the queen of Daredgt
Tackling me in the chest with wild desperation, Corvus rammed my body through the side of a building. My helmet cracked against the brick with a brutal clang.
[Aspect: Taken Devourer — Telekinesis!]
Raising my empty left gauntlet, I pulled at the structure behind him with a twist of psychic will. Bricks groaned and splintered as the building began to cave in. At the same moment, I drove the pommel of my sheathed sword into the back of Corvus' head.
He reeled from the strike, staggering—and I surged upward, kneeing him hard in the sternum and blasting him off me.
In a flash of amber lightning, I vanished from under the collapsing roof, yanking the crumbling mass down with a surge of combined telekinetic and aetheric force.
[Skill: Devil's Fire — Evil Blast!]
But Corvus wasn't done. Regaining his footing, he launched a sphere of green fire into the sky. It exploded like a miniature sun, burning the falling building into ash mid-air. What was left of the structure evaporated in a wave of emerald heat, cinders raining down like molten hail.
His hooded gaze found me, lit with fury. With a flaming palm, he hurled a storm of green fireballs.
I raised my scabbard and sliced through the incoming barrage, severing flame with edge-like precision. But the rest scorched everything around us—melting cars, shattering windows, and setting the air alight with destructive embers.
A cry cut through the heat.
"Uncle!"
Ben. I saw him—dodging between flame bursts, barely hanging on. Without hesitation, I stepped into the barrage, placing myself between him and death. The fireballs hammered into my armoured gauntlets and body, but I held firm.
"I'm alright!" I barked over my shoulder. "When this ends—get ready to jump!"
Ben nodded from behind, forcing a shaky grin.
The last fireball struck. At once, Ben leapt—and I seized the soles of his shoes with a gauntlet-wrapped telekinetic grip, flinging him high into the air.
Then I turned, swinging my sheathed sword just in time to meet Corvus' blazing daggers. Sparks erupting like an explosion of fireworks as our weapons clashed.
Corvus kicked at my knee, trying to take me down—but I twisted with the blow, then slammed my helmet into his throat. He gasped, clutching his neck, staggering back—just as Ben fell from the sky. His boot crashed into Corvus' skull with a thunderous crack.
I followed through without hesitation, swinging my [Ekrix Gauntlet] in a brutal arc into Corvus' shoulder. A burst of explosive force detonated at the point of impact, sending him stumbling.
"Don't let him breathe!" Ben shouted, leaping in to throw a haymaker at Corvus' forehead. It rocked him further, breaking his balance.
"Good work, kid!" I barked, stepping in and driving an uppercut with my sheathed blade into Corvus' jaw.
Ben followed with a heel into Corvus' gut. I struck again—flat of the sheath across his face. And finally, with a roar, Ben landed one more blazing punch.
I finished it with a savage Spartan kick.
Corvus flew, smashing into the melted wreckage of a building, and slid down in a heap.
Ben raised his fist, grinning wide. "Hell yeah! Fist bump!"
I bumped my knuckles to his. "It's not over."
From the rubble, Corvus rose—wounded, wild-eyed, enraged. "Dammit! DAMMIT! You have baggage! How am I losing?!"
[Aspect: Corruptive Wolf — Howler!]
The ground split beneath our feet. White tentacles burst forth, twisting into snarling wolf heads. They surged toward us.
Ben ducked behind me, and I slashed with the white blade—golden aether tearing through the pack of spectral beasts.
Corvus charged with a roar, green daggers blazing. He met me in a flurry of strikes, steel on steel, fury on fury. He fought like a demon.
Ben dashed in again, aiming for his elbow—but a spectral wolf paw lashed out and clawed his leg. Blood splattered the pavement as he rolled away with a hiss of pain.
Corvus thrust a dagger for my face—I batted it aside with my sheath and caught his momentum.
[Skill: Autumn King's Conquest — Ekrix Gauntlet!]
The clocks on my gauntlet locked into place. Triggering the aether within and expelling a hiss of steam through its cracks. Explosive power erupted inside the gauntlet as I drove my sheathed blade in a brutal arc, slashing into Corvus' gut. A burst of blood painted the ground and walls. He staggered, his dark hood stained, breath ragged.
Desperate, he detonated another fireball at his own feet.
I shielded Ben behind me as the street turned into a burning green storm.
[Skill: Winter Inverse — Fire Adaptation.]
My amour hardened, adapted. I endured.
As the flames faded, Corvus backed away, hand pressed over his wound, sealing it with searing green fire. He was trembling.
"You know how accurate I strike," I muttered, shaking the blood from my sheath. "What do you say, brother? Call it quits? Prophet won't be thrilled if I kill you here."
Corvus bared his teeth beneath his hood, face contorted in tired agony as he straddled. "Let's... continue."
I exhaled. I could end this—unleash my full [aspect] and defeat him. But that would summon her. And if she came, there'd be no escape. Not for Ben, he's be her first target and catch him before I could.
I needed a new plan. A reckless one.
[Aspect: Taken Devourer — Take the Space!]
Black fire bloomed across my left gauntlet—space buckled— folding in itself and erasing the gap between Corvus and myself. Then I was there, right in front of Corvus.
His eyes widened. Desperately he tried to escape as my sheathed sword lunged for his heart—but he deflected with his golden knife, just barely. The blade carved into his collarbone instead, blood erupting down his cloak.
Laughing shakily, he stumbled back. Pressing his hand into his bleeding shoulder. "You insane bastard! You just signed your own death warrant!"
[Aspect: Taken Devourer — Telekinesis!]
I didn't respond. Reaching out with my mind Corvus suddenly seized, his limbs locking as telekinesis erupted through the entire block before compressing around him.
