[Ashborn-B1] 96 - Spliced (Patreon)

XCVI

Spliced

Judith made herself small in the holy blade’s arms.

Splitter, as Garen lovingly called his blade, blazed. The light pouring from the sword hissed and cleaved an Immortal in two. One of Aedan’s copies slipped in an attack. Garen spun on his backfoot and rend the air in a wide arc in front of him.

“Keep running!” he yelled.

A black mass slamming into the earth nearby cut off his shout. Tremors shot up the boots of the holy blade into the side of Judith’s frame.

She curled in on herself and gritted her teeth.

She peered at the pillar. Absolutely speaking, they were close. But the enemies between them and the column made it feel like a canyon separated them from their target.

‘We’re not going to make it.’

A burst of light about the width of a dagger whizzed overhead. It cut through an arm of the eldritch beast. The loose arm disintegrated.

Judith’s brow twitched. ‘That didn’t happen before.’ Up until now, each time an arm was cut off, it regrew.

‘It’s running out of energy.’

Anetta also hadn’t given chase to them—an action that Judith hadn’t understood at the time.

‘She must be retreating to facilitate another ritual.’

Judith turned back in front. Her steed in the holy blade kept pace with Duke and Leila, who both did their absolute damnedest to not get caught up in fighting any of the Immortals.

Aedan’s clones weren’t making it easy.

The holy blade spun and Aedan’s morningstar missed Judith’s forehead by inch.

‘Dammit.’

The knight couldn’t retaliate because it was carrying her. That wouldn’t have been a problem if Judith could fire anything at all, but her staff had broken and her essence was low.

You can cast without a staff, Dorothy said.

That wasn’t the problem. She had a spare staff, but it didn’t do anything but increase the activation speed of her spells. The inefficiency and lack of power would remain. At this point, slinging attacks would not be doing more than wasting the small amount of energy she had left.

Yet she had to try.

Her finger whipped out at Aedan’s head. Judith’s face contorted so heavily at the essence burning through her veins that she didn’t want to see her face in the mirror. A column the thickness of her phalanx penetrated Aedan’s temple and exited out the other side.

Judith’s breathing paused. ‘Is she dead?’

Smoke rose from the wound and blood—belatedly, like it only now gotten the message it was supposed to flow—gushed from the hole.

The Bloodletter’s lips stretched into a grin. She whirled and brought her morningstar down.

‘Of course not.’

Forming a shield strong enough to stop Aedan’s attack was out of her wheelhouse. Which was why Judith was glad Garen was here.

The spiked ball bounced off the cone of light.

The holy blade regained its balance, then burst ahead and left Aedan three steps behind. The clone would be hard pressed to close that gap.

That didn’t mean it didn’t try. Spikes of blood hurled across the battlefield. Wires coiled around the lengths of the spikes like the ridges in a nail, which added to the piercing force of the missiles.

Two of the disciples in Garen’s party didn’t manage to dodge or block in time and the nails punched into their chest and stomach. Judith grimaced in advance. But their souls didn’t siphon out of their bodies like they had done during the skirmish on the surface.

She blinked. ‘Did that only work when Vyke was around?’

Or maybe only the original Aedan had that ability. There were too many variables to hazard a guess.

The good news, though, was that the holy blades wouldn’t be susceptible no matter the answer. Aedan’s techniques required blood to function.

Weapon Empire disciples and scorn battling around the structure sharpened in their view. Their side was winning. Albeit marginally.

‘This could work.’

The deeper she travelled into her army, the harder it’d be for Aedan or anyone else to stop her.

That’s why she should’ve known something would happen.

The scorn closest to her turned away from their opponents and whirled on her.

‘Fuck.’

Four hulking beasts dug grooves in the earth during their charge. They were much too quick for the Weapon Empire disciples to catch and interrupt them.

‘Dammit. We need to retreat—’

Light hurled from the sky like lightning bolts. Tirion waltzed through the sky and twirled between three of the eldritch monster’s arms.

The beast had shrunk significantly.

‘It’s about to return.’

There was no time to rejoice. More of the scorn fled whichever disciples they were fighting and rushed towards her.

The holy blade threw Judith over its shoulder, which freed up one of its arms. A flash summoned its blade into its hand. Judith’s weight or form didn’t keep the holy blade from gliding across the land. Undead limbs separated at the sockets. Light cauterised the festering wounds. With every swing, the servants of the Arch-Fiend lost part of their integrity.

An explosive desire to head straight back rose from within. She wanted to ask Scar how she could possibly get one of these knights for herself.

Dorothy smiled in her head.

When they came within distance and a swarm of scorn had gathered to stop her advance. The knight slowed and measured its steps. Right before running into the first wave of enemies, it crouched and pushed the ground away.

Winds whipped past her ears. In blinks, the letters on the base of the tablet became large enough for her to read (had she actually been capable of reading the language). The floor met the knight’s feet more than the holy blade slammed into it. Without pause, she let herself down from the knight’s shoulder. Though she wanted to let the knight carry her the final few steps, her allies were nearby—she couldn’t look weak now.

