Catch

With the bone machete in hand, I raise my arm and slash at the Volkar that is closest to me. It is currently mauling an undead and turns to face me as I get near. Their perceptions are incredible. Not a single time have I gotten without ten steps without one noticing me; they even detect Dakota.

The Volkar goes to block my machete with his and makes a surprising move I was not expecting. His blade catches the middle of mine, and with a quick twist and pull of great strength, my machete goes flying out of my hand. The unexpected skill with a blade from a demon makes me backstep rapidly as I draw a backup machete; one extra now remains of the ones I took from the dead demons.

It follows me as I step back, however, and a flash of bone flies at my face as I reflexively lean back. A warm sting comes from my lips as its blade cuts a clean line across my mouth, opening up my jaw with its sharpness. The demon twists its blade and goes for another slash, but Dakota jumps up and grabs the demon's arm with his jaw.

Ether drills into my face from the cut, turning my flesh into watery liquid as I force Rapturous into effect. The purging Ether flows through my body quickly and allows me to recover in just a matter of a single second. This fast Ether is incredible! I should have practiced speed more before. Now only the cut on my face remains with the little bit of watery liquid that joins the blood coming from my face.

I spit the flowing blood out of my mouth from the cut on my face as I cut at the demon's sword arm that Dakota is desperately gnawing on. I feel a bit of resistance before the arm falls off, and Dakota falls to the ground. The Volkar kicks Dakota away as it rips off an antler from its head to stab me using its remaining arm while whatever remains of the other one starts to liquefy. Now it's an even fight, though, as we both are missing an arm. Dakota whimpers on the side as I feel bad for letting the little guy gets hurt.

I'll finish this one on my own, buddy. I spread Ether over the surface of the bone machete quickly, the increased flow speed coming in to be a massive help here as the Volkar charges me and wraps a Leash around its leg with a seemingly useless swipe.

Then, I quickly sidestep and yank the blade that is holding onto its leg with a chain of pure Ether. I feel a huge amount of resistance at first, the demon's strength being far greater than mine, but I plant my feet into the ground and put my whole body into it as opposed to the demon's leg. This contest of strength ends with it on the ground because of it moving at me at the same time as my pull.

From there, I throw the machete at its chest and land the blade straight into its flesh. I see its chest start to bubble as it silently starts to get up. How these demons react to pain is unnerving. They are seemingly unfeeling. While it stands, I take a quick second to reactivate Ironbound. Intricate chains start to cover my hand once more, but I have to pause the skill prematurely as the demon rips the machete out of its chest and throws it at me.

I duck and jump to the side to dodge the sword spinning in the air toward me at the speed of a released arrow. The blade just barely goes past me and sinks to the bony hilt within the ground. The Volkar finally finishes standing, liquid dripping from the hole in its chest and the spot where his arm was cut off. Then, with a small shake of the head and half-arm, it once more charges at me.

Dakota moves around it like a stalking hunter as I stare at the approaching demon, machete in hand, just waiting for it to get close enough. The undead it was mauling has also recovered at this point and nods to me with thanks. The poor guy is missing half of his chest and his left leg up to his knee. I expect him to be unable to do anything, but he yells at the demon, his voice carrying a unique sense of power.

"STOP!"

The Volkar's feet pause for a single fraction of a second as it moves toward me with demonic grace, and I realize the Sigil of the wounded undead. Lawman. With that realization, I take advantage of the hesitation and throw my machete at the demon as I reach down and pull the one it threw at me.

My thrown machete stabs into its thigh with the help of the undead's pausing voice. The Volkar only gets slower at that, and I meet it in close quarters shortly after. I dart in and out, slashing and stabbing it here and there as it is now too wounded to keep up with my speed. It dies after just a short moment of this, the wounds and effects from the bone machete piling up over time.

Once it falls unmoving, I step over to the undead with panting breaths that make the cut across my lips sting with every exhale. I don't say anything because of the obvious, but I pass the man a machete for him to use, then I move over to help Dakota, who joined Blake in her fight against a Volkar. I may not know the man, but everyone deserves at least a fighting chance, and his voice alone is not enough.

I come from behind the demon with panting breaths, but I hesitate to get too close. They can sense everything nearby, right? How about I just make the only thing they can sense too fast for them to react to?

Blake and Dakota fight the Volkar with shifting steps and careful movements, the human using her spirit for defense to block any dangerous strikes and the fox its speed.

While they fight, I toss the machete in my hand in a practicing motion. I've grown to like these things quite a lot in this short amount of time. Just something about the simplicity of a blade and a handle, y'know? Doesn't hurt that they carry the Ether of their makers past their death.

