"It's approaching."
"Yeap...let's defend Gyu, alright?"
Both Bie and Casmere noticed the encroaching uninvited guest first, Bie picking up Ekulech and loosening up his joints as he stood tall with the blade level to his waist, and Casmere rolling his shoulders as he withdrew his bone pick once again.
"Tsk..." From the mist, a two-meter-tall humanoid emerged. His skin was gray and laced with crimson Nordic patterns, his garb barbaric coupled with a long flaxen mane. His face was slated and featureless, aside from two fine horns that curved up like the moon, emerging from where his eyes would've been. All ten of his fingers were ridged, resembling the horns upon its face, and each dithered about in misty shadows.
"It can talk? Oh, mother..." Lulac gulped, noticing that the demon seemed to be a lot more...sane than the others they had encountered. Casmere nodded, fixing the cloth on his face as he seemed to take a more defensive stance.
"It is known as the Veneer of Shrouded Horns. There have only been five recorded, and I think that one wants whatever Gyuho has received..."
"We won't give it to him! Cover me!" Wanxi piped up as she clutched her flag even further, leaning on the pole that she embedded into the terrain as the canna lily pattern emitted soft red light.
"She's right. Giving our friend over is not an option." Bie remarked, weighing the hand axe as he decided to take this as an opportunity to get used to his body.
"Reckless idiots...it's not like I don't agree. Building of the Mansion!!" The imprint of a twisted mansion reigned over the ruined terrain, twisting upon itself as Lulac spent his last breaths of energy moving at his quickest, executing dexterous lunges and swings with his beam saber nonstop.
"Then he's acting as control this time. Good~" Bie withdrew a heavy bone greatsword from his duffel bag, holding it above his leftmost shoulder while dashing forward with Ekulech's blade pointed towards the demon. The demon laughed and took a reticent posture, its next move nigh indiscernible.
The bearded blade whizzed by before harmlessly clattering off of the demon's ridged fingers, the opponent slapping away the weighed in impact and seeking to smother Bie's gaze with an outstretched palm. Before it could do so, Lulac's hand jutted out from a purple auric extension of the Twisted Mansion's window, burning into the rocky flesh and smacking it away further.
Bie swung the greatsword down, before bringing it up in order to slice and dice at the demon as quickly as he could before it was reduced to rubble. As if fighting against time, he counted each and every executed slash as the demon was forced to take step backs due to the sheer vigor behind the strikes.
"One." A hewing sweep.
"Two." A withdrawing upward slash.
"Three." As if drawing an X, bring it back down. Don't think about the cracks.
"Four." A stab, meant to impede.
"Five." And with a twist of the handle, wrench the guts...
The greatsword obliterated into a multitude of sharp fragments, each burrowing deeper into the demon's skin as it howled. It stepped backwards and was engulfed in mist, quickly scurrying away from Bie!
But it could not escape his gaze, the invisible being tracked by his gleaming yellow topaz eyes. Casmere's baleful eyes focused on the direction Bie's vision was pointed towards, his hands brought together as the bone pick pointed towards the sky. All of a sudden, his gaze narrowed, and his vibe changed, the wheel floating a meter above the pick as he suddenly thrust it upwards!
"Kak-!"
The demon reappeared, emitting a resentful noise as it did so. Surprisingly, it was nearest to Lulac, who had been the greatest nuisance to it due to his distraction not allowing it to parry Bie's attack. Bie's eyes gleamed as the white plus signs reappeared, and he aimed an outstretched hand at the demon before grinning and pushing it down.
While it was flattened to the ground, the shadows became miniature beams that shot down from each and every one of its twelve horns. Green energy laced with a blackened wave of particles germinated before cannoning towards Lulac and Bie, though Casmere summoned phantasmic images to take the brunt of the blow.
For Lulac, the remainder of the energy was dispersed by his swift, bitter swipes. For Bie, the remainder glanced off of his hand axe as well as tickled his skin, unable to pierce it. Greenish smoke was all that was left, calmly blowing away from his frame as if nothing happened.
"Grk..." The demon wasn't liking this, usually renowned for its skilled sneak attacks and ruthless barrages when caught. The fact that it was being restrained so easily despite the youngness of the prey before it was pissing it off, and its mane floated to the sky as it began to accumulate energy.
It burst with a darkened green aura, its hair becoming green in turn. A mouth formed on each of its fingers, and the text expanded into its aura and revolved around the demon. This transformation diffused the energy of its opponents, making Lulac trip into the empty air as his flow was disrupted and Casmere lose control of his wheel as it fell to the ground.
Though Bie was unaffected, because he had already withdrawn his suppressive force. The demon flinched, though it lifted a palm and condensed several squares into a packed-up heap of energy, which it then lobbed at Bie!
Using Mountain's Step, making sure to minimize the leakage of energy so that it would be nullified, he leapt up into the sky. From there, the heap of energy followed him, so he threw knife after knife in succession until the energy lump exploded, bringing him even higher and hiding his form in green fallout.
'Round two then, right? I'll show you what I'm made of...' Bie thought, noticing that the weakening effect from the nullification wasn't affecting him any longer. He then used his suppressive force to stay in the air, before pushing himself above the head of the demon and pushing himself downwards, coupled with an amplified weight!
"Here, take it! Ram Lend!" Wanxi's Ink settled on the descending Bie, imbuing him with her thunderous energy as his legs hung over the demon's head like the Sword of Damocles. The jolt seemed to improve the coordinated response of his muscles, as Bie felt like they were even easier to control before. With the thought of them like miniature hills, he released the strongest blow he could.
And the demon's head caved in, before being cut up into ribbons with an expedited flurry via Ekulech. The rapidly breaking yet continuously repairing hand axe boasted an unnaturally high sharpness, cutting into the rocky flesh with ease while being guided by Bie's arms that were teeming with precision and might.
--
Meanwhile.
Gyuho got up, resting his back along one side of the crater. His mouth was fixed into an odd grin, as his eyes seemed to form pools of light.
"The Shard of an Otherworldly Dog, it is mine now. I'll grow stronger, much, much, stronger..." He sighed, his frame trembling softly. Now that he had this...well, E realm wasn't so far off.
The only problem was that he now had some unsettling memories lurking in the depths of his subconscious.