So she stumbled her way forwards with as straight a back as she could.

‘I just need to touch it, right?’ she asked.

Yes. I’ll do the rest.

A deep breath released the tension in her chest. She placed both her palms against the stone. The slab was cold to the touch. The sensation smoothed out the furrows on her forehead. A white expanse drew itself into her mind and calmed her every nerve. It was a place not unlike the one she’d been floating in moments earlier—

There was a scream in her head. She didn’t catch it because of how deep her consciousness was sinking into the blank space. By the time she dragged her mind back into the outside world, the sounds had died.

‘What is it?’ she asked.

A few things revealed themselves to her between instants. One, though she thought she fled the meditative plane herself, she had not. She’d been expelled. Quite forcefully. The reason for which was the second thing that revealed itself to her: there was a bleeding stump where her forearms were supposed to be.

The strange sight had her tilting her head and furrowing her brows. Blood gushed and coated the base of the slab.

Judith turned to the side. A sawblade made of black plate only now rotated to a stop after having dug itself deep into the earth. Two forearms were lying off beside it.

A spike of awareness spun her neck in the opposite direction. Vyke hovered in the air. The silent strikes of his black wings professed only death.

As Judith’s pupils shrunk and sharpened the sight of him, the pain finally registered.

I didn’t remember moving, but all of a sudden, Skul and I were in the middle of the enemy force.

There was a yelp. A girl, but I couldn’t see who it was. Was it the silhouette in front of me? Maybe. But the yell sounded like it was coming slightly from my left.

‘It doesn’t matter.’

My blade cut through the centre of the creature all the same, and its bisected halves vanished into a portal I formed absentmindedly.

Essence swirled inside a shape three heads shorter than myself. The energy was going into their legs. A movement technique.

I tensed my ribcage. The soil cracked and burst. Hundreds of hungry, wooden arms pierced the ground and bound the souls waiting on me to feast on them in place.

Skul’s claws ripped through a swathe of them, stealing the life from their hazy forms. Then he opened his jaw. The cold energies he leeched fanned the azure fires around my blade.

I searched for my next target—

And whirled around to catch the talons of a large beast lunging for my rear. Shockwaves ripped from the epicentre of the clash. My flames pushed against the purple haze around the thing’s claws.

‘Interesting.’

I’d thought it a dream-like power before. However, it was also striking the soul. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have been able to block my attack. Doing so would’ve hurt his spirit. And what a beautiful spirit it was! His was many times more solid and stable than those of the pitiful beings around us.

The tip of my tongue passed over my lips. I couldn’t wait to taste it. Skul’s bond pulsed. Neither could he.

Eyes in the beast’s fur narrowed. “You’ve lost it.”

“Did I?” I grinned. “Isn’t this what you wanted? To fight—”

I leaned forwards.

“—and consume each other!”

Grass sagged underneath my boots. My torso twisted, and the tension unleashed like a spring. Gaje launched.

‘Ah, right. That’s who I was fighting.’

His name had escaped me for a moment.

I regained my balance and leapt after him. The world whooshed by. For a heartbeat, I closed my eyes and enjoyed the lashes of the wind on my face. Ah. This was life. The peaceful sensation lasted another heartbeat. When I opened my eyes, I was in front of the Nightmare.

He whirled the moment he landed and formed a cross with his arms. My long legs reached for the ground and cut my leap short. The fires passed inches in front of his guard.

I flipped the edge, and wondered in the instant before my blade struck again.

How must I have looked form his point of view? A direct view of my face wouldn’t have been possible—the downwards angle of my chin and my sweat-matted hair blocked that. But my features reflected in the flames. One of my pupils poked through the strands of my hair, and the fires blazing within sent a chill down my own spine.

The blade snapped upwards.

‘He’s going to phase.’ He must. The path of the blade would take it through a dozen eyes at once. And while his talons may be able to block a soul strike, his body was a different story.

That’s why I prepped my mind. ‘Skul.’

The summon cut his battle with a few of the disciples short. I fed what I was seeing through our bond so he didn’t need to turn around. Now, where would he appear—

Gaje dropped low to the ground. I was in the middle of looking away, which was why I caught the movement in the corner of my sight.

‘He managed to dodge that?’

Muscles in my neck contracted. My momentum continued past and overhead, putting me completely out of position. ‘This is bad—’

The beginnings of the gate formed beside me and expanded. Skul’s arms pierced the surface of the portal.

‘—no. It’s alright.’ Skul would make it.

Gaje was too far away to reach me in time…

Talons locked around my sword. My eyes went wide as the spindly, bird-like limbs began to twist.

The thrum of my heart deepened and my lips pressed together. I made a mistake.

And that mistake was going to cost me.

I let go of the blade so the twisting force didn’t extend to my arm and cause my whole body to spin. Instead, I was merely carried off as Skul ripped through the gate.

Gaje rose to his feet while I flew backwards. The flames on the blade were already dimming now that they had lost their source of fuel.

He tightened his hold on the blade, watching me with every single one of his eyes…

A snap.

Gaje threw the shards to the side, then lunged after me.