Chapter 92: Chapter 91 - A Deadly Game of Cat and Mouse
As the knights charged, Teclos raised several dark hands from the ground, trying to bind and slow them down.
Then he gathered darkness beneath his feet and dashed sideways onto a dark square that formed in midair. His body shot upward, avoiding the first fire-coated sword slash that carved through the place where his chest had been a heartbeat earlier.
The second knight followed him immediately, propelled by a jet stream from his feet, his blade sweeping upward in a blazing arc.
Teclos reacted in time and kicked off another shadow step, twisted above the slash, and released a shadow slash of his own toward the knight.
A wide pitch-black arc flew down toward the knight’s neck.
The man raised his blade in defense, with blazing fire bursting from the sword’s edge, swallowing the attack before it could do any harm.
"Careful," the second knight said midair. "This cockroaches moves are strange."
Teclos landed on the wall for half a second, darkness gathering beneath his boots, then pushed off again.
Behind him, Falcon clashed with Cassian and the third knight.
Falcon stretched out his hand, and wind burst forward, throwing dust and loose stones toward them, creating brief cover while simultaneously shooting himself backward.
He hovered just above the ground, then snapped his sword upward.
A wind slash howled toward the third knight and Cassian.
Cassian dodged, vanishing in a flash of light before reappearing on Falcon’s left side. His sword cut across in a diagonal slash coated with light.
Falcon bent backward midair, and the blade grazed his chin as it passed. He countered by thrusting his sword toward Cassian’s chest, but Cassian dodged by turning his torso sideways.
Cassian lifted his sword and tried to split Falcon in half, but in the next second, he was blown away by a blast of wind from Falcon’s other hand, sending him skidding back.
The water knight appeared on Falcon’s right and released a wave from his hand before Falcon could escape.
Water mana wrapped around Falcon’s legs in a spiraling current and tried to pull him in.
Falcon released a massive burst of wind pressure from his feet and shot upward, trying to escape.
But Cassian had already appeared beneath him.
"Disappear."
A dense stream of light gathered in Cassian’s palm.
Falcon’s eyes widened.
In the next second, a beam of white-gold mana tore toward him.
He barely shifted aside.
The blast tore through his coat and armor, lightly burning his skin before exploding against the ceiling.
The explosion sent chunks of stone raining back down toward him.
Falcon cursed, threw a dagger at Cassian, then stretched out both hands.
Wind gathered in his palms and began spinning into a violent vortex, shielding him from most of the falling rubble.
—
On the other side of the corridor, Teclos was being pushed back by both knights.
They were weaker than Cassian, but they were still knights. Their footwork was steady, their timing clean, and every time Teclos tried to disappear into the darkness or counter them, they blocked him.
A fireball exploded against the wall beside him, and Teclos used the opportunity to blend into the smoke.
Darkness wrapped around him like a cloak, swallowing his outline as he slipped behind a broken stone pillar.
The knights lost him for a second, and an opportunity presented itself.
Barbed hands of darkness shot out from the shadows beneath them.
Both knights were momentarily caught in a bind, and some of the barbs scraped through the gaps in their armor, drawing blood.
Teclos then appeared behind one of them, silent as the night, his sword coated in darkness, and thrust toward the back of his neck.
But the second knight saw him and reacted just in time.
A wall of fire burst between them, forcing Teclos to back off.
Teclos clicked his tongue and shadow stepped backward as the flames washed past his face.
"Annoying," he muttered.
The first knight ripped free from the barbed hand, blood running down his greave.
"Hah! Says the running and hiding cockroach."
Teclos raised his left hand.
Dark spikes erupted from the ground, aiming for the still-bound knight.
But in that same moment, the knight broke free. Fire mana burst from behind him, ripping him out of the bind and propelling him straight toward Teclos.
His blade came down with enough force to cut Teclos in half.
Teclos jumped back, but the knight redirected the slash from vertical to horizontal mid-swing. The sword scraped across Teclos’s breastplate, leaving a black, scorched scar across both armor and skin.
Teclos clicked his tongue and disengaged, throwing up a black curtain between them as more barbed hands of darkness burst from the ground to slow the knight’s pursuit.
Then he thought of the perfect distraction.
His gaze flicked past the knights, toward the egg wrapped in the tarp behind them.
The knights were guarding it carefully, but not carefully enough.
Teclos raised one hand.
A thin tendril rose from the floor and reached toward the egg, intending to wrap around it.
One of the knights noticed it too late and shouted.
"The egg!"
The tendril coiled around the tarp and yanked, trying to pull it away.
Cassian’s head snapped toward the egg.
With one hand, he released a flash of light that blinded Falcon for a moment. With the other, he fired two thin rays from his fingers.
They cut through the tendril instantly.
Teclos felt the connection burn away and frowned.
’Damn.’
Cassian had not moved from Falcon’s side, yet he had still countered him perfectly.
Once Falcon’s vision cleared, he looked toward Teclos, then toward the egg.
Teclos might not have succeeded, but he had made that blond bastard nervous.
Falcon then dove toward the egg from above, using a sudden wind burst to close the distance.
The water knight moved to intercept, summoning a wave of water to flush him out of the air, but Falcon opened his hand and, with a pulling motion, dragged the air away from the man’s face.
The knight choked, and his steps faltered.
He tried to gasp for air, but there was no air to take in.
