"...Yeah, no, I'll pass," Glenn grimaced, his teeth clenched. He nodded slightly toward Sahro, who replied by covering his entire body in an electrical current. Due to the rain pouring down, the wet mud and the rain around him flashed with hundreds of smaller crackles, the Black Heir unperturbed and focused on his goal, which was to cup up the fat cultist bastard.
"Mmh...? Wait a minute..." Abbot Hank's gentle smile faded away, replaced with pleased surprise. He grinned warmly as he opened his arms, his lips parting to reveal teeth black with dried blood and rotting meat, the thorny symbol of the Thorn's Church cut into his tongue.
"...Aren't you our dear 3333?"
Glenn felt chills down his spine as his heart missed a beat. The world seemed to warp, becoming as dark as ink and pulling him into it. He sank like an anchor in the ocean, his mind pulled away in the darkest place it could find.
'I...Can't...Breath...!' The young man took a step back, his eyes wide opened with dread. He grabbed at his throat as his heart raced madly, his eyes darting to the side in a search for an escape, but some old, heavy steel chains surged from the ground and wrapped around his wrists and ankles, restricting his movements. Muffled screams echoed in Glenn's head, crying with pain and hate, all shouting the same words. Voices he had already heard, voices he had already gotten rid of...!
GIVE UP! LET YOURSELF GO! BE FREE!
The young man fell on his knee, each attempt to fill his lungs with a fresh breath of air failing, replaced with the metallic and thick taste of a mixture he hadn't tasted since...that time in this accursed prison. Glenn's lids trembled slightly, the young man gritting his teeth as he forcefully pushed himself to the ground. Veins popped all over his forehead and arms as he forcefully lifted the heavy chains with him, pulling on them violently.
"No...This isn't right... I escaped from this place long ago, I destroyed this place!" He shouted, throwing a look around. Again, this fucking darkness, moist walls, and a rancid air perfumed with the smell of death and dejections. This was the Thorn's Church prison, and was back in it, whether he liked it or not.
"NO!" Glenn used his Mana to try and cast every spell he could think of, Diamanes remaining unresponsive.
"Shit, a god already did this to me once, do you think...!" Glenn grinned madly, his eyes exorbitated as his muscles bulged under the effort, "...That playing on my trauma work again? There's no trauma, you bastard!" He roared, ripping the chains off the wall. The steel door that blocked his way out of the exit opened, and a giant of a man wearing a dark robe barely managed to enter it. Glenn freed himself entirely from the chains, before pointing a finger at the priest. The priest lifted his chin slightly, his hood sliding off his bald head, revealing his face.
Abbot Hank was smiling gently, his thick dark book under his arm. Suddenly, as he noticed the broken chains and Glenn's mad look, the smile melted like snow in the sun. His features were monstrously deformed, his skin red like a lobster and his eyes bulging as if they were going to jump out of their sockets. Glenn sneered wickedly, clenching his teeth as the only spell he could work out appeared in the dark cell. A golden light surrounded his fist, infused with hints of the divine.
"No, this isn't a trauma. No, those are some fucking...!" Glenn punched the ground with his glowing fist, golden light surging from the collision and filling the dark room like ink on a canvas. Abbot Hank, without even having a second to try and say something was forced to take a step back, his flesh and body melting away like wax. The young man grinned as he noticed the illusion breaking, and stood up while staring at the Abbot.
"...Some fucking happy memories, you bastard!" He shouted as he lunged at the Abbot, his fist connecting with Hank's nose and making his head explode. The dark cell dissipated away, the illusion replaced by the cold reality. The rain poured on Glenn's face violently, waking him up promptly from his nightmare. He jumped to his feet, stumbling as he struggled to regain his composure.
'Fucking illusions!'
'USE THE PRIEST'S POWERS NOW!!' Diamanes screamed in Glenn's mind, guiding him to use the holy power he took away from the Twilight's Gate priest's statue. The golden divine light appeared exactly as it did in the illusion that tried to break his mind, chasing away the cloudiness and making him regain his clarity. His eyes cleared out of fog and he stretched his eyes as he tried to understand what he was seeing.
