Chapter 182 - Lightning quick
<Clara POV>
Clara, being one of the first to split off, wanted to finish up quickly, so she infused lightning into her legs which enhanced her speed. She also struck lightning onto the surrounding buildings to get the attention of the elves.
After running a lap of the area she was assigned, all elves in the vicinity were now aggravated, chasing Clara down. Once she was confident that most of the elves were following her, she spotted a town hall-like building.
'I could use the walls to my advantage.' Clara had an idea on how to eliminate the elves which required an enclosed space, so a town hall would be a suitable location.
Running to the hall, Clara kicked open the door, taking it off its hinges and hitting a couple of dark elves that were behind the door. Walking in, Clara crushed the 2 elves' heads and made it to a small stage that looked over the hall.
The hall itself was rather standard and had a massive open space that was occupied by chairs. There were also carvings on the wall which depicted an elven king or some such, which Clara assumed to be the boss of the dungeon.
'I should be able to work with the pillars, just have to make sure I don't destroy them.' Clara analysed the room and found the walls to be too far apart. However, the supporting pillars in the hall were thick and close enough to be used.
The dark elves started funnelling into the hall, but due to the sheer number of them, they had trouble advancing, stumbling over the chairs and tripping over each other.
Clara pulled out her blade whips and electrified them, encasing them in lightning. Lightning shot out from the whips as Clara waited for the Elves to get to the centre of the hall.
Once the main horde of dark elves which only consisted of normal elves were in the centre, Clara made her move. Lightning still coursing through her legs, enhancing her speed, she jumped off the stage and latched on to one of the pillars. Extending out the whips as much as she could, she then propelled herself, jumping off the pillar and into the horde.
The elves tried to retaliate with their makeshift weapons, but Clara was too fast for them to aim properly and their attacks completely missed.
Swinging her whips down in an x shape, she created a large lightning slash that would explode on touch. The elves that were directly hit by the lightning were killed while the others would get paralysed as well as severely burned.
Landing in the middle of the horde, which was opened up thanks to her attack, Clara started to take out the paralysed elves. Without even moving from her spot, Clara whipped the elves, either giving them deep lacerations or electrocuting them with her lightning.
This also created an indirect shield from the other approaching elves, as the reach of the whips made it hard to approach Clara unharmed.
Blood splattered everywhere while lightning charred the hall, filling it with burn marks, and yet there was still plenty of killing left to do.
Once Clara finished off the paralysed, she retracted her whips. Of course, the Elves that were trying to approach wouldn't miss this chance and all rushed her at once. Some elves even managed to hide behind the chairs, stealthily getting closer while Clara was using her whips which caught her off guard.
A child elf with a knife came out directly behind Clara and with his small knife stabbed her in the back.
"Bastard!" Clara went to stab the child with her retracted whip, but at the last moment hesitated since it was a child.
'Fuck.' Clara's instincts told her not to kill, but she knew that they were just beasts taking on the form of elves.
This allowed some of the elves to get close enough, stabbing Clara in the stomach and shoulder. Coughing up some blood, she dropped one of her whips and grabbed the pitchfork that was in her stomach.
"Fucking damn it." Clara got angry at herself for hesitating and violently struck all around her with her lightning.
Looking up directly into the eyes of the dark elf that stabbed her, a purple glow appeared in her eyes and the pitchfork in her hands shattered. Lightning crashed down onto the elves that surrounded her, freeing her from their weapons.
Blood poured out of Clara's body, only to scab over quickly thanks to her demonic regeneration.
'It still bloody hurts.' Although it wasn't fully healed, it allowed her to continue the fight without bleeding out. More elves came rushing at her, so Clara picked back up her other whip and overcharged both of them. The lightning discharged, not only killing a couple of elves, but also creating a wave of lightning that halted the enemy charge for a moment.
Clara then sprinted and jumped on top of one of the chairs and propelled herself onto one of the pillars. Using one of her whips to wrap around the pillar, Clara held on and charged lightning into her feet.
The elves below tried throwing their weapons as the guards which were by the entrance attempted to throw wind attacks. However, before they got close Clara vanished from the pillar in a bolt of lighting. A streak of lightning went above the elves to another pillar and bounced off it.
The lightning kept jumping around the six pillars, leaving the elves unsure of what to do as they lost sight of Clara.
Soon there was a constant line of lightning that connected all the pillars as Clara appeared above the array of electric lines. All the elves' attention instantly landed on Clara, but all they could do was watch as she was too high to reach.
Clara's whips were extended out and were what created the lightning streaks in the air. This pulled them to their utmost limit, but thanks to the material the whips were made of, they could stretch with the help of mana.
Tugging on the whips, the pillars broke off from the roof and came crashing down onto the horde. Quickly retracting the whips, Clara lifted one in the air and hooked it into the ceiling so she did not fall together with the pillars.
The guards unfortunately were too far back to be affected, but the rest of the elves were all crushed by pillars. However, this left the hall in a mess and made the area very awkward to battle on.
'I should move this outside.' Clara didn't want to bother dealing with all the rubble and dead bodies on the floor, so she started to swing on her whip.
The guards were not idle and attempted to throw some of their spears at Clara, but before they could, she was already on the move.
Going through a window that was close to the ceiling, Clara made it back out to the front and used her other retraced whip blade to stab into the building to slow her fall. Jumping off the wall, she turned to face the entrance and the group of 5 guards that came out.
Clara considered using her demon form, but it would cost too much mana as they still had the castle to fight through.
'Hmm, maybe I could do a lesser version.' Not wanting to completely rule it out, Clara thought that she could partly transform parts of her body instead.
'Wait don't we have an assistant through the system? Rea? Is what I thought possible?' Clara remembered the forgotten assistant that had stayed quiet for a long time.
[Hmm? Someone is talking to me? I'm not hearing things?] Rea with a rather depressed tone came out of hiding.
'Yes now tell me.' Clara felt a little bad, but this wasn't the time for catching up.
[Oh yes, well you have complete control over the skill so you can change how much you want to transform.]
'Thanks.' Clara now knowing she won't be draining herself fully of her mana, began to transform her arms and legs.
'I still can't even go into full form yet, but at least I can with some of my body parts.' Clara knew she still wasn't capable of a full body transformation but was still able to partially enhance her body. But now knowing she can target certain parts of her body, she could reduce the mana consumption by a lot.
The dark elves came rushing towards Clara with their reinforced wind spears, but it was pointless as Clara vanished from where she was standing.
Since Clara targeted her legs, she was now able to move at an even faster speed while paired with her lightning. This also correlated to her attacks as she was able to swiftly stab the elves in the back of the head before they could even turn to face her.
Killing 2 elves right away, she pulled her retracted whip blades out of their necks and swung outwards while extending them. Managing to precisely hit the gap in the armour on their necks Clara was able to decapitate 2 more elves, leaving only one.
Due to the final elf being last he was able to react and go for a strike, but before he could even get close his arm was suddenly torn off. Confused by what just happened, he didn't have time to see where Clara went as before he knew it his vision went black.
killing the last guard by decapitation as well, Clara now finished eliminating all the elves in her given area. Getting rid of the transformation, Clara fell to her knees. Although it didn't use much mana, it was still very taxing to use.
'Phew now that's over, I can rest.' Clara, knowing she most likely finished first, was going to take a moment to breathe.
*BOOM*
"Oh for fucks sake." Knowing exactly who that explosion was from, Clara knew her rest was going to be cut short.
'Looks like I'm heading straight to the middle.'