Shadow’s arms remained crossed, his eyes still gleaming as slowly his subordinates approached Elise. Azala took the lead, behind in approach being Szayel, then Toby, then Dustin. Elise slowly began to step back as the fighting around her continued. Dustin chuckled on his approached, Szayel with a snicker, and Azala with a growl. Her eyes danced around, all around people too busy as the fights drug off into the caves slowly, fewer and fewer remaining in the main chamber.
“Damn, five on one now. That seems cowardly, doesn’t it Azala?” Elise chuckled looking ahead to him, a smirk spreading slowly.
“Bah! I do not need backup to crush you Elise. Now you will experience my full power, hrgh-” he grumbled, darkness pooling up quickly around his chest.
Elise blinked, the darkness separating now as Azala’s hands moved away, a giant blood red sphere with a black aura forming. Her eyes grew large as the ground around shook and the air itself became dry. Blackness could be seen swirling outwards from the core of the sphere as it fully detached from Azala’s torso. With a yowl almost inhuman it fired heading straight at Elise.
Her body twisted, both fists flying out to her right unleashing light. To her left she flew, propelled by her own attacks, narrowly missing as the sphere flew passed and crashed behind. Through the rock wall it flew, melting clean through in fact as it charged away.
“I missed? Heh, no matter,” Azala gurgled.
From behind Elise there came a sword. Her body twisted again; her sword slammed against and quickly parried a strike from Toby. A yell left as she flew off, a jet of darkness having slammed into her from her right, darkness fired by a laughing Dustin. Across the ground she rolled.
Her back crashed into the wall, slowly twitching as Elise immediately flew back up, “{Dammit, I’m in over my head this time. Azala and Toby were bad enough, add in Dustin and a man who can revive the dead, then Shadow who is just watching? This is too much.}”
“Heh,” Dustin scoffed.
Elise looked to Dustin quickly, her eyes narrowed.
“Honestly child I am amazed. To see your will not broken and to see you not even going all out, it makes me wonder where you even are.”
“Elaborate!”
“Think about it. Abused much of your life, fighting people responsible for that, against Azala and myself when we were the ones that got your friends killed, against another who basically betrayed you after lying to you the entire time you knew him. Your resolve is too weak it would seem.”
“You have no right to judge my resolve you dastard, especially when yours is non-existent.”
A blast could finally be heard behind, a glance to the right to see some mild light peering through the new hole, sunlight. Steps echoed in front, her attention focused back on the four as they moved. The slushing of Azala’s steps, the echo of Toby’s, the clomp of Dustin’s, and scratch of Szayel's. Slowly.
“Holly’s not going to bail you out this time, give up!” Dustin shouted.472Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTKKTQUXLaC
472Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOgVLiZHHsY
“Holly, to your left!” came the shout of Chelsea.
Holly’s head turned left, her back arching as the sound of something soaring through the air passed above. To the right into a tree crashed three arrows dripping with poison. With a swift glance to it and then from where it originated she stood again, “Caldori!”
Callie ran quickly from the side up to Holly, huffing, “Y-yes?”
“This guy is getting on my nerves,” Holly grumbled.
Before the both of them approached an individual in Hive Uniform, beneath which there was only Knight armor painted black. The individual clanked forward, a red star on the face plate of the armor. In moments it stopped, chuckling with an echo revealing it to be the voice of a man, “Hahaha, so this is the Legendary Holly Bell without her power? What a total joke.”
“Mmm do not be so confident Basilisx, she is still a worthy prize,” came a hoarse reply as a young girl approached hovering through the air.
Long dirty blonde hair that stretched passed her feet, purple sclera instead of white for her eyes, yellow cornea, and silver pupils. Red cracks spread from the pupil throughout the eyes. She grinned with eyes big, her Hive Uniform flapping.
“Chino this girl can’t even anticipate my moves. It’s a joke!”
Holly glanced at the two and readied up with stance. Basilisx broke into a run forward, blades sliding out from his sleeves and into his hands, broadswords with purple liquid dripping from them. Chino giggled and hovered away, many individuals with rotting flesh moving from her shadow moaning with arms out. At once the individuals broke into runs, their hands falling off revealing metal tubes.
Darts flew from the tubes dripping green, the green touching the ground. Smoke drifted from where the drops hit, the grass hit turning black and crumbling. Holly nodded to her right, at which point Callie charged forward with water rising up from the grass. As it died and turned black, the water ripped itself away and flew forward at Basilisx, the darts, and then those behind him. Away the darts and rotting ones flew though not Basilisx who simply trudged through.
“Caldori, do it,” Holly murmured.
“Gotcha,” Callie replied slapping her hands down on the ground, a surge of electricity flying forth.
Basilisx roared as electricity could be seen surging out of him. He groaned, his weapons dropping and his feet stumbling backwards. Holly glanced right and quickly raised an arm, swinging down with a sword slamming it into the blade of another with both hands now. Before her was another Hive Elite, “Three of you is quite irritating.”
“Hell yes it is. Third is the charm and I will be the one to kill you Holly Bell, me. Ha ha ha,” they laughed.
A blur of white fabric and blue stars passed to the left, a fist crashing into the assailant quickly knocking them away. Holly stumbled back with a huff, “Thanks Wesley. There’s no end to their numbers.”
Multiple surrounded the two now, both standing back to back, “I noted that from the moment I arrived here with backup. Chino and Basilisx are the only ones here truly living, all the rest of these guys are reanimated puppets. I suspect that Chino is a Necromancer.”
“Well that makes this even more annoying. How much longer until the bulk of reinforcements arrives?”
“Oh I’d say another couple of minutes. Chino and Basilisx will likely mount a retreat at that point.”
“Good. We need to finish this up as soon as possible and get to the temple.”
“What about Elise?” Callie questioned.
“She’ll have to make due with what she can. I’m grateful that she has delayed the enemy but we can not afford to go out of our way to aid her now. If The Hive gets that map we could be facing a lot of trouble from here on out.”
“Damn. Alright, let’s hurry this along then so we can go and help!” she yelled.472Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdBxewIrlc3
