Oct 16th, 1349 of the Fifth Epoch
Stacy was lounging around in a VIP seat near the end of a bar after having 'bribed' the owner to give her the status as a VIP.
'Such a useless village, even the best treatment can barely be considered survivable,' Stacy groaned internally while supping on the malt-beer in her hand.
Suddenly, she felt one of the connections she had formed with her only Beyonder subordinate vanish. The beer glass was slammed onto the table and she rushed out without bother to pay for anything. Thankfully, the table was made of a soft kind of wood to prevent precisely such situation with all the drunkard banking their glasses onto their tables, so it did not shatter.
However, Stacy did not care for that as she rushed out and took a quick turn into a dark alley.
Suddenly, she bent backwards at an inhuman angle while coming to a full stop.
*Bang*
A hole appeared in the stone wall to her side, and about an inch in front of her nose. Relying on her superhuman physical abilities, she leapt up into the air and quickly changed the location of the confrontation to the sides of the buildings as he leapt from one windowsill to the next until she reached the roof.
*Bang*
*Bang*
*Bang*
*Crash*
However, the cracks kept forming all around her, breaking the stones walls to either side of her, and even breaking a window which was bound to wake someone up despite how late at night it was.
'What in the world is going on! This has to be a Beyonder's ability! But who? No! Focus, that does not matter. What matters is getting out of here alive. I can figure out who later! F*ck!'
She groaned as the cause of the cracks, had caught up too her just as she reached the roof, causing a pebble-sized circular hole right through her knee. Still, she was able to remain standing as he swivelled her head in all directions to find the culprit.
While doing so, she called out in a panicked voice, "How are you so fast and accurate?!"
This was not a spur-of-the-moment action out of panic, but rather a compliment she was giving her attacker for two reasons. One was to hopefully Brainwash them using the most useful ability she learned as a Lawyer.
Unfortunately, the chances of that having any sort of effect were very low, and she did not count on that. Instead, she instead used her ability to Bribe people and bribed her attacker using the compliment into arrogance.
Using a weakness effect at first might have seemed like the thing to do, but that was also something that would be easily felt by her attacker, and they might either run away, which was not good for her as they could attack her again at any moment, while she did not know who her attacker was, or they might launch an all-out attack and kill her instantly.
Arrogance on the other hand would not be so easy to understand for the attacker and might give her the necessary time to use more of her abilities on her attacker.
*Bang*
Rather unfortunately for her, another hole appeared on her other leg, and this time, she collapsed onto the ground, unable to move any of her legs. Still, with adrenaline coursing through her body at inhuman levels due to her Barbarian physique, she used her hands to prop herself up and noticed a figure walking towards her.
Panic finally set in as she noticed that her arrogant bribe had not taken effect on her attacker, which could only mean they were of a higher sequence than her.
However, she was not resigned to her fate as she pulled out a black and rusted nail that was clearly some sort of Beyonder artefact. She had spent a considerable amount of her savings to exchange this item from those madmen, specifically for a time like this.
Squeezing it in one hand, she stabbed the nail into her hand creating a squelching sound of metal piercing flesh as it went from her palm to the back of her hand.
In an instant, Black shadowy tentacles emerged from the newly formed hole in her palm as she pulled out the artefact and threw it to the ground so she could use her other hand to prop herself up to face the enemy.
"I- I am not afraid of you!" She said to boost her own morale as she controlled the shadows that greedily absorbed her own blood and moved rapidly towards her attacking in an attempt to bind them.
And yet, under the crimson moonlight, a sword's reflection appeared in her vision as it easily cut through all the shadowy tentacles she had sent over, but the attacker was still casually approaching her. All the cut tentacles fell powerlessly to the ground, being corrupted as red-fleshy veins appeared on each of them before crumbling into nothingness.
"Then you will die braver than most," the attacker, who could now be identified as a male, slowly walked towards her while dealing with all the tentacles that came his way.
Stacy was currently powerless and could only feel fear.
The man bent down to her eye-level, with the sword raised in the air, as he spoke softly, just enough for her to hear.
