Chapter 26 – Desperate Battle

{There’s no way other than to fight all out now. I doubt I can even take down the subordinates with Gulver guarding them now. And I need to still have to stall as long as possible. Ugh... What a terrible situation...} Senna bitterly laughs to herself.

“I won’t allow you to cut down any of the Viscount’s men. I challenge you to a duel!” The aide, Gulver yells.

Senna gives a mocking smile. “I’m realllllly not interested. I’d rather cut down your forces.” Gulver’s face reddens on the verge of attacking her. “…But it doesn’t look like I can avoid fighting you. Fine. A one on one duel it is.”

Senna wields a blade of ice in the form of a straight sword. {Too bad I can’t layer the ice to form a katana to benefit from my skills. Then again a direct sword fight is just suicide anyways.} “Also. If your so called Viscount chooses to interfere, I won’t hesitate to ignore you and take them all down.”

Mater fumes with anger and almost charges straight at her. However, Gulver stares at Mater. With a silent stare, he affirms that he will take care of it. He poises his sword at Senna.

Diving down, he charges at Senna with speed far surpassing her own. Senna jumps to the side, but he simply changes direction and slashes out. Gulver’s lightning sword cuts through Senna’s ice sword like butter posing little resistance against his enchanted weapon. He suddenly retreats seeing a evil smile on Senna’s face. Five ice needles fly out from behind him and stop in front of Senna. The ice needles turn and chase after Gulver.

He electrifies his body The basic [Enchant Lightning] and expands it until a large orb of lightning is formed with his body as the center. The ice needles touch the edge of the lightning and shatters to bits. The lightning retracts back into his body. It looks as if the spell had ended, if the occasional crackle of electricity did not crackle from his body.

“You’re really sneaky with all those traps. Why don’t you show off your strength rather than sneak around like a rat?!” Gulver yells at Senna. Senna scoffs and sticks out her tongue. “Hmph. Either way…Now it’s my turn! !” Gulver gathers magic within his sword allowing it to convert the magic into lightning. Senna stares calmly seeing him use a weapon’s ability to substitute for chanting and casting a spell. {Truly a magic swordsman.} He swings his sword forming a lightning sickle that targets Senna. Finishing his swing, he immediately thrusts his blade forming a piercing blast of lightning. The piercing lightning stabs directly into the lightning sickle. Senna’s eyes widen when they unexpectedly merge together. The combined technique picks up speed as they supplement one another and home in on Senna. Senna unconsciously whistles. {That’s an interesting technique.}

The combined technique closes in on Senna as she raises her hand in front of her, but the immediately disappears. Gulver stares blankly at his failed attack. Senna gives a slight smile as she shakes her glove of the residual static. {I’m glad I didn’t have a repeat of the Lich King’s magic. That would have been problematic even with these rubber lined gloves. Oops. Face. Face. I need to mock him.} “Is that it?” Senna sneers.

The spectating demons also stare blankly in shock. They had heard stories of the attack and how it destroyed the strongest of demons. Yet, here was a simple human that took the attack completely unscathed.

“Oi. Is this happening?” One demon soldier asks.

“I must be dreaming.” Another soldier comments.

“It must be a trick!” A soldier yells.

“Could you make the rumored disappear?” A mage asks.

“Uh…” The soldier blankly mutters.

“Isn’t it because Gulver is weak?” A soldier asks.

Mater goes to that soldier and smacks him before anyone can respond. “Shut Up!”

Gulver curses seeing her unfazed appearance against his attack. “Lightning Nullification? No…Magic Nullification? Damn! No wonder you’re so confident.”

Senna smiles in return. “Well that was an interesting display. I guess it’s my turn now.” She stomps the ground and a large crack forms in front of her. The ice splinters as the crack fans out forming a large circular hole. All of the ice in the hole sinks down into the water disappearing from sink. Gulver backs up cautiously as a geyser of water shoots high into the air. Orbs of water form hanging in the air. Every water orb siphons water from the geyser gradually increasing its size and power. Some of the water orbs reshape themselves into a sickle shape, while the orbs maneuver behind the sickle and form a large needle.

“…Y-You. This is.” Gulver stares wide eyed at Senna’s preparations.

