18 A dark backstory written in 10 minutes

(A/N: No WiFi again. Except this time, it shouldn't affect my writing toooo much.

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The Dark Reunion.

Little was known about them, and with good reason. Their power is unparalleled, enough to destroy multiple worlds and thus evidence of their existence. Even their own did not escape this fate.

But something as simple as destruction can be achieved by any creature given enough time. The Dark Reunion merely got there first, and used it to prevent others from doing so.

They kept their dominance in the void riddled with stars, reigning over it as its master through calamitous wars.

Money. Power. Terror. Without difficulty, they achieved each and every desire of theirs. Their "dark" magic considerably improved their efficiency and effectiveness, whether in battles or manufactures.

Many civilizations have fallen, trying to fight against their dark forces only to end in vain.

As they approached the brink of desolation, they would realize the futility of their actions.

In their eyes, the Dark Reunion was like a wrathful, bottomless demon—A ravenous God of Plunder.

It seemed as if they had achieved total dominance across the stars, until another desire arose.

To become gods. REAL gods.

What is a god known for? Many, many things, but the Dark Reunion lacked one aspect of it.

The authority over life and death. Not the simple 'obey me or die' but the ability to create life rather than simply ending it.

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[Creation]

To finally fill the starry void with their creations.

[Destruction]

To weed out the unwanted elements—The imperfections.

[A New World]

Where all shall worship them.

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"It's time to come home, The Jet-Black Wings."

A Dark Reunion member in the front leisurely spoke. An air of authority emanated from him, making his words seem like a harsh command.

With his words, he loosened the red bandages firmly wrapped around his arm, revealing an ink-black tattoo of a singular, stretched wing. The phrase "DARK" is displayed, shadowed by a ghostly crescent.

Suddenly, the tattoo flared with a dark and sinister light. It slithered against the member's bare skin, creeping uncannily towards his clenched fist. A great, shadowy battle-axe took form.

Saiki warily watched as the Dark Reunion members hovered in thin air. He counted nine individuals, and there was bound to be more.

'Are they psychics as well?' Saiki briefly thought. 'What kind of power is that anyway... how ominous.'

The leading member took notice of Saiki's nosy glare directed to their group.

"Oh, them? Don't mind them. I called dibs on you two first. They'll stay right where they are. Don't interfere, alright guys?"

Try as he might, Saiki couldn't read their minds; it made his heartbeat quicken. He didn't like not knowing about something, no matter how minor. To be in the dark about these invaders was unpleasant.

—

"In approximately 24 hours, this planet will cease to exist if our conditions—Heok?!"

—

{...}

Indeed, Dark Reunion was an unfathomable organization.

'What the hell did Kaidou get into.' Saiki looked over to his side.

Meanwhile, Kaidou was feeling strange. Looking at the Dark Reunion members, who he made up in his head, come for him in real life, was truly bizarre.

"...Are you the real Dark Reunion? This isn't a prank?"

The Reunionist heard his words. (A/N: I'll call them this since it's easier)

"Is that how you see it after everything you have done? A prank? Surely you're joking..."

The man responded with a chuckle. He stared at Kaidou's face and saw the befuddlement that remained.

"You... don't tell me... you don't remember, do you?"

An answer never returned. But it was enough. Kaidou's face said it all.

"Hahahahaha! Well, well, this makes things easy. But we don't want that, do we?"

The shadowy battle-axe reformed into a formless state, embracing the man's hands instead.

His figure grew blurry, and in the blink of an eye, his clenched fist was already near Kaidou's confused face.

"I'll help you remember, traitor. The power of your Scion."

The fist obscured in darkness was too quick to dodge. Kaidou, however, had disappeared into thin air, barely dodging the attack. Not only him but Toritsuka and Aiura as well.

Another fist followed up, aimed at a new target, only to be stopped by a yellow, boomerang-shaped object.

Curiously, the Dark Scion examined his new opponent.

