Arsh knew from the moment his shadow aspect became useless to him. The fight was going to turn into a one-sided assault after he had expended all of his stamina.
That was the only reason he tried everything in his power to keep his other aspects hidden. While fighting with other attributes might have given him a bit more support in the fight. It was never going to be enough to help him win.
And nobody except him in the world had multiple attributes in phase one. Giving away that kind of information could also result in cautious maneuvers from his opponents, and that was the last thing he wanted right now.
He just needed to catch them off guard somehow. And finish the bout with a surprise final spell. Though sadly enough, he did not have any strong spells in his arsenal. Most of the spells he knew were very passive and thus completely useless in the situation where he needed firepower.
And the damage-inflicting spells like fireball and the black fire were not simply strong enough to do any significant damage, much less to kill anyone with a single hit.
He didn't have much time to think either. As the battle raged on; he just started accumulating more and more damage without deciding on any course of action. To the point, many of his bones had already been crushed to dust.
At the last he found himself cornered. Crawling on the ground, he searched for any kind of tactic, idea, plan, or anything, anything to survive.
Searching through his memory Arsh stopped at one spell. Even though it was not even a bit useful in the situation but mixing it with a bit of cunning and an element of surprise. It just might work.
Arsh dug his daggers deep into the ground from the hilt. Making it look like he was surrendering to his executioners…. Inviting them closer to his body.
Arsh needed them as close as possible to the daggers. And that they did. By the time they could have realized what was going on. It was already too late.
Rock Slide|
The spell he had learned from the ax-welding adventurers just a few days ago. The spell was capable of launching small rocks in the air. Which he had used in his battle with the millennium.
Even that time he was astonished by the quickness of the spell. They were fast, very fast in fact. But the small rock was not capable of doing any damage to a third-phase person at all.
But if a dagger made up from one of the hardest bones in the world was on top of it. It could be deadly even for phase three humans if caught off-guard.
And that is what exactly happened.
Arsh suddenly fired the little rocks at the intruders with a slanted angle, aiming and hitting the throat at near point blank.
THUD
The opponents stumbled for a bit, before falling to the ground at the same time. As the light of their eyes slowly snuffed out completely.
Arsh looked back at the corpses on the ground somberly. He had won against two people who were in the same phase as Alan. An accomplished feat for him.
But strangely enough, he didn't feel happy. Not a bit. Instead, it was something complicated altogether. A mixture of many feelings such as rage, fear, relief, and sadness too.
Arsh felt his stomach churning for some reason. He sat up quickly and threw up on the ground a few times, before lying on the ground again.
'.... That's right.'
Disgusting. The most overbearing feeling of them all was disgust. He felt disgusting doing what he had just done. Taking a fellow human's life to survive himself. He knew it wasn't his fault in the slightest. But it still didn't help with the looming feeling of disgust he felt for himself.
I am going to kill anyone who comes in my way.
He had said that line at least dozens of times to himself and the others. But it was now at the very moment that he understood what his words signified. What kind of path it was going to be in the end.
A journey muddled with complete bloodshed.
And it was just the start of it all.
Arsh looked at his trembling body. His red eyes shook in sadness as he looked around. It was now that he understood many things he never did.
"....It truly is the start."
Arsh's dark voice resounded throughout the whole forest.
He couldn't let himself break over the death of his enemies. It was stupid and cowardly.
He had already buried his weakness before moving ahead toward his path. Though he was going to keep the feeling of disgust attached to him, to remember what he had taken from the others. Like how he remembered what others had taken away from him.
It was only fair.
Shadow Stature|
Arsh's shadow moved from the ground, rising to every wound in his body. Mending it by punching a hole in the skin and sewing the wound all together slowly.
But this time around, Arsh couldn't even feel any kind of pain from the process. He felt numb, as his attention was somewhere else entirely.
Arsh squatted down near the corpses as he looked at their faces for a few moments. Before pulling his daggers out of their throats mercilessly.
He did not have the time to rest. He needed to move back to the group now. Throwing a final glance at the corpses. Arsh mumbled softly.
"Don't resent me….. It was entirely your fault, to begin with. You always had a choice of not killing me but I didn't."
"Only you yourself are responsible for your brutal ending….. Rest in peace. At least as long as you can…. Before I reach the god of the underworld itself."
Arsh turned away from the corpses, running toward the direction of shouts and clunking metal at full speed. The fight on the other side was still raging on.
Even though he wasn't healed just yet. It was still enough for him to move back toward the group, hoping for the best. He was still very worried about the outcome regarding the adventurers.
But upon reaching there Arsh's eyes went wide. He witnessed an astonishing sight looking at the adventurers from the top of a tree near them.
Inwardly, he already had calculated the probability of the adventurers surviving close to none. But seeing them survive while holding their own against the intruders was a sight he never had expected in a thousand years.
Of course, it only was possible due to a single addition.
Nidia in her Griffin form was wreaking havoc on the intruders, while the adventurers were supporting her together.
It looked like an even fight from afar. But Arsh could tell the adventurers were winning.
Arsh jumped down the tree and moved toward the other side of the field. He saw the saint of the sun flying above in the air with not a single scratch on his body. While in contrast Alan was bloodied to the very brink, his clothes completely red along with Gelina who had lost her one wing in the brutal fight.
The white-robed saint moved again. Kicking Alan away he quickly turned around, clutching Gelina suddenly by the throat.
Letting out a sigh, the robed man smiled.
"Finally! I caught one of you. Now it is finally over."
But before Arsh could rush to save her. He felt an odd sensation running on his skin. An indescribable feeling as though...
Something vile was closing onto him.
He felt an uncontrollable urge to kneel, feeling the presence behind him. He couldn't speak or walk. He felt if he even moved a muscle that would be the very end of his life.
The presence stepped past him but Arsh didn't dare to raise his eyes to look at the overwhelming presence. His senses were screaming at him to keep himself down in front of the ominous being at any cost.
Suddenly he felt a sudden chill rolling down his spine. As he trembled in primordial fear. The feeling of dread clutched onto his heart as he heard the ominous voice.
[Filthy human. Keep your hands off my property, if you wish to live.]
Arsh ground his teeth in frustration. He was not going to cower against any being ever again. Denying his inner fear, he lifted his head. Looking directly toward the overwhelming being.
His eyes stopped at the terrifying yet beautiful being in front of him. The being had two beautiful dark horns growing out of its forehead.
A truly magnificent face with a tan skin color. So much so, it was truly impossible for him to discern the being between man and woman. Or probably they were not beings that could be bound by such things, to begin with.
It was a being Arsh could not comprehend from his realm of understanding. Probably ever.
Monarch of Desire. He was finally here.