"What is this appearance...?"
"This form is a symbol of the bond I share with my beloved pet..."
"Beloved pet...? You mean that griffin that was sleeping in the living room a while ago? It wasn't enough to try and get yourselves cursed, you even became friends with monsters..."
"Sphinx is not a monster... He is my precious friend... And if your father could see you right now, he would be extremely disappointed!"
"..."
Marcus raised his arms and formed his usual blades from it.
"Every single one of you..."
Using his superior speed he vanished in thin air and reappeared in front of Evlin in a split-second.
"Stop! Talking! About my father!!!"
He tried to slash Evlin in an "X" formation but she managed to dodge it by jumping backwards using all of her strength.
That was going to kill me!!! If I had taken that head-on I would definitely be dead right now!! I can't play around with this kid. Is what she was thinking.
Marcus was a weird opponent for Evlin. She became used to fighting enemies who would rely on the power of the silver metal such as Boris, the demon-slayers, and several targets of her heists such as the knight from earlier tonight.
She would usually secure her victory by finding an opening and using her modeling magic to change the metal into a weapon for herself. She wasn't sure if that would work on Marcus since his whole body was the weapon, so even if she stole his blade he could just make more.
"Maybe I should try to turn him into a frog as well...? Give Xadi a friend to play with..."
Marcus leaped on her direction with his arms extended and started to spin like a drill. Evlin shot the terrain and created a wall made of diamond to stop him. Marcus crashed with it and a huge impact was felt.
Evlin started to see a few cracks on the wall slowly increasing, and before she noticed, Marcus came out like a bullet.
She managed to partially dodge him but her shoulder was wounded.
"Yaaouhchh!!!"
The attack just barely scratched her but the pain was more than she expected. She wanted to try and catch her breath, but there was no time. Marcus started moving again, this time running towards her like a spear ready to impale her.
Evlin shot the ground again and several diamond hands started to surface trying to grab a hold of the weapon-boy.
He started to slash every single one of them like a shredding machine. While he was distracted dealing with the hands, Evlin used another layer of healing magic to boost her speed and rushed to grab him with her arms.
From her gauntlets, she started to release recreation magic and tried to turn Marcus into something else.
The boy started to glow and shrink in size. Once the bright light had disappeared the only thing in front of Evlin was a small bunny with silver fur.
"D- Did it work...?"
The bunny proceeded to cover itself with liquid metal and begun to grow in size. Evlin started to get flashbacks from the first time she saw the second "Terminator" movie and before she noticed, the liquid metal had assumed the shape and size of a young boy. The metal started to disappear leaving a back-to-normal Marcus behind.
"That... Was unpleasant..."
Evlin was not enjoying the situation. Marcus was basically her natural enemy. He was a being without fixed shape or form, so her greatest asset, the power of recreation, was useless on him.
"Huh... Would you consider going easy on me if I told you it was my birthday...?"
Marcus turned his left foot into a metal hammer and smacked Evlin around.
"Kuuuaahh!"
She went flying from the impact and as she was about to start falling, Marcus jumped closer to her and struck her again after turning his right hand into a mace.
"Gaaahh!!!"
She was knocked back towards the ground and started to spill blood from her mouth. Even with Sphinx's stronger body, that impact caused a lot of damage. She tried to feel her ribs and immense pain scattered all over herself.
[Evlin, we are all set to go!! Just come so we can leave!!]
She was enduring so much pain that she almost forgot her plan to stall Marcus so that the rest of them could escape.
[Just go now!! The second he sees me trying to leave he will catch on and stop us!! Run while he is distracted!!]
[Evlin don't be stupid!!! He's going to kill you!!]
[Better than killing all of us!! I'm the leader so do what I say!!]
[Sis!! stop talking nonsense and get over here!! You can outrun him!!]
[The hell I can!! This boy managed to keep up with Daren and an armored Lilith! I'm keeping him right here far away from all of you!!]
[Evlin!!!]
[Just go!!! Now!!!]
Marcus started to walk towards Evlin.
"So what about you huh?? What's your story with my father? Were you a candidate too? Or maybe just a friend? Or maybe more? Why not go ahead and share whatever amazing fond memories you two had together that I could never be a part of?"
Evlin was trying her best to keep herself conscious and her stomach was really hurting right now, but she decided to indulge in the kid's tantrum thinking it would give more time to her friends.
"Honestly...? You probably spent more time with him than me..."
"What...?"
"Unlike everyone else... I never really physically met Marceus... I hired a mage to cast a spell that would allow me to talk to him... The only "fond" memory he and I share together was of me begging him to help me find a way to my own world..."
"..."
"All I could do was spend a few seconds with him in some kind of weird white void before he announced that he was about to die..."
"You... You were in the white void...?"
"Huh...?"
"... The white void was the only memory I had of my father that belonged only to me... And even that I couldn't have just for myself??"
"Oh, boy..."
Marcus turned his arm into a metal crossbow and produced a metal arrow on top of it.
