Blades sung. Blood spilled. Head fell and rolled across the altar as their body collapsed in a bleeding, headless pile. The others were alarmed at this violation, and they drew their weapons from out their cloaks with zeal: swords, axes, maces, knives and the continued spectrum of cold weapons. The entire street became aware of her presence. A presence that did not belong. A violent, thirsty and vengeful presence that longed for their blood. And all they could do was watch in horror as she pried open the armor of their fallen brethren like an eggshell, sinking her blades into their sides as she held the body still and drove her arm deep into the bloody stump where once there had been a head, reaching low, all the way down to her elbow and snatching back out a dark, red glob of bleeding flesh. She brought the resident’s heart to her mouth and sunk her teeth into its juicy, gammy flesh, forcing out blood from its torn arteries and veins before devouring the heart whole in a single gulp.
She sighed, satisfied, and licked her lips clean.
Her enemies came at her as two, enraged at what she had done to their brethren, shouting from behind their masks, one wielding a single-handed axe and the other a double-edged sword, striking without hesitation, leaving no chance for her to grab her blades. But they did not work in unison. That would mean their demise. They both struck at where she was, not where she would be, and that was half a pace back then immediately leaping into the air above their weapons that only ended up further desecrating their brethren's corpse. She pulled her blades out the corpse as she spun in the air, redirecting herself as she neared her enemies. With their weapons momentarily stuck, they could only watch while they tried to free their weapons as Zaphrriyah sunk her blades home into the back of their necks with little resistance, landing between the fallen bodies of her enemies, withdrawing her blades for her next enemies.
The residents of the city were wiser than the violent Beasts of the Woods, but not wiser than the other Beasts Zaphrriyah had hunted in those Woods. They did not know her as well as she knew them. She could feel it – their eagerness for violence. Unlike the Beasts that had been forced into blind, violent rage by Aphrodisia, they enjoyed it. It wasn't in their nature, they didn't need it, they simply wanted it. Relished in it. Almost as much as her.
They surrounded her in a makeshift formation. They must have trained for it because their formation was effective. They even brought out shields. Little good that would do for them.
Spears skewered behind raised shields from all directions, but Zaphrriyah was simply in the air again. The spearheads followed her. She would land right on top of them. And she did. The spearheads punctured through the soles of her feet, but she held her balance perfectly. Then she slid down, spearheads piercing through the bridge of her feet in giant, gaping wounds as she descended along the spears' necks, stabbing their wielders in the sides of their throats before throwing her blades into the eyeholes of another's mask. She took hold of the spears before landing, pulling them out from her feet so she could land flat and firm, thrusting the spears at the enemies standing nearby, but they were skilled enough to dodge. Spears out of the way, she pounced at the fallen body, dislodging her blades and lunging into a pirouette, blades hissing as she soared through her enemies’ ranks.
Hardly a drop of blood. As she'd thought. Their armor wasn't just for show.
Pain stung her back. She swallowed a grunt, teeth gritting, and dove straight into the sword that had lodged between her rhomboid, ramming her head into her enemy's mask. It must have been made of a similar metal as their armor, but she still staggered them for a bit, long enough to pirouette and hack her blade into the side of their neck. She reached behind her, grabbing the hilt of the sword and dragging it out of her flesh, blocking another blow from behind just as she dislodged it. She spun again, biting the hilt of her own blade from out her enemy's neck and slashing with the other at the assailant behind her, right into the top of their head. The hat wasn't made of steel, and her blade cleaved right through the middle of their face, splitting their mask asunder. She took the sword and experimentally stabbed it through their side. There was a hard resistance, but her strike was fierce, and the armor shattered upon impact.
