Dimensional Descent

Leonel glanced at this blood for a moment. He had felt the heft of it weighing down his spear so he had gotten rid of it. That blood would be quite annoying to deal with, not only was it incredibly heavy, but it was sticky and viscous, latching onto the metal of his blade and seemingly trying to corrode it as well. If not for his Spear Force, that would have already happened.

'Interesting.' Leonel smiled.

Edrym had long fallen into silence, the small crater his blood left in the ground resting in the periphery of his sight.

Leonel hopped just once and suddenly shot forward. He didn't have the patience to wait for Edrym to think his way through this existential crisis.

Human, Rapax, Nomad, Cloud, Dwarven or Spiritual, none of it mattered to him. Anyone who stood in his way would taste his blade.

A radiant bronze aura formed around Edrym as he looked up, his smile vanishing, replaced by a steely cold gaze. However, in the face of it, Leonel's smile only brightened.

"Is that your real face? Show me more of it."

BANG!

Their spears crossed once before they separated and went at it again.

Edrym's senses were sharp and he seemed to respond to every one of Leonel's attempts in kind. When Leonel's spear separated into three, his separated into three as well. When Leonel swung the butt of his spear forward, so did he. When Leonel spun his spear and geared up his momentum, so did he. It didn't seem like he was trying to follow the path of the Cloud Race, but rather trying to attack Leonel's psyche.

Even so, Leonel's smile never faded. Suddenly, Leonel's spear split into four, then five, then six, then seven.

Every time Edrym matched him, he took another step forward, edging the battlefield as though he was making sweet love to it. Everything about the smile on his face to the fluid shifts between attacks and defense, between lunges and retreats, between thrusts and slices, was absolutely seamless.

Leonel truly learned how fun it was to fight without having to think. He couldn't see 10, 20 or even a hundred moves ahead like he could usually, in fact he could barely see three.

However, these three moves were like they were ingrained into his very bones, as though he already knew how to react to them without having to deduce at all.

He could entirely focus on the feeling of his blade gliding through the air, the sound of his Spear Force splitting the wind, the echo of a clash of blades. It was therapeutic in a way he had never experienced before, an escape from any and everything.

His style was absolutely suffocating, his spear came from any and everywhere, until it suddenly began to come from any time as well. His rhythm shifted, and his perfectly paced blade suddenly slowed by a small margin, causing Edrym to miss time a block and overshoot his target.

Leonel's blade snaked through and pierced through his collarbone, pulling back just as Edrym swung back to counter and thrusting forward with a strike that was twice as fast as any of his other strikes, piercing the other side of Edrym's collarbone.

Any normal human would experience both of their arms becoming useless at this point, but Edrym only clenched his jaw, a mysterious power brandishing his spear with the same ease as he had previously. The bronze aura around him grew and the heaviness of Leonel's spear seemed to increase.

Leonel looked down at his blade. It was becoming unruly and difficult to control.

He slid back, dodging out of the way of Edym's counter and slipping it. He took a strong step forward, ducking under Edrym's thrusting blade and closing the distance. He made a move to raise his spear and end the battle, but at that moment Edyrm's gaze seemed to blaze with life.

The blood that coated Leonel's spear became hundreds of times heavier.

Leonel had so much of his weight leaning forward to complete his attack that it was too difficult to stop the momentum, especially given its suddenness. Leonel hadn't considered the possibility that a Spiritual could control their body parts outside of themselves, it was too easy to get caught off guard when you couldn't think of millions of possibilities at once.

Edyrm's knee drove up with an incredible amount of force and Leonel seemed to present his jaw to him.

A sickening crack echoed and Leonel felt his brain rattle. The heaviness of Edrym's blood was nothing compared to the heaviness of his body. If it wasn't because Edrym had to hurriedly take the opportunity and couldn't grab a hold of a solid foundation, Leonel's head would have likely exploded like a watermelon with that single exchange.

Leonel's teeth cracked and his jaw broke into at least three pieces.

His head was driven upward as though Edrym was trying to rip it from his shoulders with that single knee.

Edrym took a step back to stabilize himself and prepared a second attack immediately, retrieving his spear while Leonel was still in a partial daze and piercing right for his heart.

Leonel's brain continued to rattle around in his head, but a faint voice in his head told him that if he didn't get a hold of himself immediately he would die here. Falling into a daze in the middle of battle was the greatest taboo. If it wasn't for the fact their true strength was suppressed here, these last few split seconds would have already been enough for his life to be severed.

However, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't seem to. Without his Ability Index, he couldn't take forceful control of his body without active participation of his brain, and right now it might as well have been mush.

'Just move, just move to the side, something, anything!"

The roaring echo of Leonel's soul seemed to reverberate through the dimensions, a burst of a violet aura pulsing to life around him.

Suddenly he could see, but it wasn't through the blurriness of his eyes, but rather through the tip of his spear.

As Edrym thrust forward with victory in his eyes, Leonel's spear seemed to move as though it had a mind of its own, being guided not by his hand, but rather the will that pulsed from his heart.

PCHU!

Edrym froze, looking down at his chest, the butt of Leonel's silver grade spear jetting out of it.