“It’s interesting so I thought I’d try it.” Senna smiles brightly. “Oh. And I would be careful about dodging~”

Gulver frowns unsure of what Senna means. However, he quickly understands when she doesn’t stare at him, but at the spectating demons. “Y-Y-You would dare dishonor this duel?!”

“It’s a fight. What does honor matter? Besides, I’m a commoner. Honor of nobles is irrelevant to me.” Senna scoffs justifying her plan. {That’s right. Get frustrated and show an opening. Things will get worse if I don’t deal with you quickly.} She swings down her hand.

The water needles and sickles move on Senna’s command. The water needles pierce the sickles and accelerate as they combine. Over 30 sets of set forth flying through the air. Ten of them fly directly at Gulver, but the others fly wildly passing around him in each cardinal direction. Gulver swings his blade and releases a hastily formed arc of lightning towards the center group aimed at him.

Senna reveals a bit of her skills redirecting the center group into four groups. Four of the aim at Gulver’s attack aiming to neutralize it, while the other six in the group evade the attack and take a roundabout route to attack him. The other 4 groups of each split in half taking a large amount of distance from each group aimed at the spectating demons. A look of disdain and anger forms on Mater’s face. The soldiers begin to panic and back away knowing the strength of Gulver’s attack. Even if they didn’t die, they would become crippled from the attack.

“Damn you!!” Gulver curses and takes out a violet gem. Pouring his magical power into it, the gem shines with a bright violet light. He holds it high into the air as black storm clouds form. “!!” Bolts of lightning suddenly rain down on the area. Every one of Senna’s attack is struck down by the lightning storm completely nullifying her attack. The light from the violet gem weakens as the spell ends. The lightning and thunderclouds fade leaving only shattered shards of ice and various potholes along the ice platform. The gem in his hand completely loses its bright violet radiance, now resembling a burnt piece of charcoal.

“Hmm… That must be a magic gem and you even got one with a high enough purity to store an Advanced class spell. It’s a bit overkill for something you could take care of yourself. Don’t you think?” Senna mocks Gulver with a condescending smile.

Gulver grips the gem angrily glaring at Senna. A crack forms on the gem as he tightens his grip. Arcs of electricity spark out from his body and increase in intensity. The gem in his hand crumbles to ash as his entire body becomes covered in purple lightning. Senna recognizes it as the Advanced spell, . It enchants the entire body with lightning and enhances the user’s attack and speed. Skilled users could easily triple their speed if they properly merge with the lightning.

{Crap.} Senna inwardly curses. {I pissed him off too much!} Senna leaps into the air as Gulver suddenly appears behind her. He slices through empty air, but leaves a crackling arc of lightning in its wake. He swings his sword into the air releasing another arc of lightning at Senna. As he releases his attack, he moves instantly above Senna and pierces down at her head.

“Guh.” Senna forms two swords of ice and creates a at her feet. She kicks off attempting to dodge the attack. She swings both swords out. One ice sword clashes with the lightning arc, but the blade is immediately cut as the arc attacks Senna. Her ice blade grants her precious milliseconds to store the lightning arc away and neutralizing one threat. The other ice sword is swung in a fluster as it clashes with Gulver’s blade. Senna tries to move her body out of the way as his sword comes piercing down at her.

Gulver’s blade quickly cuts through her ice sword with little resistance. Senna moves her head out of the way, but his sword cuts into her left shoulder. Lightning courses through her body electrocuting her. Senna bites her lip enduring the pain. Her [Paralysis Resistance] does its job, allowing her body to move freely despite the electricity surging through her body. Senna forms another and kicks off it. She bites her lip to the point that she draws blood enduring the pain as she allows Gulver’s sword to cut its way out of her body.

Before Senna can take enough distance, Gulver appears again in front of her and attacks. Senna is forced to create another platform and change directions. He easily breaks through Senna’s defenses and cuts deeply into her left arm before she can get away. Gulver closes the distance immediately giving Senna no time to rest.

