Zelsys had a response; one born from every facet of her seclusion training put into practice all at once. Donning the Mantle to respond to one of Red's stratagems was, at this point, no longer new. A vast and terrible deluge of Metallum followed, all of Carnifex's Fangs screeching and splitting apart. Like slag flying from a mass of red-hot steel on the anvil, copies of each segment split from them and swirled around Zelsys. With each swing, it was as though Carnifex Fulguris multiplied, but this illusion quickly broke when these many disparate segments flew not like a segmented blade being swung, but like a great and terrible swarm forming many concentric, offset rings around their master.
SHREDDING FORMATION
MYRIAD BLADES DANCE IN UNISON
GEHEIMNIS: THOUSAND-FANG FLAMENCO
Much like her Blue Moon War-era tactic of creating swarms of Thundersaws, this technique was optimal for only two things: Cutting down many weaker foes at once, and defending against many weaker attacks at once. Ideally, both; it was ideally suited to keepaway against a horde of fodder. Strangely, most of the rays which struck her formation barely did anything, leading Zelsys to believe that Karmesin was using some advanced illusion.
The clash went on, until eventually, Karmesin let go. Zelsys wasn't sure why, even though she could tell each cannon out of that huge swarm fell apart after firing once. Only some twelve or thirteen beams had pierced her defenses, and eight of those had come close enough to hitting that she considered them a graze. Of these, five she had blocked with Carnifex, one she had split apart, and two more she had used her Thundergods to, for lack of a better term, bite trough. She could barely say she dodged them...
And yet, Karmesin just stopped. All at once, her remaining cannons swarmed off into the surrounding forest of pillars and didn't return. She was more than happy to stop this game; keeping up that many False Fangs was exhausting; had she not reabsorbed most of them, she would've stopped using so much metallomancy for fear of overstraining herself. Her head did ache, for all she knew she might've given herself spiritual strain already. Even so, she would be satisfied; that many False Fangs, sustained for that long, was a feat orders of magnitude beyond anything she had done with metallum before Eldartha.
Hundreds of False Fangs gathered around her, swirling and evaporating all at once as a vast deluge of Metallum flowed back into Zelsys. She was enveloped in a cocoon of black scale, out of which she stepped forward as if nothing had happened. Karmesin looked... Positively ragged. Zel wasn't surprised, she'd pulled some extremely impressive tricks thus far. The fact she could not just keep up, but give her one hell of a fight, was testament to either the Lady in Red's freakish growth in power, her mastery of the power she had, or, more likely, both.
"I'm impressed. And I mean that. You almost had me a couple times. And I mean that, as well."
Despite the fact she had come to terms with letting the fight go if Newman survived the 8x8x8x8 Black Blossoms, her own body didn't agree. It kept pestering. One more go. One more try. Even if victory was out of reach now, something inside Karmesin wanted to go for just one more bout. Vestiges of the martial artist which Karmesin once was wanted to go down fighting, rather than just admit she had no tricks left and walk away.
"Go to hell," the Red Mantis spat, but the anger in her voice had no vitriol. It was pure, combative fury. The tactical foreplanning was gone; all her plans had already been burned through, after all. This was just sheer defiance driving her. Her horns had become nearly dull and colorless, but with a hardening of her face into a pained grimace, she forced them once more to ring out. Each of her subcores floated into place somewhere on her body; two next to her shoulders, her forearms, her hips and her knees. Bulky, crimson-red armor began to form around her such that it would join them, resembling something halfway between a Third-model tank suit and Iron Rider armor.
Then, it stopped, and Red let out a deep-chested sigh, letting the construct fall away entirely. The anger wasn't gone from her, but it seemed as though she had gotten it under control.
"Oh what am I thinking, that's just tasteless. Crimson Command: Imperial Regalia!"
All eight subcores arrayed into a circle above her, revolving as they took on a glow. With a swift downward motion over her body, Karmesin's body became clad in armor not of the bulky and oversized kind, but subtle, understated plating in the places where she had lacked it. The subcores simply floated back into place behind her, forming constructs similar to her usual cannons, but slimmed, and indeed, what erupted from them were slim, rapierlike blades. Karmesin took up a low martial stance, extending her mantis-blade, coating its edge in northlight while gesturing with her left hand.
"One more round. I'll not use any true ranged attacks, only these Flying Eight-trigram Impalers. No major techniques. First to land a hit wins," Red challenge
"Hell, you had me at one more round," Zel grinned.
Their final bout was not one of life and death, as neither could kill the other within the restrictions they had agreed upon and within any reasonable span of time. It still looked nothing like a mortal fight. By the end of it all both were utterly exhausted and riddled with wounds.
“It seems… That we are at an impasse once again,” Zelsys grinned, leaning against her cleaver.
"So it seems," Karmesin agreed, doing the same with one of her impalers.
Karmesin's pseudo-dungeon sank beneath their feet, crumbling away as they both fell into the Sea of Fog. Then, they were back in the Crescent Jungle. Despite their murderous conflict, or perhaps because of it, the two of them returned to Oasis City in high spirits, contrasting with their exhausted state.
Akaso
If you’d like to read ahead, consider heading on over to the Patreon! You get up to 20 advance chapters for both Retribution Engine and Cherno Caster.
I’d also greatly appreciate it if you could rate my story, maybe even leave a review or advanced review!
For a link to the discord, check the synopsis.