"All these moments with my father that should have been mine... You all took everything from me... Just go ahead and die..."
Marcus shot the arrow at an absurd speed. Evlin tried to escape its path but her leg was pierced by it. The arrow went straight through her muscle leaving a gaping wound.
"Guuaaggaghhh!!!"
Evlin was going to die. Marcus was much more powerful than any of her previous opponents. Power, speed, mobility, durability, agility, this kid truly was a living weapon. Trying to fight him was a huge mistake. She needed a miracle but all of her resources were gone. She was focusing all of her strength on spreading herself with healing magic to fix her wounds. Any earth attack would just be cut into pieces, recreation also didn't work since Marcus was a shape-shifter himself. Her healing boost was barely worth anything compared to his power and speed.
All she had left was modeling magic and raw magic. She could try to gather all of her remaining energy to release a massive blast just like she did against the demon-slayers. Or she could try to spread all of her modeling energy across the landscape to make some distraction so she could escape.
As she kept thinking about it she noticed Marcus approaching with a raised blade, ready for the finishing blow.
"Once you see my father in the after-life... Tell him I said hi..."
She instantly gave up on both options. Both were good ideas but they were too big and slow to be pulled off in time. Marcus could cut her up three times before she even started. Was this the end?
"Stoooopp!!!"
She heard someone screaming from behind and tried to peek who it was. It was Ria, rushing towards them by herself. The others where nowhere to be seen. Did Ria open a scar but never jumped inside on it herself?
"Marcus, you can't do this!! You're supposed to fight against evil, but you're just causing more pain. Mia, you too!! Try talking some sense into him!"
Evlin had completely forgotten Mia was even a thing. She was so focused on trying not to be killed by Marcus that she wasn't even remembering Ria's little sister who was an immortal with two-hundred years. She also remembered that this little brat interrupted Auren's proposal a while ago and somehow got even angrier. The twin ponytail little girl was just resting against a tree enjoying the fight all this time like a kid watching tv...
"Big sis, what do you want me to do? Your friends are the weird ones for trying to rebel against a goddess in the first place... What did you think was going to happen? Of course you would all suffer divine punishment for your sins..."
Evlin tried to look around once again and confirmed. All her friends were gone. Ria probably came up with a plan to save Evlin. She could still open two wind-scars so she used one to get everyone out safely and saved the second so she and Evlin could escape together. All Evlin had to do was find an opening to let Ria create a scar and jump on it without being cut by Marcus.
"So it's ok for him to just kill all of my friends?? It's ok for him to kill me??"
"Of course it's not ok... But this is your own fault isn't it? You are all adults, so take responsibility for your actions!"
Evlin couldn't help but make an angry face hearing such a thing come out from the mouth of a little girl. But then Evlin finally realized it. The little girl! Marcus was invincible, but she wasn't. She could be their opening.
"Mia, move aside... I don't want you to watch me as I cut your sister down..."
"It's ok darling... This will be big sis's final moments... I wanna watch it until the end."
"Very well..."
Marcus raised his blades again and prepared his attack. Evlin tried to risk it all in one final gamble.
"Marcus wait!!"
"!!??"
"Before I die... Can I at least share one final goodbye with my friend?"
"Very well... I'm not a heartless monster after all..."
"Thank you..."
Evlin came closer to Ria and started to hug her, making sure that their position was located as she wanted. Evlin facing Marcus and Mia, and Ria facing behind her. She didn't have Gustav's chat-room anymore so she needed to quietly share her plan.
"Open a portal on my signal..."
"What...? We will never make it in time!"
"Just trust me!"
Evlin released her hug from Ria and extended her hands towards Mia, catching Marcus with a surprise.
"...!? What are you doing...?"
She used modeling magic to convert her two Gauntlets into her crossbow and release all the raw magic she had left.
"NOW!!!!"
The blast from the crossbow was released aimed at Mia but Marcus jumped to protect her with a metal shield. However, harming Mia wasn't the goal. The blast was so powerful that Ria and Evlin began to fly in the opposite direction, creating a lot of distance from Marcus and giving Ria plenty of time to open a portal.
"You tricked me!!!"
Marcus started to rush towards them with all his speed but he wasn't going to make it.
Ria and Evlin successfully managed to cross the portal and Marcus could see the two reuniting with the rest of the group on the other side. Ashley was screaming with joy.
"Evlin! Ria!"
But Marcus refused to give up so easily.
"I'm not letting it end like this!!"
Evlin and Ria had managed to move after entering the wind-scar. They thought they were safe but they turned their heads to watch the scar and noticed Marcus with two crossbow arms on each side. Evlin realized what he was trying to do.
"Ria!! Close the scar now!!!"
Ria started to use her power to make the scar shrink but one second before it could fully close, two arrows passed through the smallest of holes stabbing Ria and Evlin in the hearts.
The two girls started to tremble and collapsed while spilling blood from their mouths. Auren and Ashley started to scream in panic.
"Ria!!!"
"Evlin!!"