“DAMN IT!!!” Senna yells swinging a newly formed ice blade with her uninjured right hand. Gulver scoffs aiming to disable her right arm too. His lightning blade cuts into the surface of the ice blade, but is abruptly unable to penetrate any deeper. Sparks fly as the two weapons clash against one another. Senna counters as the momentum from Gulver’s attack is interrupted. She drives back his sword intending to fully knock it out of his hand. But at that moment…

A stabbing pain spreads from Senna’s side. An impact immediately follows pressing against her side and blowing Senna away. Senna’s counterattack weakens as her body starts to move to the side. With the sudden loss of resistance, Gulver’s sword moves forward on pure momentum. Senna’s ice sword is sliced through with the disruption. He lands a clean cut against Senna creating a large diagonal slash across her chest and cutting into her right arm. Senna drops her weapon as she falls like a meteor crashing into the icy platform.

Gulver looks down at Senna wondering why she suddenly stopped resisting. As the mist clears, he spots Senna lying motionlessly on the ground with a large black spear protruding out of her side. Gulver’s eyes widen in shock as he turns to Mater, who is sporting a triumphant look.

In the moment that Senna attacked with full force, Mater performed a clean sneak attack. Her mind was fully focused on defending against Gulver to the point that she missed the signals released from her [Danger Detection]. As a result, the spear directly stabbed into her side just above her hips. With the attack, several organs were pierced with the spear head protruding through the other side of Senna’s body.

“Wh-Why did you interfere with our duel Ma……Sire!?” Gulver yells at Mater angrily. He makes a slight slip with Mater’s name before remembering they’re out in public.

“You were taking too long.” Mater answers.

“But our duel! We had an agreement!!” Gulver yells. His face has a tinge of worry as he glances at Senna. He was fighting against Senna, but the fact that he won with outside interference does not appease him. Inwardly, he is mentally pondering the idea of injuring himself as an apology before they continue their duel. However, Senna does not seem to be in any condition to continue the duel.

“I did you a favor and crushed that piece of trash that was in our way.” Mater replies.

Before Gulver can reply another voice interjects. “Rather than doing him a favor, you did me a great favor.” The two stop their argument and turn towards the source of the voice. They see Senna pushing herself up. Her clothes and the front of her body are completely drenched in blood. The spear remains lodged in her body protruding out on both ends. “You struck first. Now I can attack you without restraint.” The spear disappears with her words, but no more blood escapes her body as she takes control over her blood.

Senna raises her hand into the air when the Mater and Gulver stare at her in shock. Ten orbs of light form circling around Senna. White light explodes from Senna’s body as she releases the collected magic she has been storing since the battle started. Tendrils of light extend from Senna’s body connecting to the orbs feeding them at an accelerated rate. The orbs grow in size with the connection expanding from a few centimeters to two meters in diameter. The connection breaks as the orbs distance from one another forming a line with Senna in the center. When the orbs get into position, they begin spinning in place.

Watching the spectacle, Mater breaks free from his stupor as the attack forms. “KILL HER!!!”

The ice platform below them shatters in half and rises up into the air. Sharp icicles form around the perimeter of the platform giving the shape of an icy maw. The maw closes trying to bite down on the entire demon army, but they quickly fly up evading it. The icicles shoot out separating from the platform violently disturbing their ranks. Some unlucky demons have their wings pierced and fall from the sky, only to get impaled by more icicles. As they touch the water, a burst of pressurized water pierces through their armor and body creating a large hole. The water jet increases in size ripping the demon in half.

As they dodge the attacks, an odd spectacle forms as the light orbs continue to increase their power. Under Senna’s influence, they begin to absorb the light from the surroundings making the area pitch black shrouding the orbs in the process. Senna manipulates the surrounding light in the area and combines it with her spell without letting a single bit escape. The result makes the nearby area temporarily devoid of any light elements and forming the blackened surroundings as the world attempts to correct the disruption by balancing the residual light elements. However, Senna continues to drain the incoming light maintaining the abnormal situation. The blackened surroundings merge into one mass and spread to the point that even Senna is enveloped in the darkness.

Senna focuses on the demons with her [Detection] skills and makes her move. “!!!” All ten orbs move forward separating from their blackened surroundings. Mid-flight, the orbs erupt into a brilliant beam of white light targeting the demons. The space behind each of the orbs starts to turn black as the surrounding light fuels the spell. Most of the beams of split into five separate beams making them slightly weaker than the intact beams, but still retaining enough power to match a normal spell. The thirty five normal begin targeting the soldier and mage demons within the group. Three of the beams split in half as two of the newly split beams attack Mater, while the remaining four target Gulver.