"Did our traitorous assassin make a friend? What's your name? I must say, the pink hair and antennas look so damn weird. Want me to remove them for you? And what kind of weapon is that? It looks so damn creepy."

{Shut up.}

Saiki pushed him with minimal force, but it was enough to drive the surprised Scion back into the other Dark Reunion members.

The yellow boomerang, Saiki's Nanana, was afflicted by the darkness before being consumed by it. Seeing this, the Scion smirked underneath his mask.

"So you're a strong one. I honestly thought that a psychic like you would be weaker."

{...You know what I am?}

"You aren't the first psychic we have come across. The stars are boundless, far beyond your fickle imagination. There's a looot of people like you out there."

The Scion flung himself forward once more, his fist leaving behind a trail of shadow smoke.

Saiki reacted far quicker than before, ensnaring his attacker in a psychic cage a safe distance away.

Only to receive a heavy blow to the stomach.

With a brush against the Scion's cloak, the psychic energy dissipated, and his shrouded fist struck Saiki square in the gut.

"I told you, you aren't the first psychic we've come across. We slaughtered civilizations of your kind in our many wars."

Contemptuous laughter roared from beneath the Scion's mask.

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However, the sensation he felt was odd. It didn't feel as if he punched a person. A rigidness he had never felt before came from the pink-haired psychic.

His hand didn't come out the other side. There was no sickening crunch that he had grown to love.

"...What are you?"

The Scion looked up, his reflection barely visible within those blank, dark-pink eyes.

{I don't know what I am either. But I know your type.}

Unhurriedly, Saiki reached for one of his antennas and pulled it off. The air immediately turned heavy as it received a flood of psychic energy: An alarming phenomenon that the Scion noticed.

He attempted to retreat, but Saiki gripped the Scion in place with his left hand.

{You aren't my first aliens either.}

"!"

A Nanana of enormous size descended on the Scion's head, brutally crushing his body against the still-quaking earth. The sound of cracking bones and fragmenting ground mixed together, becoming indistinguishable from one another.

{I bet you've never seen that before.}

The ginormous Nanana was eventually consumed by the darkness, revealing the crushed Scion inside a deep crater.

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{H-holy. Heck. Saiki, that w-was brutal.}

{Don't just stand there and attack them! Most of my psychic powers are useless, so use yours.}

Earlier, Saiki forcefully teleported Kaidou behind him while sending Toritsuka and Aiura to their school, far away from the conflict.

"Finally, that idiot got what he deserves! Ahahaha!"

One of the Reunionists merrily laughed out loud.

"Shut up. You're no better."

"Bitch, did you say something just now?"

"Maybe I did you deaf dumbass."

Saiki and Kaidou watched as two Reunionists randomly started to bicker.

{Attack them already!} Attacking an unprepared enemy is a shitty but effective strategy.

{Fine! I'll use this move I just developed.}

Kaidou began unraveling the red bandages on his right arm.

{...}

Round and round.

{...}

Still going.

{...}

Slowly but surely.

{.....}

There were a lot of bandages. In any case, their bickering enemies had yet to stop.

{...good grief.}

With the help of Psychokinesis, the bandages were instantly unraveled.

{Thanks dude.}

Kaidou produced two black spheres on his palm, pulsing with either a crimson or violet wave. Darker than dark, the spheres hovered near one other. One of them throbbed a step faster, making their pulses sequential instead of simultaneous.

Like a sonorous heartbeat.

*Ba Bump* *Ba Bump*

Kaidou manipulated them, rotating both spheres into following a spherical path. Each revolution took a shorter time than the previous one until both spheres became a black, ball-shaped blur.

Then it appeared, too quick for anyone to see, a bright flash of crimson and violet. Kaidou felt electricity shoot up his spine.

He finally raised his hand, aiming at the loudly bickering Reunionists.

{Judgement!}

One of the spheres flew out of rotation, accurately landing right beside the duo.

{Knights!}

"What's this?"

