Natan and Ellie were sprinting down the street, heading for the central staircase that would take them to the temple grounds. Despite being pursued and surrounded by a bunch of bandits who had noticed them in the gunfire, they were unstoppable.
Natan reached for his pistol and spun it around his fingertip to reload it. He leapt into the air to avoid a bullet and dashed to the top of the bandit group, where he pulled the trigger. "Rhapsody!" He pivoted in mid-air and fired bullets that rained down on the criminals, easily wounding them. They all fell to the ground around Natan, who landed in the middle of the dead and then encountered a weird figure.
Another bandit appeared, but he was not clothed like the others. He wore a cap and was mostly clad in brown. His mouth and nose were hidden behind a black bandana. He was also wearing a long brown trench coat with a belt, a scythe on his back, and a bow in his left arm. He also had a second handgun, complete with a pocket full of rounds, on his belt. He spoke in a deeper tone, his hands clinched, and his bones shattered.
"Lord Byron's directions are simple to comprehend and carry out. Look for any intruders who may be linked to the previous three intruders and eliminate them if they are causing trouble in the Lord's location."
Natan cocked his pistol and stared at the man in his eyes. He reloaded it while Ellie beat off the remaining bandits who had attacked him and happened to be in their way. From behind, a robber swung the spear, hoping to sever Ellie's hand. After being thrown down, he dodged to avoid the swing and then hurriedly kicked the bandit in the stomach, hurling him back into the group of bandits stacked on top of each other.
Ellie drew his blade and vanished into a stream of electricity that zapped between the bandits, knocking them out cold in one fell swoop and throwing them to the ground, defeating the majority of the bandits under the man's leadership. Natan's interest in the opposing opponent rose, and he pondered what his name was.
"My name is Carlos, and I'm the commanding officer of Lord Byron's desert bandits. Putting that aside, I recommend that you surrender while you still have the opportunity, before I start shooting at you."
Natan drew his weapon and fired a shot. It flew straight towards Carlos, who drew his handgun and fired back. When Natan's bullet collided with Carlos', a cloud of dust descended onto the fight. Their combat was also initiated by the initial explosion.
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Elliott's fatigue level increased. He'd taken many heavy strikes, forcing him to clutch his own chest. He took a deep breath and maintained a tight eye on Marienne, whose smile never left her face.
Marienne took advantage of the gathering wind's shock by leaping high into the air. It blew a large amount of wind, which was caused by the wind's pulse. Elliott's hair and clothes were blown back, and the force almost knocked him down. By moving backward with his sole, he was able to regulate and maintain his equilibrium, and he discovered that Marienne had been bouncing toward him with both feet, as if she were walking on air.
She shifted her leg behind her back, bracing herself for a hard kick. She did a front flip by hurling her torso forward. She lifted her left leg in the air and pointed her heels downward after returning to her stationary stance. She swooped down quickly and prepared to attack Elliott.
He regained enough power to jump with his body toward the ground and hurled his shoulder forward, realizing that the kick would be tough to endure if he was hit. He rolled over his left shoulder, but before he could finish the roll, Marienne slammed her heel into the ground, which pulsated and threw Elliott off balance.
He was catapulted upside down into the air and smacked into the wall. His back, which had been utterly shattered by his weight, slammed against it. As his body became embedded in the wall, it flung the fragmented bits forward.
Elliott's limbs began to tremble. He attempted to pull himself away from the wall. He began by pulling out his left arm, then his right, and finally both of his legs. He succeeded, but he collapsed to his knees and coughed blood into the floor. It seemed to come from nowhere and drenched the floor in red. He fought to lift his head to meet Marienne's gaze. She had been grinning as she watched him suffer.
"Oh, dear. You're still not out cold? If I may say so myself, you're a tough cookie. However, you're on the verge of fainting out."
Elliott managed to get himself up to his knees by touching the bloodstained floor. He began to carefully raise to his feet, his arms still trembling from the pain. By saying it out loud, he shown bravery and showed no signs of letting up.
"N-Not even c-close..."
He coughed, his eyes getting more pallid and sad as he regained his footing. Marienne blitzed through the air by generating another shock wave and appeared in front of Elliott before he could take another step. She pushed Elliott's stomach with the sole of her left leg. The contact sent a shock through his body, and he felt his ribs break. He was launched into the air and yelled in agony.
He took off again, flying through the air. His body slammed into the next wall of the structure, causing him to be pummeled and pushed out. When his upper back hit the floor, it twisted his body, causing him to roll backwards and bounce back into the next wall, where he became lodged.
Marienne faded from view and reappeared in front of Elliott's body. While he was still trapped inside, she struck again, bringing her arm back, gathering the wind into a single point, and slamming her knuckles into Elliott's face. He felt a crack in his skull as well, followed by Marienne's knee slamming into his stomach for the second time. The impact of her knee slamming into his gut triggered a gigantic silver explosion that demolished a large area of the kingdom's western flank. Elliott's final hit before his one and only ribs completely cracking was the kick.
