Wrath Reincarnated

CYRUS

Greed took Cy's Light Beam blast full tilt; he didn't raise his sword or hands, and he didn't even try to invoke a defensive Script. The blast just consumed him until his body disappeared within its radiance.

Cy kept the Scroll going for a few seconds, until the Ryoku he'd stolen depleted, and a mix of sand and haze wafted in front of him. I wonder if I can recharge my own Ryoku pool with his? That Script was pretty hard to control, though… Might accidentally kill myself—

But shit! Tensa has got some power to him! Oh, crap.

The dust began to settle, and Greed held his ground from the attack. Blood trailed down his head, arms, clothes—which were now tattered, except for the cloak Vessel—and everything else. The only thing that remained in tact on Greed untouched was his sheer shock.

But no damage to him? What the hell? Think I need to take back what I said about my Vessel…

"How… How did you do that!?" Excitement overtook Greed's expression. "I infused my Ryoku into Drakon, and you just stole it—like that!" He snapped his fingers, which showed no sign of harm, besides the caked and dripping blood on them. "Now I really want that Vessel of yours!"

He gripped his scimitar with both hands and raised it high overhead, then slashed down at Cy, who lunged to the side. With eyes wide open and glistening even in the growing darkness, Greed hammered into Cy with strike after strike. Since Tensa was depleted of the stolen Ryoku, Cy only focused on defense, as striking Greed wouldn't do much. In fact, it might heal him faster than his Regeneration—

Oh. The idea formed crystal clear in his mind. I did hurt him! I hurt him bad, but after years of torture, his Regeneration Skill has to be miles ahead of Jules and Kat's. Damn, that's a serious problem. If I kill him, I have to make sure he stays dead for a while.

Cy continued to block and deflect Greed's blade, until he noticed a pattern. Greed—Jafar—he doesn't like to fight with a sword, does he? For his strength, his strikes aren't too powerful or efficient. Blades must not be a Skill that he picked up. I can win this, or at least buy some time for Jules to show up. I just need more Ryoku first.

Cy parried a blow, then kicked Jafar in the chest and created some space between them.

"You want my Vessel? You can have it if you kill me. But I'm going all in on this next attack, and there's plenty of your Ryoku left, so you better do the same!" Cy didn't give the Desert Mouse any time to think through the deceit; he just gave him enough time to react to the threat.

Seven lights on Greed's body lit up along with his eyes. He called upon the necklace, ring, dagger, cloak, scimitar, glove, and bracelet Vessels all at once.

Tensa crashed into the scimitar, and Cy felt the Ryoku aura Greed pumped into his Vessels, Tensa claimed all that went into the scimitar first, immediately upon contact. It buckled under Cy's force, and he disarmed Greed, then struck four more of the six remaining Vessels, claiming all but the glove and dagger.

Tensa flooded with power and grew unwieldy—Cy's hands cramped around its handle involuntarily from the Ryoku pressure.

"How…the hell…Do you have this much Ryoku?" Cy asked through clenched teeth. He'd have to be damn near Genius Rank!

Greed drew his dagger and held it in his left, gloved hand. Two Vessels in one spot? He's making it easy for me to hit them. Must not know what Tensa truly does, or how it works. Time to annihilate his ass.

Cy spun in a full circle to power-strike Greed; he had to get rid of all this Ryoku soon or he would lose his hands. Greed turned his body and intercepted the blow with a raised right arm that came right off, along with part of his torso and neck.

Tensa struck the sand, and Cy couldn't believe it—he'd won. With plenty of Ryoku to spare inside his Vessel, Cy invoked a Script to trap Greed in place.

«« Spellbinding Cir— » » [Cy]

Greed grabbed Cy's throat and cut him off before he could finish. How!? He looked down and saw that Greed's arm and torso had already reconnected to his body. No way his Regeneration works that quickly!

While his limb fell, Greed had used his left arm to push it back in place, spearing it in the side with his dagger like some flailing fish. Greed's grip tightened, and Cy coughed and wheezed.

"You really think I'm too stupid to see how your Vessel works?" Cy couldn't respond without air. "I'm afraid I don't have to kill you to take your Vessel, you little punk." Greed tossed his dagger into the sand, then cross his left hand over his body and grabbed Tensa's blade. With a wicked smile, the Sin invoked his own Seal.

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« Greed »

He yanked Tensa from Cy's grips, then flung Cy away like trash. Greed knelt down over a defenseless Cy, who laid on his back in the sand. "What's yours is mine. Now—All I want to know is one simple thing: Where is Kazuma?"

ENVY

The Shadow Realm cracked around her like broken glass; cracks emerged all over and refracted the world, distorting images at their seams. And then it all shattered, and Kat was somewhere else entirely.

A man. Demonic mask, Samurai armor. A man a woman knelt before him.

No, Kat thought. They're begging, pleading with him for some reason.

The Samurai walked past them. The man put his forehead to the ground and sobbed; the woman grabbed his armored boots and clawed her way up his shin guards. An older woman behind them held a crying baby. An infant, but not a newborn, she shrieked and shivered in the cold air.

