[Back To Mordred]
Bloody hell!
Alisax is an absolute beast!
My body is screaming, muscles aching all over as I use Alisax's skills
Oh, and the atrocious headache splitting my skull open is just absolute agony.
But I can't stop now.
The moment I stop channeling her skills, I am cooked.
Need to finish this quickly.
Parrying a jab aimed at my throat, the force rippling down my body, I rushed forward, swinging my fiery sword upward.
Alisax leaned back, barely avoiding the blade, but I wasn't aiming to use my sword.
{Haema: Blood Maiden}
My flaming blood surged forward toward Alisax, twisting and warping into the form of a crimson woman enveloped in Bloodfire.
Alisax reacted instantly, immediately jumping back.
She was quick, but not quick enough.
The arms of the Blood Maiden elongated and latched around the daemon's tall figure, smothering her in a fiery embrace.
Serrated spikes erupted out of the Maiden's body, piercing Alisax's body and holding her in place.
I sidestepped and lunged, swinging my crimson sword at her chest, right at the heart.
However, my attack connected, barely, as Alisax suddenly twisted her body, causing the Blood Maiden to take the full force of the attack, vaporizing into crimson mist and Bloodfire.
Clicking my tongue, I jumped back as Alisax stomped the ground, releasing a powerful shockwave. Black sand shot at me like a storm of tiny bullets.
I shielded my face with my blood crystal arm and gritted my teeth as thousands of sand particles shredded my skin.
A presence closed in, and I moved on instinct, immediately jumping to the side as Alisax plunged her sword into the ground where I had stood.
Blood swirled around me to form multiple Vortex Bloodlances that hurtled toward her at lightning speed.
Alisax effortlessly pulled out her sword from the sand, and it morphed into a long black staff.
Using the staff, she deftly deflected the bloodlances like a whirlwind. She then rushed at me, thrusting with her staff, the end suddenly turning into a deadly spear point.
The air rippled as I blocked the spear point with the flat of my blade, shattering the crystallized blood.
I immediately dropped the sword and aimed an ardor-laden crystallized fist at Alisax's face.
However, she dropped her head, dodging the strike.
Perfect.
My knee shot up, coated in sharp, serrated blood, and slammed into her head with a sickening crunch.
Black ooze splattered onto me, and Alisax's body jerked backward, launching into the air.
Gotcha!
Or so I thought.
I saw a flash of black, and then intense agony shot into my jaw as Alisax, reacting quickly in the situation, executed a devastating kick to my jaw, before flying away from my knee strike.
The world was flipped upside down, but I quickly recovered, landing on my feet.
My lower jaw hung slack, completely dislocated from my skull, and the kick had amplified my already skull-splitting headache.
I grabbed my lower jaw, feeling the broken shards of bone grinding against each other.
Using Haema, I pieced them back together and pushed my healed lower jaw and fixed it back into my skull.
Now that we have finally had a brief pause from the intense fighting, I noticed the toll the battle's carnage had left on both of us.
I was bleeding from numerous cuts all over my body, and the Bloodfire enveloping my blood arm had waned in intensity.
The same could be said for the intensity of the crimson mist escaping my pores, resulting from my strand working to the extreme.
Alisax was far from being unscathed as well.
Her armor was covered in deep slashes. The black blood of the daemons oozed out of the cuts, and the darkness trailing off her had diminished to mere wisps.
It's not just the physical damage. I could feel her desperation and anguish.
She is a prisoner in her body, unable to do anything, as Lilith made her fight me, the one she sees as a very close friend.
Of course, I can see what she is going through. I don't want to fight her.
I want to help her, but current circumstances would not allow either of us to do what we wish.
Right now, the best I can do is somehow disable Alisax and make her unfit for battle.
One of my fears right now is the devastating potential of a puppet Alisax fully controlled by Lilith.
What if that maniacal woman sends her new daemonic toy to Blood Valley?
Unleashing this deadly version of Alisax upon the Deathwalkers would be a disaster. It would be… a massacre.
I must not let that happen.
I guess our next clash would determine the outcome of this sick performance organized by Lilith.
Well then. Let' get on with it, shall we?
I took a deep breath and deactivated both Transcendence and Body Enhancement.
Instead, I focused on increasing my Blood Acceleration.
A surge of energy coursed through me, and my head cleared a bit.
My stigma had been active for about ten minutes, and my head feels like it's about to explode.
If I deactivate it now, I am going to lose my own skills for ten minutes, and a Mordred without skills won't even last a minute with Alisax unless I try to keep her in check with a constant barrage of codes.
Which is going to cause another massive headache.
