The Last Dainv-Chapter 66 - BOOK 1 END

The Last Dainv-Chapter 66 - BOOK 1 END

Ink crawled onto Gale's skin, no longer seeping into him. Instead, it bloomed billions of lines of intricate shapes and patterns. Every part of his body, from the soles of his feet to the crown of his head, was written with the more complex symbols that he'd seen in the ship. Where before nothingness chilled his bones, a slight warmth spread from it into himself.
Time stretched and compressed. The knight
moved.
To him, it had already happened. Three strikes: a lunge, an overhead slash, and a low sweep that occurred all at the same key. It was as if the knight's own breath telegraphed itself before the actions were executed.
Gale sprang forward. Sword up, he charged ahead. The art called for no defense. Every thing must translate into an attack. The knight's sword met his with a thunderous clash. Letting his body spin from the impact, he put his feet onto the flat of the knight's blade.
"Her Majesty grows impatient!" Elliot's hands crackled. Blue sparks danced between his fingers. Lightning struck at both of them, but Gale had already pushed off from the knight's sword.
Perfect. Nine seconds until the lightning.
The knight chased. Two strikes. Both horizontal, in opposite directions, high and low. He let his body spin sideways. Sword passed through where his head had been and another passed below. Holding his own sword out, it hit the knight's visor before it could find another target. He needed to maintain all the knight's attention.
The knight's form split again in the same key. Multiple images reformed. Three strikes this time, all at the same point. He needed to dodge. Backwards, he rolled.
Seven seconds.
"Die! Die! Die!" Elliot shouted. The air grew thick with static charge.
Gale kept moving, leading the knight in a deadly dance through the rubble. Each step had to be perfect. Each dodge precisely timed.
Five seconds.
The knight's blade whistled past his ear. Gale twisted away. Thralls popping out of the rubble chased him and blocked Elliot's vision of the knight and himself. The madman's hands glowed brighter, blue fire crackled into a piercing high pitch.
Three seconds.
Another overhead slash from the knight. Gale blocked. Hands went numb as he let himself be blown away from the impact.
One second.
Lightning erupted from Elliot's hands, aimed at Gale. The blast split the air. At the last possible moment, he dove sideways, rolling behind a pile of rubble.
The knight paid the lightning no attention and chased after Gale. Blade carved away the rubble that surrounded him.
Phase two.
No hesitation left.
Gale burst from cover. Beeline sprint towards Elliot. The madman's hands were already moving with the familiar gesture of summoning a blue flame wall.
"Fool!" Elliot thrust both palms forward. Blue fire roared. Wall formed between them.
Gale skidded to a stop, pretending to be caught off guard by the flames. Behind him, the knight's sword carved through more thralls as it wildly swung in every direction.
The flames flickered and died. Five seconds of vulnerability.
Gale concentrated, channeling essence into Distort. The image around him bent as light refracted away from his body. He vanished from sight, just as Elliot's eyes swept the entire field.
Five.
The knight continued its rampage. Blade cut through anything that moved. Thralls and ghouls alike flew in halves.
Gale moved away from Elliot. The mad priest's head snapped back and forth, searching for him.
Four.
"Show yourself, coward!" Elliot's hands sparked. "Face Her Majesty's judgment!"
Gale activated Distort again, willing an illusion to come to life. Bile rose up from his throat as he kept his mouth closed. His eyes felt like they were about to pop. And then, a perfect copy of himself appeared in front of Elliot in a crude sword stance.
Three.
The knight's helmet snapped toward the illusion.
Two.
Gale's copy blocked Elliot's vision as it slowly twitched to hold its sword up. The sword even reflected the blue light from Elliot's remaining sparks.
The knight charged, form splitting and rejoining as it moved. Its blade swept toward the illusion in that familiar pattern, high slash first, then low.
One.
Elliot realized too late. His eyes widened as the knight's sword cleaved through the illusion and found Elliot's flesh. The giant blade carved through his chest, leaving trails of ink in its wake.
