The roar of Kael's Aura Blade descending was deafening, a sound that tore at the very fabric of the air. Aira, rooted in place, held her steel sword in a defensive block, the blade a fragile line against the torrent of raw power.
The impact was cataclysmic. Aura exploded outwards in a blinding white flash, obliterating the remnants of the dining table and chairs, sending shards of wood and marble flying like shrapnel. Aira's stance was perfect, honed by years of relentless combat.
Yet, the sheer, destructive force of Kael's Manifestation Aura was immense. A deep fissure spiderwebbed across the floor beneath her feet, and she felt her arms scream with the effort, the unique vibratory resistance of Aura against steel threatening to dislocate her shoulders and wrench the sword from her grasp.
Kael's face was a mask of pure, unadulterated fury, his eyes burning with a zealous fervor. "This is it, Melanthos! This is the end of your vile line!" he bellowed, his voice raw with hatred.
Aira didn't speak, her focus absolute. She twisted, not attempting to fully parry the impossible force, but to redirect it. With a surge of her own accelerated speed, she channeled the colossal impact, pushing the energy blade just enough to the side, allowing the bulk of its devastating power to crash into the wall behind her.
The ancient stone groaned, then burst outwards in a spectacular explosion of dust and debris, punching a gaping hole through the mansion and revealing the moonlit gardens beyond. The very foundation of the building shuddered.
Kael, momentarily off-balance from the redirected force, snarled, recovering with astonishing speed. He brought his Aura Blade around in a rapid, horizontal sweep, the energy blade humming dangerously, aiming to bifurcate her but Aira was already moving.
Her Blur ability, pushed to its absolute limit, allowed her to flow beneath the shimmering arc of energy, appearing impossibly close to Kael's massive frame.
Her steel blade, no longer a defensive shield, became a surgical instrument. She aimed for the nexus points of his Aura, the conduits that allowed him to maintain his Manifestation.
A lightning-fast cut traced across his exposed forearm, a shallow but precise strike that wasn't meant to sever flesh, but to disrupt the flow of his Aura. Kael roared, his Aura Blade flickering violently as his Aura surged to fight off the disruption, its power momentarily faltering but quickly restabilizing.
"You can't cut what isn't there, woman!" Kael bellowed, his voice resonating with power, his wound already beginning to seal with visible Aura reconstruction. He lunged, abandoning the wide swings for a series of rapid, powerful thrusts with his energy blade.
Each thrust was a miniature shockwave, designed to batter her defenses and break her perfect stance. He knew her speed; he aimed to overwhelm her with volume and unyielding power, pinning her down.
Aira danced back, her movements a dizzying, almost invisible ripple through the air. She parried each thrust with minimal effort, her blade deflecting the energy with whispers of hissing Aura. Kael was relentless, pushing her with sheer, raw force.
He wasn't just attacking; he was subtly herding her, pushing her towards the shattered wall, towards the open night, trying to exploit her need for space in her Blur state. He was strong, far stronger than any of his men, and every parry sent jarring tremors up her arms.
Kael, though Aira had fought him countless cycles, was still as formidable as ever, a man holding the title of most Eldoria Dormant kills.
Aira, however, discovered a different thing in this cycle: Kael was fighting differently from other cycles. She had been noticing a change in this cycle after Leo didn't regress. Minor changes since the past eight years and she has always overlooked, but now it was becoming constant.
Now, Kael's fighting was becoming unknown and different. It now felt like Kael wasn't the only opponent tonight.
'What the hell is happening?' Aira thought, a sliver of concern for Jean and the children's safety fracturing her absolute focus.
She suddenly shifted tactics.
Instead of continuously dodging, she surged into his attack. As his Aura Blade came forward in a powerful lunge, she didn't parry; she stepped in, her body turning with impossible swiftness, allowing the tip of the energy blade to rip across her side.
