Rise of the Faceless Demon

Brog's headless corpse sprawled, spilling thick red fluid. The stench of rusted iron and entrails evaporated thickly, suffocating the air.

Silas landed. His steel-tipped leather shoes crushed the limestone floor. No thudding sound. Only solid vibrations crawling through the mossy water puddle. The pale man bent his knees, his defective joint anatomy twisting to mimic the limbs of a bird of prey. He shot forward, a dark silhouette piercing the blue phosphor glow.

The black metal sword in his hand swung, cutting through the wind.

Luka raised the snatched iron sword, blocking the trajectory.

Clang!

Sparks spurted wildly. The impact vibration did not stop at the sword blade. The energy crawled, tearing the nerves of Luka's left arm. The weight of Silas's attack was illogical. The syndicate leader's gaunt body stored the destructive force of a cliff boulder.

Luka dragged backward. His boots scratched the wet stone.

Silas granted no pause. The pale man rotated his wrist. His gaunt arm crunched loudly. His bones shifted roughly, piercing his leather coat sleeve, elongating and changing shape. His attack range widened twice the size of a normal human.

The second slash came from a blind spot. Bottom right.

Luka twisted his waist. He kicked the water puddle toward Silas's face. Filth and mud flew into the air.

Silas did not blink. His black blade cut the filthy water. Slashing dead center into Luka's left ribs.

Blood sprayed. Skin and flesh tore open. Luka grunted hard. His teeth clashed painfully. He ignored the burning sting in his left chest. His right hand wrapped in the torn sleeve clenched. The reddish mutated arm throbbed. He retaliated. Charging forward with a horizontal slash aiming for the neck.

Silas ducked. Extremely fluid. His body anatomy moved beyond reason.

"Too rough." Silas hissed. His black nails gripped Luka's face from below.

Those long ice-cold fingers embedded into Luka's cheek skin. Pushing his skull backward with brutal force. Slamming his body striking a stalagmite pillar in the center of the hall.

Crash.

Sharp stone pierced his back. Luka coughed. Air pushed out by force from his lungs.

Silas twirled his black sword casual. The tip of his weapon dripped the prince's blood. The defective man tilted his head.

"You wear his name. You mimic your father's wrath. But you fight like a dog fighting over a bone." Silas stepped closer. His bird knee joints creaked. "The grand King Reinhardt. Know what he offered Ulric before his head was chopped? He crawled. Crying begging for his own life to be bought with gold."

Luka's brain boiled. The heat from his solar plexus crawled feral to his neck. The thick stitches on his head throbbed painfully. That false memory tore his sanity. His father never begged. His father was a king.

"Shut your mouth." Luka charged forward.

Three consecutive slashes. Top. Left. Straight thrust.

Silas parried them all with just one hand. His black metal moved minimal. Deflecting Luka's sword trajectories with high-level precision. Sparks kept igniting illuminating Silas's pale face. The caste difference of this fight was too steep. Silas was at the Threshold of Echo. A Stage 3 Soul Energy ruler.

"It is the truth, Boy." Silas tilted his sword, locking Luka's blade. His free left arm elongated fast. That black-nailed fist punched Luka's solar plexus.

A blunt impact.

Luka folded forward. Acidic fluid rose to his esophagus.

Silas kicked Luka's knee. The crow leg embedded its nails into the kneecap. Luka fell kneeling on Brog's blood puddle.

"You nobles claim power from the sky." Silas circled Luka. "But when death collects its debt, you eat the same mud as us."

At the end of the hall, Rhea was pressed against the limestone wall. Vance's giant hand pinned the maid's shoulder. Vance's three rows of shark teeth grinned smelling blood.

Rhea did not thrash. Her gray eyes locked onto Luka's movements in the center of the hall. Her face hard. Devoid of fear. Only cold calculation.

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Luka embedded his sword into the floor. Supporting his body from collapsing kissing his enemy's shoes. Blood dripped from his nose and ribs. He pulled greedy oxygen.

Silas's attack range was illogical. The man could sever veins from three meters away.

Luka tore the remnants of his black cloak. Freeing movement. He rose. His thick-scaled right arm billowed reddish steam. His body temperature spiked drastic burning the pain. His monster flesh thrashed demanding blood.

Silas laughed. The hoarse voice of a scavenger animal. "A monster hand. Interesting. The Sin of Wrath devours your sanity."

The syndicate leader brought both his hands together. His spine crunched in succession. His long leather coat tore at the shoulder blades. Pitch-black feathers pierced the skin.

The flawless mutation of the Threshold of Echo. The manifestation form of the Sin of Greed swallowed his human body.

