Reincarnated Into A Dead Woman's Body In Another World-Chapter 449: Arc 6, - 65: Pride Comes Before a Fall
A thunderstorm raged above the broken opera house while the titanic form of Beauregard made its way eastwards, wading into the sea. Rain now drizzled freely with her away from the near vicinity.
The distant cries and shouts made all the way up to the ears of the man who smiled, his fangs poking out. Shattered walls, guards stunned into inaction and the slime-girl on her way to complete her mission—the sight before him was quite delightful indeed.
However, one sight did not exactly bring joy. The sight of a figure unfettered by the rain and fizzling in electrical arcs that jolted and hissed from every drop that hit her.
It was mostly because she blocked his view with a sword aimed right at his head. "Thwing!" Ambrose did not even flinch.
A large tortoise shell of stone-like make emerged right in front of him, blocking the blonde’s strike. It seemed the shapeshifter had made their way to defend.
Jotou’s eyes narrowed, her strike had connected at the very least... She growled under her breath the second it hit the rock and clicked her teeth, like the hitting of two rocks to create a spark.
"Ah petrichor," Ambrose inhaled. "What a refreshingly sweet scent you emit."
Her eyes sparked and circled her irises. She scraped the back of her left teeth twice more and a flash flickered like the start of a fire, much brighter than the lightning surrounding her.
Some magic and electricity flared out from the back of her tongue. Lightning coated the insides of her mouth and made a net at the back of her throat. With another click, lightning roared out of her.
Wild electrical charge surged forth towards Ambrose at point-blank range. Hundreds of arcs of lightning, like nerves, shot him; it was too fast for him to react or defend.
With the water splashing in from the rain, the electricity caught onto his suit and travelled across his form. A look of shock would be seen, if anyone could see what was happening in frozen time.
Electricity burned into the skin of his face, his claws of blood dispelled and evaporated. His natural instincts allowed him to shut his eyes at the very least while lightning coursed through his veins in an instant.
From anyone else’s perspective, they heard a roar like the start of an engine and saw bright yellow light under the dim light of the darkened sky.
Jotou’s shoulders shivered and her hair had risen akin to that of an agitated cat. Lightning surged in waves, continuously from her open jaws, like the breath of a dragon. Ambrose grunted and had to force his feet back to fight against the paralyzing effect it had.
Fortunately for him, it did not travel far from her form. The roar fizzled, coming to a lull every second from the initial roar and the blonde drew her head back, spitting out the residual lightning attached to her teeth.
Ambrose stumbled back and held the railing. His face was burned and scarred by lightning; blood quickly, at the speed of a waterfall even, rushed around his figure from his fingertips.
"Thanks for the trick," Jotou’s voice crackled and popped as she put her boot on the large tortoise in front of her. Before she could stomp it more, the tortoise transformed into a serpent and slithered off the walkway and turned into a hawk.
The armed guards of Palais Celneir, looked around the vicinity, looking for orders. "Retreat!" one shouted out and stomped along the catwalk to exit the fly loft; maybe they were not outnumbered, but they had enough proof they were outmatched.
"Probably safer," Hotaru muttered next to Asobi.
The magician leaned her waist against the railing and took deep breaths; her mana was barely recovering from the new trick she pulled.
In a panicked and abrupt casting of magic, Ambrose stood back up, completely healed and glanced to the approaching blonde to his left. "Fthck!" "Ghrg!" Another purple-tipped crossbow bolt fired from straight ahead, but the man blocked it with his hand.
By block of course, it meant that the bolt pierced through the centre of his palm and shot into the length of his muscled arm. In the same instance, blood burst out and ejected the bolt, before winding back around to heal the piercing injury in an instant.
Detective Rose did not get any closer, but she did load another bolt into her weapon and proceeded to get further away from the main fight.
Covered in sparks from head to toe and the sword by her side, she spoke with a sneer, "What’s the matter oh new god, afraid of a little lightning?" "Shlck!"
Her sword impacted into the hand he raised and coagulated the blood that emerged in an instant—if it had not already evaporated first from the... "Zap."
Ambrose yelled through gritted teeth, blood-red drizzled in his eyes. He managed to yank his arm away from her strike; a strike that should have killed with the amount of voltage that was pumped into his flesh.
His constitution was otherworldly as he backed up and blood gelled over his injuries. The healing was quicker than anything Hotaru could even do—precise and without a scar.
Claws of blood he made, only to be evaporated by her electrical arcs effortlessly. Rain sizzled, no longer a drizzle but a downpour; her eyes, continuing to spark bright, never narrowed away from her quarry.
"Clang!" "Ftink!" Two slices into the railing, while Ambrose had to hasten backwards.
"All bark!" Jotou rushed and cut her sparking blade through the joints of his fingers, provoking a loud groan of pain. "No bite!" she screamed and carved through and chopped his fingers that fell through the catwalk.
Ambrose swung with his claws at her; however, the siphon took no hold and the claw was evaporated before it could even scrape at the layers of her spell.
"All talk!" there was now a greater rage in her words as she pivoted the blade and slashed a gash diagonally across his face. "No might!"
He tried his damndest to stifle his pain and lurched himself back, to heal every injury she inflicted within a second or less. Blood seeped out from his wounds and stitched together new flesh and bone.
Forget the claws, there was no use combating her with his martial prowess. All the corpses of the cultists twitched and rose; a shadow of blood pooled around Ambrose’s feet and slithered forward.
Jotou charged forward. "Bash!" "TSh!" "Fsh!" "SHTCK!"
He could not avoid her frenzied hits; so he took the blows instead and healed them over. The blonde was so close to his face that there was a fear that was present in the dark-haired man’s eyes... This much pain he had not felt in...
