Chapter 26: The Lurking Shadow Part 3

Leviathan looked at the approaching parasol in his heart with his eyes that seem to come out of its sockets, the parasol itself doesn't look menacing, if anything it is just a black colored umbrella that is more fancier that normal, or fancier than what a parasol should be. However, he can feel it, he can feel it through his experience as a dragon, a race that can virtually live for eternity and have thousands of years of experience in his sleeve, this parasol is not normal, maybe it is cursed, enchanted or whatever.

But either way, he knew that if his heart is to get impaled by this unassuming yet menacing parasol, his life will  sure to be forfeited, that's why Leviathan immediately got out of his stupor and immediately forced his body that is still in an overdrive and instinctively dodged the impaling attack from the Princess of Vampires in the nick of time.

"Guh...!"

Leviathan, because he didn't controlled his body properly and just immediately pulled it out of the trajectory of the stab stumbled upon several trees breaking several branches and trees with the sheer impact of his body in contact with them.

" So the worm have basic instincts huh... Well, that was just to be expected I guess..."

Eris muttered as she softly and gracefully landed in front of Leviathan that is still groveling and is trying to stand up with his well toned body that is toughened by time and experience.

Eris was actually impressed of Leviathan, no matter how much his compliment sounded crooked and not sincere, she have a good confidence with her first strike for people always assumes her weapon as unconventional or outright a stupid choice without considering that someone won't use something like a parasol in  one on one combat without few aces up their sleeves.

And of course, Eris' parasol is also anything but ordinary, it was crafted by the master enchantress of the Seven Rulers, Idun and was enchanted magically with several curse and spells so that the parasol won't break no matter how rough Eris is to use it and also a curse that makes anyone that is stabbed by the tip of the parasol to bleed and never recover from it without the permission of the one who wields or enchanted the weapon, that's why she finds it really impressive that the worm named Leviathan can instinctively know and feel the danger of her parasol.

But of course, knowing that a weapon is dangerous is something not really impressive, Eris is impressed that Leviathan knows that her parasol is dangerous yes, but knowing a weapon can harm someone is the basics of the basics, or it is not even considered the basics of the basics, it is just something that is innate to two people having a fight, a weapon is made to hurt people, that's how it is.

After knowing that fact, that doesn't mean that Leviathan can have a chance against Eris, not when his brain is still in an overdrive. After all, he was easily exposed without him even starting his plots, his plots that is not even in the polishing pace was exposed and is now in the verge of being destroyed into the ground, who will not be baffled by this predicament?

It is not like Leviathan didn't expected himself to be caught or traced, after all, he knew it himself that he is not a perfect fit for this infiltration mission and thus considered the possibility of being confronted at any time and of course made appropriate countermeasures for this event.

What he can't predict is that, the queen herself to personally appear in front of him and to also personally come for his head. After all, a queen is someone who have many amounts of workloads that they have a whole bunch of subordinates from prime minister to adviser and many more to fulfill her other duties that she herself cannot accomplish, even his master whom he looks up as a god that can do and predict anything have ministers that are doing other jobs that Lucifer cannot fulfill, that is why, Leviathan finds this whole situation weird.

Yes, he may considered the fact of being caught, however he considered a subordinate or a lackey to come for him, if it's just people below the Seven Rulers, then he is confident that he have a chance in escaping or if the situation implicates, then he can even win. However, all of the prospect of winning was erased the moment Eris appeared, furthermore, because of the mere appearance of the Vampire Princess, his chances of escaping also dwindled and who knows, if he failed to get out of this mess that he is in now, he might get tortured to spill out the grand schemes of his master.

He doesn't want that, after all, betrayal is the worst thing a subordinate can do, no matter who the master is, much more if the superior is Lucifer himself.

"Hey, why are you still standing  there? It's time to run you know? Or did you come here without considering yourself being caught?"

However, Eris didn't cared, never did she cared about the stupor of Leviathan, after all, Leviathan is the one who tried to infiltrate  her territory and she just decided to personally cull the impending parasite, if Leviathan thinks that a queen wanting to protect her country personally is such a strange thing, then Eris is already not at fault.

Eris ignored the long considerations of Leviathan and started her attacks once again, her attacks consisted of stabs, stabs that aims for the carotid, the throat and the heart with deadly accurate precision, every stab can only be dodged by a nick of time and failure in doing so will lead to Leviathan's life being forfeited as Leviathan knew this very well and helplessly started to dodge in the most pathetic ways possible, rolling to the ground, hiding on a tree and many more ridiculous things much to the amusement of Eris.

_Worms will cling to their lives, no matter how pathetic they look in doing so, it seems._

Thinking of those things, Eris started to intensify her stabs, of course her stabs are still fatal and considering the curse of her beloved parasol, all of her attacks can be considered as one hit kill, furthermore because Eris is always targeting a vital spot, her fatality increased further. Leviathan can just be said to be so good at dodging that he make it look like Eris is playing around with him, sugar coating it, Leviathan have dynamic vision that can see through the attacks of one of the strongest individuals in the planet to a certain extent and have the reflexes to make his body move in the frame that the attack of Eris is about to land.

