Soul Calibur: A New Host
By atfirstdawn

*Mature content warning
*All characters are copyright of Namco


In the darkness of her dream Setsuka was reliving her recent past, her last waking memory.

Under the moonlit cherry blossoms lining an open road Setsuka had approached a mysterious woman dressed in green with a glowing hooped blade and shrill voice. Hearing footsteps behind her the mysterious woman had stopped in her tracks and twisted her body to face Setsuka, her purple eyes glowing in the darkness.

“Ooohhh you have a nice body… can I see it for a second? I wonder if Soul Edge would like it.” Her shrill voice pierced the night as she danced around her blade, picked it up with both hands and held it in front of her chest with an unhinged smile.

Instinctively Setsuka reached for the blade concealed within her oilpaper parasol.

With weapons drawn the two women charged toward each other and soon the scraping of metal on metal filled the still air of the night. The mysterious woman possessed an unnatural strength; each blocked attack sent a shockwave of pain through Setsuka’s body as her legs buckled with the driving force of each impact. The fight continued until Setsuka barely had the energy to stand; seizing her opportunity the mysterious woman spun on the spot and threw her blade through the air at Setsuka. Raising her blade to soften the blow Setsuka took the brunt of the attack which sent her body spiralling to the ground, the unforgiving stone road broke Setsuka’s fall and drove the air out of her chest…

Sestsuka lay on her back looking up at the moon while gasping for air. Setsuka saw the figure of the mysterious woman block out the moonlight as she stood and then crouched over her body. Half- conscious, Setsuka stared defiantly into the woman’s insane eyes. The mysterious woman’s lips cracked into a lopsided smile as she buried her left hand in Setsuka’s hair and lifted her right hand into the air…
“Does it hurt? Tell me it hurts!”
The mysterious woman brought down her fist and Setsuka’s world went dark….

Tira lay on top of Sestsuka’s unconscious body with her forearms and head resting on Setsuka’s breasts. Tira smiled and swayed her head left and right as she retraced the battle through Setsuka’s fluttering eyelids; occasionally Setsuka’s lips would twitch against the tight rag Tira had tied around her pretty mouth. With each twitch of her lips Tira knew that Sestsuka was reliving the pain that she had suffered courtesy of herself and Soul Edge; icy trickles of joy pricked Tira’s senses as she continued to watch the unconscious woman’s faint expressions. Occasionally Setsuka’s body didn’t move at all and with a scowl, out of boredom, Tira’s mind would revisit its own recent past and recall how difficult it had been to drag both Soul Edge and Setsuka’s unconscious body down the road.

Finding a small cabin in the nearby valley had been a stroke of good luck for Tira; when she had entered, the fireplace was already burning with a deep pot of food simmering above it. Setting Soul Edge down, Tira carried Setsuka to the bed at the far side of the room. Tearing through the cabin in search of something to bind Setsuka with, Tira eventually found numerous coils of rope out back; the cabin seemed to belong to a raft maker of sorts. Returning to the bedside Tira bound Setsuka’s wrists and ankles to each post tightly, throwing her ridiculous shoes across the room and then gagged her with a thick cloth she had found nearby. The host would need to be in some way compliant if she were to transfer Soul Edge correctly… Tira wondered where the owner of the shack had gone to for a moment and then thought nothing of it; she would kill whoever it was when they got back…

Setsuka’s body bucked under Tira, getting her attention. Tira licked her lips and settled back into the present; edging forward slightly, Tira pressed her lips softly against Setsuka’s ear.

“I can’t wait to see you die, it’s going to look incredible…” she said softly with barely contained excitement as Setsuka’s jaw clenched around her gag; the dream was coming to an end, she’d be awake soon…

Tira rested her head back onto her forearms over Setsuka’s breasts, took a deep breath and thought to herself about what wonderful entertainment unconscious bodies made.

Setsuka’s feet and hands twitched as a dark light brought her consciousness back to her. Her eyes slowly opened and she took a deep breath; her mouth was dry and her extremities were cold with barely any sensation. Snapping awake and realising her situation, Setsuka jerked her limbs away from each bed post; the sudden movements against the strong ropes and tight knots caused her muscles to cramp uncomfortably. Writhing through the slowly dulling pain Setsuka screamed in defiance through her rough and full gag and twisted her body against her bonds, her eyes glancing helplessly around the cabin.

