Soon, tens of HellSpires behind me launched forward with fiery vigor, the sound of whistling penetrating through my ears.
Fwoosh!
Fwoosh!
Fwoosh!
The vampires, halted by the power of Temporal Lock was unable to resist and could simply watch as the HellSpire bullets swirled around them, piercing through their foreheads like homing missiles.
Unfortunately for me, this was my first time using the ability of my Sacred Gear. So it didn't take long for my control over the Temporal Lock to diminish, allowing the rest of the vampires to move again.
Still, despite this, the bullets were relentless, despite trying their best to avoid it, some of them were still killed by the bullets.
'This is burning through my reserves too much.' I muttered to myself after sensing that almost half of my demonic energy has been depleted.
Maintaining the three spells in which each consumption is very high, wasn't something I could do with ease.
And so, seeing that the HellSpire bullets were no longer able to kill their targets, I deactivated my hold over them, cutting off the connection between the bullets and my Demonic Power.
Much to the relief of the remaining vampires who numbers could be counted in two hands, the bullets that were restless on chasing them, faded away.
On my side, I noticed Serafall looking at the scene with wide eyes. As if she couldn't believe that such simple spell that is considered basic, would have such devastating effects once used effectively.
"How's my performance?" Smirking in pride, I asked her.
"…How did you do that? Those are just Demonic Bullets, right? How can they be so lethal? They can hardly pierce through the skin of a Mid-class devil. But yours is like cutting a knife through butter!" Facing me, Serafall barraged me with several questions, signifying her sheer curiosity.
"As much as I'd like to answer you now. We're still not on a proper situation to do a QnA."
"What's QnA?" I heard Serafall mutter to herself, the question itself sounds more like she was asking herself.
"…H-Human….You killed my brethren! Do you know what you have just done?! You're declaring war to our Tepes clan!" The previous regal and composed elder vampire, now looks disheveled, his clothes covered in mud mixed with the blood of his fellow vampires who, unfortunately, are dead.
"And your point is? You want me to just stand here and let you all kill me? You vampires are honestly dumber than I expected. Those novels I read didn't give you enough justice." Throwing them an insult, though the last sentence was more to myself, I grinned as the elder vampire fumed in anger.
"You must be weakened now, right? This Mirror Dimension you speak off, combined with those weird flying arrows. I don't know how you managed to kill so many of us in a single second, but in the end, you're out of mana!"
'Huh, so they don't know they were suspended in time. Neat. I'm starting to love my Sacred Gear more and more.'
Thankfully, I resisted the urge to monologue like a cliche villain by telling them that I stopped their time hence they were unaware of what happened.
"You're right. I'm indeed out of mana. What's it to you?" Smirking, I lied through my teeth, 'confirming' his suspicions.
"Wait what? You're really out of Demonic Power?" Even Serafall beside me, couldn't believe it. So she asked me in a hushed tone.
"I'm just gonna let them take the initiative this time. I'm too bored to be the one rushing towards them." I answered back in the same manner.
My answer made Serafall look at me with a dull expression. Not expecting that the reason behind it was just because I don't feel like the one initiating the fight.
Grinning in confidence, the elder vampire pointed his pointy nail at me and yelled at his companions.
"Get him! I want to see his blood sucked and limbs mangled! Fail to do it, and none of you will live to attend the Blood Day!" As soon as he yelled, the remaining vampires, regaining confidence over the fact that I'm 'out' of demonic power, launched their figures towards me.
As for me, I was occupied with the last sentence that the elder vampire just said.
'Blood Day? What kind of a holiday is that?' I couldn't help but mutter to myself.
Stepping back, I dodged the first vampire's claw and delivered a swift kick to his abdomen.
Bam!
With my enhanced strength thanks to being a devil, the vampire I kicked was blasted across the forest, colliding with some of the vampires.
Then I shifted my formation in a form of waving my four fingers at them, challenging the vampires to come at me.
"I'll deal with you myself!" So easy to provoke.
On the other hand, I wasn't the only one being harrassed here as Serafall was also conjuring countless water and icicles that hurled towards the vampires, piercing through their bodies, injuring them on the process.
Unfortunately, her spells weren't like mine and it doesn't have any anti-healing properties, so she could only outpace the vampire's regeneration speed and kill them.
I could also sense that she was holding back. Those icicles weren't probably her strong ones.
As an Ultimate-class devil, I knew she can end all these vampires in a quick manner.
