Eleanor vs River part 4 (Eleanor's Core Infusion)

"You used Patukappu on her," replied River. "Just before I landed my attack."

"Stop..." begged Marthanda.

"Mother fucker!" said River. "Thunder Plunge would've split her in half if not for that defensive spell of yours that came in front of her."

He walks towards the shrine, leaving Eleanor's body untouched. He is confident that she'll die on her own within a few minutes.

"Is there any point in doing this now?" said River. "You both are going to die anyway." Her body is in no good condition anymore."

Huff*

"Ki- Kill me," said Marthanda. "Let her go."

"Hahaha!" River laughed out loud. "Now we are talking."

As Marthanda was coughing blood due to poison in his food, River came and stood before him, and as soon as Marthanda raised his face to River,.

Thud*

River landed his boots on Marthanda's face, which made him fall backward on his head.

"Hahahahahahahaha!!!" River laughed, looking at the sky and spreading his arms like a devil. "Finally, the day I have been waiting for is here!"

River jumps on the stomach of Marthanda, pulls him up, and lands multiple sets of punches and kicks without any mercy.

"Here! Take this! And this and this!!"

With every sound of River's fist colliding with Marthanda's skin, he splattered more blood than before and laid out a sound of a dying man getting hit that echoed on the entire shrine for 5 minutes straight until Marthanda's fragile body dropped to the ground without any resistance.

"Huff* Huff*" River catches his breath. "Ohhho Fuck! Now it feels good."

Then River slowly pulls Marthanda's body up by his collar, and at the blood-covered, strengthless face, he soundly says,

"Now, you know what it feels like to be betrayed and to die at the hands of someone you thought was your best."

"Arghh!" Marthanda coughs and pushes out his remaining strength to reply. "Al-ves, I- I am...sorry.."

"Huhh!?" River expressed, infuriated, "You think I give a shit about your apology?"

River tightens his grip on the collar.

"He trusted you, and you killed him," said River. "You killed my father. You, the fake hero of this kingdom, don't deserve to live."

Marthanda remained silent like a stone, in guilt and shame over the memories of the past that only he and River knew about.

Just then, River sees something that he wasn't expecting to see. 

"Really? Now you want to show this?" said River

Drop* Drop*

Each drop was a weight of his remorse, the tears that were silently cascading down from Marthanda's eyes.

In response to it, the eyes of River blurred away.

"I guess I am just wasting my time now," said River, letting go of Marthanda's collar. "I should end this and move on."

Chrrrr* The dagger materialised in his grasp. With a determined grip, he raised it, poised to strike down Marthanda with a single, fatal blow.

"Goodbye, murderer of my father," said River.

Marthanda keeps his eyes down on the ground, kneeling like a defeated person, ready to accept his fate at the hands of River.

Clink*

.....

In that hopeless moment, when everyone thought it was the peril of destiny, the sound of chains steadily arose.

Eleanor picks up her Witchcraft and pushes her soul to stand again.

"Ahuuuhhhhhhh!!!!"

Eleanor let out a big sigh, as if releasing all his pain, looking up at the sky.

After wiping the blood from the mouth, her eyes diverted to the lightning flash that was cracking near the shrine. She sees River holding his dagger on top of Marthanda's head to kill him off.

Tap* Tap*

Eleanor presses her boots firmly, ignoring all the pain. Her movements are not stable, as she has multiple bruises and blood splattering from the wounds, but still she persists, looking straight in the eye of River.

"Really Bitch?" Said River, turning his head behind towards Eleanor. "Look at yourself; are you sure you can even walk properly anymore?"

Tap* Tap*

Eleanor utters no word in reply and keeps walking towards them.

River let go of his stance as he made his way towards Eleanor with gradual steps.

"I was thinking of letting you live as Geezer was begging for your sake, but I guess you are itching to see the afterlife. Don't you?" said River.

"El-eanor.." murmurs Marthanda, unable to move or do anything.

In the plain area, in front of the shrine where they began fighting, Eleanor and River both stand facing each other.

The crows gather behind the River and caw at his mercy; the ground beneath trembles, and the crackling of lightning emerges around River's body.

"This time you won't be making it alive," said River. "Marthanda is done; he can't use his protection spell on you anymore."

River again draws one leg back while bending the other knee forward, his right arm clutching his dagger. His left arm aimed at Eleanor, and the lightning began to gather around at the tip of his dagger's blade with a loud crackling noise. 

Eleanor this time shows no hesitation in her response; she holds her Witchcraft laid open in arms, with one hand holding the knife and the other hand holding the remaining chains.

Huff* Huff*

Giving out deep breaths. She looks at them with a quiet demeanour in her eyes, thinking deeply about their origin, Marthanda's teachings, and the most important of all. 

—What her father would've done in this situation.

Eleanor's practice for Core Infusion hasn't been completed yet. She was practicing all this time, but barely managed to use it once a day, and that too was not so perfect. The aura and energy required to perform such a feat require diligent practice, so Eleanor, if she wants to win, she must push her limits and figure out a way to defeat someone who is much more experienced in Core Infusion.

Just then, a voice interrupted Eleanor's thoughts, giving her exactly what she needed in this moment.

"Y-you can do it.." said Marthanda, looking at Eleanor.

As soon as those words reached her ears, a torrent of emotion surged within her, causing her eyes to brim with tears. Her master had always believed in her, enduring till the very end.

"Master...." murmured Eleanor.

....

Eleanor starts swinging her chains with a mesmerising rhythm, like a pendulum before River. As she did, a black aura began to flow around the metals, swirling with graceful motion. Then she shifted Witchcraft's direction on side and as the intensity of the black aura surged, the air around her became heavy from the relentless rotation of her chains.

"Haha, that's more like it," said River with a smirk. Let's see who will be the one standing last."

...

Wooosh* Clank* Swooosh*

As Eleanor's gaze locked onto River, the velocity of her chain's rotation around her surged to an unprecedented level, blurring into a frenzied whirlwind of motion. Soon, the chains moved with such swiftness that they became invisible to the eyes, with the emergence of a deep, metallic sound that started resonating through the air.

The sound became equally terrifying as the crackling of River's lightning, which he seemed to be charging to its peak.

"THUNDER PLUNGE!!!!" 

THUD*

River releases his foot to propel himself at Eleanor.

TAP*

With her chains, which were still whirling around her, Eleanor swiftly released her foot loosely upon the ground and began to spin on the spot, the momentum of her movements amplifying with each revolution with respect to the moments of her chains. As she spun, the swirling black aura surrounding her clashed and converged, giving birth to radiant beams of light that danced and flickered around her form, adding a deadly elegance to her martial dance and casting an ethereal glow upon the battleground that vaporized and shredded stones down to its last atom.

—and with that, Eleanor released the name of her Core Infusion.

"PULSAR!!!"