That still wasn’t entirely right, Glomar had been with him for a long time, and Welsh had started to think of him as a friend. Other than Oscar that would be his only other friend he would have made since he lost everyone in the Abyss long ago so he did have important worry over Glomar in terms of his use as an asset, but he also worried about him as someone he started to think of as a friend.
To the right of Welsh, a divine golden shine suddenly appeared forcing Krey to look at it, along with everyone in her squad. It had been brief but once she could pull away from its grasp she could see the figure producing the golden light now had golden armor on along with a golden sword at his hip and bow in hands. Worse yet Welsh had pulled out a large lance akin to the size of Oscar's spear, it looked large for his figure but his powerful demeanor made it fit nearly perfectly in his hands. And the person to the left of Welsh had pulled out a sword breaker, a type of sword that could catch weapons and with a twist snap them. She could identify the golden armored man as a man named Clide, she had information on him from the records she read before this mission. Why is he here, isn’t he supposed to work for Aton, he’s dangerous too. Krey could also recognize the woman on the left of Welsh, a woman named Thackray a mermaid but Krey didn’t know about her abilities.
Thackray skin was made up of dark colors, she blended in with the dark sea they were in, in fact in the middle of combat she could very well use that to her advantage. After the divine light distraction three floating unlit lanterns had appeared around her, they must have something to do with her skill. And then suddenly they teleported around the battlefield now illuminating the sea around her. Doesn’t that go against her natural advantage of blending into the sea? Krey thought, and looked around at her comrades.
“Oi comrades, avoid the lanterns, they are definitely dangerous, focus your attacks on the domain user!” Krey commanded, the last part a lie, Krey and her comrades already knew the plan and they had no intention of targeting the domain user. A lantern appeared in between the two groups, another near but not too near to the domain user, and the last one close to Kreys group near to their front left. Clide readied a golden arrow and launched it towards Krey and her group, starting the fight. The golden arrow flew with incredible accuracy towards the long-range Ash users on Kreys side, the tank went to intercept while they prepared offensive attacks of their own.
Krey threw her dagger at the arrow, making a thundering boom as the arrow exploded into light. Since the arrows were made of Ash she wanted to test their functionality and turns out they blow up on connect, but she didn’t remember hearing anything about Clides arrows exploding. She pulled her dagger back towards her with a clear sting that she had attached to it. Krey only had three daggers she didn’t want to waste any. She attempted to look back at Welsh but as she turned her head Welsh had appeared in front of her with a his lance quickly making towards her head. Damn I only looked away for a second.
She thought as she used her puppet master skill to pull his attack upward slightly, only barely going over her head-scratching her scalp. And at the same time launching with a dagger toward his heart. Welsh quickly pulls back completely avoiding the attack.
What is with that speed, he’s a true master all right he is channeling Ash that quickly to accelerate his speed. Still, it's bearable. Another arrow flew from Clide now himself. Wait where did the other one go? She thought frantically, but knowing she couldn’t look away from Welsh again, she could only hope that her teammates wouldn’t let the lantern user get in her way. She stared at Welsh, he looked resolved but also completely unfazed that his attack didn’t work. In fact, he looked emotionless to her.
He launched toward her again with incredible speed, his enhancement capabilities were top-notch much better than anyone Krey has ever seen, other than maybe her boss, but either way he outmatched her completely on that front. She once again activated her skill pulling him back slightly as he dashed towards her giving her a much needed second to react. She pulled up her dagger to block his large lance now aiming at her heart but the dagger shattered instantly on impact. Impossible. She managed to think as she quickly reacted, twisting her body to avoid and activating her defenses onto her left arm. His lance pierced through her arm shredding her scales with ease ripping into the flesh of her arm before barely stopping at her sides. With the combined effort of her now shattered dagger, her Ash defense and activating her skill once again plus twisting her body she barely managed to cling onto life.
However, this had been enough for Welsh to win already all he needed to do now was lunge his lance once more into her side straight into her heart which would kill her instantly. But he pulled his lance out of her arm and dodged an incoming Ash ice crystal that had been fired by one of Krey's allies. Her arm started to get healed by another ally using an Ash healing skill which rapidly mended her skin over the gaping wound, it would leave a nasty scar but it would be healed in about thirty seconds. A very quick pace, but against Welsh this injury would definitely lead to her death if she didn’t have her allies. She grabbed another dagger now, not sure if it would help. But while fear did linger inside of Krey, she also was extremely pissed. While she was saving a couple of tricks, she couldn’t believe Welsh hadn’t used a single Ash skill yet. More Ash skills were getting thrown at Welsh giving her a second to observe the battlefield once more. The lantern user had begun a fight with her elite squad of three which would explain why they hadn’t provided support. And Clide had been exchanging blows with her tank and long-range user. The lanterns were in different locations now one still lingered near the circle of enemies but the one had started to make its way in between her and her long-range Ash users, while the other in between her and her elite squad of three. The lantern user was trying to cut off her support. Well, little does she know that does not hinder my plan. Trap me if you want. I'll show you my jail skill.
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Once the final Ash skill had been dodged by Welsh she made her move, she used her puppet master skill to pull Welsh closer to her and went for a downward slash with her dagger, this dagger lined with a deadly poison, all she needed was a single cut. But he expertly pushed back and avoided the attack. Krey had predicted this and with her skill using his own momentum pulled him back causing him to go much further back than originally intended. She threw her dagger with incredible precision at his gut. Making it hard to block with anything but his fluke, however, a slight pierce of the fluke would enact the poison making the block useless. However that still wasn’t her true aim. Her three allies had rotated behind them in an attempt to launch a pincer attack on Welsh. While dealing with the lantern user. They were elites in the Van Dresels; the lantern user could only by time against three of them.
