Bane of Existence

With the death of Malik, the dark mist covering Lethia started to lose its strength, slowly fading away into nothingness. However, before Lethia's restrictions could disappear, it was already too late!

"Argh!" Lethia cried out in pain as her eyes widened. She looked down; there was a sword protruding from her chest, piercing directly through her heart. "What? How?!"

When the battle first began, there was no one other than Malik that could be considered a threat. There were undead, but she knew they couldn't be a threat, even to the bloodhounds, a low-ranking demon. So, it didn't make sense to her that right when Malik died, someone could be so close to attacking her! Unless…

Everything was a trap! A trap set to weaken her to obtain this single opportunity to kill her. Even when Malik had the confidence in his newfound skills to kill her, he still left a backup. He fought to his last breath, where he used the rest of his strength to ensure her death, realizing he was going to fail.

In the midst of the dark mist, Lethia's senses were heavily restricted, making her unable to sense anything behind her. That was the perfect time to strike, while she was unable to properly evade or see the attack.

As soon as she was given the opportunity, her figure disappeared as she reappeared ten feet away, the sword still inside her chest.

She held the sword firmly, pulling it out while also looking where she stood to see just who it was that attacked her like that! For them to be capable of hiding their presence in this space. There was no doubt; they had to be strong. If not, how could they hide themselves from her?

"You… How can someone as weak as you attack me? You're a mere zombie. Just how could you bypass my perception?"

The sword fell to the ground, covered in Lethia's blood. A mysterious mist could also be seen surrounding the sword, corroding the blood on it. It was as if the sword was repulsed by her blood.

She raised her hand to her wound, realizing that it wasn't too serious. She would need to heal, but it wouldn't kill her. "It's unfortunate that even after bypassing my perception, your attack amounted to nothing."

A grin quickly surfaced on her face after she came to a realization. All the efforts of Malik and this female zombie to kill her were in vain! This zombie was given the chance to kill her, but she failed!

"Hahaha…" Lethia couldn't stop herself from bursting into laughter. It was clear that she no longer considered Aurora a threat. "For a mere zombie, you nearly killed me. If you aimed for my head instead, just maybe you could've killed me."

Aurora didn't respond, staring calmly at Lethia's bleeding chest. Even though enough time had passed since the wound was inflicted to have healed with a vampire's natural regeneration, it was still there and bleeding. If anything, the wound on her chest was expanding, covered in the same mist as the sword.

There was no reason to tell Lethia this when she would realize it soon. As she expected, it didn't take long for Lethia to notice. She lowered her gaze, looking down at her bleeding chest as a trail of blood trickled down from her lips.

"Huh?"

Her face darkened. It didn't make sense to her for her wound to still be bleeding with no sign of healing. Even if she were a noble vampire, this wound wouldn't kill them as long as they were given enough time to heal.

But… She wasn't a noble vampire! She was of a royal bloodline and had a special power of blood that made her blood more pure than the other royals'; even her father feared her because of this power. How could her wound not have healed by now? She felt it; there had to be something she didn't notice.

It was at that moment that she finally realized. "The sword!"

She lowered her gaze even further, glancing at the sword that lay by her feet, the blood having disappeared from the mist's corrosion. Seeing the corrosive mist covering it, she felt a deep sense of danger in her heart.

This sword... it wasn't any sword she had seen before in the hundreds of years she had lived; there was an incredibly dangerous aura coming from it, telling her one thing: this sword was the bane of her existence.

In her eyes. It didn't make sense for this sword to even exist. She understood that with this sword alone, the extermination of the vampires could become a reality. She wasn't overconfident, and she knew there was only one option she could take now.

"The sword... it must be destroyed." Even as her body was losing its strength with the corrosive mist spreading through it, she mustered as much strength as she could, aiming to destroy the sword, and attacked, using most of her dark energy.

A bright red ray of light shot from the ground beneath the sword.

Boom~

In the end, the beam of light hit the sword, covering it so as to destroy it in one attack. However, it didn't stop there; it left a hole in the roof of the cave itself, allowing one to see the darkness of the sky above.

Lethia dropped to her knees, breathing heavily. This attack had exhausted her completely of her dark energy. But she felt it was worth it; the sword was so dangerous that she couldn't allow it to exist.

Now that the sword was destroyed, all that was left was to kill Aurora. She forced her body, which felt extremely heavy, to her feet, clenching the blood sword firmly in her hand.

"If you didn't use that sword, I might've let you die painlessly." She carried her body forward, feeling heaviness begin to take over. She knew she only had a few minutes before her body lost all its strength. She had to kill her before then.

Her heart was filled with a strange feeling of fear. Each step was like a thousand steps for her as her body slowed down, with only her little strength and will forcing her to continue. She had to erase this threat before she had the strength to erase the others.

Lethia continued moving towards Aurora until she was merely half a foot away from her. She held the sword with both her trembling hands, feeling glee from seeing that even if she died today, she would at least take this threat with her.

However, before she could attack, she froze in place as she watched the slow movement of a dagger enter her vision. Her strength wasn't the only thing she was losing; her senses were also growing weaker enough that she couldn't see this dagger coming before it was directly in front of her.

Lethia's face turned pale as she saw the dagger coming closer. She could see the dagger slowly approaching her, but she knew her body was too weak to react in time. This was something she had never experienced—absolute helplessness.

Her fear took over her heart as she realized this dagger had the same corrosive mist as the sword! It was certainly weaker when compared to the sword, but in her current state, she stood no chance against it, especially without dark energy.

Fear took over her heart as the dagger finally reached her throat, piercing directly through her neck.

She could only wait for her death as her vision turned black, followed by her other senses. Her body had lost all its strength, with the corrosive mist having spread throughout her entire body as she dropped onto the cold ground of the cavern.

She couldn't move a single finger as her blood was converted into a type of poison, destroying her body from the inside. She couldn't even lift a finger. She felt as if she were now forced to watch herself die and nothing more.

The pain was so great that she didn't realize when she lost consciousness, falling into a deep slumber that she knew she would never wake up from.

The dark mist didn't stop after converting her blood into a lethal poison; it started taking over her mind, soul, and heart. This was the first time in her life that she was this helpless, and the last time.

Soon, her entire existence was taken over; black veins began to appear, and her body was quickly reduced to dust, where the gentle cold breeze of the wind she had cherished scattered the dust, leaving nothing behind.

"Sigh… That took more dark energy than I had anticipated." Aurora fell to her knees as she felt a little nauseous after using all her dark energy to create the dagger. "Fortunately, the dark mist had weakened her; otherwise, it wouldn't have ended with my victory."

A screen opened up before her, displaying the increase in her status. An expression filled with relief appeared on her face, seeing the changes in her stats.