I sidestepped to avoid one of the many lightning bolts raining down on me. Mixed in between the thunder strokes were arcs of energy the same colour as the night sky, which rained down in a straight line and pierced the ground like spears, without dispersing in the surroundings.

These atmospheric phenomena were more of a nuisance than actual dangers, a way to keep me occupied and study my behaviour. The electric arcs reaching me travelled through my body and discharged into the ground, leaving me unaffected, while the shadow javelins bounced off of it and their rebound sent me flying in the opposite direction.

The demon was still floating up high into the sky, observing me enthralled. He raised his left hand and the obsidian layer covering its skin morphed. It extended from its hand, forming a long thin blade of shadow that reached up beyond the clouds.

He swung its arm vertically and the long blade fell down on me. The blade moved following the motion of his wrist. With a single flick, its tip travelled hundreds of metres in a fraction of a second. The blade hit me on my collarbone, cutting through my skin but breaking up against my bone. The pressure generated by the impact made me sink to my waist into the ground.

I freed myself by kicking the layers of dirt behind me, as the wound on me closed up and returned to its previous state.

“Pure mana, ineffective. Restore quicker than undead. What a puzzling being,” the murmurs of the demon reached my ears.

A circle of arcane symbols started to form behind him, absorbing all the mana around it. He was preparing a huge spell, one that could actually prove to be a danger.

So, I moved. I kicked the ground and shot like a rising comet towards him. His eyes morphed as I suddenly appeared in front of him accompanied by a flaming front of fire. My extended hand aimed at him, the tip of my fingers piercing through his shadow coating and grazing the surface of his skin.

He immediately flapped his wings, generating a shockwave that catapulted me across the sky. My body flew quick and far towards the nearby city. I pierced through a skyscraper and embedded myself in the middle of the local traffic. The few remaining supports collapsed as the top part of the building came off and fell down on the road below.

Confused and terrified cries resounded all around me but I kept my ears and eyes focused on my enemy who floated above the torn building. His expression was distorted.

“You dare!” he exploded his voice, causing mana fluctuations that raptured the ears and the eyes of all the civilians around.

He kept his right hand on his chest which was still bleeding because of my previous attempt at gauging out his heart. All the interest he had held in his eyes had disappeared, replaced by urgency.

The magic circle he had been preparing was completed. The arcane symbols glowed a bright blue as space itself appeared to bend and fold in the shape of a colourless sword, visible only thanks to the distorting effect it had on the light passing through its surface.

He swung his weapon and reality split in half. I ducked just in time to see a wave of distortion extend towards the horizon and cut deep into the Earth's crust. A powerful rebound followed the slash, as the severed space tried to mend itself, causing the surroundings to engorge or condense in distorted shapes.

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The wave struck me and I felt the tidal forces trying to pick me apart. My skin swelled but didn’t burst and my bones were squeezed but didn’t break. The city around me wasn’t as lucky as half of it had been sheerly erased from the world.

I looked at the demon. The mana around him had severely depleted and the black film covering his skin had grown more transparent. Nevertheless, both were slowly but surely coming back to their previous state, as he tried to amass more and more mana.

“You need a recharge,” I commented. His eyes quivered.

I jumped at him swinging my fist. He intercepted it with the side of the blade. It felt like being repulsed by a magnet. My punch was redirected and missed its target. I spun my body around, aiming my head towards the ground and my feet towards the sky and kicked him on the top of his head.

His wings glowed and disappeared as several layers of solid shadow mana formed over him, blocking my feet from hitting him directly. The strata of magic broke like glass one after the other and the rebound sent me flying towards the sky and him towards the ground.

As I ascended, he embedded himself inside a crater in the middle of the now vanished portion of the city. His wings were starting to reform but he interrupted that energy expenditure as he saw me rain down towards him.

He moved out of the way and I landed supine where he had just stood. I bounced back up and faced him, a smile plastered on my face and annoyance plastered on his.

“How come I didn’t know of such a powerful being? In the millennia my eyes scoured every single corner of reality but never they came across an entity such as yourself,” he said, swinging his sword.

I moved out of the way and everything behind me was destroyed.

“You avoid my attacks and yet no mana flows in your veins,” he swung once again, this time infusing mana inside the sword whose surging flames washed over me.

The flames charred the outer layers of my skin, but couldn’t dig deep into my core.

“Mana itself, the force of creation and destruction, abhors you. No, it’s your flesh that abhors mana,” he continued speaking, trying to make sense of what he was experiencing, while he evaded my attempt to grab his throat.

A chasm opened beneath my feet and hands of darkness grabbed me and brought me breath to the ground as the earth closed over me. I clawed around me and swam through the rubbles, digging myself out of the earthly prison.

“You are strong, but more than that you are incredibly resilient. I do not understand,” he said from over me, having recovered its obsidian wings and his ability to fly.

“It’s quite simple,” I interrupted his monologue.

He fell silent and listened to me attentively.

“You are powerful, but I am strong. You cannot win,” I stated in the simplest terms I could imagine.

Silence engulfed us. Even mana came to a standstill. A smile crept up on his face as his lips drew revealing a mouth of sharp teeth. He began to laugh an uncomfortable, disturbing laugh. Madness and darkness filled his eyes. The aura changed rapidly. He swung his sword to the sky and cut it in half, revealing a crimson sky behind a gash in space. Miasmatic mana rained onto the earth, engulfing everything and corroding all it touched.

He revelled in the new atmosphere and his power grew with each passing second.

“You! Are! Magnificent! Oh, how wonderful would be to travel to your lands and meet your kind! To be the one to show the meaning of fear to your people, oh, how glorious that would be! But sadly, that won’t be possible. My presence here defies fate and I can already feel its shackles on my body. But fret not! This day, we’ll be together until the end!”

He turned to the horizon, where the sun was rising.

“Today, the night won’t end!” he shouted and the sun obeyed.

The night returned, the storm clouds cleared and only the blue moon shone down on the world.

“Let us dance and sing of crimson blood, my otherworldly friend! I will show you a never-ending nightmare!”