Realizing Krey's plan, two of them turned around while the other continued his fight with the lantern user. One pushed his spear out to shred through Welsh’s back while the other readied a sword to slash him once he got stuck on the spear. Even the great Welsh wouldn’t be able to avoid this or at least Krey thought. Welsh pulled up his fluke to block the incoming dagger putting his Ash defense there while swinging his lance behind him with terrifying force twisting his body to be able to reach behind him. The lance collided with the Ash user holding his spear. The man with the spear only barely got a glimpse of his fate, which only came from him being very experienced himself, which in this case harmed him as he could’ve gone with unknowing bliss, but instead time slowed for him as the lance made itself way sideways towards his head. He tried to bring up his spear in defense, but that again resulted in a downside of his experience. The spearman's natural reaction had been to block the oncoming attack, but if instead, he kept his hand steady even in the face of death, or merely didn’t know what approached him Welsh would’ve still been on path to be pierced by his spear. While that wouldn't have killed him at least the man wouldn’t die completely in vain; at least doing some damage to Welsh before death. Instead, though, the spear blocked nothing and pierced nothing but water as Welsh’s lance spattered his head, like a watermelon. Chucks flew in the direction of the swing covering his sword-wielding partner in disgusting red and white fluids and pieces of his brain.
While that occurred from the front the dagger did absolutely nothing to his defenses and only bounced off of his fluke not even breaching his skin. Welsh had planned to let the sword women go and focus on the enemy in front of him expecting the sword man to either recoil in fear or despair at the gruesome death of his friend but the man acted unsuspectingly and swung at Welsh’s back as he turned back forward. Causing a large but shallow wound down his back. Welsh didn’t react to the pain but did focus his eyes slightly in surprise as he once again swung his lance behind her this time aiming for the torso near the stomach area of her side, doing a full 360 spin around his lance and cut her in half as he once again faced towards Krey who now closed the distance. Acting as he would’ve predicted anger covering her face, he killed her allies and she was upset and so she stupidly charged him with anger instead of her normal intelligence. Welsh deemed the fight had been won right then and there. He could hear her scream something, names she had screamed their names with absolute sadness and desperation in her voice. She screamed
“Straus, Abbott you can’t die you, bastards!” She had another dagger in hand brandishing it for him to see completely. He figured it too most likely had been coated in poison, but didn’t really care, or even if that dagger was a decoy or a trap for something else it really didn’t matter he would smash through it either way. He went to counter-attack her dagger about to reach him, but his arm didn’t move at all, it wasn’t normally resistant but rather something basically froze his arm in place. He gazed upward at the clown puppet master above him, while physically it didn’t look any different, the Ash around it painted another picture. Welsh could focus his eyes to see Ash, and how it formed this wasn’t a skill but instead a talent he developed in his childhood. But without time to think about what it meant, he attempted to move up his other arm to block the attack but that one wouldn’t move either, in fact, his entire body below his head had been basically paralyzed.
A powerful trap he had been placed into, but quite frankly not enough to defeat him in the slightest. He activated his first ash skill since the fight started about thirty seconds ago and her Ash skill turned into Ash. Welsh had a skill to manipulate reality for a short period of time, for a limited number of people, but that would be more than enough. To reduce the strain on his body he did something incredibly simple for such a high technique skill, he made it so in Krey reality she didn’t know she had a puppet master skill. He didn’t actually remove the skill, she still had it and had full access to it, but since she did not know that she could not use it. And since all he needed to do was get the skill deactivated the duration of his skill was one millisecond the shortest amount of time possible for the skill. He also knew the cost Krey must’ve used to activate such a powerful skill combined with her many uses of her puppet master skill she would be running out of steam. After freeing himself he easily blocked off her dagger shattering it, but with the minimal amount of time to put in more power Krey didn’t retrieve any real damage.
“Your skill was impressive, most would’ve succumbed to that attack, but I am afraid you’ve used too much Ash in that attack. Ash follows death, and Ash is surrounding you now.” Krey didn’t have the energy to respond with a witty remark, he was right, her trump card which had been helplessly squashed used up a lot of Ash, and in a short amount of time which had caused a lot of strain on her body. And her side effect caused her body to seize up and get paralyzed in random places at random times until she became completely unable to move. Paired with the fact that she pushed through her arm seizing up to attack Welsh, she was in dire straits now and barely a minute has passed since they started fighting. She had been told to only use the artifact in her pouch if she had no other option, it was their national treasure, the Van Dresel's most valuable item. But with her trump card proving to be completely useless against her opponent she had no other choice, she reached into the pouch on her waist and pulled out a golden chalice with ancient markings on it related to the god of the underworld Eversor. A red liquid somehow stayed in the chalice unmoving even in the fight and unmixing in the water surrounding it. She brought up the chalice to her lips to drink the red liquid inside. Only then did the liquid begin to move and as it did so did Welsh he didn’t know what the chalice did but he didn’t have any desire for her to use it, he could claim it for himself.
But Krey used as much Ash as she possibly could manage without any restraint to pull Welsh back and as she pulled Welsh away from her as she drank the chalice, barely managing to drink in the liquid before he reached her. And as Welsh launched his lance toward Krey's chest, she grabbed onto the lance stopping it in its tracks.