Chapter 265: Madness

Chapter 265: Madness

Every skeleton in place. Bring out the dummies.

The graveyard skeletons had spread around, they were in every wall of the room, with half of them in the ceiling. On Sofias signal, they extended their arms, not exposing themselves but instead bringing fake skeletons into the room. These dummy skeletons, had empty bones and skulls, filled to the brim with shade and blood dust. The creature attacked, crushing them all to bits like it did every time. These were all physical attacks, so whatever appendage they used to strike would be completely coated, and the dust would burst all over the room.

Sofia had no way to see what was actually happening, but she trusted that it would work. If not, she had more things in store. As the skeletons did their job, she killed herself. Crushing her own head after stabbing herself once to prevent the one-hit protection to activate was quick and efficient. Three seconds later, she was brought back by her first rune. So she did it again.

In a fight where she needed to be able to dodge multiple attacks all at once, and not get touched once, she couldnt afford not going all out. By dying twice, she stacked [One with Suffering] to 200%, while still keeping a rune active for safety.

The lengths I need to go to.

[One with Suffering] : For each % of Health lost during a singular battle, gain a 1% increase to all stats except Mana and Health until the end of combat, lose 1% for each % of Health healed.

She had done some testing, and the definition of a singular battle was very lenient as long as she didnt heal, which the rune bypassed without any issue.

Time left on the demon form: 4m38s. Depending on the situation, this could be four minutes too long, or much, much too short a timer. In both cases, it meant the battle wouldnt be easy.

Sofia took five extra seconds to breathe and clear her mind after her two deaths while the graveyard skeletons all gathered near her. They would all enter the room at the same time, reducing her chances to be targeted outright. She clenched her staff, took a lower stance, looked over her current stats, and gave the order.

Lets go.

The seconds it took to phase through the floor felt like they lasted forever.

The skeletons did their best to eject her out of the ceiling as fast as they could.The initial instance of this chapter being available happened at N0v3l.Bin.

As she was cannonballed into the room, she could finally see the monster that she had been preparing so hard to face.

Her preparations felt futile. This was nothing like she had imagined. The cubic room, the battlefield she had envisioned, expected to be inside of, was nowhere to be seen. Around her, she could see her graveyard skeletons emerging out of ethereal walls of nothingness, tearing through the fabric of this dark voids space.

She could see faint forms in the horizon, colors that did not exist, shapes that would not connect to themselves. It was abhorrent yet familiar. She had been there once, in a dream.

The spines surrounded her. She cut them and cut them, her mind an impervious wall of focus and resolve. They regrew without end, but with every dodge, every slash, she inched toward her goal, coming closer and closer to the creatures core. The tip of a spinal cord had grown atop her scepter, the [Spine of the Black Sun].

The creature must have understood her aim, its tendrils retracted and rearranged, when they extended again, their form had changed, they were like infinite tree branches, splitting ends diverging in countless directions. They covered all the surface they could, threatening to envelop and smother Sofia in clouds of their thin threads.

Sofia controlled the bones of her armor, she used spines of her own spikes of bones used like forks to pin away the iridescent fabric of nightmares as she still had to avoid the few remaining regular tendrils that were unrelentingly pursuing her, bending in untold ways to catch her off-guard.

If not for the demon forms spherical vision and the thinking speed bonuses of [Evasion] and [Way of the fool], she would have been long dead.

She knew Pareth was waiting for an opportunity to strike, but his form was too imposing. He could never avoid the tendrils, and his fate if he was hit was uncertain. He would sacrifice himself if needed, but Sofia still hadnt been touched once.

Her mana, however, was falling at an alarming rate, no matter the insane speeds at which the battle took place, every second of fighting was another second closer to her reserves being depleted by her passive skill, and she still needed to use the rot.

After evading the innumerable strikes, she was finally in reach of her goal. Bone dominus was too slow, it had to be a direct, physical hit, using all the momentum she could muster.

She only had one shot.

The creature had taken her precious skeleton dog away, and it would pay the price.

The tendrils engulfed her as she stabbed forward with her scepter, aiming at an opening in the creatures defenses, a tiny space in between three of its jagged tendrils.

Sofia felt her body decompose into its smallest components under the influence of the tendrils, her very existence stripped bare as she delivered her final attack. Yet her soul held true.

She had Aphenoreths mark. Her essence was whole, unblemished, unbreakable. The creatures best efforts could not leave a dent.

The sword form of the spine of the black sun struck true, avoiding all three tendrils in its way, and lodging itself deep inside the core of the mad beast. From within, the creature erupted in a bright flash of light, the spines solar burst. Sofias rune was about to go off, in her last moment of awareness, she activated her rot with the remnants of her mana, leaving her completely empty.

DIE!

The rot permeated the emissary of the Deep from within. Eaten from the inside, it could outgrow the all-consuming black plague no longer. The thing gave a last effort, unleashing a pulse of ethereal matter, a concentrated essence of raw concepts and rules, like a wave resonating with the laws of the universe itself. Yet it did nothing as it washed over Sofia, and like the other parasite before it, the creature of the Deep exploded, showering the room in its shining, iridescent blood, and revealing the being it had been trying to destroy for millennia.