Divine Beast Ascension

Captain Khas pressed against his assassin foe with a focus on speed. And the early-perennial with dark essence was forced to defend himself with dual rapiers instead of slipping away.

At the same time, Rofar was stuck between his two opponents.

The low-perennial assassin circled Rofar and peppered him with both slashing winds and buffeting gusts. Advisor Hiddar blitzed the Prodson heir with electric charges and stabbing spear strikes.

Fw-fwishhh! Zzrch-ch!

Still, Rofar remained calm and balanced. He hacked through the threatening winds with his own wind-laced saber. He blocked and parried the lightning charges with his hammer clad in earth essence. All while carefully adjusting his footwork to always be on the move and keep both foes in his line of sight.

“AAAHH!!”

A jarring cry rang out, attracting the attention of almost everyone.

Both Khas and Rofar glanced in the direction of that pained yell, as did their opponents. Though, Vloz only smirked at the sound, letting his visage yet again be hacked apart by the cautiously raging Rokkal.

.....

Mid-jump, with both construct swords stalled mid-swing, the earth-wielding assassin’s head was fully turned around. Blood trickled down his lips and chin. And even more blood spilled out of the assassin’s lower back, where a small hole had been poked through his essence armor.

The assassin’s blood-crazed eyes were locked onto the vanishing figure of a large, twin-tailed fox. He adjusted his body to try and swing one construct sword at the fox before it could disappear.

“Why you?!”

Fwoosh!

While the assassin was caught in the moment with his head turned, a plume of purple flames burned through the remaining shadow tendrils and crashed into the assassin’s essence armor.

Quickly, the assassin adjusted his essence armor. The area targeted by fire was rapidly thickening to reduce the burns and damage to a minimum.

However, the assassin hadn’t realized how bad his error truly was. Not until it was too late.

Frrip…

In the middle of those purple flames, the assassin felt something slim and sharp barely penetrate his side. The earth essence armor had stopped that attack’s momentum. It wasn’t even as deep as the fox’s sudden strike, barely poking into the assassin’s flesh through the thick essence armor. But it still came in contact with the man’s flesh.

“NO!!”

Both construct swords faded before either could strike their target. Convulsing, the assassin twitched and winced as he wailed, “NOoOo!?”

The assassin immediately turned his full focus to the drake, who was already pulling away while breathing another stream of flames from point blank. Pulsing aches rapidly plagued the assassin’s body. But he was somewhat expecting a soul-raking attack, so the assassin refused to fall or be crippled by the blow.

A stone pillar rose out of the ground to give the assassin new footing. And he leaped after the drake, lusting to skin the beast for a trophy pelt. “Youuu!”

The assassin cleaved through the fire with a new pair of construct blades, temporarily focused thanks to his rage.

Then, the twin-tailed fox appeared between the assassin and his draconic prey.

“I’ll claim both of your trophies!” the assassin shouted, cleaving the fox in half with an emphatic cackle… Only, he felt no resistance against his swing. And no blood was sprayed whatsoever.

Frrrip! Frrrip!

Before the assassin had a chance to adapt yet again, two claws were thrust into the man’s back. And both earth-construct swords quickly faded away.

“You’re soul’s in turmoil. Of course, you can’t create solid armor and strong, construct weapons at the same time,” Netra coldly commented from behind. She also removed her paws from his back, exposing a punctured lung and bleeding, run-through heart.

The assassin wanted to turn around to face his killer. But he didn’t have the energy or the ability to do so. All he could do was feel his life and tormented soul slip away, along with his consciousness.

As the corpse drifted downward, slamming into the stone wall behind the drake, Oli smiled back at the fox girl. “Thanks for covering me.”

“Thank you for creating an opening,” Netra replied with a quick, semi-warm tone. “Now, let’s continue.”

Oli nodded and sighed, “Fair… though I’m a bit gassed after breaking into the palace on my own. So I’ll take a breather for now.”

Netra didn’t respond. She just nodded before disappearing yet again.

“They killed a perennial?!” Khas’s opponent blurted in shock.

The others were already refocused on their own battles, unable to witness the quick end of the battle against the drake. But no one from Prodson Territory was expecting to hear that startling news.

Even Khas was taken aback by the outcome, letting his opponent have that glance without consequence.

Since Khas seemed to lighten up for that moment, the dark-wielding assassin shouted one more thing while he had the chance, “It’s Netra! The invisible fox candidate!”

Everything quickly made sense to the others, taking that information seriously.

But a new wave of chills washed over that dark-wielding assassin when a calm chuckle appeared from his side, saying, “Thank you for the introduction…”

Chting! Frr…

The assassin parried Khas’s strike while thrusting his second rapier into the appearing fox. Out of relief and reflex, the assassin laughed, “Ha! I sense dark essence too! You can’t hide…”

He never finished that taunt. Because the fox was quickly slashed apart and dashed away, leaving only fading dark essence behind.

Frrip…

A long cut appeared on the back of the assassin’s calf, while the true Netra remained invisible to duck the rapier and dive past the perennial.

“Thank you, fox girl!”

The moment the assassin’s footing faltered, the assassin heard Khas’s bold statement. He quickly readjusted his stance as best as possible to accept Khas’s follow-up strike.

But Khas wouldn’t waste time.

Chting. Frrrip!

A wind blade was launched preemptively, landing on the assassin a split second before the following sword.

The assassin wanted to let that wind blade go unblocked, to focus on the incoming sword. But with it targeting the thigh of his last good leg, the assassin didn’t hesitate to cleave the wind blade apart.

That left only one rapier left to parry the threatening sword, allowing it to barely streak by the assassin’s side.

But that left another opening for a claw clad in dark essence to stab the assassin’s throat from behind.