Blue fire sputtered in Elliot's hands. His mouth opened in a silent scream as the corruption ate at the fresh wound. The knight pulled its blade free from his flesh, swinging the blood away from its edge.
"Her... Majesty..." Elliot's words gurgled in his throat. Black veins invaded the fresh wound and the peristalsis that pulsed inwards before now flowed outwards.
The knight's form fractured again, sword already moving into its next attack pattern, a wild swing of random flurries all around. Each swing that missed Elliot by inches drove him back further.
Thralls collapsed around them as the thread of light connecting them to the madman weakened.
Blood mixed with corruption dripped from Elliot's wound. He tried crawling backwards, weak and sluggish as his nails bent off the remaining skin of his hands. The knight continued its assault, swinging its sword everywhere at the air.
Gale circled the crawling Elliot, turning off Distort. It wasn't over yet. It was just a mortal wound. One thing about game was that you don't stop till it's really dead. Although slow, some thralls were still active even as the thread that connected them to Elliot blinked on and off.
Elliot rolled onto his back, hands pressed to his chest. Miasma leaked between his fingers. His gaze directed to both the knight and Gale.
Sparks ignited around Elliot's hands. It was obvious he was no longer able to call upon the blue flames and lightning.
"Her Majesty will... will..." Elliot whispered.
Gale pounced forward the moment Elliot was far enough from the wildly swinging knight. In one breath, Gale had reached Elliot. Blade perfectly silent carved through the air, seperating Elliot's head from his shoulders.
The thralls dropped like puppets with cut strings. Their bodies hit the ground with dull thuds.
[Mission Complete.]
[Elliot the Defiled Felled…]
[Extracting Origin from prey…]
[Unstable Rift Opened.]
The silence lasted only a heartbeat. Metal screamed against metal. The knight's blade crashed into Gale's sword, launching him backwards.
The notifications scrolled past his vision, something about an unstable rift. However, the knight gave him no time to read it. The giant sword cut through the air where Gale's neck had been a split second before.
The knight's form fractured once again, attacking him from four different angles. Each strike came faster than the last, leaving trails of ink in its wake.
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Gale met the strikes head on, allowing the momentum from the giant sword to tell him how to move and weave.
One slow inwards breath. More lines of ink overlapped the previous over his body, now fully covering his flesh underneath. Stars and galaxies swirled beneath the symbols as he surrendered more control to the Void's breath. The world twisted further, vision inverting in a higher contrast of whites and blacks.
On the edge of his blade, Phase Touch flickered with a frequency that seemed to not exist. The knight's sword met his. Black sparks flew that ate at the white canvas.
Gale let the blade spin from its hilt, allowing that momentum to aim for the head. The knight had already moved its visor away from the sword's path before it stabbed through.
Light bent around Gale as he activated Distort. Multiple reflections of himself appeared around them. The knight's helmet snapped from one to another, tracking the real blade amongst the illusions.
Sweat ran down Gale's back as the fight dragged on. His essence drained with each passing second. Each strike that came from the knight became heavier and heavier.
[Essence: 5/100]
The knight's sword found its mark on the correct image. Gale countered by slipping through, striking at a joint.
And in that round, he saw it. A hairline crack in the armour near the knight's left side. It was the spot where Elliot's lightning struck true while he took the knight's attention.
There was one more card left up his sleeve. No way was he going to outsmart a literal force of nature. It was now or never.
He slipped his free hand into his left pocket and willed the screen of the storage box to appear. He quickly selected the vial to materialize in front of him. Closing the interface, he caught the vial mid air.
Gale raised his sword, meeting the knight's descending blade. He shattered off the lid in a hurry, putting the top of the vial into his mouth, sharp edges making his lips bleed.
[Consumed Compressed Origin Dust.]
[Essence: 100/100]
[All Output Increased.]
[All Skills temporarily increased by 1 Level.]