After tossing the machete a few times and starting to get a feel for its weight, I push the limits of Strugglers Defiance with a burst of extra Ether from within and follow up with Adrenaline Surge. The increased strength makes the machete feel as light as a kitchen knife as I rear back my arm from beyond the Volkar's senses.

I wait to throw it, however, despite being ready to do so. I do not have nearly enough skill to hit a moving target, so I have to wait until it stands still. My eyes track the Volkar as I also use Nightvision to see even better in this partial darkness. The bright pulses of light and dim constant light from Chief Birdie make it not too difficult to see, but I need to be sure. I don't wait without action, however, as I finish up the web of Ironbound on my hand. The defensive and attacking skill is rapidly becoming my favorite. The only downside is how quickly it breaks apart. I'll have to improve it.

Seconds pass as it goes back and forth with the two in front of me, yet I wait a bit more. I wait as it leaves a thin cut on Blake's neck, her life coming far too close to forfeit, but I trust in Dakota to back her up. And he does. The oversized fox jumps at the Volkar crazily from the side and repeats his move on the one from before, chomping down on its sword arm.

Blake recovers from the near-lethal strike quickly and uses her spirit that comes forth from her arm to wrap its phantasmal hands around the Volkar. The demon stops moving for a split second under both of their actions, and I set loose the machete.

It flies out of my hand in an instant, the stored-up strength built from my Ether raging through me enough to send it flying out just as fast as the demons did earlier. An arrow of bone stabs straight into the back of the Volkar as it can only slightly turn its head toward the danger before the blade almost entirely pierces through him. And in an effort to both save ammo and get this thing killed, I grab the spare machete that I had and throw that as quickly as I can as a follow-up.

And because of the blade sticking out of its chest, liquifying its organs along with Blake and Dakota holding it down, this one pierces straight into its chest as well. It falls to its knees as I run to it, but before I get there to finish it off, Dakota rips out its throat, quickly causing it to die before it even hits the ground.

My steps slow when I get near them, and my labored breaths paint a descriptive canvas of pain along my ribs. These demons really like to punch me in the sides, but I guess I do put them in positions where that's all they can do.

I check on Blake real quick as she kneels to siphon the Vigor from the demon's corpse, likely to heal the threatening cut on her neck. The two simple words I say elicit pain and blood from my cut, but I just spit out the fluid when I'm done talking and endure the pain.

"You good?"

She nods at me silently before pointing behind me with her free hand that isn't siphoning Vigor. I turn and see that Otto is on his knees, heaving for air and bleeding profusely with the Volkar's prominent liquidation at his wounds. It's not all bad for the man, however, as he shows how he gained those wounds with pride by the four Volkar laying motionless around him, dead, along with two undead.

I take a step toward him as he seems to need help far more than Blake, who is healing herself, but before I take even a single step, I hear a faint sound of something. Ether swirls in my ears in a fraction of a fraction of a second as my eardrums are so close to my core, and I hear a swirling wind, like an approaching arrow.

I react instinctively, part of me somehow thinking that the archer from the swamp is back, and I swing my palm covered in Ironbound toward the sound. I feel a burst of pain and recoil as I am flung half a step back from the force of whatever slammed into my hand, but that's better than its original destination. Blake's skull.

A glance at my hand adorned in Ironbound shows that the skill is barely holding together. After just one hit. Damn. This isn't good. But I don't give it too much attention as I focus on the new threat. All the Volkar around us are dead, either killed by us or the undead, and the new threat seems to be a Volkar as well, only this one is much more imposing.

It is a bit taller than the other ones, only by a foot or so, but its antlers are much, much longer, and in its hands are shards of bone obviously broken off by its hands by their chipped nature.

Far behind it is a large group of fallen undead, the men and women behind it achieving another death and possibly their last. I pull my hand back and step in front of Blake to take the Volkar's attention, but I am surprised by its next action.

The demon reaches up to its mask of bone and breaks it off with a powerful flex of its hand muscles. The Volkar reveals its face to me, and for the first time, I see what they look like under the masks without lethal wounds. Under the mask is a pale white face, one that is perfect and lacking any imperfections whatsoever. A wide smile almost the same width as the cut on my face that goes from the edge of each cheek to the other grows on the demon's face as it speaks. Only the voice is rough and difficult to understand, almost as if the Volkar does not fully know Chero.

"Hello… Vaulki, you?"

