Melufilous wasted no time, and unleashed his sword collection; all the flying dangerous weapons in the sky, with different types of auras surrounding them, started to charge towards Ana at breakneck speed.
[Active Skill: Lightning Blitz activated]
"!" Ana too buckled up his falling trousers and with impossible speed, started to dodge the rain of sharpness by running around in irregular patterns.
Ting Ting Ting
The swords that missed Ana by yards, pierced straight into the ground after landing with impeccable momentum, rotting the very volatile magma mud to lethal black ash.
"Tch." Ana noticed that the swords were mixed with some kind of magic which made them extremely dangerous to touch, and that only made it impossible for him to drop Toti from his hand, so naturally, Ana decided to go and kill the enemy at once.
[Active Skill: Lightning Blitz deactivated]
"What the-" Ana stumbled a little but then immediately tried to reactivate his skill.
WOOOOSH
A scimitar zoomed past Ana's long silvery fluttering hair, the gap between the two being less than a meter, but the sword's black miasma felt toxic and dreadful up close.
Ting Ting Ting
[Active Skill: Lightning Blitz activated]
This time Ana ran straight towards Melufilous, with the flying swords all chasing after him like missiles, leaving a trail of black rot on the ground that Ana marked with his feet.
"Tch." Having enough time now that everything appeared slow to him, Ana looked towards Melufilous with murderous eyes, and the deadly weapons meant to hinder him were far too slow and too far away to even catch up to him.
Tiiiiiing
An ear piercing sound came from the sky and Ana found that Melufilous had sheathed his katana and entered a drawing stance, with his eyes closed and hands ready, as he radiated a blackish translucent sphere made of his aura which smelled like death and gloominess.
Ana figured that the swordsman's intention was to lure him in, meaning that Melufilous wanted to get a straight, simple slice on his sprinting body.
"As if." But Ana wasn't going to fall for such a simple tactic, so with his supreme velocity, he teleported just beside Melufilous, the time interval being so less that Ana's afterimage was still a mile away, in the place where he originally was before the sword rain started.
"Die." Ana thrusted his sharp nails towards Melufilous's ribs, thinking he had entered Melufilous' blind spot by coming to his right side, the side opposite to where Melufilous was holding his sheathed katana, but just before his hand reached the black translucent aura, his skill deactivated again.
[Active Skill: Lightning Blitz deactivated]
SLICE
And at the exact next moment, Melufilous's katana sliced straight into Ana's hand, cutting open half his palm.
[Pawn Melufilous declares Check on the Black King]
"!!!" Ana jumped back immediately, as multiple swords started to fall all over the place, while he tried to ignore the tremendous pain that hit his hand at once.
[Active Skill: Lightning Blitz activated]
Ana forced his skill to activate again, and jumped away, this time backwards, further than a mile away.
Looking to check whether the skill was malfunctioning because of his smartwatch, Ana looked towards his wrist and found it completely intact, not even a speck of dust on it, however, the same could not be said for Toti, whom Ana had forgotten about completely.
The unconscious boy was half naked and looked extremely weak and fragile, and Ana who, for some reason, could sense Toti's vitality, felt that it was rapidly fading away.
[Curse of Belladonna's Rot acquired]
[Warning! Female Body (SSS) has taken damage]
[Repelling Curse of Belladonna's Rot…]
But before Ana could worry about Toti, he also found that his hand, which ached tremendously, was starting to turn black slowly.
[Warning! Melufilous's Domain has encroached 30%]
[Warning! Escape the Domain as soon as possible]
Tiiiing
The swords again slowly began to follow Ana, their master afterall, had declared Ana to be a thorn that needed to be removed.
"Fine. If that's how it is." Ana threw Toti up in the air and breathed out hot fumes, opening his lightning coloured eyes to the maximum to focus on only one person.
"I'll finish this just as you want."
As Toti's body began to rise up in the air, Ana increased his speed even further and zoomed in straight towards Melufilous, walking right through the sword garden that was yet to notice that their target had already changed locations.
"..." Melufilous hadn't expected Ana to return so soon, therefore being unprepared, but to counter again, he relied on a different sword technique, an upward slash, neat, agile and clean.
Bam
With his rotting cut hand, Ana punched Melufilous' black mana sphere, breaking it open and continued it straight towards Melufilous.