[Aspect: Corruptive Wolf — Infection!]
White veins coiled up from the asphalt, wrapping his legs, rooting him down. Preventing my telekinesis from dragging him towards me. "You know what'll happen if you kill me!" he shouted.
I turned to Ben. His face was pale, confused. "Trust me," I said. "No matter what happens next—just trust me."
Suddenly, purple circuitry lit up across Ben's skin. And behind him, the shadows swelled.
A voice purred from the dark. "My, my... it's been a long time, Traveler." A woman stepped from the void. Tanned skin, black dress flowing like oil. Violet cat eyes, dancing with twisted amusement just like her feline tail.
[Stigma: Equal Correlation — Sequence Release!]
[Stigma: Equal Correlation has been removed in the presence of an equal foe!]
Dropping my head, I let my eyes linger on the shattered ground, exhaling slowly. The dust curled around my boots, as if the city itself were holding its breath. When I finally looked up, my gaze locked with the woman's violet eyes through my helmet's visor.
"I'd say it's nice to see you again," I muttered, "but given the circumstances, I'd be lying."
She pouted, one delicate hand resting on Ben's shoulder. The boy stood rigid beneath her touch, terror etched into his expression. To a mortal, her presence must've been suffocating—a deathless pressure pressing down on every thought. This wasn't her real body, of course. Just as I wasn't using mine. But that hardly mattered. Unlike me, she didn't bother dulling her presence to spare the minds of others.
"Seven thousand years of hiding after breaking your prison, killing the kralscell of adventure, and destroying
[Skill: Horizon Chain — calms minds.]
Slithering unseen through rubble and shadow, a thin spectral chain coiled gently around Ben's ankle. Its touch was subtle, anchoring his thoughts before fear could take root. He couldn't shatter here. Not now.
Flicking my thumb into my fingers I held back from acting on her barb. "What could I possibly say to one of the most beautiful and powerful women in the connected galaxies?" I said, voice dry beneath my helm. "Anything I try would sound like an insult."
Still suspended in my psychic grip, Corvus writhed like a caught animal, his struggles pitiful. I tightened the pressure, just enough to remind him how little control he had.
She glided closer, her obsidian dress rippling with ethereal shimmer with her cat tail flowing behind her. "We're past those games, aren't we?" she whispered with a coy smile. For a moment, her beauty bloomed like a curse—dazzling, unbearable. "But really... no 'How have you been?' Not even a little 'You look lovely today?'"
Her tone was light, but behind it lingered a flicker of sorrow. I hesitated. Too long. That flicker sharpened into something colder.
I gave in. "How are you, Prophet?"
Her eyes narrowed, the smile returning faintly. "I go by Propheira now."
Finding that strange I thought for an exaggerated moment before firmly saying, "You'll always be Prophet to me."
Something in her gaze softened—just for a heartbeat—before the smile curled back, sheepish this time. "Then, just for you, I'll be Prophet again."
"Wouldn't want you shouting my alias to the universe." I said apathetically.
Her lips twitched, the warmth gone in an instant. She straightened. "Hmph. Release my acolyte. Do that, and I'll let you walk away."
I glanced sideways, feigning confusion as more pressure was put on Corvus. "And the boy?"
"This one?" Her eyes slid to Ben. Her expression shifted as she studied him—curious now. That single brow lifted slightly. Despite the divine pressure suffocating the air, Ben stood firm. His fear remained, but behind it burned defiance. She noticed.
"He reminds me of Etrill," she murmured. "That look in his eyes. Fine. He lives—if he stays under my protection. I assume that's what you were about to ask?"
"Then I suppose asking you to let him leave with me is a bit much?" I asked, with a wry tilt of my head. My fingers curled tighter around the hilt of my sheathed sword behind my back.
"You've scorched half this city fighting my acolyte," Propheira said firmly. "This is the most I can offer, as a friend. If I give more, I risk losing authority at the next CGA summit. Even after sixty spiral epochs, they still haven't accepted a Kralscell as one of its founder. I should have done what Order did and hid my identity."
Creak!
The sound of Corvus' bones popping under my grip echoed faintly beneath the devil's grunts of repressed pain. She didn't even blink.
I believed her. The aether stirring in the air whispered that she wasn't bluffing.
With a long breath, I opened my hand. Corvus dropped like a stone, gagging and gasping in the souls in the air to heal his bones. My sword dissolved behind me, vanishing into the void.
"I don't know how you put up with politics," I muttered. "It's suffocating."
"Not all of us get to live without cages. Some of us just build them large enough to pretend they aren't there." She brushed a gloved hand against Ben's shoulder—gentle, almost motherly. Almost. "He won't be harmed. I'll hand him over to the three Lords of Idaten-II."
Ben looked at me, confused and uncertain. I met his eyes.
Trust me, I sent mentally. That was all I could offer.
[Multiple skills have been cancelled.]
The faint glow left my body. The chain coiled around his ankle dissolved into golden particles. I breathed out slowly.
"See you tomorrow, Propheira."
She gave a slight nod. "All the best with the Empyrean, Traveler. Let's see who gets there first."
With a flick of her wrist, a purple vortex peeled into existence. She stepped through with Corvus and Ben in tow, the street echoing with silence as the portal sealed behind her.
I stood alone among the ruins, dust rising with every breath I took.
High above, nestled in the shadows of a collapsed billboard, an owl-shaped silhouette watched me. Green eyes shimmered from within it's white feathers of silk—unnatural, calculating.
I tilted my head toward it and let my voice drift into the ruins. "You better have planned this perfectly, Sathuna. Or else hope itself will hunt us all."