The last song of the ancestors

Thabit smoked his shisha with pleasure, and shared it with the two top models who accompanied him. Tuponili had enjoyed the fight, but he didn't show it. He didn't want to give his enemy the upper hand. When he saw Tora-Tora facing Ali Omar Khalid, he drummed his fingers on his thigh. He had bet against the ninja.

"Your fighter looks a bit down. He looks like someone beat him with a blender and flushed him down a toilet."

"Now, my friend, ninjas are sons of Shaytan. But pay attention to Ali Omar Khalid, he can do something stupendous!"

"Something… stupendous?"

"Yes, Ali Omar Khalid was an applied Sufi. He studied the mystical and esoteric currents of Islam for years. After a failed exorcism ritual in the Sinai desert, he strayed from the path of Allah. If the legend is correct, he has acquired powers beyond our comprehension."

Tuponili crossed his fingers. He looked at the ex-suffragette and at the ninja, weighing them up with his eyes. He remained confident.

As they watched, the two fighters did the same thing. On the right was the Japanese man. He wore an iron mask, lined with silk. He wanted to avoid fragility by hiding his wound. His jaw had been crushed by General Luena's hands. The wound could become a prime target for enemy attacks.

On the other side was Ali Omar Khalid. He had dark skin, and a long, curly beard filled out his chin. He wore an orange-toned kandora, the closed collar of which had a personalized cord attached above the chest. The ghafyia was made of sheepskin, covered in red and green crochet, with palm trees embroidered on the sides. Her feet wore white naals made of camel skin.

He was dressed in typical Omani attire. He was unarmed and wore a peaceful countenance. Nothing stood out about Ali Omar Khalid apart from a gold ring on his ring finger.

Tora-Tora rested his hand on the handle of the tachi. The sword, an ancestor of the katana, was used by the samurai cavalry of the Heian Era. Heavier, curved and longer than the katana, its balance point is closer to the guard. The ninja would use it for a laijutsu attack, which was not recommended due to the low hardness of its blade.

Laijutsu, as an art of rapid drawing of the sword, was created by samurai in the Edo era to enable quick attack and defense, with maximum economy of movement. The art evolved to the point where it became an autonomous discipline within Japanese fencing. The ninja were not immune to its influence and incorporated it into their arsenal of deadly techniques.

The technique used by Tora-Tora was adapted to tachi. Instead of holding the sword with his left hand closed and his fingers down, he held it the other way around, with his hand closed and his fingers up. The blow, usually a stock, or upward cut, whether vertical or transverse, or even straight horizontal, was the expected one.

However, the defecting ninja used a straight horizontal uppercut applied after standing side by side with his opponent. Impossible to predict until he was hit. It was with this technique that he cut several men in half.

I'll end this in a single blow.

He grasped the handle of the tachi with his left hand, and his right hand in the scabbard. Emitting a wheezing breath like Darth Vader, he prepared himself. He planted his right foot forward, with the sole firmly planted on the ground. His left leg extended like a lever, with the instep resting against the ring. He advanced like lightning.

Ali didn't see it coming. Before he could react, the tachi grazed his sheath. Slinz, the metallic sound echoed in the air. To Tora-Tora's surprise, the blade caught on something invisible. The Islamist looked at him and said:

"I don't have to lift a finger to defend myself against you."

The ex-suffragette's eyes blackened and became two coruscating spheres. A dark soot was emitted from Ali's pores and accumulated on top of his head. The ninja tried unsuccessfully to remove the sword. The blade began to melt and became a puddle of liquid steel on the ground. Tora-Tora let go of the sword handle and stepped back.

When the oriental assassin raised his eyes, a huge red-black mass solidified and took on a humanoid shape.

"Behold mortal, this is the one who will dig your grave."

"Yes, my master. We will fight together once more, and may our enemies be turned to ash."

"Yes, Malek Ifrit, let's show this coward your power."

Malek Ifrit was a jinn king. His body of steam and fire granted him a threshold existence between the ethereal angels and the sulphurous demons. Floating behind and above Ali Omar Khalid from the waist up, he resembled a bald man with a ponytail and a pointed goatee. His eyes were yellowish and terrible.

From the waist down, it was a dark smoke that was fed by the vapors that emerged from Ali's body. The man's skin sweated as if everything was boiling under his skin. Malek Ifrit opened his mouth and spewed out sulphurous fire. The flames devoured everything in their path, and part of the ring was melted with the wall in front of it.

Tora-Tora threw several kunai at the creature, but its flaming skin melted the weapons as they touched it. The man changed tactics. He took out a blowgun from inside his karate-gi and blew the dart into Ali Omar Khalid's neck. The poison didn't even have a chance to enter his bloodstream. His body heat evaporated all the poison.

Malek Ifrit, with his powerful arms, punched the ninja, who struggled to dodge the attacks. The heat emanating from the vaporous giant was enough to cause burns on his skin. The jinn's limbs stretched out, making it difficult to avoid and anticipate the blows.

The ninja grabbed several explosives and detonated them all at once. Malek Ifrit gathered a large quantity of flames in his hand and formed a fireball. He waited until he sensed the enemy's movement. After spotting his silhouette, he fired the fireball. However, what the vaporous giant hit was Tora-Tora's karate-gi.

"An illusion…"

"Don't worry, my master, he won't be able to hide from me."

The jinn opened its mouth and sucked in all the smoke. When it was all gone, the ninja counter-offensive revealed itself. A shower of shuriken fell on Ali. Malek Ifrit shielded him with his body, but it was then that the Japanese warrior struck the final blow.

With a kunai, he deflected the direction of a shuriken in mid-air, causing the star to sever the finger bearing Ali's golden ring. Little by little, his metamorphosis was undone. Malek Ifrit faded away. The ex-suffragette cursed his enemy. Without his armor of flames, Ali Omar Khalid was vulnerable. He laughed as if he had gone mad.

"How did you discover the seal that bound my soul to Malek Ifrit's essence?"

"Chuf… Muslims… chuf… don't wear… chuf… gold."

He put his hands up as if invoking Allah. The wound on his finger turned into an intense hemorrhage.

"That is the price a believer must pay for making a pact with a jinn, may the will of…"

He didn't finish his sentence. He lay in the ring of the Great Arena with his head decapitated by a wakizashi. The crowd cheered the ninja for his cold-bloodedness and bloodthirsty spectacle. Tora-Tora headed outside while the team removed the body. He waved his sword to spray the blood. He put it back in its sheath.