Of course, Leviathan knew that simply dodging will lead him to nowhere for he also have a limit, no matter how he saw himself as one of the glorious dragon race, he still have a limit and of course even though his limit is still far from being reached, that also applies to Eris and a battle of attrition is hard to risk, after all, just like Loki the standards of Eris in being strong is her mother, the strongest Ruler to Ever exist and the country destroyer, so who knows what will happen to Leviathan if he ever tried to use endurance as the winning point of this one sided battle.

_Just my luck!_

Leviathan cursed inwardly as he dodged and dodged again and again without ever being tired, Eris started to hasten her pace and  doubled her speed. Eris' footwork started to become more sophisticated, her stabs started to look like a dance as she started to employ her intricate and beautiful fencing prowess.

_And she even have the leisure to show off!_

Leviathan can't stop cursing Eris as Leviathan once again finds it hard to dodge, he can't understand as to why is the moves of Eris was hard to dodge in the first place, after all Eris literally looks like she is dancing, she will shift her direction to dodge a tree by spinning, making her back become practically vulnerable to attacks, however, for some reason, Leviathan cannot take advantage of this moment, he can only stare, it's as if... He was being caught by the graceful yet deadly movements of his nemesis... It was as if he was being captivated...

_Huh?_

_Me?_

_Captivated?_

"LIKE HELL I AM!"

Leviathan was furious by this mere thoughts, he who holds and represents the sin of envy, he who seeks the possession of other individuals, but unlike greed will also be satisfied to destroy anything that he can't get is getting captivated?

He cannot accept it!

He will never accept it!

Leviathan was in a flurry of rage and forgot all of his worries, will he escape? Will he run for the sake of the mission? He forgot all of his rationality, he even forgot his master Lucifer and his orders, he just turned into a stoic dragon into a brat that have unreasonable tantrum.

_Woah, he turned into a brat..._

That was all of Eris thoughts as she saw Leviathan stop dodging and started to use his hands to swipe out her parasol out of its trajectory, in which is actually a simplistic yet effective countermeasure to her dead accurate stabs, if something is so accurate then that something just needs a little bit of disturbance for it to completely miss its target.

_Uh-huh, he have brains alright._

Eris started to add variations to her stabs, while Leviathan continued to change the trajectory of her attacks, however Eris is currently not in a good position, after all, no matter how fancy she make her stabs look like, in the end her attacks have only one principle, it is a stab and thus Leviathan's countermeasure is the best measure for her main point of attacks.

It is not like Eris can't use slashing motions, after all living for three hundred years will give one enough time to master many things, one of those things she have a basic amount of mastery is Swordmanship, however this mastery is useless because of her weapon of choice that specializes in stabs, if she used her parasol as a sword and not as a rapier then the purpose of the curse of the tip of the parasol will be all for naught, furthermore the damage made by a parasol being used as a sword is simply not that impressive, well in Eris' case not as impressive as she wants it to be nor as deadly as she needs it right now.

_Well it won't be that easy to drive away a giant worm, guess I have to get serious a little_

Eris started to smile and as she smiled, a changed in her parasol occured. Her umbrella started to glow a crimson red one as the parasol was engulfed by a thick crimson colored mana filled shell that shaped itself as a two meter lance, the parasol didn't even bent for her parasol is made to adjust to Eris' mana and right now, her first unimpressive looking parasol now looks like a blood colored lance that glints a terrifying light as Eris raised it with her right hand without even an effort on doing so, like the lance is made up of cotton, she just lifted it just like that.

"Tsk! Such dramatic power-ups won't work on me!"

Leviathan, seeing Eris' majestic display got more enraged, his envy knows no bounds and he can only use his own power to not be beaten by flashiness, the proud member of the dragon race is now gone and only a brat that doesn't want to lose can be seen...

Leviathan also made changes to himself, he raised his hands as his eyes started to shine a silver light, his skin started to morph as it twisted and pulsated for a moment, his hands enlarged in size revealing a  gigantic claw that have silver scales that can even surpass the sturdiness of Mingguang armor as it can protect anyone who goes under it against blows from cannons or even boulders of catapults.

In his hands also displays three gigantic claws that shines under the moon of the night and will song the hymn of death of anyone unfortunate enough to be cleaved by its  dreadful blades.

Looking at the claws, Eris was unfazed and even challenged Leviathan.

"Hooh? Do you think that little nails of yours can penetrate me?"

"Heh! We won't know until we try!"

With that conversation, Leviathan immediately made his move as he raised his claws and attacked Eris.

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Author's note: Mingguang armor: was an armor of Tang Dynasty (618-907). It was relatively lighter than the heavy lamellar armor.