Particles of dust and snow exploded into the air as Frosttusk slammed the Marquis into the ground with his trunk, rattling the latter's skull.
The damage wasn't fatal, but the Marquis was going to have one hell of headache.
'This feeling...Fenririte?! How did that guy-'
"Batter...up!"
Frosttuk wasn't about to give the Marquis a chance to recover or counterattack after launching this surprise attack, so he decided to follow up by swinging his trunk around and throwing the Marquis at high speed towards a specific spot in the room, where Nepherage was waiting and charging up.
"Swing! [Volcanic Cutter]!"
Nepherage intercepted the flying Marquis by running towards him, grabbing him by the neck with her, now glowing red, arm in a headlock and slamming him face first into the ground below. A shock of fire and earth exploded in the Marquis's face as he felt a small eruption happening only on his head.
At this point, he went from bemused yet annoyed to straight up pissed off.
These silly,whatever the hell they were, have been harassing him far longer than he anticipated and had not been cooperative in the slightest.He just wanted to cut them open to see what made them tick, was that so wrong?
"Alright you little toys. Get ready to be-"
"Espada Barrage!"
He was about to get up and take revenge when a sharp yet heavy force came crashing down on his stomach, in the form of the Razor Maiden. Adding insult to injury, the Razor Maiden began to rapidly stomp her "feet" down on the Marquis's gut.
The Razor Maiden didn't know if this was effective or not, she just wanted to cut his stomach open.
Unfortunately, this didn't amount to much in terms of damage.
'This is getting annoying! Where is that stupid puppet user?!'
_________________________________________________
'Huh? Shouldn't they have gotten stronger when I ranked up?,' Zhen Liu asked as he stuck to the walls of the echo chamber. He had a destination in mind, he just needed to be sneaky about the whole thing. This was the reason why he sent the big and loud Frosttusk to go help fight the Marquis.
'What? How would that help?'
'Huh, more you know...well the fact that you're suggesting this means you found some material I could use?'
'I can only guess what...'
_________________________________________________
Analysis Paralysis.
A phenomenon that occurs when one begins to overthink about the solution to a problem, or when they're making a decision between choices, weighing everything from cost to benefits to the point that they're unable to make a decision or even move.
Some consider the phenomenon to be a common symptom to several medical mental conditions, but it can happen to anyone at any time.
In the case of one Draigo the Bard, he was subjected to a surprising amount of life or death decisions that had compounded with repeated reminder of an old trauma combined with new ones. It not too much of a stretch to assume that right now, he couldn't think straight.
'What do I...what do I do?,' Draigo repeated in his mind as he saw the battle between the monsters and the Marquis unfold.
He was told by the red horned one to get out unless he could help with the fight, a command he could have heeded. He would have been able to run away, possibly disappear again, while keeping a hold on the precious shamisen that belonged to his beloved. However, this would also involve leaving behind (most) of Wyvara's body to the machinations of the Marquis and he refused it let that happen again.
On the other hand, it has been years since Draigo could properly fight and his aether had long since grown sluggish to the point that a low ranked Acolyte or a high ranked Novice could probably beat him up. He'd be more of a liability than a benefit.. but at least he'd go down fighting...but then he wouldn't be able to carry on her memory...
And on the chance the Marquis won this battle, he would have been pissed at all that has transpired and would come hunt him down anyways, rendering this whole thing moot and pointless!
Faced with all this, Draigo was stuck there, cradling a pair of shamisens, next to the stitched corpse of his beloved, while trying to figure out what to do next. It would take a miracle to get him out of this stupor.
"What the hell are you doing?"
Or the intervention of one, presumably cursed, young man.
As Draigo stared up at the young man, he couldn't help but notice the weird glow coming off of his left hand and the distinct feeling that it wasn't due to the presence of aether.
"I once asked you 'who', but now I need to know the 'what'. What the hell are you doing?," the youth asked again.
Draigo was a bit shocked at the blunt forwardness of the question, but he felt compelled to answer.
"I... I'm not sure. After all these years...I finally reclaimed some...small part of her. But now I see her like this...and I don't know what to do." Draigo gestured towards the stitched corpse behind him, it only took a glance for the young man to glean his meaning.
"Hmmm. Someone once said, that inaction was worse than taking no action," the youth began to say to Draigo, keeping his eyes firmly locked with his. "So let me ask this:that girl on the table, is this what she wanted you to do?"
It was a simple question.
A straightforward question.
A rather dumb question.
And yet...something about it made Draigo pause and focus.
'What would she...no...she told me what she wanted me to do a long time ago...'
"Well? What are you willing to-"
HOOOWWWWWLLLLL
"AHHHHH!"
The youth was about to ask Draigo another question, but suddenly began to clutch his head and scream in pain.
Draigo was confuse at this sudden turn of events and tried to see what could be the cause.
As he focused on the battlefield, his blood ran cold.
"Oh no..."