[Melufilous' Domain broken successfully]
Albeit Melufilous was fast, his sword wasn't fast enough to reply to Ana's aggressive attack, and Melufilous watched with an expressive face, as his chest was punched open, his muscles fibres bursting one by one and his bones exploding with extreme fury, all happening with just the power of a single person's punch.
Ana, who was finally close enough to notice Melufilous' face, saw that his black stubble wasn't contorting in fear, instead, it seemed to be curving up like a smile.
[Active Skill: Lightning Blitz deactivated]
"You are indeed foolish." Melufilous sliced into Ana's torso, but when the sword stopped after penetrating a few inches, Melufilous grabbed Ana's neck with his other hand. "What king attacks a pawn themself?"
"What-" Ana was astonished, not because his skill had stopped working again, but because his punch had stopped too, it had stopped after entering just a few inches, similar to Melufilous' sword.
[Pawn Melufilous cannot be captured while it is being protected by another piece]
Ana's eyes widened in shock, as he realized what the message on his screen meant.
"That's right, Pride." A girl's voice came from far away.
Ana hurriedly turned his vision to see who this person was.
A girl with a body to die for, an extremely attractive shape, but with no color except a ghastly mash up of black, white, and grey, flickering like the screen in a retro television, was standing with grace and holding Toti in her arms.
"Did you really think you only had to fight him?"
"!!!" Ana tried to dash towards that girl, but his skill didn't activate.
[Active Skill: Lightning Blitz failed]
Slicee
And also, Melufilous sliced his katana further into Ana's body.
[Pawn Melufilous has declared Check on the Black King]
"Aghh-" Ana's voice came out when his entire cut skin started to emanate black vapors.
[Warning! Curse of Belladonna's Rot in effect]
[Warning! Female Body (SSS) is taking damage…]
"Ah my dear Pride." The mysterious girl put her abominable hand on Toti's face, soaking out a stream of blood from his nose, which she further redirected into Toti's mouth. "We may not have the same wounds, but that does not mean I do not understand how yours feel."
Ana glared at her as she continued to torment Toti, not understanding who she was and why she was here.
[Checkmate Sequence initiated. Failure to continue will result in Forced Checkmate]
"The prophecy was incorrect." Melufilous took back Ana's attention by squeezing his neck.
"There will be no one Prideful enough to stop us."
[Warning! Melufilous's Domain has begun encroaching...]
A black translucent sphere again started to form all around Melufilous.
[Warning! Escape the Domain as soon as possible]
"Ackgh-" Ana grabbed Melufilous' hands and tried to break free but the feeling of numbness in the places that had been cut and also the fact that his skills weren't working, made him feel weak and tired.
[Active Skill: - failed]
[Warning! Capacity Exceeded!]
[Raise Patriarch Rank to increase Capacity]
"In the end, you were no great one, but just a fool.." Melufilous put force in his katana and started to cut in deeper into Ana.
"Shut up." Ana did not wince in pain however, he rather got too angry for that. "Shut up shut up shut up."
All the useless errors in his system, complicated terms that made no sense, and an absolute despicable and pathetic sense of powerlessness forced Ana to his limits, so he finally fell back to the only thing he could trust, his sheer will.
"Don't open your mouth."
[Active Skill: Lightning Blitz failed]
[Active Skill: Lightning Blitz failed]
[Active Skill: Lightning Blitz failed]
"EVER AGAIN."
[Active Skill: Lightning Blitz activated]
"-!" Melufilous, startled by Ana's sudden power, began to react but his speed was much too slow, for Ana's rotten hand gouged out both his eyeballs in one swipe.
Wham
[Melufilous' Domain broken successfully]
Ana kicked on Melufilous's abdomen, jerking his body away from the nerve-wracking cursed katana, and then flashed with lightning speed directly towards Toti and his torturer.
But the mysterious woman liquified by the time Ana reached them, nonetheless Ana managed to grab Toti's falling body which had nothing to support it.
"Who are you?!" Ana then screamed at thin air, calling out the person who had just disappeared. "Why are you attacking us?!"
"Me?" The woman reappeared right infront of Ana's eyes.
… pause…
Time stopped completely, and everything became motionless, even Ana himself.
"But I'm only attacking you." The girl touched Ana's wrist watch.
[Character names that hold no hostility towards the user will not be displayed]
"Do you not know me, love?" The girl then brought her featureless face close to Ana and softly spoke with a kind and feminine voice.
"!!!" Ana was stunned.
It was a voice that he recognized, a voice that has scarred him for life.