A searing line of agony flared across her ribs, a genuine wound, but it was a calculated risk. In that microsecond of contact, she was inside his guard, closer than he could have anticipated.
Her blade, a phantom in her hand, became a blur of silver. Two strikes. One, a deep cut across Kael's bicep, severing another major Aura conduit. The second, an upward thrust, aimed for the underside of his jaw. Kael reacted with desperate speed, twisting his head just enough that the blow only grazed his cheekbone, leaving a deep gash that sizzled with uncontrolled Aura. The cut was superficial but bled freely, marring his furious face.
"You... little pest!" Kael roared, staggering back, his Aura flickering with rage and the strain of his wounds.
His Aura Blade seemed to pulse with unstable power, threatening to dissipate and reform. He instinctively raised his other hand, and a defensive force field, thick and crackling with unstable Aura, flared into existence around him. He needed time, time to repair his Aura conduits, time to re-manifest his full, overwhelming power.
This was a direct, desperate attempt to gain a moment's respite from her relentless precision.
Aira, however, saw not a desperate defense, but an exposed target, a crucial opening in his overwhelming offense. She pressed her advantage, her speed unwavering, her blade singing a grim, familiar song. This was the moment. This was where she had to break him, to end this cycle of personal vengeance.
Kael's force field flared, a desperate barrier. His eyes, burning through the unstable Aura, glared at her, trying to find a gap in her relentless assault.
He was pushing his Manifestation to its limits, trying to reform his blade, but the previous precise strikes had taken their toll. His Aura conduits were still fractured, his control wavering.
He lunged within his own force field, a desperate, raw thrust, trying to buy himself more time, to push her back.
Aira, moving with the impossible speed of her Blur, saw it. A subtle ripple in the otherwise solid shield, a flicker of instability in the raw Aura that briefly outlined Kael's own bicep, precisely where her previous strike had disrupted his Aura.
It was a miniscule opening, a fraction of a second where Kael's desperate lunge pulled his own Aura just enough to create a momentary, almost invisible weakness in his defensive barrier.
It was sheer, desperate luck, a consequence of his own strained power and his furious, unthinking counter-attack. Most would never see it, much less exploit it.
But Aira did.
Her steel blade became a silver streak, faster than thought. She didn't pierce the field; she slipped through the momentary flicker, a phantom darting through a whisper of a loophole.
Her blade wasn't aimed at his body, but directly at the strained conduit she had just disrupted. With a final, explosive surge of Aura, she plunged her sword into his bicep, directly into the throbbing, overtaxed nexus of his Manifestation.
Kael's roar was cut short, replaced by a gargling gasp as his Aura erupted, not outwards in an explosion, but inwards, imploding around the wound. The force field shattered like glass, and Kael's massive form seized.
His eyes widened, not in fury, but in a moment of pure, disbelieving shock, as if suddenly understanding a terrible, ultimate truth. Then, his very essence seemed to collapse. His formidable Manifestation Aura, unstable and severed at its core, imploded within him, extinguishing his life force in a silent, internal scream.
He crumpled, his Aura completely gone, the light in his eyes fading to a dull, lifeless grey. Kael, the formidable Ascendant, the killer of countless Dormants, lay still amidst the wreckage of the mansion.
Aira stood over him, her chest heaving, the burning pain in her side a dull ache compared to the exhaustion that threatened to pull her to her knees. Her Blur flickered, threatening to give out completely. She had won. By sheer, desperate luck, she had found the perfect opening at the perfect moment. But the victory felt hollow, cold.
He had been different this cycle, more aggressive, more unpredictable.
What the hell is happening?
She thought, the question echoing the earlier fear. The grim satisfaction of eliminating a persistent threat was quickly overshadowed by a gnawing dread. Kael was gone, but the anomaly of this cycle persisted. She quickly scanned the shattered remnants of the dining room, her senses strained.
"Jean... children... are you safe?" she whispered into the tense silence, a new, more immediate worry consuming her.