[Duration remaining: 299]
Time dilated. The edge of the knight's sword inched closer. The Compressed Dust burned Gale's throat as he swallowed. Heat spread through his pathways like liquid lightning.
The knight came down with enough force to disintegrate stone. Even though his output increased, Gale's muscles tore as he blocked the downward strike.
Essence surged through his body. Skin singed where the lines of symbols bloomed. Stars blazed beneath the nothingness that covered his being.
The knight's next strike split the air as a shockwave. Gale moved faster than ever before, appearing elsewhere in a blink of an eye.
Multiple swords materialized around him, each a perfect reflection of the Weber blade he held.
The knight's head snapped at each of the blades pointed towards it. The illusions were no longer just mere reflections. They were real.
Each of Gale's blades took on the touch of Phase, becoming sharp enough to distort reality. He altered the length of each blade to his will, variations unpredictable, and went in to the knight's space.
He struck at the hip joint. With it, reflections of the blade using his own stance struck at different joints of the shoulders, legs, and arms. The style became unpredictable and ever changing.
The knight didn't budge an inch. A strike was met with another strike, living the philosophy of offense.
Another stab through the visor. Blocked by the flat of the giant sword. Multiple swords stabbed at the open joints.
Yet none of this was enough.
The knight matched him blow for blow, its own blade leaving trails of starlight. Each clash sent shockwaves, blowing away the rubble in the castle.
The Compressed Dust burned in Gale's pathways. Time ticked away with each strike, each dodge.
Through this enhanced state, he saw a familiar unstable rift atop the demolished castle. It was not only the compressed dust's time that ticked away. The escape rift could disappear at any time.
Gale's eyes fixed on the crack in the knight's armour. One chance. One perfect strike.
The knight's blade swept toward him at ludicrous speed.
The world twisted. Stars burned brighter beneath the nothingness that bloomed into his skin. His sword met the knight's blade head-on. The impact almost sent his own sword flying.
The knight pressed forward, its form splitting again, similar to the reflections he used.
Gale danced through the barrage of strikes. Power coursed through his head, perceiving the limits and beyond. Void's breath showed him paths where there should be none, telling him intuitively which muscle to activate, how to breathe, and where to strike.
The knight's sword descended again, cutting through multiple reflections at once. Gale's real blade slipped past its guard, aiming for that hairline crack in the armour.
The blade slipped into the crack, metal screeched against metal. At the same time, blood sprayed, painting dirt and stone red as the knight's sword carved a deep line across his right thigh.
The knight staggered back, its form solidifying. The fractured images collapsed into a single shape.
"Young Lamb. Hurry, kill me." The words rasped from the helmet, followed by a scream that shook the castle walls.
Gale pushed forward through the pain, sword finding exposed weakness. The knight's blade snapped up, deflecting the strike. Metal rang against metal as the knight pressed its advantage, driving Gale back across the rubble-strewn floor.
Blood ran down Gale's leg, each step sending warmth down. Death from blood loss now in the table of ticking time.
The knight's attacks came relentlessly, but something had changed in the knight. The knight had slowed. No longer did it have its vigour and explosive speed. Its movements were now easily trackable by his eyes alone.
He couldn't risk stabbing at the crack again. He needed something stronger. Something that could pierce through the armour in one go.
Then it hit him. Two powers working as one. What if… Maybe…
Gale channelled Phase Touch onto his blade's edge, feeling the essence build up into the sword. The sharpness of the sword emitted a high frequency, something he didn't hear without the doping.
Then he added another layer. The reflection skill cast on top of his blade.
Leaping up into the air, he swung downwards, and a reflection split off from the sword, launching a single massive blade towards the knight. The blade itself enveloped Phase Touch, cutting through the air and hurling it even faster towards the target.
[Warning Max Load Breached.]
[Warning Current Load Usage: 150]
Pain exploded behind Gale's eyes. The world spun, and he no longer knew where up and down were. His skull felt like it might split open, but he forced himself to maintain the connection.