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Seeing that he is being targeted, Mater immediately hides using his subordinates as shields. Normally, he would charge directly into the fray attacking his enemies and emerging victorious. However, Senna’s actions have been anything but normal. Despite receiving a killing strike, she continues to stand up unfazed with her injuries. Her spells seemed normal and simplistic at first, but the preparation for the current spell reveal an abnormal power that shouldn’t be underestimated. Thus, he decides the first thing he needs to do is retreat until the spell loses its potency.

Gulver grits his teeth and immediately activates another lightning gem. Thunder clouds form and begin bombarding the area with bolts of lightning. However, relief quickly turns to shock as the lightning makes contact with Senna’s spells. Bolt after bolt begins striking the beams of , but fails to hinder Senna’s spell at all. Instead, each bolt of lightning seems to combine with light beams enchanting them as arcs of electricity begin to emanate from each of the beams. “ARGH!!! You tricked me?! The first time was a probe?!” He yells glaring at Senna.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about?” Senna replies with a large smile.

“FUCKK!!!” Gulver yells releasing a lightning sickle to attack one of the light orbs aimed at him. He finishes his first attack and moves to attack another beam, but falters seeing the entire light beam maneuver around his beam. He tries to attack again, but like the first, the light beam dodges his attack unfazed and resumes its pursuit. “DAMN IT ALL!!!” Gulver curses as he releases a lightning sickle twice the normal size attacking Senna. In response, a geyser of water suddenly rises beneath Senna’s feet lifting her out of the way. His attack strikes the water geyser releasing a flurry of electricity through the water. However, the geyser suddenly sections off the affected water ejecting it from the rest of the body. The result shocks Gulver, but his attention is diverted elsewhere as the demons begin to scatter to escape the incoming spell.

Gulver dodges the beams targeting him and charges at the ones aimed at Mater. The four beams attacking him change their pattern as they block his path instead of directly attack him. Despite the change, Gulver’s surpasses the speed of Senna’s spell control and strikes down one of the light beams pursuing Mater.

As Gulver attacks one beam, Senna increases the speed of the other beams. She secretly refills her magical power again with another pill condensed potion. Her body heats up with the pill making her entire body feel as if she was tossed into a raging inferno. Sweat runs down every inch of her body as she continues to maintain the spells. Her blood vessels work incessantly as they strive to maintain Senna’s body to help fuel the magical power emanating from her magical core. Senna bites her lip as her body pushes herself to disturb the demon threat. Once she uses up the remaining magic in her body, she will most likely crash regardless of whether she takes another or not.

Twenty of the beams find their mark, striking down their targeted demons. The demons take on the brunt of the attack as the spell forcefully purifies them to ash leaving their armor intact. The other beams act more strangely dodging certain demons, while attempting to strike others. After Gulver destroys one light beam, three of the remaining beams stop their pursuit and merge together before targeting Mater. Some soldiers act as shields to protect Mater, but light beams diverge and dodge the soldiers without hesitation, aiming to only strike Mater down.

Gulver stops gawking at the relentless attack and changes his strategy. He charges forward and immediately shatters the four beams chasing after him. With the distraction out of the way, he closes the distance and attempts to decapitate Senna. The geyser beneath her rises abruptly throwing off his aim. In the end, Gulver’s speed overwhelms the speed of her magic. Instead of striking her neck, he cuts into her side reopening the stab wound. Fresh blood sprays from her body making her face even paler. His sword abruptly stops as it cuts into her ribs. He attempts to pull back his sword, but it remains lodged in her body. Twisting and turning, the sword remains firmly stuck while the grip twists under his force. He glances at Senna and notices the dark smile on her face. “Damn you! Just how many tricks do you have?!”

