Adaptation

What happens when a tiger’s claws are cut?
When time mistakes change as growth and adaptation as evolution.
Will it die, or will it revert to its ways?
Or will the darkness swallow its dying corpse to live in shadow.

A drop of liquid echoes through the endless darkness, a ripple beginning to illuminate the sea of the boy’s mind. His body lost in the emptiness, letting himself be submerged in the water of his soul. An exhale finds its way outside of his body, is it a dream, or another warp version of reality. He found himself unsure, all he could do is focus on his breath.

“Geez, so this is the sorry state you’re in now…”

The cheeky voice carried through the emptiness with un unsettling echo, hollow to the boy’s ears akin to a warped reflection. The darkness was suffocating as it’s dark hands slid from his shoulders before stopping at his neck. His eyes flashed in the direction of the feeling, yet nothing was there…

“You can barely even sense me and I thought we had grown for once, unfortunate.”

“Where the hell am I anyway?” The boy spoke out into the empty darkness, no sound came from him, yet the voice responded to him. His eyes looked out into the shadow to only see silver.

“So dense, yet trying to seem so smart… maybe lucky, is that it? Geez.”

The boy focused on the silver eyes in the dark, slowly forming figure around it. Bit by bit his form was revealed and this world became white, the echoes of his mind, unconscious, yet conscious of his being.

“Always inside my own head again, let’s get this over with, I’m tired of fighting my inner demons.” The boy spoke, hearing his own voice as his eyes, pink like the petals of a Sakura Tree, focused on the figure of shadow.

The shadow gave the boy a confident smirk before hearing the laziness in his voice, the arrogance. His silver eyes became cat-like as he held out his hand. Shadows wilted from his body before swirling around a hand. The petals merged into a white blade, the kanji upon the steel burned with 真実

Truth.
“I wonder what they saw in you … Let’s see how many you’ve gone through, First Yiani-san, then Itsuki-san and now Katsuo-san… Oh but you barely use honorifics with him anymore.”

A searing pain hit the boy, the burning sensation stretched across his chest as the crimson infected the white of his Kimono and extended to the world he remained in. The shadow stood over him, as shadow shifted to the tangible they boy saw the shadow clad in a black kimono, the blood melting off of the blade. The boy grit his teeth, feeling if he should have died from that blow.

“So trapped in your own mind, unable to act, unable to sleep. Tell me, when is the last time you actually tasted blood.”

“I-”

“You haven’t!”

The shadow’s voice echoed throughout the space as he stabbed his blade down, cracking this space that he felt trapped inside of. The impact sending a ripple as the world shifted it’s form, becoming overtaken by dark.

“Attack Masaharu! Or will you use that honor of yours to hide your weakness, too tired to act, yet what have you been through?”

A twisted grin grew on the shadow’s face as he let his intent to kill known. The boy, Masaharu reached out to the blade as its white hue reminded him of the past, the dark beginning to overtaking the sword as he got into a battoujutsu stance. He didn’t speak, only focusing on his breathing before being shaken by the voice once more.

“It’s not like you’re doing anything new go ahead and slash at me, I have no way to defend myself.”

A single fluid motion. A river that flowed freely. The blade was unsheathed as Masaharu slashed towards the chest of the thing before him, avoiding it’s eyes and neck as if hesitant to battle. Water flows until stopped by something that can match it’s force as the shadow caught the blade, appearing in pain as he did so, clutching it as he conjured another weapon for himself, bringing the blade across Masaharu’s face. A second death. The Kishino felt a kick to his stomach, the tempered breath betraying him with its escape as he was knocked back.

“I can never get over what you’ve become, Masaharu Kishino.”

The shadow dashed towards Masaharu, feigning a slash to his neck. Masaharu’s gaze adjusted to the sight of the shadow, its features forming a human face that was a mirror reflection of himself. He raised the black blade to block the strike only to see the shadow divert it’s path, dipping towards the ground like a snake, before delivering a blunt strike with the hilt of his blade.

“Why are you just drifting endlessly throughout life?”

Masaharu took the blow full on, his instincts betraying him as he was pushed back once again. He gripped onto the hilt of his katana, staring dead into the eyes of this shadow. The milky silver irises blazing as he looked at this warped version of himself, he did his best to not react to it. His unnaturally pink gaze centered on this shadow before he sheathed his blade, dashing over to it before throwing out an ill-timed slash, his blade burning forward as the shadow fell back in defense, his leg flying up to strike Masaharu’s chin, blasting him back again.

“MASAHARU!― What is the difference between a Master and a Genius, and I’m not talking about the simple differences like one has experience while the other has talent, or one could wield a single weapon while the other could manipulate many.”

Masaharu reeled back from the yell, his head pulsating as his words echoed through his mind, his arms sliced with pain that had long since passed him, his ribs felt as if they were ready to crack open. Crimson came from the boy as a deep cut he was reminded of hit him, the darkness overtaking this world. The Shadow’s voice continued to echo.

“Experience, Power, and Skill!”

The shadow maneuvered his fingers around the hilt of his blade into a reverse grip, focusing his chakra before flipping a switch, enhancing it’s density before he slashed out a stream of chakra towards him, white like the blood of the moon. The blood flowed straight towards Masaharu, too fast to dodge, he held up his blade to block it only for it to shred through his sword. A third death. He looked forward at the shadow casually tossing the blade into the air, spinning like a crescent. The sword fell into his hands, pointing it to Masaharu.

“That’s what I find odd Masaharu, if all those things are exactly the same, what distinguishes these two beings. Why is it that one dies, restricting themselves to a single practice while the other survives to be written into history?”

Move…move… Masaharu forced his body forward to charge at the false copy. The shadow tilted his head side to side as he began to enhance the density of his chakra once more, lowering his body. A silver and black river of chakra surrounded him akin to twin coy fish.

“Adaptation”