"Please!" The young woman shouted. "Salvos, please—spare her!"

"Odessa," the Samurai said. "Her Seal."

Odessa? So this is…

Kat looked around. She didn't exist in this place, not yet, anyway, but she recognized it from how the others described it while she was knocked out.

The Raventrees' underground lair. So then this man is…

"No," Odessa said. "It's been months since you left that Fateful Night, Musashi. Why come see her after all this time?"

The younger woman continued to cry and beg and offer; the man kept his silent lips to the dirt.

Musashi unclipped his oni helmet. He removed it, then dropped it to the ground. Odessa gasped and recoiled. Whatever was wrong with the Alter's face, Kat couldn't see from behind, and she couldn't move.

Am I not possessing someone's body right now?

"I have been watching her for some time, Odessa."

"How did… Who could have done this to you?" Odessa asked.

"I sought another, and paid the price," Musashi answered. "I am not here to harm the Child. Jiro, Mira, please stand. I simply seek to learn who she is. That is all I've come to do."

Odessa glared at Musashi for some time. Neither Mira nor Jiro obeyed the order to rise. Seraphina's grandmother, on the other hand, gave in, if only slightly.

"It's the number 2, Musashi. She is Lust."

"Two? That makes four. Thank you, Odessa. I see now."

"I highly doubt that."

And explosion went off inside Kat's head, and she was back in the real world. The Iron Maiden was once again far away, and Lust was once again before her, fuming with rage.

Thank Salvos The Iron Maiden is gone, but why did I see that vision? What does that have to do with me? Before Kat could think anymore, Lust charged her and tackled her to the ground. Both girls tried to grabs the other's arms and pin them down. Sand got in Kat's eyes, but the pain paled in comparison to their flesh coming in contact, with Lust's having some Holy affinity to it.

Slobber and drool dripped from Lust's mouth, which was filled with teeth that had sharpened during the Black Sacrament to make her truly look like a demon. Painful tears streamed from the berserker Sin's eyes, and eye shadow leaked down her face.

"Hey you bitch—Listen up in there!" Kat screamed in Lust's ear. "I just had a vision of you when you were a baby for some reason—" Lust scratched a deep gash into Kat's cheek. "OW! I don't know why I saw it, so I'll leave that for you to figure out, but Musashi spared you when you were—ugh—a baby!"

As Lust raised both hands together in a hammer fist, Kat saw a puppeteer thread stretch out from a shoulder. It's horizontal, not vertical anymore? Lust's fists pounded down on Kat's chest and knocked the air out of her. A wheezing gasp broke out of her involuntarily and air rushed back into her lungs.

"Well right about now I wish he killed you!" Kat intercepted the next hammer fist attack, wrapped her legs around Lust's arms and neck, and tried to lock in an arm-bar. "Wake up in there, Sera! Are you this weak!?" She held Lust as steady as she could, then braced herself for some inevitable self-harm.

«« Raining Arrows »» [Kat]

Arrows shot down at them from the sky. A few pierced Kat, but one severed the thread tying Lust to The Iron Maiden. Lust's eyes softened up for just a moment, when another thread stabbed her in the back and turned them back to pure black.

«« See if you can break these threads, Child. »» [The Iron Maiden]

The voice came from Lust's lips but belonged to The Iron Maiden. All of the fallen Elementalists and Nomads around them slowly got to their feet with dead and expressionless eyes. Their slack jacks fell open, and their bodies moved around awkwardly like a crab had possessed them. She's struggling to control them while fighting The Nomad—

A dozen of them charged after Kat, who had to abandon her hold on Lust. The zombies reached out and tried to tackle her, and soon she was overwhelmed.

«« Summon Bow and Arrows »» [Kat]

Kat knocked as many arrows as she could hold and blasted any body that came too close. Careful to aim for the threads she could see from her Vessel eye, she felled a few of them, but more arrived to take their place. Fuck! She has an endless and growing supply of bodies to control out on a battlefield.

"Come on, Lust! Break through—you aren't dead like these morons! Your family begged Musashi to keep you alive, and for what, this!?"

Lust tilted her head to that and stopped her approach, but Kat didn't have that luxury and kept filling up dead bodies with even more arrows, until at last a black raven fluttered down and landed on Kat's shoulder.

"R-Raven…" Lust muttered, in her own voice. Raven? Kat glanced at the bird that had made her shoulder its stoop.

"Hey, you her Familiar?" The bird nodded. "Any advice!?" It shook its head. "You're all worthless!!" Kat thrust both her palms out in front of her. Time to rest in peace, you poor bastards.

«« Summon Quiver »» [Kat]

Dozens, then hundreds, then thousands of arrows shot out of her hands, and by the end of the attack, none stood but Lust, until she collapsed on one knee. Arrows stuck out of her at every angle and slowly faded away back to mist, back to the Void.

«« If the girl dies, then so be it. »» [The Iron Maiden]

What…?

« Lust »

The berserker Sin's Seal lit up and blinded even Kat's Vessel eye. She shielded her face and felt the raven hop off her shoulder—it tried to intercept the attack from its master, but she annihilated it to dust, and then the attack melted Kat's skin.