(Artoria PoV)
Once Jorgen has finished eating, we make our way over to the elevators and push the button, taking it to the highest floor possible.
When we get out, we face empty hallways and start walking.
"Hey Jorgen do you want to become stronger?" I ask, while we walk. Then I use Bestowal on him, since it's easier, than to explain.
He seems to fall into thought, but after a moment. "...Impudence!" He bellows.
"I stand under no one." He simply says and continues walking. I get the message that my bestowal has been rejected.
"Tch. I will make you change your mind." I click my tongue and follow him like nothing happened.
*Boom* *Boom*
Suddenly I hear these muffled explosions. Rather than explosions, it actually sounds like something is breaking through the walls, on our way to us.
I quickly focus my senses and try to pinpoint, in which direction they are coming from.
"There."
*Boooom*
A hole appears in the ceiling, 30 meters behind us, where we just came from. 3 women jump down from the hole.
"Hmm? Deas?" I mumble in confusion. Since everything has been enhanced in me, this also includes my senses. And what my senses tell me is that these Deas are crazy strong. They're almost as strong as the top members of my organisation.
Deas of this kind of strength are not cabbages! They are extremely rare! So where the fuck did these girls come from?
I instantly deduce that they have something to do with whoever runs this Box. One of the reasons why is because the three Deas belong to different factions. Their necklaces are differently coloured. This doesn't happen, unless they are part of the same organisation.
"Artoria Lucifer..." One of the Deas starts to speak. She is a rather tall woman, with a slender physique and green hair, in a ponytail.
"...Our master wants you to serve him. Come with us." She walks closer to me and so do the 2 others behind her. Her face looks expressionless as she speaks.
"Who is your master?" I ask.
"You will soon find out." She says and then attacks me. She closes the distance between us in an instant and throws a right hook to my face.
*BOOOM*
I catch the punch, but the mere shockwave destroys our surroundings within 50 meters.
I made an ice cocoon around Jorgen, so he wouldn't be killed. Even if he's insanely strong, he's like a kitten in front of these women.
The man that I was dragging along simply dies and goes splat on the wall.
"Heh. Hehehe." I chuckle and grip the womans fist, applying increasing amounts of pressure. Her face winces when I do.
"I don't think you understand your position." I say with a soft tone and smile.
Another woman blinks behind me and launces an elbow towards my head.
"Oh? A teleporter?" I duck and sweep her legs from under her. Then tighten my grip on the green ponytails fist and use her like a rag, swinging her on top of the falling Dea.
*BOOOM*
Another destructive shockwave rocks the building.
The third Dea launces some kind of curved energy blade at me, without minding the fact that her two comrades are also in the crossfire. It seems their coordination is trash.
I quickly dodge the beam and distance myself from the three. From the time the Dea teleported behind me, all of this happens in under a second.
I quickly bury the ice cocoon containing Jorgen somewhere deep underground, so he wouldn't get in the way of our fight.
"I finally regained my powers, so I guess a little workout shouldn't hurt." I smile at the trio and tie my long hair up, in a ponytail.
This time, all three of them rush at me like mad dogs. More energy blades fly toward me, but I slap them away with my bare hand.
"Heh." I create an ice wall in front of the green haired one, making her crash into it. The teleporter rushes at me and swings, but that is a distraction. Just before the swing, she teleports above me.
I tilt my head and narrowly dodge the strike. She teleports again and strikes. I block the second hit.
Meanwhile the third Dea stops her rush, since she sees the teleporter teleport around me like crazy, constantly striking.
"Teleporters are always a nuisance." I mumble, while dodging or blocking the ridiculous hits coming at me from all angles.
After her 20th time teleporting, I've somewhat understood her pattern, so I throw a kick where I think she'll teleport.
As expected, she teleports right there and gets a kick to the neck. Her body goes flying to some random wall, destroying it in the process.
The green haired one is already on me again, trying to smash my face in. I deflect the blow and throw a hook in her ribs, sending her flying. She seems to have an ability to increase her physical power, since she's almost as strong as me. That's completely ridiculous if you think about it.
The 3rd Dea backs off and bombards me with her her energy. I throw up an ice wall and simply wait, like opening the umbrella in the rain.
When she stops bombarding me, I break down the ice wall.
The three women regroup and look at me with frowns on their faces.