Three more stings of pain. Sharper, acute. They were knives that had found their mark on her trapezius. More would be coming. She swung to the side, blade dropping from her mouth into hand as she deflected two more knives thrown at her. A giant war axe flailed upwards for her torso, an attack she was in no position to dodge with more enemies already scheming behind her back. She took it head on with her arms, saving the sharpness of her blades and blunting the depth of the cut by using its force to propel her up. She flipped face down, diving into another enemy that was less vigilant, blades stabbing through their face before she rebounded off their body at the axe-wielder. For one with such a large weapon, they wielded it with surprising haste – nowhere as fast as Aphrodisia with her Evorsor, of course, but still fast enough to be a threat. (Zaphrriyah had only witnessed Aphrodisia wield the Evorsor a few times on occasion: When she chopped down a Pine for firewood, when she was training alone, and when she helped Hellawes take down an Abyssal Beast.) She had to block again as the axe slammed into her midair, but also threw a blade at the enemy, precise, nailing them in the eye, but not hard enough to kill such a large foe. Her blade still disrupted them though, as they let go of their axe with one hand to grab at her blade in their face, but it was already gone, having had a dripping, bloody fibrous chain wound around its handle from Zaphrriyah's wrist. Her second landing wasn't as successful. The enemy saw her coming and swung their mace, but they weren't as fast as the axe-wielding one, and Zaphrriyah was able to kick against the bladed club and return to her current focus. This strike was for the kill. The axe-wielder swung wild and furious and blind. She closed the distance in quick, short dashes, climbing up to their back, crossing her blades to their neck and pushed.
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Blades hissed. Blood spilled. Head rolled down the main road. More enemies awaited. A lot more. From out the buildings by the road and their alleys, flooding onto the road, excited by this night of blood and slaughter. They were worthy of being her enemies. They were skilled, strong, and hell were they plenty with many more to come. This was the sacred grounds of her crusade, the first of many battles to come.
Zaphrriyah arose from the corpse of the axe-wielder, prying out the knives in her back with her own blade, staring down at the horde of warriors that stood in her way and the rest of the city she was going to slaughter. Then she noticed her breaths were uneven. She was breathing through her mouth – and was that a bead of sweat dripping down her face? She was getting tired. No. That couldn't be it. It was the city. It was getting hotter. There was not a flake of snow to be seen drifting in the air. The buildings by her side were much taller, their heights blocked from view by their countless levels. She had already come a long way from the altar. Night had totally fallen, but the city road and its many alleys and narrow streets were still bright with lanterns.
Vigilance, focus and will.
Zaphrriyah dashed headfirst into the army of enemies, her shawl dripping with blood that landed on the blades of her khukuri, sliding along its edge, coating it red. It hardened to the air, but where it contacted the edge, the blood seethed, rippling restlessly. She clashed brutally with the first enemy that presented themself, meeting their blade but only for a second. The force of her strike was savage, deflecting their sword aside for her second blade to hack into their shoulder, crushing the armor beneath their cloak, drawing away for another rapid strike by her sharp blade which sliced through flesh, clean and swift, tearing them in half across the side. More were eager to take their place, lunging at her with their weapons but none were able to match her strength. They were each brutally cut down by her twin blades, one after the other or all at once. It was a bloody slaughter. She gave them no space, no chance to communicate, no time to see her coming. She danced amidst the maelstrom of chaos and bloodshed that followed her. The streets were painted red by the pooling corpses each brutally gored and dismembered. The blood spilt that was siphoned by her shawl was enough to saturate it whole, and she used this to her advantage as well, casting out waves of blood to conceal her strikes and movement and to disorient those it blinded.
Somewhere in all the seemingly endless blood and slaughter, Zaphrriyah lost herself. Laughter rang out to the song of clashing steel. Rushes of ecstasy tingled through her nerves at the sensation of cutting into flesh. Her enemies ceased to be her enemies and became mere fodder for her slaughter. But her enemies were still her enemies, and they were strong and wise and just because they were many did not mean that any one of them was the same.
She hadn’t even realized what had happened. One of her attacks had been parried. It simply hadn’t seemed possible, but one of them indeed managed to do it, be it skill of luck. The timing of their attack and its direction perfectly countered hers, directing the full force of her strike away and back at her, stunning her in place if only briefly. But that was still more than long enough for their brethren to sink their swords, knives and spears, and bash their axes, clubs and maces into her. A dozen different blades skewered her from every point in her body as another dozen bludgeoned her down to the ground.
The pain was sobering, like hammering red-hot steel on an anvil, if her entire nervous system was the steel and her body the anvil. Every system went on overload. She knew what was coming next and she had to prevent it. But she was completely paralyzed from head to toe by the dozens of blades ceaselessly penetrating her body. She had made a mistake and now she was paying the price. Blood rushed to her neck and every fiber of muscle she had there, reinforcing them with sticky, hot tendrils glued tightly to every tendon and ligament of her spine. And then it came. The one who had parried her attack now the executioner who dealt the final blow with the ferocious swing of their sword, cutting straight through her neck.
