Chapter 365 - The Stifled Sword IX

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Dear Diary,

Lina had a great idea, so today we made Ms. Olga a present to pay her back for dinner. We threw together a whole bunch of flowers we found when we went out to play in the forest. She liked them a lot. She says she’s gonna treat us to something tasty again tomorrow.

Lia

___

Porcius’ men sprang into action as soon as the marquis gave the word. They were like a pack of ravenous wolves. The mages channelled their fastest spells and the warriors lunged across the stage, their blades thirsting for blood. The non-magical cottontail was the group’s fastest member. She crossed the ten meters between the two groups in a fraction of a second, her blade aimed straight at Arciel’s neck.

To the few capable of perceiving her blinding speed, it appeared as if the kill was hers to take. But she never made contact. A massive bubble inserted itself into the space between them and slowed her to crawl before pushing her back the way she came. She struggled against it, gouging at it with the tip of her sword, but it refused to budge.

The mages’ attacks met the same end. The fireballs and lightning bolts were all unceremoniously consumed; the shield absorbed them all without the slightest hint of losing its effect.

It was a baffling display, but Iapetus, the group’s one thoraen warrior, was undeterred. He chalked the protection’s effectiveness up to a lack of power and stepped forward to break the shield himself. He raised all six of his arms overhead and prepared a powerful, downward smash. His muscles bulged, tripling in volume as the tattoos that adorned his arms glowed with a dazzling light. And yet, the results were unchanged. His swords, shields, and spears sank into the elastic material and bounced right off without so much as leaving a scratch.

Furious, he shifted into his ars magna. The most powerful attack in his kit embodied the concept of bludgeoning. It was a deadly blow that instantly destroyed any entity whose current health was less than ten times his strength. But again, there was no damage done. His weapons were repelled, brushed away like a child by an uncaring adult. There wasn’t even a shockwave with which he could startle his foes. His attack was completely and utterly denied.

His indignation peaked when he regarded his enemies again and found that he was ignored. Not a single one of the four fighters was concerned with his assault. Their attention was centred on an empty spot in the middle of the room, like they were seeing something that he was not. The phenomenon was strange enough for him to direct his gaze towards the magical spectrometer, only to find that it was gone. Its operator had half suffered the same fate. The bottom half of her body was still present, but something had removed everything above her hips.

He clicked his tongue. The information they had gathered was far from complete. The enemy must have had a high-level rogue—someone to cover for the mage standing beneath the ship.

It only made sense. The stealthier types were meant to avoid detection; a rogue who spoiled his cover, a rogue who revealed his existence to the world, was a rogue whose use was already half squandered.

Sucking in his teeth again, the thoraen warrior threw his weapons over his shoulder and took a moment to consider his position. Iapetus was one of the few with some amount of faith in Porcius. He didn’t think much of the man as a leader, but as a fighter, the buck’s edge was keen. If said keen warrior was on high alert, then chances were their shit was fucked. The only reason for such a claim, especially one wrought by the spectrometer, was for the enemy mage to have exceeded all his calculations, despite having been made with an aspect in mind.

The thought was as thrilling as it was terrifying. He still had an attachment to life, but his battlelust had him by the balls. He wanted—needed—to know what it was like to engage an aspect in a duel to the death. He was one of the lucky few to have been personally tutored by Virillius. But it had only been a friendly, instructional match, and the king—duke, back then—hadn’t bothered to show him the extent of the gap between their prowess. He needed to learn it. He needed to know the rush of challenging a foe that could treat him like a child. He needed to wrap up his assignment so he could hunt the caster.

Fortunately, the bubble was quick to fade. It vanished after just a few seconds, leaving the enemies fully exposed. Something about them had changed. There was a faint, wispy aura around each of their bodies. It was pale enough that it could barely be seen, but his compound eyes attested to its undeniable existence. He hadn’t the faintest clue as to its effect, but whatever the case, his next course of action was clear.

The queen was probably dead. The greedy, spring-footed rabbit beside him had broken into another deadly charge. But he chose her as his target regardless, just in case the rabbit failed to see it through.

He knew that it was checkmate. She could never evade them both. The pieces were on the board, and she was completely cornered.

His certainty gave way to surprise when he found a wand buried deep within his eye. It failed to reach his brain. The wooden stick was unable to pierce his bone, and the spell it unleashed was just as pathetic. He tried to slash at her body, but she vanished before his blade could reach.

Frowning, the man fixed his wound and raised his weapons again. She had already returned to her previous position, her wand pressed against the cottontail’s neck and the wispy aura growing ever stronger. She unleashed a blast of magic; a torrent of shadows swallowed the rabbit whole. But again, no damage was done. The spells were weak enough that she hurt him more when she slapped the back of his head and sent him spiralling to the floor.

Her approach to combat had changed since they captured her that morning, but he could tell that the discrepancy was at least somewhat unplanned from the way she looked between her torn-up glove and the target she struck.

He understood full well from that alone. The wispy aura was a buff, likely applied by the bard beneath the fortress. She was toying with them, making them fall victim to the very prey that they had seemingly secured. It was a blatant insult to their pride as warriors, a show that a simple buff sufficed to negate all the time and effort they had ever invested.

But at the same time, it was a testament to her presence on the other side.

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By defeating the foe in front of him, Iapetus could win one point over the aspect to whom their lives were beholden. He could challenge a mage on the verge of immortality. And he could come out on top. Empowered by the realization, he raised both arms overhead and charged. He could feel the feet pushing against the ship as he closed the distance and rushed the witch again. He raised his weapon. But his assault was interrupted by the same warrior he felled that morning.