They took notice of its vivid red color. Finding it familiar, their heads swiveled towards Kaidou's outstretched hand.

{Of!}

This time, they saw a violet sphere fluctuating in a menacing manner.

{Thunder!}

A streak of violet and red attacked from each sphere, sandwiching the duo in a torrent of colorful lightning.

Each sphere relentlessly poured out thick forks of thunderbolts, their color slowly draining throughout their continuous assault.

In the end, both spheres turned murky, regaining their original form of darker-than-dark with faint pulses, signaling the end of Kaidou's attack.

{How was that? Cool right? I made it myself after experimenting for a month!} Kaidou began fishing for compliments. Unfortunately, he was bound to get none.

"Ahahaha! That was close, wasn't it, Scion #2?"

"You're doing it on purpose again. My title is not 'Scion #2.'"

"Yeah, but your actual title is too long. Even mine is. Just call me Scion #1."

"No way. If anyone is #1 then it's me."

Shadowy barriers connected to the silent Reunionists took the brunt of the attack. Subjected to such force, they collapsed, exposing the bickering, unharmed Scions.

"I changed my mind. You should be Scion #3."

"Screw you!"

{They really cannot shut up.}

Saiki remarked before noticing a detail he missed while glaring at the two. The Reunionists wore two types of masks, one of which contained intricate red feathers in its design.

The Scion that he smashed against the ground had red feathers on his mask.

So did the two bickering ones.

"Anyway, you Legionnaires did well. I would've used #2 over here as a shield otherwise."

"You would've been hit even if you did. The lightning came from two directions dum dum."

The attack didn't work, and they were back to bickering once more.

{Saiki! Just smack all of them as you did to the first guy!}

{Later.}

With a thought, Saiki and Kaidou disappeared into the horizon. The dark pillar of light was approaching their previous position. A fight with the invaders while near it would have been stupidly dangerous.

As a result, they lost sight of the Reunionists. Temporarily.

Saiki crossed his eyes, using Clairvoyance to keep an eye on the enemy.

"Hey, why are his eyes crossed. Is he a weirdo like #3 said?"

{What the hell‽ How did they follow us so fast?!}

Mysteriously, the Reunionists followed after them in an instant despite teleporting to a faraway place. Thankfully, the Reunionists didn't take the opportunity to attack. At least, not yet.

"Anyway, we can't beat them. Even Scion #3, that meathead, couldn't damage the traitor's friend. Scion #2, let's use 'that.'"

"Going full power from the start, huh. I like it!"

Each of the silent Reunionists, the Legionnaires, had their bandages already removed, revealing their matching tattoos.

{Get ready. I don't like the look of this.}

Scion #1 waved his hand, followed by the tattoos uncontrollably spewing out a great deal of "dark" energy. Overhead, symbols formed and connected to create a circle filled with incomprehensible meaning.

What it is for, neither Saiki nor Kaidou knew. They didn't want to find out, given the feeling of trepidation that arose from watching its creation.

Scion #1's complete attention was on creating whatever 'that' is. Without sparing another second, a torrent of pyro-kinetic flames rushed the Reunionists from every cardinal direction, drowning their figures inside a sea of psychic fire.

Nevertheless, just the fact that it was of psychic origin became its undoing.

Without difficulty, Scion #2 created a shadowy barrier that obstructed the flames, protecting her comrades.

The "dark" barrier was incredibly thick. Saiki and Kaidou could barely see the inside; they had no clear vision of 'that'.

Similarly, a Nanana of epic proportions struck the barrier, yet it was incapable of leaving a small dent.

Followed by a sonic boom as Saiki himself moved, using his uncontrollable strength to brute force a way through.

*Bonk* *Bonk*

No damage whatsoever, to Saiki's dismay.

"You can't do anything, pink boy. Psychics have always been helpless against us. You alone can't change that!"

Scion #2 was correct. No matter how strong Saiki's abilities are, they would crumble against their "dark" power's unique constitution. Destroying it was one thing, but even measures to bypass it such as Teleportation were unsuccessful.