Jotou did not in the slightest let up. "All you wannabe gods are the same!" "SLSH!"
"GH!"
"Greatness this, greater purpose that! You’re murderers!" "FLSH!"
"AgH!"
"Delusional fanatics!" "BSH!" "ZZZFFF!"
"GGGHHAH!"
"A SAD JOKE!!"
Finally after all her repeated attacks, the blonde’s blade missed its mark. A rabbit with wings and antlers flew in front of her and transformed into-
"Thundering Strike!" she had balled up her left hand into a fist and slammed into the entity that was changing before her. It appeared she missed on purpose... Streaks of yellow lightning shot through the creature. "BLASTTTTTT!!!"
It was sent flying in the same arc in swooped in with and the thunder that echoed mimicked the one from the clouds above; the already broken rooftop had some hanging rubble and rebar—even that was now gone with her strike.
Without missing a beat and with the forming spider-creature that was sent flying, she arced her sword into Ambrose again. It slashed into his chest-
"Roar!!"
A familiar sound. For the first time, Jotou’s eyes darted elsewhere, away from Ambrose. Leathery bat-like wings flapped crashed under Ambrose and its stout maw bit the metal clean through, separating the two engaged combatants.
Jotou slipped a foot, but gripped onto the railing and saw her doom beneath her; right before a barbed tail swooped past her and attempted to thrash into her.
With a charge of lightning from her shoulder, she slid onto the catwalk. "CLANG!" The metal was busted and bent upwards as Ambrose rode the wyvern that emerged and flew under the open roof.
It flapped and hovered. Bloated and bubbled up scars were under its scales that began healing, as did Ambrose himself. Her lightning did a lot, unlike Forallei; even so, each opponent and each affinity had some way to survive.
The blood that was a shadow beneath Ambrose’s feet just a moment ago, pooled underneath Jotou’s feet. She did not even realize something was under her; blood tendrils emerged and- passed right through her ankles as if she was not there at all.
Ambrose’s eyes finally calmed; he dispelled the magic, almost like he had confirmed something for himself. Wind fluttered Jotou’s ponytail strand after strand as she stood there with her sword out—none of her form sparked any longer.
’I’m, so out of magic... But it wasn’t about winning.’ "You’re a coward Ambrose," she said loud enough to the wyvern and its rider. "How many corpses have you stacked up to stand so high with no legs?" her eyes sparked. ’It was about sending a message.’
He stood tall, unwavering in his tone, "Us of the Deuctus Cult have not lost. Another time Thundering Blade; you will fall, and you will grovel." The wyvern began to ascend.
Water began drenching her hair and Jotou made no attempt at a reply, knowing it was a waste of her breath. "Woosh!" A shadow emerged and whizzed past her vision.
Through the pouring rain, wisps of purplish-black shadows lashed out and behind Ambrose, a brunette with her dagger stabbed into his spine without a moment of hesitation.
"GHA!" Ambrose’s entire back arched as a jolt of pain stung through him, like it was eating away at bone. Thunder roared above, rain ran down the scales and leather of the wyvern.
Droplets fell through Fumeko’s lashes as she strained her arm to carve the dagger up his back.
His scream was carried over the storm as he reached his arms back and tried to grab a hold of her- "Woosh."
The absence of the dagger in his back stung even more. The open gash through his clothing was not stitched together in blood, but the skin, muscle and sinew underneath was in an instant.
She reappeared right in front of his face and swung the dagger, which he grunted and grabbed her wrist before it could pierce his chest.
She blinked again and appeared over his head; she wrapped her legs around his neck and knifed her dagger into his eye socket. His monstrous yell was only momentary as Fumeko had to blink away and he healed his entire eye in seconds.
The wyvern ascended further into the sky, where it seemed the storm was moving away from. Clouds shifted eastwards, following Beauregard, allowing streaks of sunlight to pierce through the darkened veil over the city.
Fumeko stood on the wyvern’s head and stared at the dark-haired man she had seen one too many times now. She panted while her wet hair was pasted onto the sides of her face—her magic had not fully recovered from the day prior still.
Her eyes darted down and realized, if she did not blink down soon onto the roof of Palais Celneir, there was not going to be a soft landing afterwards.
"Your blood’s the one they use; the one that makes people immune to charm and unable to divulge secrets in court," she said over the beating rain.
"Which by ’they’, you certainly mean us. Congratulations, you managed to figure out what your father could not," even after all the screams and panic, he now stood tall, hands behind his back and without a quaver of fear in his voice. "Then again, I believe I revealed my hand.
So the question remains, how good a detective are you little Sable. A little fire and a little of the fray, and suddenly you believe you rival the clouds in height."
"Aren’t you the dumbasses who call themselves gods?" she glared.
"I believe it is time for you to depart dear detective; the object of your mockery now advances upon the enemy of our nation," Ambrose replied.
It was indeed getting higher. As the sunrays began glistening over the water-draped scales, Ambrose stepped away from the sunlight just as it brushed against his hand—he did so uncomfortably.
Shooting another glare at him, she blinked away and reappeared onto the roof. She watched the wyvern take off and fly. "Meko," Jotou’s voice called her down.
Her shadows appeared fainter as she stood on top of an unstable catwalk. "We’ve got some answers," Fumeko sheathed her dagger.
The blonde right in front of her sheathed her sword, "And a lot more questions."
"Ambrose—necromancy, healing. I guess blood is some form of water if not nature."
"We have a whole other water problem to deal with."
Over to their right, the massive creature was making its way through the sea without a single obstacle in her path. The storm following her wake while the panic in the streets grew quieter with every passing second.
