Flicking my index finger downwards, a sword landed in my grip. "Enough chitter chatter."

The welcoming look on his face all but vanished.

"Nightcrackle." His lips moved, uttering a vaguely familiar name.

The small area in space around him cracked and broke, ripping itself apart. Tendrils of something that looked like lightning infused tentacles stuck at open air as the small point in space fractured even more. And from the inside of the small tear in space, a handle poked out. Gripping it in his gloved hand, he pulled it and then held it above his head with its tip towards the sky, as if showing it off.

It was a longsword with a dull grey blade and a fiery red hilt with a small amethyst gem on top of it.

"Brace yourself, human. I don't want you to disappear just yet." I felt his fingers tighten around the hilt. "I want my mother's soul to be at rest. Even if it means disregarding the promise of giving you a quick death."

"We'll see about that--" The words in my throat were suspended in the air as he moved his sword down right from where he was standing.

The air churned around the strike of his sword and detached itself from the physical body of the sword and extended towards me. Wisps of sickly grey moved like the side-view of a giant wave towards me.

Pivoting my foot, I barely dodged it and focused on my hand. The white sphere of pure compressed Arcanum suddenly started to get larger with every passing breath until it dwarfed even my own stature and then the sphere erupted into a beam of pure Arcanum.

There was not a beat of sound to be heard from either my attack or his, only pure havoc as the plumes of dust and debris rising from both of our backs marked the start of our battle.

"Not bad." He remarked, looking behind himself.

The area where his sword extension strike? had landed was completely gone. As if it had long since decayed and withered away into nothingness.

As I was looking down at it, a shadow swallowed my own. Pushing my body backwards, I bumped into Ed and cancelled his downward strike. Using the hilt as a weapon, I tried to drive it into his ribs, however, since I had pushed my back into him, I was off balance.

Taking advantage of that, he removed his own body from me that was anchoring my weight and blitzed to my side.

Twisting my body immediately I plunged the sword into the ground, using it as a support to not fall down.

Barely giving me any moment to rest—rightfully—he drove his shoulder into me.

The impact felt like a wrecking ball and my surroundings blurred and then stretched like rubber. Before I could fully register the crushing impact of the wild, bull-like charge and the excruciating pain that followed it, my back collided into the wall of one of the workshops.

However, impetus was an unforgiving maiden.

The flimsy wall made out of mud-covered stacked-rocks gave away the instant my body made contact and caved inwards.

Piles upon piles of rocks and lumps of hardened dirt fell over me one after another, stacking like the tombstone of an unkempt grave.

I clenched my teeth and held my breath, trying to push away the sensation of a needle stabbing the inside of my chest.

If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

With one sudden, concentrated blast of pure Arcanum from my palm, the stone grave exploded, releasing me.

I heard the sound of flame hissing in the hearth to my left a second after I brought my sword up and blocked the bone jarring strike from Ed.

His Nightcrackle clashed against the stolen sword with a certain degree of defiance. As if it was unworthy of clashing against such a feeble excuse of a sword.

And it was not wrong.

After delivering the shock of his blow to my arm that rattled my bones, the blade in my hand started to melt.

The same wispy grey aura that had surrounded his slash clasped around my blade, coiling like a cobra around the solid surface and then its ghostly tendrils seeped into the metal like incorporeal tentacles.

Sparks flew, followed by a crack in my blade as I pushed him back with a considerable amount of force—which only slightly budged him; however, the damage was done.

The dull clatter of the sword in my hand slowly fragmenting made me look down. Even the broken shards' shape began to soften, its edges blurring and melding into the surrounding haze of the hearth burning the flammable objects around it.

It was such a foreign thing to witness that I watched the last vestiges of solidity vanish into a faint shimmer all the while excluding Ed from my focus.

As if letting me witness it, I saw him standing with Nightcrackle resting on his shoulder. "Done gawking? Have you gained some clarity now? Has the brain fog that makes you think you even have a sliver of a chance to succeed subsided?"

Pushing myself to my feet, I raised my hand and the suspended halo of weapons atop my head into the hair moved towards me.

Ed looked up and then cleared the distance between us in the blink of an eye.

Weapons rained down at him like a hailstorm as I dashed backwards.

The amethyst, crimson and black-grey colours that formed Nightcrackle combined in one deadly arc, slicing through every weapon I had sent towards him. The blade and handles of multiple types of weapons scattered around him like dried-up leaves in autumn as he stepped on them, crushing them to fine dust before stepping away.

"It's futile, human." His voice was a rumble. "You are feeble, your friend outnumbered and there is no hope for any of you." He took a heavy step towards me. "Succumb to the inevitable."

I slightly tapped my right ear with my right hand. "You talk a lot." A sword flew from the right and I caught it. "And it's getting on my nerves." Cranking my neck, I got into a tail stance, grabbing the hilt with both my hands and then extending it backwards. "And that's a feat. Since I rarely get annoyed."

He sighed in a way that made him look like a remorseful parent, disappointed in his child. "As you wish."

Ed wasted no time, gave no further warning.

An aura of black wispy flames burned the air in my lungs and coated his entire body, billowing up and down in a girthy cone.

Not only the workshop where we had landed into but almost every other structure surrounding it was obliterated, the earth beneath blackened and burned away, flattening everything to the ground of the length of a football field.

Smoke and debris formed a natural camouflage and he disappeared within it.

[Phase 1: Ferrum Field]

The roofs of almost every remaining workshop gave away as thousands of weapons flew towards me.

Slicing through the mushroom of dust and black smoke, I caught sight of Nightcrackle, however, it was too late. Instead of parrying it, I pulled the weapons towards me and formed a round structure in front of me made entirely of swords and axes.

They followed each other, attaching in a perfect sync while forming a giant kaleidoscope. The tip of Nightcrackle clashed against the stacked weapons and frenzied sparks flew in every direction.

As if I was holding a tangible rope, I jerked my hand backwards and three spears homed in at Ed in a pincer attack.

His focus faltered for a second as he looked back and swung his sword back at their bases. However, it seemed like he still wasn't aware of my Arcane Arts. The severed top areas of the spears redirected themselves towards his chest and shoulders.

Taking a hold of one of the swords that formed the defensive wall a while ago, I lunged forward.

Swinging my sword in a downward, diagonal slash, I aimed for his thigh.

Ed swung his sword in a circular motion and parried my attack and then immediately struck at the two spears.

I flicked my arm and the last spear shifted direction. Weaving around him, it lodged itself into his thigh as I plunged my sword into his chest.

Or so I thought.

The tip of my sword that was imbued in a slightly pale golden aura stopped right before dipping into his chainmail as it started to glow and several shields compounded upon one another, taking the brunt of the attack before breaking layer by layer like shards of glass.

His eyes were wide, and his smile grew wild. "You are something else." He mumbled in a moment of pure stillness.