Even physical strength, enough to drastically change the world map, came up short.

Saiki was already lucky to catch a Scion off guard and take him down.

{Is this the power capable of destroying the world?}

Saiki could also cause the end of the world, but Dark Reunion's power was quite unimaginable. Just a barrier created by one person (A Scion) was enough to render Saiki useless in a fight. There was the matter of compatibility and fairness, things ignored in situations such as these, and for a good reason.

Life or death. Victory or defeat. History is written by the victors. The losers can shut up and be forgotten.

Far away, there was still the pillar of dark light, ever-growing, now bordering a nearby city.

'Was it possible to stop it? To save the world like always?' Similar thoughts ran across Saiki's mind. He felt a nauseating dizziness erupt and an urge to bang his head on something.

After all, they were about to become the losers.

{Judgement Knights Of Thunder!}

A stream of violent lightning took everyone by surprise as it struck the unbreakable barrier.

Kaidou had been silent all this time, occupied with launching an attack more destructive than the last. It was the biggest he had ever created, each thunderbolt thicker than an adult with their length incomparably longer.

Numerous lightning chains crackled as they skewered through the barrier after a veritable lightning storm, illuminating the barrier's dark interior with bright flashes of red and violet.

"AHHHH!!!"

Like a peal of thunder, a terrible scream escaped from within before being drowned out by the booming thunderclaps.

{...}

Saiki and Kaidou stood motionless, their gazes glued to the honeycombed barrier.

Even after J.K.O.T. ended, they moved not a single muscle.

{...good job.}

{...thanks.}

The scream unsettled the two deeply.

"AHHHH!!!"

They jumped in surprise as another scream rang out. But there was something wrong with the way it sounded.

"AHHHHH... AHHAHAHAHAHA!!!"

It was laughter, hysterical and unnerving to their ears.

The enemy was yet to be defeated.

The shadowy barrier slowly returned to the Scion's tattoo, revealing the Scions beside each other. The people they came with, the Legionnaires, started falling to the ground, as if they were drained of energy, after the barrier fully dispersed. Unconscious but alive—unless they take horrible fall damage.

Above the Scions was a completed magic circle towering over the two.

"To think that Black Beat has such devastating power! And you dared to hide it from us for so many years! The Jet-Black Wings does not deserve it, right Scion #2?"

"Yeah, it hurts a bit."

While Scion #1 came out unscathed, there was no hiding the burns present on his accomplice.

Scion #2 wore a tattered cloak and a semi-broken mask, revealing her dark eyes filled with hostility.

She spoke somewhat harshly, "Fuck them up."

The magic circle above the Scions began to spin. Saiki prepared to summon his massive Nanana while Kaidou started to create more spheres.

The First Scion reached for the red bandages on his arm.

"Darkness is the absence of light. Darkness without light goes unseen, for it is everywhere and everything.

True darkness is its name, but True Darkness is a myth: a flawed universal notion that shouldn't exist, for it is outside the boundaries of our cosmos.

For that, we are grateful."

*BAAM!* *BAAM!* *BAAM!*

The Second Scion interfered whenever Saiki attacked. With her efforts, the dark ritual continued unimpeded.

"HURRY THE FUCK UP! I'M ABOUT TO RUN OUT OF JUICE!" The Second Scion had something important to say.

"Darkness is the absence of light, but with blinding, brilliant light, True Darkness is surpassed."

The First Scion finished unveiling his Dark Reunion tattoo. However, unlike the ones previously seen, it was surrounded by a spiral of scaly dark ink. The closer it was to the center, the thicker and darker it became.

"And when dark overlaps with dark..."

The spinning magic circle turned into a black ooze, dripping on the First Scion's exposed tattoo, spiral and all.

"...when dark overlaps with dark... aha, AHAHAHA!!!! I should show you! Our dark creation! The fruit of our Dark Reunion!"