Setsuka’s heart skipped a beat seeing the mysterious woman clothed in green sitting beside the unnaturally glowing hoop blade at the other side of the room. Tira had left her place on top of Setsuka a short while ago to sit by the pot of food over the fire; she had kept her attention trained on Setsuka, drinking in the sight of her beautifully helpless and unconscious body as she fished around in the boiling hot soup with one hand, it’d taken her a while to find anything of interest but she had eventually discovered a chicken leg, she hadn’t felt any pain… Setsuka continued to stare at Tira defiantly while Tira stared back with twisted desire and a mouthful of spicy chicken.

Tira picked the chicken leg clean and threw it back into the pot as she stood up and dragged her Soul Edge infused blade to Setsuka’s bedside. Tira was still staring at Setsuka as she approached with her head tilted and her eyes and mouth smiling manically; crouching down beside her Tira’s expression changed to disgust; Tira’s hands pressed themselves onto Setsuka’s chest and slowly moved down over her breasts and to her stomach. Setsuka moaned lightly as Tira’s hands roamed her body, her chest tightened and a breath caught in her throat as Tira’s hands reached her thighs and helplessly another moan whispered out from underneath her gag.

Setsuka infuriated Tira; she was so beautiful with her chiselled facial features, her smooth, perfectly pale skin and the helpless expression in her eyes. Tira snapped her attention away from Setsuka’s perfect body to Soul Edge sitting idly beside her.  

“Let’s get started, no point in dragging it out, right?”

Standing up and hoisting Soul Edge above her head Tira’s expression quickly morphed back into the manic smile.

A thick sensation of helplessness flooded Setsuka’s body as she watched Tira’s expression intensify.

Tira stopped; uncontainable rage filled her eyes, her head shook with anger as she slowly turned it to the cabin’s entrance. A skinny middle aged man stood trembling in the doorway, paralysed by fear.
“That noise… the sound of your heart beating… its irritating!” Tira’s words were hissed through clenched teeth as she planted Soul Edge into the soft wood of the cabin’s floor and walked towards the petrified man.

“How do you manage to even exist!?”

The man’s breathing threatened to break his ribs as his deep and panicked breaths became more and more frequent. Tira threw out an arm as she approached him; in a flash both the middle aged man and Tira had disappeared into the night outside of the cabin.

Setsuka moaned in relief through her gag and lay still on the bed for a moment, her eyes closed, and her heart beating rapidly. Closing her eyes made Setsuka aware of her body; the ropes around her wrists and ankles sent shivers through her body as she lightly tugged against them, gauging the amount of torque she had to work with in order to release herself. Setsuka tugged on the length of rope tying her left wrist to the left bed post, the rough rope burnt against Setsuka’s skin as she struggled against it, the pain intensified; Setsuka grimaced and bit down on the thick gag between her teeth, the rope was unrelenting, eventually Setsuka let out a long moan and stopped her futile struggling. Setsuka lay motionless again, looking helplessly up at the ceiling of the cabin while her mind worked through potential escape plans and hoping that Tira wouldn’t return too soon.  

The middle aged man had ran out of breath, he wasn’t used to running; his arms were strong enough to bind wood together but that was it, he wasn’t a young man anymore. Reaching out his arms to steady himself on a nearby cherry blossom tree lining the open road the man stood panting, his chest feeling like it was tearing into two straight down the middle. His desperate eyes flitted around his surroundings for a hiding place; instead he saw a parasol lying on the ground and next to it was a small blade, the sharp metal illuminated by the moonlight. The raft maker stumbled over to the blade, his legs shaking, threatening to give up on him. Suddenly he heard Tira’s raspy breath in his ear and felt a hand clutch his shoulder with a vice-like grip.

“I’m annoyed; I’m going to make you disappear forever!”

