‘Please, I’m no match for a regular bright violet-cored Awakened, let alone an old monster with Friya’s talent.’ Tista inwardly sneered at the cursed shield as it tried to catch her.
‘The only thing that playing hero would achieve is becoming their hostage after Lith barely rescued Solus. I have to bring them close to the tower. Once we get there, Lith should become powerful enough to defeat these assholes otherwise we can escape.
‘Either way is our win!’
“I see what you are doing but I won’t let you, traitor!” Knightfall dispelled the Distortion Field for a split second, allowing Stargazer to Blink toward the tunnel of Demons of the Darkness.
Lith noticed the appearance of the entry and exit points, Blinking after the cursed scythe.
“Lith, no!” Tista screamed, knowing the dangers of using that kind of spell in the presence of a dimensional mage.
Alas, two words weren’t enough to convey a proper warning and Lith wasn’t aware of the nature of her opponents nor how skilled they were in their teamwork.
A cruel smile appeared on the host of the cursed shield as the space collapsed behind Lith and the resulting explosion throw him off balance.
Lith had positioned the exit point of his Blink so as to strike Stargazer in the back but the blast had ruined his attack and propelled him toward the enemy faster than he intended.
Stargazer’s host smiled as the six Evil Eyes etched on the surface of the Yggdrasil haft turned their power inward and channeled it into the curved blade of the scythe.
The arc was wide, slow, and predictable, but Lith could see with the Eyes of Menadion that the blade now carried the collective power of the two cores which was further boosted by the Evil Eyes.
‘Fuck me sideways! Double Edge is still damaged but I can’t risk dodging that thing. If it hits Solus in her weakened state, she’s never going to survive.’ Lith channeled the power of his mana core into the blade, using War’s skill, Gleipnir.
The golden fetters joined Lith, War, and Double Edge through their respective cores. Their collective might instantly fixed the dent and turned the black blade white from the mana flow within.
‘The tower is close enough to boost me enough to match a bright violet core, but the problem is that I have no idea if the same stands for my Adamant weapons. That scythe is the product of ancient but powerful Forbidden Magic and is made of Davross.’
Lith thought as he aimed his strike so that War would intercept Stargazer on the flat side and avoid its edge.
The host of the cursed scythe smirked again as his weapon suddenly shapeshifted into a glaive. The awkward and slow arc turned into an elegant and quick downward slash that struck War from above, the haft pushing the sword down while the blade cut Lith’s arms off.
He screamed in shock as fire and black blood gushed out from the stumps right below the elbow. Black tendrils of energy reconnected the severed parts. War used its enchantments to fly like an arrow at the enemy and protect his master.
“Oh, please.” The glaive emitted a peal of joyless laughter as her host blasted the angry blade away with a Raging Sun.
Without stopping her movement, Stargazer’s host reversed the grip on the haft and pulled it back up, opening a deep cut going from Lith’s right hip to the left shoulder, stopping at the level of his neck.
“Let’s see how far you can regenerate your host, shall we?” The man adjusted the grip to follow up with a horizontal cut and decapitate the Tiamat.
Then, a Davross hammer smashed his head into bits and another hit the blade of the glaive with so much strength that the shockwave broke the fingers holding it.
Stargazer didn’t need her host to deal the finishing blow but Solus wasn’t done either. The Furies’ Flight created eight copies of her hammer so there were six more. Four were aimed at the remaining limbs of her host, one at the glaive’s blade and the last at the haft.
‘Oh, shit!’ Had Stargazer still a face, her grin would have disappeared.
It wasn’t just that it was unlikely for the Yggdrasill wood to endure the blow of a Davross hammer thrown by a Divine Beast but also the fact that Solus was rushing at the cursed object while holding the original Fury above her head with both hands.
‘Luckily that pipsqueak is slow, otherwise, I’d never managed to dodge with my body still vibrating from the first impact. Sure, I can repair Yggdrasill wood with ease as well, but if she shatters me, my power will be crippled until I’m fully-‘
A burst of black flames the size of a river engulfed both the cursed glaive and her host, disrupting both the spells and the enchantments they kept at the ready.
Stargazer had focused her attention on Solus, forgetting that Lith was wounded but still conscious. Darkness fusion blocked his pain receptors from the start. The moment he had overcome the shock from the amputation he had been waiting for an opportunity to counterattack.
Solus’ arrival had given him the opening he needed which in turn slowed Stargazer long enough for the rest of her hammers to hit.
Already weakened by the Void Flames, Stargazer’s host limbs shattered on impact. The haft of the glaive snapped into two and deep cracks opened in both pieces. When the Fury struck the blade, the cracks opened further and the metal came free from the wood.
Solus arrived the second after the flames faded, dealing to what remained of the cursed object and her host a blow that carried all of the little strength she had.
‘Thank the gods you are alive.’ Lith’s wings had stopped flapping so she grabbed him to keep him from plunging down to the ground.
Direct contact allowed her to further hasten the recovery of her strength and to both of them to share everything that had happened since Solus’ last visit to Lutia.
‘Barely and so are you.’ Lith didn’t care about his own wounds.
He needed but a few breaths to go back to his peak condition whereas he could tell that Solus’ essence had come this close to being damaged beyond repair. If that happened, she would lose her body if not even her memories.
‘We need to get away from here and fast. Your wounds have reached your mana core and life force. Invigoration can’t fix them. If not for the tower and my presence, you would have died or whatever happens to you when you are supposed to die.’
‘I’m afraid that you are right. I tried using my breathing technique and healing spells but neither worked. Every time that I try to draw upon the world energy or light magic, I feel like my body is about to explode and the cracks on my skin open again.’ She replied using her Sky Blessing on him instead.
The wound on his chest closed rapidly and the stumps on his arms stopped bleeding. War and the severed limbs had been blasted away by the Raging Sun and until they retrieved them, there was nothing Solus could do about them.