{Judgement Knights Of Thunder!!!}

But Kaidou was too late, for immeasurable darkness burst out and swallowed the bolts of lightning whole.

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That immeasurable darkness... went away?

Sucked to the sky?

"Impossible! How could this be...‽"

Drained of "dark" magic, The First Scion lost his footing in the air and fell to the ravaged ground by natural and artificial disasters.

It was the same for the Second Scion.

Defending against the psychic anomaly that was Saiki required an incredible amount of "dark" magic: magic that she had all used up.

"I don't really get it, but... we won?"

{...yeah}

And before Saiki and Kaidou's eyes, the Reunionists vanished into thin air.

They tensed up, thinking that their disappearance was another of Dark Reunion's ploys.

"Emergency Quest Accomplished! Everything is now daijoubu." Snow appeared and did a peace sign with her hands.

Thankfully, it was just Snow with her antics.

"Now, who wants to try a new kind of coffee jelly? It should be good, a friend of mine made it."

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[Emergency Quest (Completed)]

The End Is Nigh |Rank: FFFFF|

[Quest Completion Rank]: SSS-

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We were back in the ground, taking a much-needed coffee break.

This time, Saiki and Kaidou were noticeably more tired, despite the fact that they spent less energy against Dark Reunion. Must be a mental thing.

Since they were tired, I went ahead and reversed all the damage that the Dark Reunion caused.

I did nothing about people's memories though. Or all the videos going around the internet. Or any satellite pictures and whatchamacallits. The news and shows on the TV would be more interesting that way.

Though anything that proved the existence of psychics was promptly Annihilated.

Would people think that aliens came to invade? Maybe the government would deny everything and blame it on the Russians. Oh, wait. I'm in Japan now, not in 'Murica.

...does Area 51 exist in this world?

Nah, I'll visit the original one back home. Last I remember, people were planning on raiding it. I wonder if they actually found aliens.

Anywho.

'My first quest was pretty easy. Should it even count as a quest? It felt more like a freebie.'

I'm not complaining though. The coffee jelly is delicious. It's so much better than the ones I bought!

Thank you, System.

[You are welcome]

I even got a new skill and some kind of authority, though I don't know what the latter is.

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[Notice]

[Complementary skills detected]

[<Skill Synthesis> in progress...

- PSI

- Saiki K World Skill

...Completed]

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[P.S.I. "The Lord of Sweets" |Rank: XII| Skill Successfully Obtained]

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New information quickly entered my mind. It confused me, but it took less than a second to understand what it meant.

New powers! More than what Saiki has!

"Let's see..."

I closed my eyes and concentrated. My perception underwent an odd change, but their effects are something I should confirm myself.

A little peek into the outside world, and I saw it very clearly.

What should have been an empty mountainside was suddenly crowded by people. They were everywhere. Beside me, around Kaidou... they avoided Saiki though.

The most peculiar thing is that I could see through some of them, apart from them being able to float, and that they wore clothing from past and current eras.

Ghosts exist in this world, and now I can see them.

I see dead people.

Walking, floating, flying, they were everywhere. They see each other. They know they are dead too.

This is the world Toritsuka sees, and it's beyond freaky. I mean, some of them don't even look dead, more like a random passerby on the street.

'Imagine trying to talk to one of them in a crowded place... You'd look like a crazy person without knowing it...'

Curious, I examined each ghost from head to toe. Everyone was different and doing different things.

An old man ghost was mooning an oblivious Kaidou.

A girl with long black hair was also sitting on a tree branch while swaying her feet.

Even a naked dude was saying this weird ass chant, "magicmagicmagicmagicmagic." He must be a chuunibyou.

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...huh.

I've seen that naked buff dude before.

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[Notice]

[Reviewing saved memory data]

#FLASHBACK#

...

...am I tripping or is that a naked person over ther—

*BOOM*

...

#FLASHBACK END#

Yep, I know that guy.

"...gicmagicmagicmagicmagic..."

...I think I could've prevented that.