. However it's made, the maker is a genius. Not only does it look like it would function as a proper replacement for a lost limb, it also has a magnet in the palm that would also it to tightly grip a metal object."

The doctor passes the metal arm to the sheriff, who turns it around in his hand.

"How did you find this out so quickly?"

The doctor blushes and rubs the back of his hand.

"I was taking a sticking needle to the patient's room and it flew over to the metal arm when I got close."

The sheriff sighs and accidentally pulls down on the hand, revealing a hole in the arm.

"What the hell is this?"

The sheriff raises the arm to look inside, whereupon a cannon ball roll out of the arm and almost crushes the sheriff's right foot. Instead he pulls his foot away and it dents the floor instead.

"There's a cannon in this man's false arm?! What kind of a monster could withstand firing a cannon from their arm?"

The doctor struggles to moves the cannon ball over to the rest of the man's equipment.

"Whoever this man is, He may have the power of a holy knight."

The doctor returns to the sheriff with a small repeating crossbow.

"This was found with the rest of his equipment. I believe it may attach to the man's false arm."

The sheriff puts the mechanical arm down. He walks over to the equipment and before he can pick up something else he feels and sees the armor. It's just sitting there.

"Doctor, was the man found wearing this armor?"

The doctor start sweating in the presence on the armor.

"Yes, he was. So far I haven't tried to mess with it."

The sheriff turns away from the armor and look through the rest of the equipment.

"That's probably for the best."

The sheriff passes over the throwing knives to look at some strange spiked balls with fuses in them.

"Doctor, what are these?"

The sheriff hands one over to the doctor. The doctor looks at the fuse and the ball itself.

"I'm not sure. I don't think I've ever seen anything like it. I don't think we should try to figure it out though, given the rest of this man's armaments."

Ther sheriff nods and finally turns to see the pies de resistance, a giant black sword.

"What a mighty weapon. I've never seen anything like it before. To think a man could wield such a device. It's massive."

The doctor runs his hand over it.

"It's also thick, heavy, and rough. I'd hardly call it a sword. It seems more like a heap of raw iron."

The sheriff and the doctor move back to the main room.

"This man needs to have an eye kept on him at all time until he wakes up. I don't want to know what he might do if he wakes up to find that his stuff is missing. Until he wakes up I also don't want anyone coming in unless they need help."

The doctor nods and the sheriff leaves. The doctor goes back to the room where the strange man is resting. While it's true that the man's wound where deep and many, he seemed to at least be resting well.

Gut's was trapped. He couldn't find his way. All he could see was darkness. Suddenly there's a light. Guts runs towards the light. When he reaches the light he finds Casca standing alone in a white void. Guts runs over to her.

"Casca, what's going on?!"

When Casca turns around it's revealed that she has Griffith's face.

"This is your punishment."

Gut's jumps back. He draws Dragonslayer and rushes Griffsca.

"GRIFFITH!"

As he swings his sword, a black light follows in its path and carves through Griffsca. The darkness travels alone Griffsca's body, consuming it. Once again Guts is in a black void, but this time, standing in front of him is the Beast of Darkness.

"Well look at you. It's nice to see you again."

Guts swings Dragonslayer at the beast.

"Leave me!"

The sword has no effect on the demon. The beast merely laughs at Guts.

"Don't blame me. You're the reason they all hate you. You took away their little fantasy."

Guts' mind fills with rage.

"I said leave!"

There's a sudden flash of light and Guts feels a great weight on his eyes. He opens them to see a strange man looking over him.