My eyebrow raises at the demon's speech, but it isn't all that surprising. None of the demons I've met so far besides Hura and that Nain Rouge could speak, but those did have many years on the surface. Well, I guess Aniwye, too, but Angelhood changes things, even for beasts. The ones down here, however, are not given the opportunity to learn how to speak Chero other than… when they fight people.

My eyes go even wider as I realize what a demon capable of speech entails down here in the Underworld. Only a demon who has encountered enough humans would know how to speak. And the only ending of an encounter with a human for a demon down here is death for one of the sides.

I ignore the demon's attempt at conversation as I rip out the machete from the other dead Volkar beside me and point it at this… Vualki. I assume that's a name, but I won't give it any satisfaction. Blake slowly gets up beside me as I see the cut on her neck has stopped bleeding, as well as the effect of the machete's liquidation disappearing. Dakota slowly starts to stalk along a wide circle around Vaulki.

My Chain Eyes tell me that this Vaulki is a 4th Sigil, light blue chains wrapping around the demon's body that seem to gather on the wrists of the demon. I take a step toward the demon cautiously after seeing how dangerous it is. The 4th Sigileds from earlier were difficult enough. A 5th? That is likely too much for even the three of us. But what else can we do?

I turn slightly to look toward the fight between Angels, and I am almost blinded by the direct glance at the radiance. The demon that transformed into the giant owl-bear mixture is insanely powerful. Chief Birdie uses her light non-stop to create hard light walls to protect herself and others, but they are broken through easily.

I can see Johnny continuously do his best to help in the fight, but he is heavily limited in what he can do. His bullets barely even sink into the hide of the transformed Stikini, and Silas, who is nearby, is barely keeping himself out of harm's way. The three of them seem to be getting their asses kicked, but who knows. Johnny hasn't used his Absolution yet, and neither has Silas or Chief Birdie.

My focus turns back to the demon that seems to be growing impatient. It speaks once more with two fingers pointing toward Blake and Dakota, one to each of them.

"You. Me. They. No. Us honor."

My brain can barely comprehend what he is asking for. Is he asking for a duel? Just between the two of us? What?

"What?"

The words come out of my bloody mouth before I can stop myself, and Vualki seems to chuckle, only its laughter is completely silent despite its body making the movements of laughter. He then speaks once more in broken Chero as his face motions toward the dead behind him.

"You worthy. You catch. They not."

Does it find me as something worthy to fight? What the hell is this? A demon looking for a worthy fight? What the fuck is happening? Frustration rises as a demon has the audacity to challenge me like this. It feels… wrong. Like I'm being looked down on somehow. I grip my machete tight as I take a step toward Vualki.

I give Blake a glance and nod at Dakota as we all start moving toward it to fight together. Fuck this one-on-one. There are three of us; why would I do that? Who fights fair? With honor? That's stupid as fuck. I'll stab you in the nuts to win if I have to, even if it's ten-on-one.

Vualki doesn't seem to like this answer, however, as the demon's smile shifts to an ominous twisted expression of glee. It then stares at Blake's face before it pulls its mask down and takes a step toward Blake and me, who are close, before rearing back an arm.

I see its arms stretch far more than any arm should stretch as its joints turn to some kind of liquid. I recognize what it's about to do as the thing from earlier that came flying at us like a bullet, and before it can throw it, I reach out with my arm to cover Blake's skull. But she is too far, and my hand doesn't reach far enough to cover her face as I hear the sonic boom of the bone shard being released.

The projectile doesn't even register in my eyes, but it does in my mind that is moving as fast as possible. My Ether moves faster than the speed of sound into my arm before detonating as intricate snowflakes within my muscles. I instinctively activate Reach just as one would when trying to grab something just outside of their reach, muscles, tendons, and flesh stretching.

The internal explosion occurs within my muscles, and for the first time, it succeeds, if only because of my recent practice with ornate Ether constructions. So, my arm extends a whole four inches beyond what is humanly possible as the tendons and muscles stretch, allowing me to catch the bone shard aiming for her skull with Ironbound. A loud boom occurs as it breaks the skill from the impact, and a slap follows as I hit Blake in the nose with the back of my hand.

She retreats in pain from the slap, but she thanks me with her eyes as blood drips from my hand. My efforts aren't without consequences as my arm screams in pain from my rushed job of Reach without ample practice, and the pain of a nail stabbing into my hand comes from the palm of the Bloody Palm. I shake my hand off, throwing blood to the dry soil beneath the Underworld. This demon can straight up throw bullets.

It's going to be like fighting Johnny, isn't it? My blood begins to boil at the thought of a rematch, even if it's not really him.

At least I got a little bit of practice; who cares if I got my ass kicked last time.