"Why the sour faces? I haven't even gotten serious. Don't tell me you're giving up." I taunt them.
They collectively seem to come to the decision, that they're not going to best me by attacking head on. Each of the tree women manifest weapons in their hand, appearing as if from thin air.
The green haired girl manifests a greatsword, the teleporter a pair of daggers and the energy user manifests a halberd.
They rush at me with their weapons, but this time they are not coming at me uncoordinated.
The sword user attacks me head on and slashes at me. Meanwhile when she slashes, the teleporter teleports in my blind spot and strikes with her daggers. The third Dea strikes at me from behind the sword user, with her halberd. Using the reach from her pole weapon, she strikes at me through gaps created by the sword user.
Even I find it difficult to simply continue dodging and blocking, as I can't simply block the weapons.
"I guess I've had enough fun."
I manifest a purple and black themed sword, that radiates a kind of miasma. This is my sword, Lex Talionis. A monstrous weapon.
Next I edjucate the teleporter why she's a bad matchup against an ice user.
I create a multitude of ice small ice spikes all over my body. Then expand them at an insane rate, in all directions. This happens so fast that neither of the three can react to it in time.
The teleporter and sword user get skewered, just barely managing to avoid damage to their vitals. Only the halberd user and sword user are relatively fine. The halberd user is fine because the sword girl was in front of her. And the sword girl, because her physical constitution is abnormally enhanced, which means her defence is much higher.
I quickly dispel the spikes and rush at the sword girl. Since she's physically almost my match, she manages to block my sword strike. However unexpectedly that does jack shit, as my sword simply slices her's in half, taking her shoulder and right arm with it.
I swing my sword again, aiming to decapitate the woman, but the teleporter teleports in front of me, in a show of tenacity.
I react fast and conjure small and thick ice slabs to deflect the blows, but I can't strike her with my sword, as she is too close. So I lean forward and rip a chuck out of her neck, with my teeth. Then nudge her forward with my body and bisect her.
Usually seeing one's comrade die this violently, will create a momentary lapse of reaction in people. But unexpectedly these women are unreactive to this.
Even though I'm slightly suprised, it won't change the outcome.
I bombard the halberd girl with ice, allowing me to slice off the legs of the sword girl. Once she's defeated, I simply run at the 3rd Dea, slice off her hands and choke her out.
Once she's out, I walk over to the bleeding girl, with only one limb remaining and stomp on her head, until she passes out. Then I freeze the stumps to stop her from bleeding out.
Finally the horrific sounds of booms, bangs and screeches of metal stop. Only the background sounds of flowing water and electrical charges is heard. Since the cables and piping are exposed.
The whole area looks like someone detonated a ridiculus amount of C4. We created a cavity, about kilometer on all sides, with our fight. Luckily we didn't have a fire user, because then the damage would have been even worse. The whole place would be full of smoke as well.
"Haah." I sigh. Even though these girls were quite strong, it was not as fun fighting them as it was against Zela...
I unsummon my sword and call the ice cocoon, that Jorgen is in, to me.
When I let him out of the cocoon, he calmly looks around. "It's unusual that you would survive a battle of this magnitude..." He says.
"That was the case before, but I have regained my memories and my power. You have no idea what I can do now." I smirk.
"Let's get out of here." I grab the two surviving Deas and create an ice pillar under us, that lifts us upwards.
....
....
....
-At the Haines mansion-
Samuel Haines is still sitting inside his office. But unlike before, there are now a bunch of people there with him.
Next to him is sitting an attractive woman, that has a supernatural feel to her. She is not like a Dea, yet she commands powers that break common sense.
She's currently using one of those powers to project what is happening inside the box.
The whole room has gone deathly quiet as they have just seen Artoria play with and then completely destroy their 3 assets.
"Haah..." Samuel sighs in defeat.
"Detonate the Box." He gives out the command.
The man beside him nods and pushes a button. When he does, the magical screen they used to watch the fight goes white.
Samuel heaves another sigh, this time of lament. Then he urges the people to leave his office.
Once everyone is out, he stands up and looks out the window, with his hands behind his back.
He has a feeling that the detonation didn't take out Artoria, based on the destruction he saw her create.
However he isn't that shaken by it, as he still has cards to play. He still has his most powerful asset alive and well...