Falcon kept his hand clenched, maintaining the vacuum, and flew inward toward the egg.
But before he reached it or knocked out the knight, Cassian flashed in front of him with his sword raised high above his head.
Falcon was forced to release the vacuum and block.
Their swords clashed.
Light and wind mana cracked against each other, sending a shockwave through the corridor.
The water knight dropped to one knee, coughing and gasping for breath.
Falcon, meanwhile, was thrown down to the ground and skidded across it.
"Kghh!"
He clenched his teeth and forced himself to stop, his arms aching from the clash.
Before Cassian could press his attack further, Teclos slipped past the knights and made another attempt for the egg.
This time, when another explosion obscured him, he sent a shadow in one direction with a trace of his mana inside it as a decoy. At the same time, he erased his presence and rushed toward the egg.
The knights attacked the decoy and destroyed it in a second.
But that second was all Teclos needed.
He reached for the egg, intending to snatch it and run.
Then Cassian appeared behind him.
Teclos turned quickly, and their blades clashed.
Light burst from Cassian’s sword, tearing apart the darkness around Teclos. The force also blew back his hood.
For the first time, Cassian saw his face clearly.
A young man with pitch-black eyes and a cold expression.
Cassian’s brows furrowed slightly.
"A kid?"
As Teclos was blown away, he could not stop himself against the force. He rolled across the ground before being brought to a hard stop by a rock.
The air was knocked out of his lungs.
Cassian wondered how a kid was causing them so much trouble.
And the way he used mana...
It was like watching a veteran fighter.
The two fire knights finally joined back in.
"For gods’ sake, can you two knuckleheads keep him away from the egg already?"
The knights grunted in embarrassment and trapped Teclos between a wall of flames.
He summoned six dark limbs from his back, spider-like and sharp, and used them to launch himself onto the ceiling. The limbs dug into the stone, carrying him across it as he rushed away.
Against all three of them at once, he had no chance.
The two knights froze for a second, stunned by the sight. The way he moved looked wrong, like something that should not belong to a human body.
Cassian snapped them out of it.
"Go after him!"
Then he looked to the side, only to see Falcon use the distraction Teclos had created to behead the water knight.
Everything had gone wrong the moment those two assassins appeared.
And one of them was a damn kid.
Cassian’s rage exploded, and he rushed Falcon with a war cry.
Another battle of speed began on that side of the corridor, with Cassian trying to catch Falcon with everything he had, while Falcon exploited that rage, forcing him to waste mana with every missed strike.
Teclos, meanwhile, had his own problem.
One of the fire knights thrust his sword toward Teclos’s stomach, but Teclos opened his pocket dimension directly in front of the blade.
The sword and the knight’s hand vanished inside.
Then Teclos closed it, and the knight’s hand tore off.
"Aaaarghh!"
Teclos immediately stabbed toward his eyes, trying to finish him, but the other knight swooped in and knocked his blade aside.
Teclos ducked beneath another slash and rolled away. Dark spikes shot up from the ground, forcing the knight to stop his pursuit.
Then Teclos summoned his spider-like limbs again and quickly latched onto the ceiling.
The knight propelled himself straight at him.
Their swords clashed.
The impact cracked the ceiling above them, and both of them fell along with several heavy chunks of stone.
The knight quickly propelled himself away with fire.
Teclos, on the other hand, summoned a dark platform in the air and dashed sideways. At the same time, he opened his pocket dimension above himself, swallowing a falling boulder before it could crush his head.
The knight below was not so lucky.
He was still clutching the stump where his hand had been torn off when he looked up.
A boulder crushed his face and skull in.
He died instantly.
Things were starting to even out.
Now it was two against two.
Across the corridor, Falcon was still fighting Cassian. His movements remained sharp, but they were slower than before. A burn marked one arm, and blood ran down his cheek.
He released another wind slash toward the egg, trying to pull Cassian’s attention away from himself.
Even with his tactic of running, dodging, and slowly draining the enemy’s mana, Cassian did not look like he would tire anytime soon.
Falcon smiled grimly.
’Of course I get the hard part while the kid takes it easy again... I should demand a round of ale from him once we get back to the tavern.’
Cassian’s eyes flicked toward the wind slash. With a single gesture, he cut the attack apart and stopped it cold.
Falcon had gained maybe half a second.
It was not much, but at this point, he would take anything that went his way.
Then he had a bold idea.
He threw his sword.
Wind spiraled around the blade as it flew like a silver streak toward the egg.
Cassian’s eyes widened.
He could not reach both the sword and Falcon.
So he chose the sword.
With a flash step, he appeared beside Falcon’s blade and struck it with all his might, blasting it upward and lodging it into the ceiling.
When he looked back, he saw Falcon behind the remaining knight, trying to approach him quickly and silently.
"Watch out!"
The knight turned around and, on instinct, released flames all around himself.
The attack caught both of them.
Teclos opened his pocket dimension, swallowing the flames in front of him, while Falcon spun a vortex around himself and redirected the fire away.
But the surprise was gone.
And Cassian was already charging at them.
They all tangled in that deadly dance of cat and mouse for a few moments longer when disaster happened.
As Falcon flew close to the ceiling and prepared to launch yet another wind slash, a spike suddenly rose out of the ceiling and impaled him through the abdomen.
The knocked-out knight from the start had regained his consciousness.