"Do you remember?"
"Huh?"
"There was a house back in Intis. A house of two loving parents, and an innocent child. A workshop where they built things together, and made just enough money to survive. Yet, they were happy."
Stacy was still confused as where this was going, but she quickly used these few moments of respite to try and heal her own body to be able to escape when the chance came.
"And yet, some idiots thought they could take it all away and were beaten up by the parents. A show of perseverance in the face of adversity. Was that not something to be rewarded in this cruel and unforgiving world?"
Without warning, the sword found its way into her only uninjured limb, her hand causing her immense pain, not just physically but also spiritually as red veins formed on her hand and on her very soul.
"But a Beyonder came along and decided to intervene directly in the affairs of normal humans. She not only killed the strong-willed parents to make a show of the others living around them but also made sure to sell the child to slave traders heading to Backlund."
"Unfortunately, you have made me use my sword, so you will have to die. But only your body. Your soul on the other hand… Kekeke, it's coming with me. Let's see how long your will can survive before it is extinguished completely."
With trembling and watery eyes, Stacy turned to look at her attacker and saw someone she did not recognise at first. But then she recognised the silver hair and blood-red eyes as that of the female she had killed and then got scolded for a few long minutes as her unique traits would have made her a prized possession.
She matched the face of the only remaining family member, the child with the bloodied and creepily smiling face of the young man in front of her and was stunned as it was impossible for him to have grown so old in such a short amount of time.
That was the last thing she saw as the sword made its way directly through her face and out the back of her head, killing her without a change of revival as Max made sure to take her soul and send it to the Amalgamation of All for safekeeping.
He was not done with her yet, but doing it in the real world had too many risks, and it was better to just kill her and torture her soul instead. Plus, he could instantly replenish the energy of her soul, unlike her mortal body which would need Beyonder items and time as well to heal each time.
Still, the sadistic grin did not move from her face as he revelled in the satisfaction of having taken revenge. Just like Samuel had said, revenge did feel really good, and unlike other novels and movies, it did not leave you with a sense of emptiness, but rather a feeling of being complete.
It was the complete opposite, likely because earth back then was a 'civilised world' and portraying revenge over allowing the law enforcement to provide justice would be considered unethical, immoral and downright illegal. Perhaps that was why entertainment portrayed revenge as something that would never bring you joy, and it was an absolute lie.
'Or perhaps our minds are just twisted like that…' Samuel commented nonchalantly and Max simply shrugged, 'If it is so… then all the better. I don't need morality to survive in this world. All those with a just moral compass either fall behind those without or are just outright killed.'
Unity and Samuel simply nodded approvingly as Max sacrificed Stacy's body to his Sefirot, as well as her Beyonder characteristic.
'Nice, I got Sequence 7: Briber Beyonder Characteristic of the Black Emperor pathway, and a Sequence 8: Archaeologist Beyonder Characteristic of the Paragon Pathway. It's unfortunate that the Sequence 7: Shadow Ascetic Beyonder artefact was a one-time item, but I still got a lot of good stuff. Now, I wonder if I should just hand over these characteristics for Ademisaul's future students to help in advance, or if I should keep it and try to make Beyonder artefacts?'
'Yeah, let's just keep it. After all, Ademisaul had only just found another two students and it would take time to teach them about Mysticism, especially if Ademisaul had to investigate the Great Backlund smog incident. I'll decide when they actually are ready to become Beyonders.'
After thinking for a while, Max left this area and returned to his room with no proof that the fight had even occurred, other than the small holes in the bricks and that one broken window.
Since he had meticulously cleaned the area using Unity energy, no local Beyonders would find anything wrong with the scene and just treat it as someone using special bullets in their gun and ignore the matter, leaving it to the local police.
[How was this guys? this was my first proper action scene that I wrote myself without any copying or skipping over of major incidents in the fight itself. I hope it is interesting as I would now like to begin implementing more of such fights in the story as Max has finally reached some amount of strength, and will soon be much stronger after the Backlund smog incident.]