Zelsys had a response; one born from every facet of her seclusion training put into practice all at once. Donning the Mantle to respond to one of Red's stratagems was, at this point, no longer new. A vast and terrible deluge of Metallum followed, all of Carnifex's Fangs screeching and splitting apart. Like slag flying from a mass of red-hot steel on the anvil, copies of each segment split from them and swirled around Zelsys. With each swing, it was as though Carnifex Fulguris multiplied, but this illusion quickly broke when these many disparate segments flew not like a segmented blade being swung, but like a great and terrible swarm forming many concentric, offset rings around their master.
SHREDDING FORMATION
MYRIAD BLADES DANCE IN UNISON
GEHEIMNIS: THOUSAND-FANG FLAMENCO
Much like her Blue Moon War-era tactic of creating swarms of Thundersaws, this technique was optimal for only two things: Cutting down many weaker foes at once, and defending against many weaker attacks at once. Ideally, both; it was ideally suited to keepaway against a horde of fodder. Strangely, most of the rays which struck her formation barely did anything, leading Zelsys to believe that Karmesin was using some advanced illusion.
The clash went on, until eventually, Karmesin let go. Zelsys wasn't sure why, even though she could tell each cannon out of that huge swarm fell apart after firing once. Only some twelve or thirteen beams had pierced her defenses, and eight of those had come close enough to hitting that she considered them a graze. Of these, five she had blocked with Carnifex, one she had split apart, and two more she had used her Thundergods to, for lack of a better term, bite trough. She could barely say she dodged them...
And yet, Karmesin just stopped. All at once, her remaining cannons swarmed off into the surrounding forest of pillars and didn't return. She was more than happy to stop this game; keeping up that many False Fangs was exhausting; had she not reabsorbed most of them, she would've stopped using so much metallomancy for fear of overstraining herself. Her head did ache, for all she knew she might've given herself spiritual strain already. Even so, she would be satisfied; that many False Fangs, sustained for that long, was a feat orders of magnitude beyond anything she had done with metallum before Eldartha.
Hundreds of False Fangs gathered around her, swirling and evaporating all at once as a vast deluge of Metallum flowed back into Zelsys. She was enveloped in a cocoon of black scale, out of which she stepped forward as if nothing had happened. Karmesin looked... Positively ragged. Zel wasn't surprised, she'd pulled some extremely impressive tricks thus far. The fact she could not just keep up, but give her one hell of a fight, was testament to either the Lady in Red's freakish growth in power, her mastery of the power she had, or, more likely, both.
"I'm impressed. And I mean that. You almost had me a couple times. And I mean that, as well."
Despite the fact she had come to terms with letting the fight go if Newman survived the 8x8x8x8 Black Blossoms, her own body didn't agree. It kept pestering. One more go. One more try. Even if victory was out of reach now, something inside Karmesin wanted to go for just one more bout. Vestiges of the martial artist which Karmesin once was wanted to go down fighting, rather than just admit she had no tricks left and walk away.
"Go to hell," the Red Mantis spat, but the anger in her voice had no vitriol. It was pure, combative fury. The tactical foreplanning was gone; all her plans had already been burned through, after all. This was just sheer defiance driving her. Her horns had become nearly dull and colorless, but with a hardening of her face into a pained grimace, she forced them once more to ring out. Each of her subcores floated into place somewhere on her body; two next to her shoulders, her forearms, her hips and her knees. Bulky, crimson-red armor began to form around her such that it would join them, resembling something halfway between a Third-model tank suit and Iron Rider armor.
Then, it stopped, and Red let out a deep-chested sigh, letting the construct fall away entirely. The anger wasn't gone from her, but it seemed as though she had gotten it under control.
"Oh what am I thinking, that's just tasteless. Crimson Command: Imperial Regalia!"
All eight subcores arrayed into a circle above her, revolving as they took on a glow. With a swift downward motion over her body, Karmesin's body became clad in armor not of the bulky and oversized kind, but subtle, understated plating in the places where she had lacked it. The subcores simply floated back into place behind her, forming constructs similar to her usual cannons, but slimmed, and indeed, what erupted from them were slim, rapierlike blades. Karmesin took up a low martial stance, extending her mantis-blade, coating its edge in northlight while gesturing with her left hand.
"One more round. I'll not use any true ranged attacks, only these Flying Eight-trigram Impalers. No major techniques. First to land a hit wins," Red challenge
"Hell, you had me at one more round," Zel grinned.
Their final bout was not one of life and death, as neither could kill the other within the restrictions they had agreed upon and within any reasonable span of time. It still looked nothing like a mortal fight. By the end of it all both were utterly exhausted and riddled with wounds.
“It seems… That we are at an impasse once again,” Zelsys grinned, leaning against her cleaver.
"So it seems," Karmesin agreed, doing the same with one of her impalers.
Karmesin's pseudo-dungeon sank beneath their feet, crumbling away as they both fell into the Sea of Fog. Then, they were back in the Crescent Jungle. Despite their murderous conflict, or perhaps because of it, the two of them returned to Oasis City in high spirits, contrasting with their exhausted state.
Akaso
If you’d like to read ahead, consider heading on over to the Patreon! You get up to 20 advance chapters for both Retribution Engine and Cherno Caster.
I’d also greatly appreciate it if you could rate my story, maybe even leave a review or advanced review!
For a link to the discord, check the synopsis.