Senna maintains her confident demeanor, but is inwardly sweating from the attack. {He’s way too fast! Before I can react, he’s already cutting into my body. I’m glad it barely worked.} Earlier, she had casted on her ice blade. With the time of her weapon frozen, the damage would not feed through keeping it intact while Senna performed a counterattack. This time, Senna had intended to cast it again on her clothing, but Gulver’s speed overwhelmed her. By the time she casted the spell, she was forced to freeze the time of her blood and his weapon barely interrupting the attack before she was sliced in half.

Her face continues to pale as her injuries start to take a toll on her body. She coagulated her blood sealing off the wounds and preventing any further blood loss. A temporary solution to deal with her injuries while she tried to maintain her spells and strikes down Mater. The other beams have already made their mark killing off 34 demons. Their corpses float on the ocean surface before sinking into the depths. Some demons try to retrieve the corpses, but stop when tendrils of water shoot up trying to capture them.

Mater constantly evades the light beams like a loach moving through his subordinates using them as shields. The beams constantly change direction increasing Senna’s strain as they chase after him. As Mater approaches the coastline, the burning forest suddenly stirs. Numerous fireballs start shooting towards Mater cutting off his escape route. Some fireballs strike one another increasing in size as they attack Mater.

““WHATTT?!”” Mater yells.

Gulver looks over and starts to panic. He glares at Senna and grips his sword. Pouring his magic into it, lightning flares from his sword coursing through Senna’s body. She takes the attack without flinching.

“Too late!” Senna yells converging the light beams on Mater.

“DIEEE!!!” Gulver releases one hand from his sword and pulls out a dagger. He strikes her chest aiming to pierce her heart. As the dagger touches her chest, a large amount of feedback transmits back to his hand. The blade of the dagger cracks from the recoil of Senna’s and cleanly snaps off. “FUCK!!!” Gulver curses as his hand continues to move striking with only the remaining hilt.

As the dagger hilt strikes her again, Senna’s body suddenly shakes as she coughs up blood. Her body temperature drops from a blazing inferno to a biting frost. Her skin pales with a tinge of blue as her blood runs down her chest. The sudden pain surprises Senna disrupting her concentration. Her magic comes to an end all at once with the disruption.

The beams stop their pursuit and burst like a balloon. The entire area becomes enveloped in a flash of light as the spells explodes. The protection on Senna’s body fades as Gulver suddenly dislodges his sword from Senna cutting open a new wound. The water geyser stops terminating Senna’s foothold. A splitting headache and a shrill noise form as Senna suffers from a mental backlash with the disruption of her spells. The pain overwhelms her mind as she clutches her head. She feebly glances at Gulver as her vision blurs. “Why?” She weakly murmurs as fresh blood sprays from her cut abdomen. Her mind blacks out as she passes out from blood loss and shock.

Gulver inadvertently drops his dagger when he stretches his arm and grabs Senna in haste. He lifts her up yelling at her. “What are you planning?!” When he feels the cold touch of her hand, his anger washes away. Her weak pulse and vacant look show that she’s not pretending to be unconscious. Clicking his tongue, he shoves a potion down Senna’s throat and performs some emergency treatment on her wounds.

Mater flies over with the soldiers in tow. “Why haven’t you killed her?” Mater glares angrily at Senna for all the disgrace he suffered from today. Nearly a third of his forces were eliminated by one lone human being. If news were to spread, he would never be able to endure the shame

“Don’t forget why we’re here in the first place. We are here for information about the Goddess’ plans. She has more value alive.” Gulver argues. He strips Senna of her equipment passing it to a soldier. He leaves Senna’s normal clothes alone before he binds her arms and legs. Once her body is fully bound, he gags her mouth. “Done. Let’s move.”

“…Fine. Let’s get out of this wasteland! We’re heading home!” Mater yells to his group.

“OOOOOOHHHHHHH!!!!” The soldiers give a brilliant yell. After months of arduous travel, the signal to go home is extremely well received.

As the group moves, Gulver carries her on his back. A soldier offered to carry her, but relented when Gulver calmly looked at him and said ‘Can you subdue her if she starts to fight back?’

A report interrupts their calm departure. “Reporting! We’ve spotted several humans near the edge of the forest fire.”

“Hah? Who cares we’re leaving.” Mater glances in the direction of the flame, but loses interest. “Move.”

