Lusya allowed the wall she had built up to crumble. She needed her full faculties to assess Falin’s Full Release as it formed around her. Otherwise she would not survive it. A dome materialized, she estimated about one thousand feet in diameter. Rather than solid stone or steel, the dome was composed of countless anvils, each with a floating hammer pounding a faintly shining copy of the First Release, a stark contrast against the dark iron they rested upon, as if finishing forging it. A dull orange glow filled in the gaps, the fires of the forge she found herself in.
The hammers working in unison filled the dome with a faint rhythmic clanging. It wasn’t loud enough to be painful or distracting, but enough that it demanded to be heard.
Lusya glanced around for anything else important, but she didn’t see anything. Anything about the Full Release, that was. Azure and Ariya were rather close behind her, Ariya straining against Azure holding her back. The Full Release was large enough that it probably would have encompassed them anyway, but she didn’t think they had been that close. She wasn’t sure if they had moved closer for some reason, or if the fight had moved toward them at some point.
“Lusya, are you okay?” Ariya shouted.
“I’ve got her, Lusya,” Azure said. “You stay focused.”
Lusya did just that, returning her attention to Falin.
He hissed in pain as he ran a hand over his neck wound. The one that had almost been his end. He drew it away to examine his bloodied fingers and scowled.
“I hope you’re proud of coming so close to killing a Paladin,” he said, glaring at her. “It’s the only time its going to happen.” His focus suddenly snapped behind her. “You stay out of this, Seventh! Don’t make things worse for yourself.”
That seemed an overreaction. Azure was closer, but she didn’t seem ready to intervene. Unless, that was, she had done something else while Lusya was focused on Falin. She didn’t sense Azure getting closer, but Lusya wasn’t going to risk the distraction of visually checking.
Falin took a deep breath and returned his attention to Lusya. “Now. Die.”
Every single one of the shining swords shot forth from its anvil like an arrow. No, faster than any arrow. They bore down on her from every possible angle. If it hadn’t been for the distance they were coming from, if they had flown from just a bit closer, she would have been dead. Instead she charged forward and slashed Lunera in front of her, glancing behind to allow the Demon Blade to connect a rift there. The copy swords flying at her from the front flew through and clattered against their brethren. She assumed, anyway, based on the clanging cacophony that followed, but she couldn’t keep looking behind her for long to make sure.
Experimentally, she threw a small wave of Miudofay’s flames to the side, toward swords that would miss anyway now that she had moved. Their glow faded, but they did not immediately stop. With the minimal physical force Miudofay’s fire applied, they kept their momentum and continued on to hit the ground or another sword. She had her suspicions, but it was too early to say for sure what the glow dissipating signaled.
She deflected several more swords with her own while she ran, closing in on Falin. He made no attempt to move, unconcerned. More swords fired out from the anvils to replace the ones she had neutralized, so she kept deflecting or warping them. Until, that was, a pair danced away from Miudofay and slashed at her throat. She lashed out to hit one away with Lunera in time to dodge the other, noting the one she had hit losing its glow and spinning away to hit the ground.
Of course, he could control the swords. She had expected as much. It would have been too much of a trade-off for a Full Release if he could only fire them as projectiles from where they were forged. The real question was how many he could control at once. That first volley had been hundreds of swords. There was no way he could exert fine control over all of them at once. There had to be a more reasonable limit. She would guess no more than twenty. If she had to guess, the swords that stopped glowing when hit could no longer be controlled, whether he had done so before or not.
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Ten swords formed a high wall in front of her and slashed, forcing her to move back. She could have jumped over it, but that was a last resort. Even with all the improvement she had made, she had less control in the air. That would be a death sentence in the chaos of this storm of swords. Even as she retreated, she had to keep defending against blades flying at her from every which way. One managed to slip through and clip her shoulder.
She made a brief mental note that there were no swords littering the ground, despite how many should have fallen by now. She didn’t have the luxury of observing the exact process, but they seemed to disappear shortly after hitting something.
When she tried to move forward again, three swords surrounded her. One slashed at her, forcing her to parry, then whirl to bat the other two away as they tried to thrust at her. They weren’t like the First Release that all had to be doing the same thing, then.
Another ten were around her before she could even try to advance. She span, throwing out Miudofay’s flames before the swords could move, all the while dancing around and deflecting more swords flying at her. Some, unfortunately, made it through to nick her, but she avoided any serious injuries.
Falin charged at her and hit her with a punch. It sent her sprawling back, the angles of the launched swords changing to track her. She righted herself and managed to defend, but the swords were endless. If it was just the ones shooting straight at her, she might have been able to manage. They were an endless hail, but that was straightforward and predictable. She could have adjusted and tried to fight back. That wasn’t the case, though. Some stopped and slashed or thrust at her, forcing her to respond to them more specifically and preventing her from getting into a rhythm. There was no going on the attack. It was all she could do to stay alive. Even then, the occasional sword slipped past her defenses. None had inflicted any major wounds so far, but she was going to bleed out from the equivalent of dozens of paper cuts at this rate. That wasn’t the main issue, though. There would only be so many close calls. If she couldn’t defeat him or figure out a better way to deal with the swords soon, he would hit her. Whether through luck, skill, or a mistake on her part, it didn’t much matter. She could be dead all the same.
He appeared in front of her and punched again. She saw it coming this time and jumped back as it struck her, allowing her to control her angle of flight a bit. That was the best she could do under the circumstances. The sword behind her that had been in position to slice her in half clipped her shoulder instead.
The blow had launched her into the air, though. She whirled about to deflect suddenly closer swords from above and warped to the ground the instant she had a chance. Most of the flying swords were aimed for elsewhere, so the place she had arrived was somewhat safe for a moment, before several swords changed course to attack her, though she managed to defend against them.
Ten. She had counted ten swords there. That seemed to be the maximum number of swords Falin could exercise fine control over at any given time, for all the good that knowledge did her. She had already observed that the limitations of the First Release were reduced, if they existed at all. He still lost control of swords when an outside force acted on them, but, since he was working with limitless copies instead of seven, he could just switch to controlling another one as soon as he lost one. This was wearing her down. There was no opening to attack, and, if she didn’t find one soon, this battle was over.
Falin approached again, forcing her to divert some attention to him. She threw a wave of fire at him, but she couldn’t afford the focus for anything big, so he jumped over it with ease, and, came down at her with a powerful punch. If that hit, it would drive her to the ground and leave her vulnerable, she had no choice but to dodge. Right into a sword embedding itself in her left thigh. She winced and struck the sword with Lunera the moment it started to pierce. The golden sword was dislodged and dissolved into motes of white light. Her leg burned as blood seeped out. At least she had managed to turn it into a deep stab wound instead of a hole all the way through her leg.
Another punch came at her, and this one connected, sending her sprawling and tumbling back. She landed and rolled until she slid to a stop lying on her front. Countless swords converged on her, eager for blood.
Against the protests of her leg, she managed to rise to one knee and spin, using Lunera to expand the space between her and the swords, buying her some room and effectively slowing them to a crawl. Then she sent Miudofay’s flames toward them and warped away, just as space snapped back to normal. Hundreds of swords crashed together where she had once been, their master unable to redirect them.
It seemed he had expected that to be the end, as there was a brief respite from the constant hail of blades.
Falin clicked his tongue as he turned to look at her. “You’re annoyingly persistent.”
She was still kneeling, breathing heavily. Her wound was distracting, but not debilitating. She could stand. Indeed, she started to, but she knew she would never make it to her feet. Another volley of swords was already raining down on her. This was the end.