Bound Evil

Emily watched as dark blood dripped from her nose and fell to the stone floor. Her body was rioting against her, refusing to get up even when she screamed at it to move. The biggest reason was coming, as the Speter lumbered towards them with lethal intent.

Emily’s muscles spasmed, and she just about hunched over her spine coiling with pain.

The others weren't doing much better, save for Kael who seemed to be enduring it with his skills.

Things couldn’t continue like this so Emily moved a small amount of vitality up from her chest and into her extremities.

Normally Emily’s power could stave off disease and in most cases, it prevented her from even being infected in the first place, but this was different. Somehow this specter was directly controlling plagues and using it to attack them. Worst still, this time frame didn’t make any sense.

It had been a matter of minutes and they were experiencing the advanced stages of disease.

The thing was Emily’s power couldn’t stop it completely when the source of the skill was so close, but it could delay it. Burning through a small amount of vitality to push back the disease proved effective, allowing Emily to bundle it up and keep moving.

Emily got to her feet she saw the specter had already halved the distance between them.

Fine, they wanted to play with whips? Emily could play at that game.

Pulling another piece of power from her chest caused a stream of blood to run from her hand and collected all the other nearby blood lessening the cost as a thick tendril of blood condensed him Emily’s left hand.

Swinging it outward she cracked the whip against the chest of the approaching specter, this caused it to take a step back as it narrowed its gaze on her. Emily felt as the disease in her body wrestled to get free but it was unable to break out of the packet of life force she’d wrapped it in.

That was when the smaller specter with the whip decided to intervene, bringing its weapon down towards Emily’s skull.

Her own whip was still recoiling from the previous hit but now it changed direction all at once and smacked into the incoming attack.

The specter didn’t give up and pulled back for another strike but Emily blocked that too. Parrying the block at the exact point of contact. The sound in the room was suddenly drowned out by a series of impacts as the two of them were evenly matched. Emily had no real skill with the whip, but she made up for it with her blood manipulation. On the other hand it was clear that whoever this specter had been in life was well-versed with the weapon. Perhaps even being supported by its title.

While this was happening Kael moved to block the incoming specter, he glanced back at Oscar for just a second before they collided.

“Clear it, and help me fight. We’re not getting away at this point.”

After that, the cyan vapor pouring from his body seemed to double and his skin began to shine with perspiration.

When Kael engaged he had the weapon advantage because the spear was far more effective in a large open space than a flail. However, even with that he still had to fight an opponent twice his size while wrestling against the disease. The unpredictability of the flail did not make it any easier.

Oscar on the other hand seemed to get up and point his dagger at his own heart. At the point of contact spread black veins and even though he seemed in pain Oscar continued until his condition rapidly improved.

Emily frowned, had he scoured away the disease? Was that something black source could do? When Oscar was up he glanced over at Alex who was still reeling on the ground. He seemed to pause in thought, but then he turned away and made for the battlefield.

Moving past Kael and his opponent, Oscar went straight for the whip-wielding menace Emily had been holding off.

The moment they engaged in battle it freed Emily up to turn her weapon on the Viscount of Plague. It had been dangerously swinging its fail, forcing Kael back with each encounter. But when the blood whip came from behind it was forced to react and block Emily’s attack. In doing so it left an opening and Kael capitalized on it. His spear was about to connect with its collarbone –or thereabouts– when the specter pulled the very same move as its subordinate had earlier.

It moved its arm up into the path of the attack, scarificing it. If the spear had connected, Kael would have been able to end the fight then and there. Instead, the specter's arm shattered releasing the sealed plague into the surroundings. Kael tried to back off but the cloud was too fast as it covered the area around him.

The flail swung down and crashed into the Kael, sending him flying backward.

Unfortunately, he went flying past Alex leaving the guy completely without protection. Emily swung the blood whip down and lashed the specter but it seemed to have homed in on Alex’s weakened form. Emily lashed the creature over and over, yet it paid her no mind, reaching down for Alex. Emily was about to abandon the whip and launch a spear when Alex suddenly rolled out of the way. He stood up, wobbling as he did so but raised his weapons as his skin flushed red as sweat poured down from his body. It looked like a heavy fever had taken hold, but then Emily realized that might be his plan. He was artificially raising his body temperature to slow down whatever ailment was festering inside him. Either way, it gave him enough time to dive out of the way of the second strike and the third as he tried to disengage.

Kael had recovered by now and lunged back in taking some of the pressure off Alex. While Emily swung the blood whip once more and connected with the back of the creature’s icy skull. She’d been going for its title stone but it ducked at the last second.

This time though, instead of breaking the connection Emily rooted the whip into the ice.