Thundering sounds were shaking both Earth and Heaven as blue lightning crackled violently, meeting an abyss of darkness head-on. Glenn took only a second to realize that the lightning was Sahro's and the darkness from this fucking Abbot. The young man wiped the water and mud off his face, Mana trashing violently in his left hand as he cast the holy spell toward Sahro, willing it to affect only his friend. The blue lighting gained a golden glow, surging with even more power and lunging with even faster speed.
'Okay, good! Now get rid of this fucking priest! I'll think up a name for the holy spell in the meanwhile,' Diamanes screamed the last part as if both of their lives depended on finding a moniker, which made Glenn's lips curl upward slightly. He stretched his palm open, summoning a light-swallowing Blackhole in it. The rain was inspired by the powerful attraction of the spell until Glenn used Diamanes' powers to cast a Carbon Blade and forcefully infuse the Blackhole in it. The Carbon Blade shuddered into reality in an unstable matter that vibrated violently. Glenn gritted his teeth and stretched the vibrating Carbon Blade into a sword, holding it in his right hand like the weapon he truly deserved.
'You and your ego!'
'Shut up.'
Glenn lunged forward through the rain, blinking to try and follow Sahro and Abbot Hank's movements. The priest wasn't particularly fast, but the darkness that surged out of his book was, even more when it was receiving the Aura-laced sword slashes from Sahro. The darkness seemed to swallow each attack, canceling the force behind it.
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"Oh, Loyal Soul, let me consume you to fuel my strength to fight off the one standing between the Vessel and me!" Abbot Hank chanted without stopping, ripping the writings of his dark book one after the other and throwing them against Sahro's attacks. His face was serene as he fought off the Black Heir, but Glenn caught his gaze hardening when he met his eyes. Abbot Hank's lips opened slightly, forming an oval.
"...How?"
The blue lightning flashed with crimson and golden light past the priest, a red veil of scarlet blood painted into the sky. The Abbot fell on one knee, his face free from pain. He looked insanely happy for someone well on his way to die. The Abbot ripped a whole page of his book, crushing it in his hand. The darkness it produced flowed toward the Abbot's wound, filling and healing it in a second.
"The God of Thorns, Lord of Redemption, Ruler of Sacrifice, let me bath in your grace—" Hank was raising his hands to the sky fanatically when he hurriedly spun on his feet and blocked Glenn's rageful attack with his dark book. Glenn's vibrating Carbon Blade bit into the book, milling through it page after page. Darkness flowed out of the book like blood through the cut, worsening as Glenn used his weight to push on the blade. Hank collapsed on one knee, using both hands to block the attack.
"FUCKING CULTIST BASTAAAARD!!" Glenn's face twisted as he roared and used Gravity Manipulation to artificially increase his weight and force the chainsaw-like sword even further into Hank's book, the pages ripping helplessly in front of the attack. The Abbot smacked his lips, not even flinching when Sahro's sword pierced through his lungs, his fanatical grin unmoving.
"...So be it, cough!" Abbot Hank spat a thick black phlegm, retching loudly. Sahro took his sword out and covered in crimson Aura tinted with gold, the blade glistening in the night as he readied himself to perform a crescent cut to lop off the mad priest's head. Glenn continued to push forward, his blade inches away from reaching Abbot Hank's head behind the book's cover, when darkness exploded around the giant man. Glenn slid away, piercing the ground with his vibrating Carbon Blade to slow himself.
"...Effort, is pain...Pain is a blessing...A gift from our Lord...!" Hank's low voice reached his ears through the rain, making him try to peer into the darkness. A black sphere had swallowed the priest, hiding him in an obsidian veil that couldn't be pierced by human eyes. Glenn snorted and discarded his Carbon Blade away, joining both hands as he charged a Nitrogen Lance.
"Here's my gift, you sick piece of shit!" The young man grinned and shot the cold swallowing beam toward the sphere of darkness, the obsidian veil enduring the attack without flinching. Glenn gritted his teeth and forcefully injected more Mana into his spell, making it surge forward with even more strength. The veil crackled, letting Glenn see a pale pink light emanating from the fissures.
'Careful, you're not far from the Overload!' Diamanes warned his host with a shout, but the latter ignored him as he bit down on his lower lip.
