NOVEL NEXT Chapter 143: Fimbulwinter
The glimmering crescent shape of a blade flew toward Marie, only to be slashed into crystal powder by a sharp claw before it could reach her.
"I see you've developed a few new tricks, Zulie." Marie scoffed.
"Shit…! Damn it! Fuck! Damn it! Damn you! How can you be okay with this?! How can you just… accept this?!" Zulema's chest huffed over and over while angrily gripping her scythe. She swung desperately at the empty air, firing three more perfect arcs of ghostly crescents through the air directly at Marie.
Each icy projectile was parried by Lucia's quick strikes.
"I thought you cared about your Sisters! About us!"
"You sister believes you to be dead, you know."
"Shut your fucking mouth!" Zulema screamed at the top of her lungs before lunging forward with her double-edged scythe. She closed the distance between her and Marie in mere seconds and brought her blade down hard. Marie didn't flinch however, as her bodyguard—the mindless Lucia—blocked the attack again with her claw. Zula jumped back before striking again with a flurry of swipes from her blade, and each time she was greeted by Lucy's eyeless face viciously snarling mere inches from hers with each swing that crashed down against the cold steel of her claw.
"Here comes another cleansing flame!" shouted Marie from behind as another group of large fiery orbs flew toward Zulema.
"No!" The ice maiden pushed her weapon against Lucia and threw herself backwards, narrowly avoiding an orb that would have hit them both. Before she could catch her breath, two more came arcing toward her from each side. She spun her weapon as fast as she could, attempting to block them by making a rotating shield. Both fireballs pushed against her weapon with an audible sizzle, throwing steam high up into the air between them. Zula clenched her teeth as the projectiles forced her to slide back through the snow before finally deflecting them with a swing. The two weakened balls crashed into a nearby tree, sending a cascade of snow hurtling to the ground.
"I simply cannot stress what an exemplary captain you could have been, Zulie."
"You almost killed her!" Zulema glanced at Lucia, who sat terrifyingly still on all fours as she tilted her head while looking back at her.
"My dear, sweet Zulie. She's already dead. Were you not just trying to put her out of her misery a moment ago?"
"That's different! You don't care at all what happens to her! That's not the Marie I know! What—What did they do to you? It's… insane…" Zulema trailed off. There was no point debating it—Marie's mind had been lost to their madness. Zula's mind raced for answers. How was she supposed to fight against that insane zealotry without being lost herself? She reminded herself what she knew about lunacy. Craziness. It was all over the place. It was unpredictable. She needed something that could fight against it. Not just physically but mentally as well. She remembered all of the anguish she been put through to land her in her current situation. Being kidnapped by Derleth. Her family believing her to be dead. The loss of her purpose. Insanity was always in flux, never focusing on any one thing for too long. But despair… despair was a constant. Perhaps to fight against insanity, she needed to use the certainty of despair. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes.
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"What are you doing, Zulie? Giving up already?" Marie motioned to Lucia. "Kill her, Lucia, if you would."
The mindless beast threw herself at Zulema, who seemed to be lost in thought. Her claw came down with wild abandon plunging into the ex-priestess's neckline. Or so it seemed.
Steel clashed against the unbreakable ice of winter as frost spread across Zulema's body. Her snow-white dress melted and reshaped itself into an ethereal armor with intricate glacial patterns that mimicked the designs of her old Scarlet uniform. Another heavy-looking pauldron formed on her other shoulder and crawled down her arm, fitting it in a icy gauntlet. The breastplate meanwhile took on a slim, sleek form-fitting shape that fit her torso perfectly. The bottom of her dress melted onto her thighs and transformed into thick thigh boots that climbed up her waist at the sides. As she opened her eye, the bandages on her head melted away and coalesced into something grander. A houndskull that stretched outward like the needle-nose snout of a perrin, concealing her face except for a single opening around her lone eye that was radiating a silvery glow. The helm concealed her identity, connecting to a glacial gorget that wrapped around her neck. The Sister of Eternal Winter was born.
Lucia's remaining claw went flying off her hand and the glacial knight swung her scythe faster than she could react. The beast was forced to jump back in retreat.
"ACCEPT YOUR ABSOLUTION!" Marie scowled as she raised her artifact again. The fireballs cloaked in a shadowy dark purple flew out again and homed in on the knightly Zulema. She spun her weapon without delay, swinging at the orbs destroying two of them with ease while putting a special force on the last to parry it back towards its caster. But just as the orb almost made contact with Marie, the bestial Lucia jumped in between them and was set ablaze in a howlingly painful flame.
Zulema gasped as she watched the flames engulf her old friend. The dark blaze burned through her ragged robes and singed her hair. She dropped down into the snow and collapsed.
"Oh dear. Look what you've gone and done, Zulie." Marie eyed the changed Zulema. "Well, it seems your wicked transformation into blasphemy is complete."
"Leave, Marie. It's over. I don't want to have to kill you too."
"Kill me? Zulie, you underestimate your poor Sisters."
"What?"
Lucia's charred body flinched as it lay in the steaming snow. The ghoulish Sister slowly rose up back to her feet, her body blackened and peeling from the fire. Her robes had burned away to reveal a nude body that was strapped in a painful looking harness that barely concealed anything. Thorned leather bit into her body around her shoulders and thighs, crossing around her breasts and torso, seemingly continuing her punishment as a penitente. Lucia reached around her back and unhooked something that was attached to her. In her hand was a staff connected to a chain whose other end hooked onto an elongated bar of hefty, spiked metal. The priestess flicked her wrist, whipping her old flail against the snow violently.
"Lucy… Dear Goddess…" Zulema mumbled.
"Let us finish her, my dear Lucia." Marie grinned sickeningly behind her mask as she held up her artifact again. "Once and for all."
Solis Fulmen Natura!
A sudden fireball came bolting down from the sky, knocking the artifact out of Marie's hand.