Back to me, unlike Serafall, I wasn't using any magic spells or such. Instead, I am maintaining the persona of running out of mana, resorting to using only my fists and kicks.
Bam!
Bam!
Whether they attack me from the left or right, or even from my behind, my fists would always find its way on their faces.
This is mostly thanks to my Time Sense, the passive skill given by my Longinus.
Time Sense basically enhances my perception of time, allowing me to experience the world in slow motion. This ability activates instinctively in moments of danger or when heightened awareness is necessary such as my current situation.
The vampire's claws that were rushing towards me, may look very fast and almost a blur to a normal human's eyes but to me, it is moving in a snail's pace.
I feel like I could even solve several mathematical equations while the vampire's claw is moving.
Time Sense combined with my incredible speed as a High-class devil, the vampires that were onto me were no match, each and every single one of them faced death after cracking their heads open.
Literally.
Before I knew it, only one Vampire was left. And since it's the only one left alive, I decided to break the Mirror Dimension or else it would continue to siphon my reserves and suck me dry.
"How about you? Are you coming or not?" I displayed my impatience on my face as if to insult him. Which did its wonders as the elder vampire growled in anger.
"Do you really think you two have won? This isn't over yet. I haven't used my ultimate ability yet!" While speaking, mist started to come out of his nostrils and ears, his skin slowly transforming into mist as he continued but this time, a victorious grin on his face.
"I mostly refrain from using this as it consumes too much of my life force but now, you forced me. No one has ever survived an encounter with this abi-"
"Dude. I'm not interested in whatever you're saying. So stop yapping and get on with it." To be honest, I'm actually really annoyed right now.
Do villains really have a knack of monologuing and revealing their trump cards?
"…Arrogant fool." Clicking his tongue, the elder vampire's entire body has already turned into a mist, spreading around me and Serafall, blinding our vision.
His head, which was the only thing left in his body that still complete, also became a mist.
"So turning into smoke is your ultimate ability? Can't say I'm not impressed." I said out loud, bearing a dull expression on my face.
"I think I've heard of this ability of vampires before." It was Serafall beside me who spoke.
"Really? What does it do?" I asked.
"It's nothing much really, it's just that we would be having a very hard time killing the elder vampire now. Not to mention, during this state, they could still use their racial ability which is manipulating darkness and shadow." As if to prove her words right, tendrils made of darkness suddenly pierced through the mist, heading towards us.
Thanks to my Time Sense, I was able to grab Serafall and jumped out of the way. Watching as the tendrils of darkness smashed on the ground.
Boom!
'So it's powerful enough to create a large crater? This would be troublesome. I'm not sure if I have spells that could deal with this mist.' While muttering to myself, I was already thinking of whether I should create a spell that could perhaps allow me to kill the elder vampire.
Suddenly, I was interrupted by a tug on my robe.
"Hmm? What is it, Sera?" I turned to look at her out of curiosity.
"I have a way to deal with this. It's actually quite easy. But it would take me a few seconds to cast the spell."
"So I just need to buy time for you to cast your spell?" I asked for confirmation.
"Yes. And also, I can't be moved or I'll be distracted. After all, I just created this spell a few weeks ago during my fight against that Archangel."
"You fought an archangel? Wait, hold that thought, answer it later once we're finished here."
Nodding my head, I sensed another tendril of darkness rushing towards us.
With Serafall already working on her spell, I wore my Sling Ring and started conjuring spells wherever the tendril attempts to hit us.
Everytime a tendril of darkness was about to hit either me or her, a portal would intercept the tendrils and even if it tens of tendrils came from different location, my portal would always manage to intercept them
With my upgrades, creating multiple portals was no longer a problem.
Heck, I'm not even sweating from the constant creation of the portals.
Not to mention my unique capability of having rapid demonic energy regeneration and being able to recover while using it, I can confidently say that I can maintain this activity for an indefinite amount of time.
"Are you ready!" After almost an entire minute of constant back and forth of portals and tendrils, Serafall finally spoke.
Creating another portal to stop a tendril, I turned back to look at her and saw a huge magic circle bearing the mark of the Sitri family, floating above her, the size being ten times larger than an average magic circle.
"Is that it?" I asked, despite the obvious.
"That's right! I call this spell, [Frostfall Cascade]!"
The next thing that happened made my eyes widen in shock.
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[Next Chapter: Ch. 39 - Killing a Vampire Elder [3]]
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