Curse of Bloodlust

Time froze as everyone stood in place and stared at each other in disbelief. Was this really happening? Was a random person from god knows where suddenly executing random skill a random stranger used at a higher degree of expertise?

The coincidence is too extream!

And yet....

'No, it can't be, it must be a fluke' Angulimala thought as he he shook his head. Immediately after that, he stared at the man in front of his and readies for another strike while thinking, 'only one way to find out'

Bzzzzzz

Angulimala's body flickered in an out of existence before blurring into the shadow and fleeting around again.

Swish!

His daggers at where the neck of Jeremy would have been once again but similar to before, Jeremy would disappear and reappear a few steps away from him, as if no matter what he tries, his strikes will never hit him.

"You..." Angulimala said as frustration started to fill him with rage.

"Look, I don't want to be the person telling you this but, your execution of Shadow Step is just horrible!" Jeremy said with disdain on his face.

"How do you... Horrible..." Angulimala's face twitched.

It was through his obtaining of this accursed method that he was forced to live a life of crime and cut of fingers of random caravan folks for years. Often travelling from one route to another to avoid detection. And yet here is another, criticising him of his execution. What in the world is going in...

"Who are you..." Angulimala said as he calm himself down.

"I am Jeremy. You are?" Jeremy replied.

"My name is Angulimala, the Finger Demon. I... Arghhhh!" Angulimala said. However, just as he seemed that he had calmed down, an eerie red glow started shining from his body, causing great pain to him to the point of hunching into cradle position.

"His cursed..." Hana said as her eyes widen.

"The curse of bloodlust. I've seen this before!" Irshad said after listening to Hana's comments.

"What is the curse of..." Adam and Jeremy couldn't help asking at the same time.

"The curse of bloodlust is a powerful binding spell which causes the cursed to go into beserk until either the cursed or someone dies. The curse activates in two conditions, either after prolonged period of time the cursed hasn't kill or if he looses the will to kill someone. The curse can only be lifted by the person who placed the curse or if the conditions placed by the curser has been fulfilled. Due to the random nature of the curse, spell casters often use as a death sentence to those who has committed a severe crime... " Hana explained.

Being a mage herself, she has long came across such things in her study but she never knew there were people who would actually use this to curse someone. It was just needlessly cruel. It's like reading about how the Arab Kings used to beat their goats to death without allowing it to bleed before cooking them. It's just needlessly cruel.

"It has a high mana requirement and is extremely complicated to cast. As far as I know, only the mage council still uses this as a form of punishment and even so, its only as a death penalty. What on earth did this person do to suffer such a fate?" Hana continued with a shocked expression.

" Arghhhhhhhhhh!!!!! " Angulimala shouted as the curse stared to overwhelm him.

" Whatever it is, we don't have the leisure to figure it out now!" Irshad said as he step forwards with his shields out.

" Is there anyway to lift the curse?" Jeremy asked from the back.

" I don't think so. The only way to snap him out of it now is for someone to die... " Hana said.

A cold chill suddenly filled the air.

The ceaseless shouting from Angulimala just abruptly stopped as he now stood and stared silently into the sky.

"Tck, we defeated him once, we can do it again!" Adam said as he readied for an attack.

"First of all, Jeremy did, not us. Second of all, Its not going to be that easy..." Irshad said with a worried look on his face. However, before he could finish saying what he wanted to say, a dagger flew in his direction aiming right at is head.

KLANG.

The sound of metal clashing with metal could be heard as the dagger crashed into Irshad giant shield. As the dagger bounced up into the air, Angulimala, whose body blured into darkness the moment the dagger was thrown, reappeared at where the shield was, caught the dagger and immediately connected it with a downward slash with said dagger.

The attack slammed right into the shield thus nullifying its fatality but the force was so great that Irshad himself was forced to retreat 3 steps to the back.

"Move!" Hana yelled as let lose a series of firebolts.

Swosh Swosh Swosh Swosh!

Four firebolts launched immediately one after another at Angulimala as soon as Irshad ducked. It however, did little to phase him. As if he was an engaged beast, he merely lept into the flame, the same flame that one hit ko his fellow bandits earlier, towards Hana.

Not expecting Angulimala to just face her firebolts heads on and remain unfazed, Hana's thoughts just jammed as she frozed at where she stood

However, just as Angulimala's fleeting body seem to close its distance with Hana, it's trajectory abruptly shifted perpendicular to where he was heading as if hitting a wall. In its path where he should have past if his trajectory didn't change stood Jeremy with a hatchet in his hand.

"You might be faster and stronger but I am still more skilled. There's hundreds of ways I can exploit your execution!" Jeremy said as he glared forwards.

Smirking, Angulimala merely stood up and slammed his feet on the floor with a might that caused dust to rise into the air, creating a thick smoke screen around him.

" Bruh, you think I can't catch your error if I don't see your execut.... Whaaaaaaa" Jeremy was in the midst of saying something cocikly when a dagger suddenly sped out of the dust aiming right at his head.

Swoosh.

The dagger flew past where Jeremy's head was supose to be. Noticing the potential for an ambush attack, Irshad was paying close attention to the moves of Angulimala when he saw a shining glint burst out of the smokescreen. As soon as he saw that, he lept towards Jeremy to push him away from the daggers trajectory just in the nick of time.

That however wasn't the end, as Irshad pushed Jeremy to the side to duck, Jeremy was in a sense falling sideways to the ground. In the midst of falling down, a shadowy figure blured above of him followed by a swift downward slash clearly aiming for Jeremy's neck...