Chapter 106

Chapter 106

A/N: Oh hey, look what I found between the couch pillows. I wonder if I could find any more if I checked? I know I managed to write the ending of this story last night, but I seem to have misplaced the rest. Maybe i should check the couch again? Seriously though, I thought I should do something to celebrate the ending of the story, and what better than to do speedy releases? I'm doing some slight PR and editing on what remains, but i should have them up in a few hours. Maybe i'll see the story in the top ten weekly stories for once. It's been a while since last time.

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The Blood God was pressuring Asariel back. She successfully parried the attacks made by her opponents axe swings, and dodged the lashes of the whips that kept striking from odd angles. The demon was powerful and skilled, but Asariel kept up her end of the fight. She retaliated by pushing the demon back with bursts of her psionic power, which managed to damage the demon but not seriously enough. Any lesser wounds kept regenerating. By all appearances Asariel was losing.

Yet why did the demon have such an ugly grimace on his face? Why had Asariel sent the other celestials back towards Gabriels fight instead? There was a rather simple reason for that. Despite all his efforts and seeming upper hand, the demon had not been able to land a blow on Asariel. If the current stalemate continued, Asariel would be able to defend against the demon for as long as she wished. And that was a problem for the demon, because the elusive celestial was a psion.

Even if you considered all the weird and fantastic abilities a psion could possess, one of the most fundamental and dangerous ones was the ability to affect their opponents mind. Against enemies as powerful as the Blood God, it would take time to bypass the robust defenses protecting his mind, but inevitably the time would come when those defenses would not be enough. As such, a battle against a proper psion that was even relatively close in strength to you was always a race against time. Once that time ran out, the psion would be able to affect your mind, and do things to you that ranged from involuntary movements to illusions and temporary paralysis. In fights like this, a small mistake could lead to a quick death and a psion could force that mistake on you.

The demon was losing that race for time. Yet, that wasnt entirely against his plans. He could feel the annoying celestial worming her way through the defenses he had set up. Hed rather be able to deal with the pest before she got into his mind, but he knew he had ways to retaliate if he didnt manage that. The demon growled as another burst of psionic lighting forced him back. The damn lighting stung even if it wasnt dangerous!

Suddenly the demon felt his mind getting invaded, and tried to limit what she could access. However, the celestial suddenly disappeared from his sight. He tried to use his senses to find the celestial, but suddenly felt a blade penetrating his chest. Only the tough hide as well as his fast reaction managed to prevent the blade from going into his heart. Another invisible sword strike struck at his leg, severing several tendons and limiting his mobility.

Well, if you cant see your enemy, all you have to do is attack everywhere. The Blood God said loudly, and suddenly a powerful blast of force struck everywhere around the demon, shattering the surroundings. The battle had moved over land as they were fighting, and now the surroundings suffered from that.

The Blood God was able to notice Asariels presence, as the demons attack had disturbed her control over his mind, and immediately lashed out with his whip. Asariel became visible again, as the flaming whip bound her, and screamed incoherently as the Blood God pulled her close. A flash of the axe, and a fountain of blood. The Blood God laughed in glee as the celestials head flew from her shoulders and bounced on the ground. This rain of blood was what he lived for.

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Khali was more and more certain that her enemy had some limited ability to glimpse into the future. Her attacks were clearly getting predicted! That was the only way her enemy could keep up with Khalis faster movements. Although her enemy did seem to get a sudden burst of speed and power every now and then, whenever she showed some type of opening. She had several wounds as proof of that burst of power. Only her quick reactions and careful avoidance of risk kept her alive so far. It seemed like her enemy was trying to give a wrong impression of his abilities and take her by surprise. Visit no(v)eLb(i)n.com for the best novel reading experience

Fine then. If your opponents knows your every move, then the only way to defeat him is to make an attack that he cant avoid even if he knows its coming. She said to herself glumly, her words eerily echoing those spoken by the Blood God in another place.

She once again used her favorite technique. Serpentia had managed to turn it back, but she refused to believe this pile of metal was as powerful as her old nemesis. Unlike Serpentia, this enemy hadnt seen Khali using this attack earlier either. Khali turned into an orb of pure ki and the orb once again separated into a dozen copies of her. The dozen identical copies dashed at her target.

The silent opponent took a wide stance with his blades separated, while the two shields at his shoulders became active again. The copies all attacked at the same time, while their target moved in a controlled dance of blades that redirected the attacks in the way of other copies, disrupting Khalis attacking rhythm. Any attack that he couldnt deflect got blocked by the shield. However, unlike with Serpentia, none of the copies was getting destroyed so the stream of attacks continued. It was only a matter of time before one got through.