Once the explosion faded away, Marienne watched Elliott's body fall forward. He fell on the floor with his broken ribs and cracked skull onto the floor and never moved again. Marienne only smiled in response of seeing him immobile.
"It was probably only a matter of seconds before you died. Now that I'm done over here, one of the gals could be next on my hit list. If I can track down their captain, that is. Before I meet my next foe, only time matters."
She turned around and started walking away, but before she could take two steps, something grabbed her calf. She looked back and was taken aback. Elliott was still aware, albeit his gripping arm was quivering.
"W-Where are you g-going? Our f-fight still isn't d-done..."
"Still alive, huh? Let go of my leg."
"If I d-do it, you'll go after my f-friends. Y-You'll kill one, and then a-another. You'll follow to the t-third and fourth and fifth, t-there's no end to k-knowing what y-you will do. I-If you w-want to reach them, you'll h-have to k-kill me properly. B-But know that I w-won't go d-down easy..."
Marienne was disgusted after being grabbed by Elliott's palm and promptly kicked him in the face with her other leg. He was thrown backward onto his back, unable to move or speak. She swung her spear behind her as she hurriedly walked back toward him.
"I didn't think I'd have to get blood on my clothes, but if you really want to die, I'll make it happen."
She hoisted the spear high in the air and began to gather wind, which she would turn into a high-pressure shock wave as she stood above Elliott's immobilized body. Elliott's pale eyes only looked up at the sky and the spear's point, although he did catch a glimpse of a purple spark in the air before it vanished.
The pressure she managed to build up at the tip of her spear began to increase in strength, and the wind began to whirl around like a feather. It began to absorb more and more wind with each passing second, until the spear began to emit silver pulses. It flung the sand and rubble around.
"Here! Enjoy your wish of being killed!"
Her arms gripped the spear tightly as she spun it around and pointed it at Elliott's body. She jabbed downward, and in the next second, an even stronger shock wave blasted throughout the area, covering it completely and causing everyone from the temple and the opposite side of the kingdom to observe it.
Once everything faded away, Marienne's eyes, shook on the spot. The floor beneath her was fully obliterated, but Elliott's body vanished from her sight. "Where did he-?" Before she even asked, her answer had been already answered as she look through the area and finally noticed Elliott high in the air. He was shifted into a flip, as he continued to keep an eye on the floor. His mouth where shivering, his skin had appeared more smooth than usually and his sword had been glaring within purple electricity.
"How can he still move so much after taking so much damage?! Oh dear, something about him seems off."
His hair had shifted in color, and turned to purple, along with his eyes that were glowing with a sharp pink hue. The silver electricity flicked into purple and pink colors as it grew in size and pressure. It began to spark out wildly without any flaws and suddenly he spoke with his voice becoming deeper. He spelled out loud.
"1 Billion Volts, Prismatic Lightning..."
Elliott grasped the blade with both hands and fully pulled his body back while in the middle of the aerial flip. He stood with his legs stretched out behind him, pointing the sun, and his sword held high in the air. The blade emitted purple electricity that resembled plasma and began to extend from it. It began to take the shape of a Loong dragon, swirling behind Elliott's back. It didn't have a true physical body or hues because it was made of electricity. It roared and moved in the same pattern and motion that Elliott had done with his sword.
Elliott twirled the sword around him from the top of his back, then moved it beneath his stomach and directed the tip toward the sun. "Chthonic Dragon!" Elliott screamed loudly, a vein protruding from his forehead, and then kicked the air with his foot behind him. With the speed of lightning, he blasted toward the ground.
The enormous Loong that trailed Elliott dove without hesitation as his eyes blazed with purple lightning.
Marienne, who had been stunned and perplexed by Elliott's enormous and sudden rise in power, felt proper fear for the first time, her smile changing to terror, and she couldn't move no matter how hard she tried while seeing Elliott descending flawlessly with a massive dragon preparing to slam into her.
"Oh, dear! There's no simple understanding to how he can move at such speed! I can't tell if I can dodge it fast enough or-" But before Marienne could finish, she noticed a storm of electrical only inches away. It swirled and flashed inexplicably before Elliott dove through the cyclone. He finally hooked it to his dragon and drew the sword out of fury and prepared to cut. When the big dragon slammed into Marienne's body, he cut from beneath her stomach and spun like a wheel.
The dragon stunned Marienne's entire body with a tremendous explosion of throbbing lightning. While the explosion continued, she shouted in agony and pain in the air. The floor cracked and spread fissures throughout the area as the deafening and echoing roar resonated throughout the area. The sand bounced around in the air like it was made of jelly before being annihilated by Elliott's shock wave.
Elliott's eyes were filled with bravery, but shivering, as the pink and purple lightning slowly dissipated. He was in the center of the huge field of lightning, with a Loong wrapped around his chest behind him, as well as the remaining trail of rainbow zigzagging in the air.
To be continued...