“Wait.” Gulver interrupts him. Mater glances at Gulver in annoyance, but waits for his friend to speak. Gulver uses his [Identification] to gather information. He points to a squad of soldiers. “The six of you. Chase them away. Make sure they can’t follow us.”

The leader salutes back. “Yes sir.”

“Don’t chase them too far.” Gulver points to Senna. “There are humans at her level hidden in the area. Those four are probably bait.”

A slight shiver passes through the squad when they imagine someone at Senna’s level. “YES!!!”

Mater’s army starts moving while the six fly north at top speed. The six soldiers fly towards the group of four. As they approach, the burning forest releases a stream of fireballs in their direction. Many of them fly over wildly, but some force the soldiers to evade. They become much more cautious confirming the existence of another magician.

The scouting group retreats when they see the demons headed their way. The group is mostly comprised of thieves sent on Bernard’s orders. They’re lightly equipped focusing on speed, and unable to properly deal with the heavily armed demons.

Two of the soldiers stay around the burning forest trying to track down the user. More fireballs fly their way, but they easily evade them since there are no tricks to the attacks.

When they approach the core of the forest, the flames collect in the core changing into a flaming tornado. The surrounding forest fire extinguishes as all of the fire elements feed the tornado.

“There.” The two soldiers split up waiting on either side of the tornado. The fireballs have stopped attacking them allowing them to calmly wait for the fire tornado to fade before tracking the caster. After some time, the fire dies down leaving nothing, but burnt trees and ash. In the center, a large hole is partially concealed under fallen trees. They decide against pursuing and wait for the others soldiers to return.

While the other four soldiers follow the human scouting group. They maintain ample distance from their targets cautious of any sneak attacks. The scouting group reaches and placing the city on high alert. The soldiers spot the town, but the plans to calmly return go awry. Fifteen beams of light attack the demon soldiers hidden along treetops. They swiftly retreat seeing that the light is actually from the same spell they witnessed earlier. They regroup with the other two soldiers and fly to catch up with their group wary of any attacks from the hidden magicians.

Later that night, the demon soldiers report their findings to Gulver. Senna continues to remain unconscious, severely weakened from the battle. “So you met both the fire user and light user.” Gulver replies with a slightly bitter look.

“Yes sir. The user escaped after some light attacks. The user was extremely territorial and attacked with the same intensity that eliminated many of the troops.” The squad leader replies.

“Umu. Make sure to keep the night watch on high alert. Now that we’ve taken they’re comrade, they are sure to attack us to take her back.” Gulver directs the soldiers.

“Yes sir!” The squad leader goes to pass off orders to the night watch.

“So it’s not just one hero that the Goddess sent. There are at least three of them.” Gulver mutters to himself. He goes to pass on the news to Mater who is drinking large amounts of wine.

Little did they know that Senna had no help. Everything was orchestrated by her own hands, but intentionally arranged things to seem that way in order to present a more worrying threat to the demons.

The burning forest had some experimental magic tools rigged within the trees. Constructed with [Presence Detection] and [Fire Magic] engraved into the tool, the wand shaped tools randomly fired intermediate class spells without restraint. The advanced was also used in the same fashion. Of course, since no one was actually in the burning forest, there would be no real need for an escape route. The tunnel was loosely dug up by Senna twisting into the ground as a trap. With a minor impact at the lower levels, the entire tunnel would cave in within seconds.

The trees near had similar yet different magic tools set up. They were aimed out towards the sea and engraved with [Enemy Detection] and [Light Magic]. The constructed wands were set to the trees and connected to a crystal infused with large amounts of magic. The trigger was meant to specifically target the demons and provide a potent enough attack that they would think twice about attacking. With the initial impact of Senna’s spells, the demons immediately chose to retreat instead of engage her traps in a war of attrition. As a result, things worked out in her favor with the demon’s immediate decision to avoid further investigation.

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Author's Note

Well I'm exhausted. I had to rewrite about 40% of the chapter because I wasn't happy with how I originally portrayed it. I probably missed a few things here and there, sorry about that.

In other news, my friend recently created a DeviantArt page to display her handmade plushies, mostly Touhou related along with a few other animes. If you enjoy looking at such things, please give her some support.

I had something else, but it honestly is not coming to mind at the moment. Oh well. Until next time~