"I fought against a fucking evil god spawn and the remnants of what was probably a deity, you're telling me I have to shift up a gear for this crap of a priest?!?"
The dark sphere broke down, blinding him with a wave of pink light. Glenn hid his eyes behind his hand, squinting through the blindness. He couldn't help but blink in awe when he discovered the contents of the dark cocoon. Stretching his arms widely, a bare chest with barely half a robe to cover his lower parts was a human that seemed to have been sculpted in marble. With muscles that seemed to stretch to their limits like steel cables, Hank was standing there, looking at the sky with an ecstatic expression.
Glenn could barely recognize the priest. From the monster that was so wide and tall he could be compared without exaggerating to a wall, he had become a man even more slender than Glenn or Sahro, with his body mass reduced to the minimum.
'...No, his body mass wasn't 'reduced'. It was 'compacted',' Diamanes corrected Glenn's thoughts with a shocked voice in awe of what he was witnessing. The young man scowled and noticed Sahro standing with his sword pointed at the priest, a cold expression on his face. His blade was covered in red Aura tinted with a golden hue, making it look like some sort of strange divine flame. Some crackles of electricity were running along the Black Heir's body, but he seemed either unaware or uncaring of them.
"... Thank you, my Lord, for accepting this foolish one's request..." Hank whispered while hiding his face in his hands, shuddering under the rain. His muscles undulated weirdly, the flesh moving underneath his skin like waves in the ocean, heading for the center of his chest that was hidden behind his arms. A chuckle escaped from the Abbot's lips, echoing through the rain and reaching the two men's ears, chilling them to the bone. Even though the rain was pouring down madly, they could still hear this whisper of a laugh, oozing with unrestrained madness.
Glenn's breath froze when he realized that the priest's book was nowhere to be seen.
'That's his main weapon, what did he do with it...?'
The answer to his question was not long in coming when the priest opened his arms wide again, letting him gaze at his chest, where there was a book beating like a heart. The priest laughed fanatically as he looked at the clouded dark sky, a large shadow deploying behind his back. Glenn took a step back, feeling a chill run down his spine.
This was no shadow, or dark magic, or whatever the priest had used until now. No, this was different.
"...Sun's Touch," Glenn whispered, not because he needed to pronounce the name of the skill to use it, but because he needed to say something, anything. His arm glowed like a sun in the night, revealing the true appearance of the dark shadow. Connected to Abbot Hank's back were two, horribly majestic wings made out of interlinked fingers, thorns tying them together tightly in a bloody oozing mess.
"...Hahahaha!!!" Abbot Hank couldn't stop laughing, stretching his fingers and testing the new resistance of his limbs. He slowly took a step forward, his foot touching the mud with a squishing noise. The ground crackled, small rifts appearing with the place the Abbot stepped on the epicenter.
"...I thank you all," He pressed his hand against the book sealed in his chest, a tear dropping from his eye and dripping down on the dark cover, "...my dear believers. It was well worth it to free so many of you and to keep you away from Redemption..." He muttered through his teeth, before glancing toward Glenn. The young man involuntarily took a step back, instinctively shooting a wave of Nitrogen in front of him. A second later, Abbot Hank's smiling face pierced through the wave of otherworldly coldness, saddened with pity at Glenn's sight.
"Don't make this harder than it already is, 3333. This is all for his will—!" A burning spear shot through the rain curtain, piercing the Abbot in the side and making him moan in pleasure at the pain. Glenn couldn't help but wince at the twisted sight, shooting a Carbon Blade toward the priest's unprotected body. The blade nicked him slightly, opening the skin but not cutting deeply.
'His body is as durable as steel now. I don't know how he did it, but it's a twisted version of what they did to you with the Beast Blood,' Diamanes snickered, explaining coldly what Glenn was encountering. Another spear of fire pierced Hank once again, this time hitting his finger-wings. The rain pouring down from the sky, instead of helping extinguish the burning projectiles, was only transforming into boiling steam upon contact with them.
Glenn's eyes searched in the darkness of the night through the rain curtain, capturing the smoldering light of a cigar in the distance as well as a glowing, intricate white mark slightly above it.
"...Hey, kiddos."