The reflected blades shot forward like arrows, trailing starlight and void. The knight moved its sword to block. However, Phase Touch let the reflections cleanly slice through the knight's chest silently. Only the sound of the crash behind the knight could be heard.
[Fallen Dainv felled.]
[The man who was once a star in the Academy, called to action against the blight of the other world. Corrupted and weakened by the Blue Moon, now he lies in slumber forever in the Eclipsed. Although fallen, he led his squad valiantly against the tide. May his forever sleep be peaceful in Aurumn's embrace.]
[Extracting Origin from Kin...]
[Core Density Increased: 11/12]
[Mind Core part built. Logical support system online.]
What the hell… he wanted to ask more. Tell him more. What he should do, but there was no time. The unstable rift wavered at the castle's peak.
He forced his injured leg to move, climbing the crumbling walls. The wound dripped with warm blood with every motion, but years of practice climbing trees made him feel like this was just a walk in the park. That was the only easy thing that came out of this whole goddamn thing.
The moon's massive eye blinked open above him.
[Warning: Extreme Danger.]
A lance of blue light speared down from the sky. Gale threw himself sideways, feeling the heat as it passed. The beam burned through stone, leaving molten rock in its wake.
The Compressed Origin Dust's effects vanished between one heartbeat and the next. Gale's stomach lurched, vomit wanting to come up from his stomach. The world tilted even more as the side effects of the doping kicked in.
Time felt like it was stretching on, similar to not wanting to do exercise. Each movement seemed to take hours as more blue lances rained down. He wove through them while climbing sideways to avoid each lance. Sweat ran into his eyes, making them sting. The headache pounded like a drum behind his temples, the back of his head, and both front eyes.
Stone crumbled under his fingers. The torn leg almost gave out. But the rift waited above, growing fainter by the second. Another lance of light split the air beside him, close enough to singe his clothes.
With one final vault, Gale reached the top. The small triangular rift flickered before him. Reality crackled around its edge.
He threw himself into it. Looking back, he saw the blue moon blink. Both middle fingers went up, directly back at it.
Before the lance could hit him, the world twisted. Colours inverted. Reality bent as he was sucked into the rift.
Gale snapped back into focus. He lay down on what felt like concrete. The smell of exhaust and rain filled his nose.
Something was off. This was the same street he grew up in. The park he would go to in order to escape the nagging and dive into the books he stole from the orphanage's library.
He looked up just in case he was still in a different world. The stars would tell him.
A familiar view of the night sky fell into his gaze. Unclouded, but the light pollution made it hard to tell where the stars were. Though it was clear. The stars and constellations matched what he had seen every night since he could remember. And every night thereafter would be mom telling him of the stories while pointing to different stars. Dad would teach him a different star map, mostly to tell him to memorize it.
Gale dropped to the sidewalk, keeping his head straight up at the starlight, drinking in the view. Rain dripped from the sky. The familiar scent of exhaust from cars in the distance gave him a sense of nostalgia.
Adrenaline in his veins slowly wore off. The nightmare was all over. His consciousness became hazy, blood loss setting in.
A man in a worn out suit stepped into view, blocking the stars before him. Smoke curled from the cigarette between his lips.
Sirens wailed in the background, closing in on his location. Red and blue lights strobed across the damp pavement. Dark figures crowded around him, all trying to get their hands on him.
The suddenness of everything reminded him of the hordes of thralls. But his body had nothing left to give. Darkness crept in from the edges of his vision.
His consciousness waned and all he thought of was needing to stay alive, to survive. Get stronger, and this time, not alone.
"Relax kid, we're here to help."
His muscles relaxed as those words came out of the man. If he's here to help, then let the man take him. He's got nothing else to give anyways. Maybe he'd even see Rachel's face the next time he woke up. Who knows...
They lifted Gale's body onto the stretcher, and loaded him in the ambulance. Before the world faded to black, there was one last thought that rang in his head.
Fuck solitude.

.
!
Chapter 66 - BOOK 1 END