[Juliana's PoV]
The Fallen threw Amelia to the side as if he were discarding garbage.
She landed with a harsh thud that made her bleed even faster. Her body convulsed violently as she choked on her own blood. One of her arms reached for the sky, an instinctive attempt to escape. Then it fell into the pool of blood.
Amelia was too weak to even breathe. In between spasms, she took in small, tiny breaths and immediately coughed them back up as blood.
Red gore perverted her previously beautiful pale skin and blue hair.
An intense lightning cackled around Juliana as she hyperventilated from anger. Wind itself cried as the force of built-up energy caused her hair to flow in the air. Any passerby would clearly be able to see that she was charging a powerful spell.
The Nephilim Fallen disregarded this fury just as he had Amelia, stepping forward with a smile.
"Is that all you can muster? A great Valkyrie mage like yourself? Some firecrackers."
Soon, he was right next to her face, walking through the tornado of energy with ease. His skull smiled again, revealing an endless black behind its teeth.
Lowering his eyesockets to her face, the Nephilim Fallen said, "Here. I moved closer for you. Maybe I'll feel something now."
'You want to be cocky deckhead? Ok. I'll show you my magic isn't something to play around with.'
Juliana screamed as even more lightning and wind collected around her. The sky itself listened to her call, blocking out the sun with the darkest clouds. The earth cried as just the small bolts jumping from her body scorched it a pitch black.
Her eyes turned completely scarlet red as she lost herself to the lightning. She became one with such a penultimate force of destruction as lightning coursed through her very being.
Then she focused all that energy into a single point. Collecting it in her right hand, she called on the sky itself to smite the enemy before her.
"Die." She said as she spat into the Nephilim's smile.
The next instant, heaven itself struck him with the force of a trillion volts. Just the byproduct of the energy scorched the surrounding battlefield, instantly melting gravestones and evaporating the air itself.
Lightning hit the Nephilim square in the chest, sending him flying through the air.
He quickly caught himself, turned mid-air, and landed elegantly on the ground. Smoke concealed the damage, but his laughter suggested it was minuscule.
Juliana watched in disbelief as she panted, resting her hand on her legs. There was no way he took no damage...
What kind of enemy was he? To just take a strike like that with no damage?
Doom walked through the smoke as nothing more than a silhouette. The second he finished his journey, Juliana knew she was going to die.
Still, even if her energy was almost fully drained she would fight to the end.
He stopped at the edge of the smoke, causing only his face to peer through it. His head cocked to the side as he laughed and said, "Juliana, you are a mage, no? I thought you'd be more creative."
Juliana gasped as he walked through the smoke. A huge hole started at his chest and ended where his waste would be. Any being should've died after taking that much damage...
"You really think I would die just because you killed me? I'm already dead, Juliana. Nothing short of complete destruction can kill any Fallen, let alone one like me."
Juliana furrowed her brows as she summoned more lightning, doing her best to hide her fatigue. "Then that just means I need to damage you more, a$$hole."
He sighed before covering his face in his hands. A lightning bolt zapped him as Juliana tried to take advantage of his lowered guard, but it landed innocently on his face.
"Is this what has become of magic? Has the most pristine power ever created really fallen into the hands of apes?"
The Nephilim Fallen lowered his hand from his head and then snapped his finger. Nothing existed right where he just stoo–
"Ahh!"
Juliana cried as something hit her from behind, sending her flying to the ground.
"Despicable. I knew my mercy was unwarranted. You're not a mage and Nick isn't a Progenitor. Both of you are nothing more than food for the lower life forms."
His bony fingers grasped around Juliana's neck before squeezing.
"You're no mage. You're no Valkyrie. You're nothing. Now, fall before real magic."
Energy emanated from his hand, sizzling the skin of her neck. The pain was unbearable, like a thousand needles stabbed into her neck while a molten rock was pressed against it at the same time.
Not a single cry of pain escaped her lips. She didn't even wince. Death would not have her here, and that's the only fact that mattered.
He was right– magic dealt with a lot more than destruction. There were 5 main applications for magic, and only one of them was Annihilation. Numbers alone made the variety of magic abundantly clear.
Yet for all of his snide remarks, even he resorted to destruction. Because at the end of the day, if someone was powerful enough deceit meant nothing. What is a lie or distraction going to do when a single spell could erase an entire kingdom from history books?
Even if he claimed magic was far more beautiful than sublime destruction, he knew that law. And it was clear he believed his magic was far superior to Juliana's.
Which was probably true. However, when it came to tenacity, he couldn't remotely compare.
Juliana laughed as her skin sizzled. The red glow of her eyes illuminated her face with a scarlet hue.
"Laughter? What could create such laughter? A false sense of security? Juliana, dear. Do you think some sort of trickery could defeat me?"
Lightning crackled across her fingertips as she continued laughing. The Nephilim Fallen pressed his fingers deeper into her neck, cutting off her air completely.
Still, he could feel her soundless laughter crescendo as her vibrating vocal cords pushed against his grasp.
'I don't need trickery, a$$hole. I just need to make sure I don't go overboard.'
Then she activated [Tempest's Rage] as she directed her lightning between them so that they'd both take damage. When the skeleton's friend had revived her, that probably disabled Nick's [Emperor's Will] effect.
She hoped that her health would drop below 20% but that she wouldn't kill herself. So far, that part seemed successful.
Next, she needed that dammed idiot to wake up.
Like the Nephilim Fallen had proven, strength and destruction prevailed over anything else. Soon, he would be defeated at his own game.
"So, you damaged yourself? Was that your great plan? Almost die just to get a bit of bone? Congratulations, then!"
Her sides screamed in agony as she silently laughed.
'I wasn't even planning on damaging you at all, weakling. I was aiming at myself. Creating that huge hole in your bony gut was enough for me. Nick... I trust you to do the rest.'