The creature was far stronger than her but she used the base of the whip to root herself to the stone floor and pulled, causing the specter to become unbalanced. Alex was close enough to take advantage of this and tacked one of the thing's legs. Leveraging his full weight into it and causing it to fall backward. The flail fell from its hand and Emily felt it the moment Oscar killed the other specter.

This seemed to enrage the Viscount of Plague and a hollow screech echoed from its body. With its now free hand, it grabbed Emily's blood whip, attached to its head, and ripped it free, pulling on it with its full strength. Emily’s arms were suddenly yanked as the cords she’d set down snapped like tree roots and she was sent flying into the air.

While airborne Emily flipped herself and dissolved the whip in her hands, moving it to surround her. When she crashed on the other side of the creature, her blood cushioned the blow by expanding and retracting rapidly.

The dissipated force meant she rolled onto her feet in seconds before reshaping the blood into a cord and latching onto the specter's icy palm.

With its remaining arm incapacitated, the specter wasn't able to stop Alex from plunging his daggers into its neck and shattering the surrounding ice, exposing the title stone. Before he could land the killing blow, however, the ice around its neck suddenly expanded and crashed into both Kael and him. Alex went flying through the air like a kite with its strings cut and crashed to the ground while Kael blocked but his spear was sent spiraling out of his grip.

Emily grunted and was about to take things into her own hands when Kael reached down with his bare hands and plunged it into the specter.

At first, Emily thought it was a trick of the ice, but then she made out his hand as it seemed to turn to liquid and weave unnaturally into the space. His whole body then changed to become less physical.

There was something unsettling about watching the man’s hand twist and contort to fit into the groves of the ice as he grasped the title stone. When he took hold of the stone, the specter thrashed and attempted to knock him off with a headbutt, but Kael’s body deformed and then rapidly reshaped itself.

One final wail was all that it managed to get out before Kael pulled the stone from its home and the specter fell apart.

Kael stood over the corpse panting as his body continued to ungulate like the tides before solidifying and becoming whole again. The skill must have taken a lot out of him because he fell to one knee as he got his breathing under control.

“Oscar get your ass over here!” he growled as he clutched his arm to his chest.

Emily looked over to the man but the Viscount of Plague’s vitality hit at that point causing her to stagger.

Sitting down before she fell down Emily easily felt around ten lives worth of energy entering her. The problem was how cold it was getting. Shivers began to move down her body even though the room was boiling and got to the point where her teeth began to chatter. Things would have gotten worse if her vitality didn’t kick in at the last moment. With that kill her threshold seemed to release and Emily felt the life force in her blood rapidly condensing down again.

Emily closed her eyes and let the shift in her power deepen, feeling the changes.

With the first threshold met she knew a fair amount of costs were halved. For example, she could now create double the amount of blood bolts for the price of one. The next technique was one she’d missed the most, resorption. Holding out her hand all the blood in the room rushed toward her and entered through the pores in her skin, returning about two lives worth of life force to her. It still wasn’t as much as directly feeding on someone but it made for a far easier time in combat. Not to mention clean up.

While she was confirming everything was working Emily glanced up at Oscar and saw that he had already cleansed Kael of the disease.

Alex was still on the floor breathing heavily so Emily made her way over.

“Hey, come fix him too” Emily pointed at Alex.

Now that the specter was dead, the direct threat was gone and this meant that the plague would not advance unnaturally anymore, but it was still spread throughout their bodies.

Oscar looked at Alex and pursed his lips.

“Boss I don’t know if I have the strength to fix them both. It might be better for them to take a tonic and rest naturally.”

Emily frowned.

“Don’t worry about me, I’m golden. Just fix him.” Emily couldn’t help the nose bleed at that point as her body pushed out the infected, black blood.

Kale made an annoyed grunt and took out a tonic.

“Here take it. Oscar get Alexander up. We don’t have time to wait for him to recover naturally.”

Oscar looked reluctant but nodded as he moved to Alex’s side and placed the tip of his sword against his heart.

Emily watched the man work with interest.

“I was under the impression only white source could heal”

Oscar's eyes remained on Alex as he worked but he did answer.

“Black source is the end of all things. Things like disease, poison, and curses rot away eventually. I’m just accelerating that process.”

Emily hadn’t expected it but it turned out that black source was one of the most powerful purifying colors. Though that was probably to be expected seeing as its origin was the same as white. Turning back toward the entrance Emily looked around for Nox but didn’t see him anywhere. He should have heard the quiet by now so then where was he? Poking her head out into the hallway Emily shifted but didn’t see anything.

“Guys it looks like we are going to have to backtrack, I don’t see Nox,” she said as she poked her thumb over her shoulder.

Blood points: 107