The storm didn't roar.
It whispered.
A low hum echoed across the peaks of Mount Reizan, as if the clouds themselves were listening. Lightning cracked silently in the distance, restrained, waiting. The confrontation between Raijin and Shinkū had been momentarily severed by the arrival of a presence more oppressive than the storm.
Kurogane Tetsujin stood alone on the cliff's edge, wrapped in armor that clanked like thunder forged into steel. His eyes — cold and forged by war — bore down on Raijin like a blacksmith judging his creation.
"Disappointing," he said again. "I told you that lightning without discipline is nothing but a spark in the void. And yet here you are — parading your power, chasing ghosts."
Raijin's hands trembled, not from fear, but fury. "You came here just to shame me? This was never about you!"
Kurogane's gaze moved past him — to Shinkū.
"You're wrong. This has always been about me. About what you're trying to become. About surpassing him."
Shinkū stood still, blade at his side. "I didn't come to fight you, Kurogane."
"And yet you stand at the center of my son's delusion," the man replied, stepping forward, each step sending tiny quakes through the stone. "He cannot see beyond you. You were always the example, weren't you? The prodigy. The one I couldn't mold. So now, Raijin tries to mold himself in your shadow."
Raijin turned to him, voice cracking. "I'm not trying to be him! I'm trying to surpass him! To shatter everything you forced onto me!"
"You've shattered nothing," Kurogane said coldly. "Look at you. Lightning, yes. Rage, yes. But where is the steel? Where is the control?"
He drew no weapon. He didn't need to. His presence alone warped the mountain's breath.
Shinkū raised a hand, stepping between the two. "If you came to test him, you've done it. Now leave."
Kurogane smirked. "You've grown bolder. Or softer. Once you would've struck me where I stood."
"I'm not who I was," Shinkū said. "And neither is he."
Raijin gritted his teeth. "Stop talking like I'm not here!"
Lightning surged from his body, exploding outward. The clouds above crackled in tandem — no longer whispering, but screaming.
But Kurogane didn't flinch. He stepped through the lightning unharmed, walking through it as if it were mist.
"Still can't strike me," he said. "Still holding back. Weak."
Raijin screamed, unleashing a full arc of tempest that shattered the ledge beneath Kurogane's feet.
A crater formed.
Smoke and ash.
But Kurogane stood within the dust, untouched, armored fist raised.
"No storm bends iron."
---
Down the slope, Mei, Kaito, and Gorou watched in tense silence. Mei's fingers twitched, dark mist curling at her fingertips. The Abyss was whispering again — louder now. It liked the chaos. It thrived in it.
Gorou noticed the shift in her and stepped closer. "Hold your center."
"I'm trying," she said through clenched teeth.
Kaito, arms crossed, stared at the duel. "This isn't our fight. But it's tearing them apart."
"They need this," Gorou said. "He needs this. Raijin's entire soul is built on proving himself."
"And if he fails?" Mei asked.
Gorou's jaw tensed. "Then we catch what's left of him."
---
Back above, Raijin panted, lightning dancing off his skin. His robes were scorched, his arms bloodied. Kurogane hadn't even drawn steel.
"Why?" Raijin asked, finally. "Why… were you never proud of me?"
The question floated in the storm like a thunderhead without a strike.
Kurogane, for the first time, faltered.
He looked down at his son — not as a soldier, not as a disappointment, but… as a child.
"I didn't raise you to need my pride," he said at last. "I raised you to stand above it."
Raijin sank to his knees. "That's not enough. You turned your back on me when I needed you the most."
"And yet you stand," Kurogane said.
The storm pulsed.
Raijin's aura flickered… and stabilized.
"I'm done proving myself to you," he said. "You're no longer the storm I chase. You're the chain I break."
He rose slowly, lightning wreathing his form — not wild, but refined. Measured. Controlled.
Kurogane's eyes widened, just slightly. "Good."
He turned away.
"I came to see if you were still weak. I see you are not."
With that, he vanished — a gust of iron wind in his place.
---
Raijin stood alone.
Then looked to Shinkū.
"I'm ready now."
Shinkū nodded. "Then we meet not as master and storm, but as two wills."
The disciples stood as well. Mei stepped forward. "We'll watch. But we won't interfere."
Kaito crossed his arms. "Unless you break the mountain."
Gorou grinned faintly. "I'll catch the pieces."
Raijin smiled — a real one this time. "Thank you. All of you."
He turned to Shinkū.
"No more distractions. No more fathers. Just this."
He raised his hand, and the sky split open.
Lightning rained down behind him — not in chaos, but in cadence. As if the heavens themselves had aligned.
Shinkū stepped forward, his void aura darkening the stone beneath his feet.
"Then let's end this storm."
---
Far beyond the storm, across the fractured continent, the Five Strongest Jūshin stirred.
Gokumetsu, the Hell Erasure, opened a single eye in the void between realities.
Kuroki, the Black Demon, shifted beneath the tectonic crust, claws flexing.
Mukurojin, buried beneath ten thousand corpses, smiled at the scent of war.
Yamigarashi, walking across forgotten ruins, stopped mid-step and turned to the north.
And in a realm not bound by time or truth, Kurozankai laughed.
"The children clash," he said to the wind. "Let the illusions break."
---
Back on Mount Reizan, the wind stilled.
Two warriors stood at the summit.
The void and the storm.
And when the battle began… the mountain would remember.