Chapter 41 Awakening

  As my heart began to weaken from blood loss the world stopped and turned grey.

  “Oh dear, to think this life would be this short for you… Truly, I'm sorry for your terrible luck. The least I can do is let you pass painlessly from here on.”

  A floral smell wafted forth as Tanl leaned down over me, or at least I felt like she was. It was hard to tell if she was actually here, being a goddess and all.

  “Tanl?”

  I croaked, my mouth full of blood.

  “Shush child, rest for now. You've done enough.”

  “...I can't… not… not yet…! Sarah…Derek… Alice…Jean, They'll die, or worse…”

  As I spoke I felt a bit of energy return to me, something born of desperation. A small tingle spread from my spine to the tips of my toes.

  “I can't abandon my friends… or my love. I'm sorry Tanl. But I can't give up just yet!”

  “Oh child… I'll be rooting for you.”

  The world lurched back into motion, the gray fading as I got back to my knees. I couldn't give up, I WON'T give up. The tingle was building up until it felt like electricity, a small warm golden glow emanating from me as the sensation grew. My wounds began to close and my heart began to beat strongly again. At the zenith of the glow I got a notification.

  [Unique skill created! Unleash- as long as you draw breath you won't give up! Massive increase to all stats while active and a moderate heal, but beware! Your body cannot handle this might for long! “I'm proud of you Xion.” -Tanl]

  [New title acquired! Deathless- you've stood on that teetering precipice and come back- you are very slightly harder to kill in every way and you now get a 5% increase in endurance.]

  I stand covered in blood slowly dripping off of me and take a breath. My body feels charged and like everything around me is moving slowly.

  “Face me!”

  The leader stops and turns around, surprised. I charge forward with quickdraw and my remaining blade, imbuing it with mana and our blades meet once again. His lackadaisical movements are gone, our blades shriek against each other as the metal begins to heat up and strain between us.

  My tail whips around and slashes his mask off his face with the small blade at its end. We pause as the halves of his mask clatters to the ground. Half his face was burnt off revealing his bare jaw and massive incisors.

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  “vampire…”

  He makes some distance between us and throws a few knives stashed in his cloak at me, I redirect them with spatial magic where he then blocks them and they fall to the ground harmlessly. We both look away for a moment as a green flash of mana comes from Alice's direction as she begins healing everyone up.

  “Fucking healers… they never stay down.”

  The vampire grumbles as I dashed towards him once more, our blades dancing as I finally matched his speed and strength. With a cry I bash him through a building as he blocks once more. He tumbles through the air where I'm already waiting. This time I kick and he's sent barreling into the ground.

  A massive thud rings out as dust falls from his landing. As I fall I chant out a fireball that hurtles downwards and splashes into him as he tries to recover. The surrounding buildings begin to catch aflame as the vampire gets up, tossing his smoldering cloak to the side.

  “I've been building this under-city for two hundred years… and it's burning in just one day. Pity.”

  As he speaks his wounds begin sealing shut, and after only a moment only his mouth is left scarred.

  “Why do you want Sarah so badly!? Why couldn't you have left us alone?”

  We begin to circle each other as the buildings around us burn, making long shadows dance between us.

  “You wouldn't understand, It's for the sake of everyone! The end times are coming and only a great mage can seal it away.”

  “Seal what away?”

  “The End.”

  With that he takes the offensive this time, his sword blurring with a bloody red coating as our blades clash. My arms turn numb as I keep his sword away, each strike from him is heavier and faster than the last. Danger sense goes off behind me and I barely manage to block a strike that sends me back to the tower. As I got back up I started hearing screams and crying from every direction, the whole city was catching ablaze.

  “I have no reverence for life, but if everything dies, so do I. It's nothing personal, I just need that little mage of yours. So just die already.”

  A bloody slash is sent through the air, digging up deep grooves from the street as it passes by. I roll out of the way only to be caught by the vampire's leg as he kicks me into the walls of the tower itself. Wooden walls splinter and break from as my body tumbles through them. I try to redirect myself only to see the vampire coming in with a slash aimed at my neck.

  I barely dodge by tilting my neck and several of my hairs are cut instead. We land in a garden at the center of the tower, the once beautiful flowers are crushed underfoot as we continually clash and try to outmaneuver the other. I sent spell after spell after him when my blade couldn't reach and kept him on the backfoot for half a minute before my vision swam in shades of red. Blood pooled in my mouth and trailed down from my eyes and ears as I stumbled.

  “XION! WE FOUND THE TELEPORTATION CIRCLE!”

  Alice's voice booms from several floors above us and the vampire finally shows a bit of worry on his mangled face. He quickly loses all sense of swordsmanship and begins bringing his sword down with a ground shaking thud every time our blades connect. Blood begins trickling down my arms from the sheer amount of exertion I'm forced to put into holding my blade steady until my sword snaps in half from all the abuse it had faced.

  Right as the vampire's sword reached high for a final blow Jean jumped onto his back.

  Dark blade!

  The blade bit deep into the vampire until only his hilt was sticking out of his collarbone. Not wasting the opportunity I coated my broken blade in flames and slashed with all my remaining might. The vampire screamed as the fire burned, his body was almost as tough as his blade but with my last bit of strength I managed to cleave him in half.

  His upper half clawed at the air for a second before going still. I had done it. They could escape…

  POV Sarah

  I watched as Xion got back up from what should have killed her and as she faced the vampire. Alice had healed herself and was now going one by one healing everyone until we could walk again.

  “While he's distracted we'll search for the circle, we're all gonna get out of this together!”

  We half walked half hobbled as Xion, now glowing, fought. We could feel the ground shake and tremors from them crossing blades across the city. Before long half the city was up in flames and we could barely breathe from the smoke as we quickly checked each floor. On the seventh floor Jean finally woke up and slowly walked by himself.

  The building shook as Xion was sent through several walls and into the central garden on the ground floor where we watched her fight for a moment before hurrying up. On the eighth floor we finally found it and Alice yelled out a window to her. We all collectively gasped as Xion suddenly started bleeding from her eyes and ears and Jean jumped from the window before we even realized what he was doing.

  He landed roughly in a small tree before getting behind the vampire. Right as Xion's blade snapped he jumped up with his blade in his remaining arm and used dark blade. Not even a second later the vampire lay in pieces on the ground from Xion's attack. We ran down the stairs when she collapsed and brought her to the circle. We all stood in it together as the city burned down around us. The world blurred and warped around us, spinning until we popped out into a field on the surface.

  The moon shone up above us as we all collectively took a breath of relief, the stars twinkled in the sky as we stood there. Bloody, exhausted and covered in all manner of gore. But we were alive.