The first attack went through the armored opponents leg, breaking his stance, which allowed two more copies to plunge their blades into the chest of their enemy. As the attack had finished, the copies disappeared, and only one remained with her blade though the armored chest. However, Khali was not happy. In fact, she now realized she was in deep trouble. The armored form twisted at the waist, wrenching Khalis blade out of her hands, as his sword descended towards her head.

Oh no, the aura of the Enemy is getting to them. Neleh thought with slight panic.

Im moved, but this is not the time or the place. Such gestures will not work against this opponent. Neleh tried to convince Estelar.

She was too late. A booming voice could be heard once again, as the dragon managed to hit Gabriel with its tail, which flung the celestial away for a moment. Well, well. It seems you came with a proper plan this time. Too bad you fought me alone last time. I didnt get to show most of my abilities.

The dragon had a bloodthirsty grin as it rose on two feet, and made a rumbling growl with a single note that suddenly carried across the valley. Neleh could feel hatred, malice, bloodthirst and resentment in that single note. She was able to resist the effect easily, as sound magic was one of her specialties, but the forces on the cliffs werent as lucky. She watched in horror as the people started attacking each other in a haze of negative emotion.

She wasnt sure if she should be happy or not, when she noticed that the members of the Order were not attacking each other. Even in a haze like this they remembered their strict training and stood as one. However, they stood as one against all the other people. While the others were quite happily attacking each other, the Order members cleaved into their ranks with methodical but gruesome effectiveness. The cliffs turned into a slaughterhouse.

Dammit, even if we win this the other races will carry a grudge against us if we kill off their most powerful members. Neleh cursed.

Apparently the Enemy was not yet finished, as the elves and faeries werent dying in sufficient numbers, and made a roaring attack against the cliffs. Since the priestesses were no longer defending the cliffs, the sonic wave emitted a pressure that shattered the cliff sides, causing rockslides and the ground started collapsing beneath their feet.

Well then. Lets try this again. The voice had become more normal, as the dragon suddenly shrunk into a fair sized humanoid shape. The blood red eyes and pale skin hinted at a vampiric origin, as the Enemy now resembled one of the rulers of the night, with dark features and a slight beard.

Plan B! Neleh signaled everyone still capable of listening.

Gabriel leapt back, and a specially prepared doorway appeared behind the Enemy. Neleh summoned Jormungandr just for the purposes of the great wyrm pushing the Enemy forcefully into the doorway. This doorway didnt lead to Nexus, but instead allowed access to a special battleground she had prepared beforehand in a rather barren pocket dimension.

I wish you could just shut the door and trap him inside. Gabriel grumbled as she entered after the great wyrm to distract the Enemy, while Neleh did what she had to do here.

I agree, but he would break out soon enough. Neleh replied. The doorways werent prison doors; they were just doors that opened both ways. Even if they were locked, the Enemy was perfectly capable of forcibly opening them. Trying to collapse the pocket dimension with someone inside would just expel them back outside, so that was out too.

Neleh gathered her power and whistled a single long note that lasted almost ten seconds and remained echoing in the air, not fading in the slightest after she stopped whistling. Everyone around her started falling asleep, and the dark aura started slowly dissipating as the being causing it had left. She felt very tired. They should remain asleep and wake up with a clear head, assuming they managed to defeat the Enemy. That wouldnt help the dead and the dying though, and she didnt have the power to waste on trying to heal such a large number of people.

She also had to close the arches leading into Nexus, to avoid other people getting affected by the aura that hadnt yet disappeared completely. She gave a deep sigh. Although the attack against the Enemy was quite effective, I wonder who really wasted more power in the end? I have a feeling that we might have not come ahead in this exchange. She said mostly to herself, as she moved towards the doorway while pulling out one of the containers she used to store mana in preparation for this battle. These containers would be only so effective, as the mana she could gain from them was limited and had diminishing returns. That had never been a problem before, as she only used them to boost a single spell, but would become one in this battle for certain.

She also checked that Asheara was still ok hidden within the shadows, protected by Abyss, Nelehs darkness spirit. She would follow along inside the pocket dimension. After a small thought, Neleh decided to leave the doorway open for others as well, as it was possible the others would finish their battles before her and come to provide help. With another sigh, she entered the doorway.