The mantis placed himself between them and deflected his spear with a rapid swing. The parry was heavy enough that the rest of his weapons joined the spear in missing the man in front of him. Like the sudden change in the witch’s speed, it was born of the aspect’s power. And it meant trouble. Matthias’ technique was well beyond his level, but without enough speed or brute strength to back it, it was worth nothing.

That was why he had fallen in the first place. Iapetus had literally crushed him underfoot, overpowered him with a single limb. But the bard changed everything. That one moment of contact was all he needed to confirm it. His enemy’s raw strength had grown to outclass his own. He was faster as well, enhanced to the point where he could easily keep pace. With the tempo on the enemy’s side, it was a situation which called for the bee-ogre’s forfeit, but he had never been one to yield.

Again, he raised all six arms overhead and prepared his ars magna. He didn’t care that the enemy was going for his head. His body would complete its task even if his mind was destroyed and ensure a mutual elimination. Those were the terms he laid, the terms with which he was willing to die.

It was supposed to be a life for a life. But the enemy chickened out. He retracted his weapon and evaded the blow. He kicked at the thorae’s legs, but even with his strength enhanced, his own feet were far too thin and brittle. His strikes were unable to shake the trunks with which the ogre was planted.

Iapetus lifted his weapon and prepared another attack. He was ready to strike the warrior down and brute-force his way to an even trade.

But he stopped before he could.

It was not because he suffered an unexpected attack. But because he had witnessed the nameless knight’s arrival.

Like his allies, the carefully trained thorae turned his body, shifting slightly so his weapons were held between the active combatants and the newfound intruder. But then, he froze. They all froze, with some going as far as to drop their weapons as they laid their eyes on the knight’s naked face.

It was not the person they expected.

Everyone had been told, effectively convinced by both Lord Ephesus and the data they gathered that they were up against the king’s older brother, the traitor who forced a wedge between their almighty ruler and the benevolent monarch he served before. They were all convinced that they were right, that there was no mistaking their judgement. But seeing the knight unmasked, they could begin to question all the things they thought they knew. Why was she there? Was it they or she who fought against their country? Was the grand magus the aspect beneath the ship? Was Ephesus mistaken? Or had he simply chosen to obscure the facts despite possessing a better view of the status quo?

There were so many points of confusion that Iapetus had no idea where or how to begin.

Porcius was very much the same. He stared and scratched his head as he tried to work through the problem. But he was given no time. Claire walked right up to him, a cold stare on her face all the while.

“Porcius.”

The cervitaur snapped to attention when his name was called. He dropped to his knees, with a hand across his chest and his head bowed. But evidently, his obedience was not the princess’ desire. She drove a foot into his face, sending him flying across the room and into one of the panels that showed the world outside.

“Don’t bow,” she said. “Fight me. Again.”

Porcius frowned. “I’m not sure I see the purpos—”

He cut himself off to evade a flying dagger. It went straight into the wall beside his head, burying itself at least a meter deep.

“I said fight me.”

The marquis sighed. Slowly getting to his feet, he brushed off the crystalline shards born of the union of her foot and his helm. Both the excitement that had stemmed from the prospect of glory and the fear that had gripped him in the aspect’s wake were gone, replaced by the boredom and lethargy that always plagued his person.

“Can you at least explain what’s going on?”

Claire paused. “I’ll consider it if you win.”

Porcius cocked a brow as he looked her over. “So is that bard of yours going to buff you up?”

“No.”

“Then you don’t stand a chance.”

A small smile crossed her face, one so faint that it practically went unnoticed.

“I haven’t grown any stronger.” Her dagger suddenly appeared in her hand. It twisted itself out of shape, growing and warping until it became a halberd. The design was strange, featuring a bone as its base and both a hook and a hammer to maximize its utility. To Porcius, it made no sense, but to Claire, it was familiar. “But now, I know my faults.”

“What the hell are yo—”

She grabbed his unprotected tongue with a vector and yanked it silent.

Iapetus gulped as he watched the scenario unfold. He couldn’t interrupt, especially not after she looked at him the moment he imagined raising his voice. Having studied under her father directly, he knew the look, and he didn’t dare oppose it.

“Come. Strike me down, finish me if you dare.”

Porcius tried to talk, but his lips remained tightly shut, muffling and distorting his words beyond the point of coherence. He tried again, but seeing the result repeated, he picked up his weapon and assumed a combative stance. Eventually, he charged, his blade aimed directly at her center of mass.

She only raised her weapon overhead and waited. It was an unguarded stance, like she was betting that her strike would land. Porcius suspected that it was bait, that the bard’s buff would kick in, but he continued regardless. If she was to play such a card, it would surely be as they came within striking distance.

His sense of timing was certainly correct, but the event was not what he predicted. His last-second guard went completely to waste.

The ground beneath them lurched, and the entire floating fortress tilted as the marquis’ foot was about to hit the ground. There was no tell, no way for any of the fighters to have known that it was coming. Everyone in the room was thrown off balance.

Everyone except for the princess herself.

Porcius tried to react. He spread all of his wings, even the ones that adorned his hooves. But though he was far faster than his opponent, she had read ahead. She knew that he would rear up to regain his balance, that his wings would displace him, and that his momentum would be locked the moment they were flapped. That was why her blade had remained steady, held in the same position throughout the split-second exchange.

It was too late by the time he recalled it.

He tried to dodge backwards, flapping his wings as hard as he could, but the halberd’s blade extended to match his retreat. His only choice was to raise his weapon to prevent the blade from landing, and he was just fast enough to pull it off.

With divinity factored out of the equation, neither fighter had grown since their last encounter. But that was precisely why his defence was so easily predicted.

Her tail slammed into the shaft of his spear and swatted it out of the way.

Her weapon landed right between his eyes.

The heavy glaive completely flattened his skull while another twenty ikaretts skewered his body through.