"I don't have enough Abi left for my third sword... but that's alright, my next move should be enough, the window of opportunity is short but I have to take the chance."
Blue Abi surged across the Wolf Sword, wrapping the steel in a frigid glow. The very air around her dropped in temperature, and her breath came out in icy plumes.
"Wolf Sword — TUNDRA!"
Frost exploded from her fur, racing outward in a glacial surge that coated the ruined street in ice. The ground cracked and hissed beneath her boots as she lowered into a stance that would decide everything, not just the battle, but the fate of her people.
Across from her, Sephiss turned a page in Damon's Penalty.
"Damon," he whispered.
The air tore open again. The monstrous wire-beast erupted from the page once more, shrieking with fury.
"Penalize... Execute!"
Damon roared, its single red eye now burning a menacing gold as it focused on the wounded knight before it.
Blue Abi pulsed violently across Lanni's body, forming a blizzard-like aura around her armor. "Tundra..." she growled, and then she moved.
With a deep inhale, she focused every ounce of life left within her, and as she exhaled...
BOOM.
She vanished from sight.
Lanni shouted "You took away my, fiance, my friends, my family, comrads, I will hunt you untill you're in the pit of my belly!"
The street exploded under her as she bolted forward at inhuman speed, slicing through Damon's first wave of razor-wire limbs. The ground split, the air screamed, and shards of ice flew in all directions. Piercing into Damons wired body.
"She's cutting through my Philo..." Sephiss hissed, panic flickering across his face. "This isn't good."
The monster bellowed and unleashed another storm of wire-limbs, hundreds this time, all whipping toward her like a metallic hurricane. Lanni dodged and weaved, cutting a path forward, her blade a blur of blue light and frozen air. Her eyes were locked not on Damon, but on Sephiss himself.
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"Philo," Sephiss snarled, his gaze darting to Damon. "Take my pinky finger... and impose."
He grabbed his left hand and twisted.
There was a sickening crack.
"AAAAAHHHHH!" Sephiss screamed as his pinky snapped backwards, twisting like a broken marionette. Blood splattered the pages of Damon's Penalty, and the monster grew.
Its wires multiplied, thickened, stretching skyward and raining down like a storm of living blades. Damon doubled in size, towering over the battlefield, its golden eye blazing like a hateful sun.
Lanni roared and kept cutting, the fur on her body moved as if it had life itself slicing through wires, left, right, upward, downward, but no matter how many wires she severed, more replaced them.
Lanni "My ice is melting, im slowing down. At this rate.....I'll"
They lashed around her legs, her arms, her back.
"It's... too many..." she gasped. "I can't... I can't keep up..."
Her body burned. Her lungs screamed. The cold in her veins began to fade.
"I'm sorry... Jett... Naggi... Euly... Raffi... Hido my love....everyone..."
The world went silent.
And then the wires pierced her.
Dozens of them tore through her armor, slicing into flesh and bone. Blood sprayed across the ice and steam rose from her wounds as she screamed, a sound that was half human, half beast — before collapsing.
Sephiss staggered, clutching his ruined hand, pain twisting his expression. "Damn it..." he hissed through gritted teeth. "I didn't think I'd have to use the Penalty on myself. She... really proved to be a nuisance."
The wires slowly withdrew, and Damon, its task complete, began to wither away. Its body crumbled into smoke and dust before vanishing entirely back into the pages of Damon's Penalty. One more page disintegrated into nothingness.
Sephiss looked toward the center of the battlefield. "Now that she's dead the only the rest should be easy for the others."
There, on the frozen street, Lanni lay still in her human form, her once-proud armor torn and soaked in scarlet. A spreading pool of blood formed beneath her body, steam rising from it in the cold air. Her Wolf Sword had fallen from her grasp, its once-brilliant blue light now dim and fading.
Sephiss exhaled shakily, his breath hitching from the pain in his hand. He stepped closer, eyes scanning the carnage.
Several Delta-class robots landed around him in a synchronized formation, their red sensors flickering as they assessed the battlefield.
"Delta units," Sephiss ordered, his voice low and composed once more. "Call for a medic. Immediately."
One of the Deltas pressed a comm node on its head.
"Requesting medical emergency. Priority one."
Sephiss stood in silence, gazing down at Lanni's broken form. Around them, the Zoner District was chaos, fires devouring buildings, sirens wailing in the distance, civilians screaming as they were dragged into transports.
A slow, satisfied grin spread across his face.
"And so..." he whispered, almost reverently, "...the new order begins."
The wind carried his words across the empty street, over the pool of blood where a knight had fallen, and into a night sky that felt colder than ever before.
To be continued...