No choice then. I'm going to have to finish this with Alisax's skills.
{Haema: Blood Loop}
Blood flowed out of my healing wounds, twisting and shaping into a rotating ring on my back, sucking in the abundant ardor from the surroundings and funneling into me.
I straightened up, took out my white sword, splitting it into the Fangs, and faced Alisax.
She also straightened up, and her spear turned into two black daggers, mirroring my own.
Just before we even took a step forward, I activated one of the new codes I developed in these ten years imprisoned in this hell.
Scarlet runes circled my wrists, the sequence of shifting runes spiraling twice before forming a closed loop.
I then slit my wrists, carefully using Blood Acceleration to let my blood flow smoothly out of my body, pooling around me before the black sand could absorb it.
After letting out enough blood, I healed my wrists and used Haema to recover lost blood before leaning forward.
The blood pooled around my feet began to rise in the air as suspended droplets, just as I blitzed right in front of Alisax, my right dagger aimed for her heart, and my left dagger for her head.
Intense sparks flew as she blocked both strikes and retaliated with a vicious knee strike at my body.
Oh, let's not do that.
Blood appendages unfurled from my back and blocked her attack. I twisted my body in the air and lashed out with my leg, mirroring her kicking style.
Alisax immediately blocked the attack, but I immediately released a powerful wave of ardor that threw her off balance.
I took the chance and struck swiftly, and plunged my dagger into a gap in her armor.
Black blood spurted out as I ripped out the blade and jumped back.
I figure I would get a few seconds before Alisax makes a move.
Boy, was I wrong.
She didn't even care about her wound and jumped at me!
"Shit!" I swore and strafed to the right, deflecting a dagger strike to my liver.
Shifting my left dagger to a reverse grip, I swung upward, nicking at her shadowy hood.
She immediately ducked low and drove her dagger into my stomach, but I was expecting that.
Ignoring the pain and the cold of her dagger slipping into my body, I sank my left dagger into her shoulder, hoping against hope that the paralysis effect would work.
And it appears that today is my lucky day.
Alisax suddenly froze in place, paralyzed by the basilisk emerald. I carefully pulled my body away from her dagger and jumped back.
I could see that the effect is not powerful enough for Alisax, as she is already breaking free from the paralysis, trembling all over like a hyper-charged chihuahua.
But it has given me enough time.
The light shining on the arena suddenly dimmed as a massive cloud of crimson mist gathered above us, drawing the attention of every daemon watching, even Lilith and the silent one cloaked in black cloth.
The runes circling my wrists flared, and then they faded.
I couldn't help but smile.
The code is ready.
Alisax shook off the paralysis and stepped forward before noticing the massive swirling cloud of crimson above the arena, bathing us in a faint scarlet hue.
The blood cloud churned, a red storm of swirling mist stretching across the entire arena.
Then it began to rain.
Blood fell from above like raindrops, falling on the black sand, the cracked and broken stones of the arena walls, me… and Alisax.
For me, it was a refreshing shower of blood, each drop containing fresh ardor and energy that healed my fatigued and injured body while also gradually alleviating my fierce headache.
But for my opponent, it is a whole different, and grim story.
Every droplet from the crimson cloud was mine to command. By drenching Alisax in this blood rain, I could block off her access to the surrounding ardor, effectively weakening her ardor attacks.
And it's not just that.
In developing this code, I had incorporated my other deadliest codes into this, interweaving them together to form a deadly tapestry.
With just a thought from me, each blood droplet can turn into a small, exploding Blood Grenade, or a miniature Shredding Gyroscope that can drill into Alisax's armor and well, shred her, or even a small Blood Maiden, latching onto her and bursting into small yet deadly spikes.
I could ignite the blood in her into Bloodfire or even incorporate the deadly crimson-black flames into the rain.
A multifunctional code that brings to life the concept of blood being the symbol of life and death.
{Haema: Scarlet Fall}
However, a powerful code like this has its caveats.
It requires a constant supply of massive amounts of ardor that can only be accomplished by a continuously active Blood Loop, and that requires intense and unbroken focus.
The moment I lose that focus, the code will disappear, but not before hitting me with the rebound of channeling the huge amount of ardor required to run it.
It would involve a lot of internal bleeding as my blood vessels burst, and my body breaks down from the sheer ardor overload.
Yeah. Nasty stuff.
Anyway.
The grip around my sword handle tightened, and I watched Alisax, who seemed to be entranced by the crimson rain falling on her. The crimson droplets clung to her jagged armor, soaking into the gaps like dew.
She was unaware of the deadly venom of this amazing spectacle.
Sorry Alisax. But I must cripple you.
Let's finish this properly.