Silas's arms were no longer normal limbs. Stunted wings grew at his elbows, ending in sharp curving four-fingered claws. That pale face shifted. His jaw elongated forward. His nose melted merging with his upper lip. Hardening into a dark beak crusted with blood. Devoid of eyeballs on that mutated face. Only an expanse of pale skin wrapping tight his eye sockets.

The blind crow monster tilted its head. Olfactory instinct replaced visual.

In the dark corners of the cave, the assassins held their breaths. Vance narrowed his eyes. Lysandra gripped her dagger tight. They had seen this form.

Luka sprinted circling to the left side.

Silas whipped his black sword. His range now pierced four meters. The air cleaved by force.

Luka dropped himself. Sliding on the wet floor. The black sword cut the hem of his shirt. He rose instantly. Shooting thrusting his snatched sword straight toward Silas's ribs.

Clang.

The sword blade halted. Silas used his new jaw. The large beak embraced Luka's sword metal. The pointed teeth inside the beak locked the iron.

Silas pulled his neck backward. Hard.

The sword slipped from Luka's left hand. The weapon thrown falling to a dark corner of the hall.

Luka did not retreat seeking cover. His mutated right hand clenched. He punched Silas's beak with full force.

Red scales clashed with bone beak.

Crash.

Silas staggered. The claw grip on his feet wavered.

Luka jumped. He aimed for the neck. Yet Silas's crow arm swept from below. Black claws tore Luka's right thigh.

Blood spurted. Thigh muscles tore severely.

Luka fell, striking the water puddle. Filthy splashes covered his face. Agony crawled to his groin. He failed to stand straight. His leg veins partially severed. He crawled backward.

Silas stood adjusting his neck bone position. His beak bore a small crack on the left side.

The crow monster opened its beak wide. The sound of wet regurgitation echoed. The veins in Silas's throat expanded.

The defective man vomited a long object from the bottom of his inner stomach. Slime smelling of bile and filthy blood covered the metal. A serrated chain whip. An enemy weapon he once killed and ate.

The chain whip swung.

The serrated tip struck Luka's shoulder. Tearing skin. Flesh peeled. Luka growled rough. He rolled evading the follow-up whip. The limestone floor shattered scattering hit by the lash.

Silas vomited a weapon again. A double-serrated dagger. His left claw caught the slimy metal.

Dual attack. The whip holding long-range movement, the dagger ready to cut from close range.

Luka pushed backward. His boots shifted approaching the stalagmite cliff. His mutated hand throbbed stinging enduring the bleeding on his ribs. His strength thinned. Blood puddles flooded his own feet. Pure brawling would yield no results. Their levels differed.

His brain worked processing street tactics. An assassin's rationalization took over the remaining prince ego.

If you cannot break his strength, use his arrogance.

Luka stared at his own blood dripping to the floor. His left hand groped his waist. He drew his hunting dagger. The filthy iron blade he used to stab Brog's gut. The weapon was not merely smeared with blood. Before he kicked this cave door, Rhea had bathed the metal with black sap. A cell-destroying nerve poison.

Luka ducked, enduring the pain in his thigh. He deliberately left his defense open, baiting the predator.

Silas stepped closer. The chain whip lashed Luka's back. His back skin tore open. Luka did not evade. He accepted the blow to cut distance.

Silas twisted his left claw, thrusting the dagger straight to pierce Luka's chest.

Luka raised his mutated arm, blocking the lethal thrust upon his red scales. In that exact second, his left hand shot forward from a blind spot, thrusting the hunting dagger straight to pierce Silas's bird thigh.

Iron embedded, tearing and piercing pale flesh.

Silas thrashed. His crow leg kicked Luka away. Luka launched hard, striking a stalagmite.

The crow monster stood straight. Its beak emitted a demeaning snort. Its long claws pulled the small dagger from the thigh and threw it to the floor. The wound on his leg was merely the width of a leech bite—a shallow scratch that did not paralyze movement at all.

"Cheap trick." Silas's beak mocked. "The bite of a dying animal."

Luka rose, resting on his knees. He spat filthy blood to the floor. His pitch-black eye stared intently at the syndicate leader's body.

On Silas's thigh, black fluid began seeping into the blood vessels. The arteries around the scratch wound slowly turned pitch black, crawling slowly to deaden the nerve cells toward the heart. Rhea's poison began working from the inside, burning flesh without a sound.

Luka's mutated right hand clenched hard. He wiped the blood on his chin.

"You swallowed too many carcasses," Luka whispered, his voice echoing cleaving the phosphor room. "Our fight has just begun.”

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