Setsuka’s mind had strayed from the present during her helpless silence to thoughts of her dead master. He had shown her kindness and taught her the way of the blade, she hadn’t realised until it was too late that she had fallen in love him. The day he died she had vowed to avenge his death and to this day his murderer was still at large, his name; Heishiro Mitsurugi. Setsuka took a deep breath, her mind pictured Mitsurugi standing over her bound and helpless body, looking down and laughing at her. Setsuka felt humiliated; rage built up within her as her imagination continued to taunt her.

Mitsurugi would raise his katana above his head and impale Setsuka’s heart with merciless relish… the image of Mitsurugi became Tira, the mysterious and unhinged young woman holding Soul Edge above her head, ready to drive it down into Setsuka’s pale and perfect body. Setsuka’s breaths seethed behind her gag; closing her eyes she forced her limbs against the ropes binding her again and again.

Pain coursed through Setsuka’s ankles and wrists, her bones and the wood of the bedposts each threatening to snap and break. With one more muffled scream Setsuka raged against the left bedpost binding her wrists and splintered the wood. Setsuka released the rope from around the newly broken bed post and began untying her right wrist and her ankles; Tira had tied the ropes so tight that it took Setsuka a long time and a lot of frustration to free herself completely. Rolling off the bed to a more comfortable position on the floor, Setsuka regained a little of her strength and raised her head; Soul Edge was within arm’s reach in front of her. Setsuka’s initial reaction was to back away from the possessed blade… but staring at it, its purpose became clear to her. Mitsurugi had been searching for Soul Edge; the blade was rumoured to give power to those who wielded it and thinking back to her melee with Tira, a woman whose body was even slighter than Setsuka’s, the rumours were apparently true. Tira had been attempting to merge Setsuka’s body with Soul Edge… the blade was looking for a new host…

Noticing the gag still in her mouth; Setsuka bit down on it for the final time as she crawled toward Soul Edge. Kneeling in front of the possessed blade Setsuka closed her eyes and gripped Tira’s possessed hoop blade with both hands. A rush of energy washed through Setsuka’s veins; her body, spent from her struggling earlier, was still weak and almost unable to take the force of Soul Edge’s spirit invading her. Screaming through her gag and holding tighter to Tira’s blade; Setsuka felt the final painful rush of Soul Edge’s entry. The hoop blade fell to the floor in its simple silver form with Setsuka’s body falling to the floor close behind it.

The middle aged raft maker lay bleeding on the floor; his broken ribs piercing through his thin aging flesh and his eyes no longer in their sockets. The man was dead yet Tira was still sitting by his side with his arm in her hands, systematically breaking each of his fingers. With each crack that filled her ears Tira’s smile grew a little wider, once she had finished with the dead raft maker’s second hand she had become ecstatic. Leaping to her feet she bounced back to the cabin with laughter in her stride.

Dancing through the cabin’s doorway Tira immediately noticed the broken bed and there, in the middle of the room was Setsuka, on her knees, her body emitting a burning purple aura.

“Awwwww no! I missed it, how irritating!”

Tira stamped her feet in rage; Setsuka jerked her head to face Tira and instantly darted towards her with inhuman speed, clutched her neck in the palm of her hand and slammed her against the cabin’s sturdy wall; all of the air left Tira’s body as she struggled for breath under Setsuka’s tight grasp around her throat. Locking eyes with Setsuka, Tira managed a weak and quivering smile.

“Master…” she spluttered, with choked joy in her voice.

Setsuka smiled back and released her grip on Tira. Falling to the floor with one hand comforting her neck Tira looked up at Setsuka.

“So this is the new host body? It’ll have to do for now.” Setsuka’s words were more to herself than to Tira as she examined her chest, stomach and upper thighs with her hands as if for the first time.

Tira’s eyes caressed her new master’s emanating aura, the sight sending her heartbeat into rapid spasms. Setsuka reached down to Tira’s jaw and guided her back to her feet, a length of rope still hung down from Setsuka’s wrist from earlier. Backing Tira back up against the cabin’s wall and taking the length of rope from her wrist and pulling it taut between her fists Setsuka looked into the misguided angel of death’s eyes purposefully.     

“Open your mouth, Tira.”