The Shadow

Bondrewd looked round the entire corridor again, it was empty. "If a shadow can disappear and appear out of nowhere that's a big problem, except I'll get you soon enough." The man smiled in anticipation, the magic cable stretched along the wall of the ground floor corridor, concentrating fully on controlling the environment, the Lord of Dawn continued ripping the cable out of the wall. "To the right."

A magical projectile flew right over his head, Lord of Dawn fired his Sparagmos without looking and turned around, needles embedded in the wall, and of course no one was there. "I take it he's not going to let me work."

A glimmer of light appeared to the left, this time it was throwing knives, Bondrewd blocked them with his hands, the situation was starting to piss Bondrewd off. The opponent uses magic, and instantly disappears and appears elsewhere. "Teleportation, doppelgangers, summoned creatures, there are many options, we need to disarm him, he is no match for me in open combat,"

Lord of Dawn, dropped the magical cable and turned around and stood with his back to the wall, the man was in complete control, space in front and to the sides, with the wall covering him from behind, listening to his senses he just waited at full strength. "Time is working for me anyway, not much time left until morning, and if my theory is correct during the day the curse is inactive."

But nothing happened, Bondrewd was ready to start building again. "Crack," the planks directly above his head cracked apart, the wood was broken by magic of great power, through the resulting gap immediately flew out a bunch of oblong vessels, "Damn, a grenade!" thought Bondrewd stepping aside, but there was not enough time to manoeuvre. - thought Bondrewd going sideways, but there was not enough time to manoeuvre.

The vessels exploded in mid-air, half a metre short of the floor, the ceramic vessels burst, showering everything around them with a sea of shrapnel.

"Ghaa." Bondrewd was thrown back by the blast, his body riddled with shrapnel flung away by the blast wave and slammed into the wall. The man took a quick glance at his body, "I'll live," a thought flashed through his mind. Waves of pain spread all over the body, but if the arms and torso were tolerable, the legs suffered the most, the man tried to stand up, but the lower limbs simply refused to move, demanding immediate treatment.

The smoke from the explosion had almost cleared and the shadow was preparing for the final blow, moving out of sight of its victim it swung its staff, emitting a massive fireball. The enemy was no longer hiding his presence, and the Lord, feeling the weave of a powerful spell, prepared for the worst.

Everything that happened lasted a couple of seconds, and at their end an even bigger fireball, no real blazing block, that barely fit into the corridor. "Yeah, right." Bondrewd thought to himself and hundreds of purple rays burst out of the helmet's visor towards the target.

The fiery clump of flame fluttered away in an instant, literally dissolving into thin air, the rays missing their target and kicking up a sea of dust. The shadow used its ability again and deciding to go to a bank, appeared five steps away from the lying man.

"I'm sick of you, die at last." The dark figure hissed angrily through his teeth, bringing his staff for a new and final blow. A blue blob flew off the top of the stick and towards the already battered Bondrewd.

In a split second hundreds of dark harnesses burst from the man's back, the dark harnesses lifted the man's body above the floor, the picture was insanely frightening and looked more like a second-rate horror film.

The centipede dodged the projectile with no problem and lunged forward through the rising dust, its movements were jerky as if the creature didn't fully understand how to handle so many legs. The shadow, not expecting such an outcome and with a smile, looked around the corridor, the magician did not expect a real monster to jump out at him through the rising dust.

One of the harnesses pierced his body and nailing his body to the wall, the man intercepted his opponent with his hand and lifted him off the ground.

"Gkgh..." was all the shadow mage could manage to squeeze out of himself, the already tired Bondrewd was finally able to examine his visage. It looked like nothing ordinary, a dark robe, completely hiding his body, half of his face was hidden by a long hood. Having satisfied his curiosity Bondrewd broke the silence.

"Who are you?" Bondrewd squeezed his hand tightly, clearly implying that not speaking was not the answer.

"Fuck you!" he exclaimed angrily, the shadow kicking furiously.

"Wrong answer." One of the hundreds of harnesses flashed in front of the shadow's face, and returned to its original place. The shadow did not fully understand the meaning of this manoeuvre, and he saw it with great difficulty. The situation was clarified by the faint thump of something against the floor. The Shadow slowly turned his head toward the supposed source of the sound.

"What?" a mute question arose in his mind, his left hand was gone, apprehensively the man shifted his gaze to the floor, his hand lay there showering everything around it with a fountain of blood. Realisation came quickly, and with it came a savage pain.

"AAH!!!" The mage screamed convulsively, twitching like a fresh fish in a frying pan.

"I know it hurts, but what are you going to tell me now?" Lord of Dawn asked with a sneer.

"Lord Bondrewd!" A voice came from the side, and the Lord let his guard down for a second and turned towards the new threat. And the shadow gladly seized the chance. Already the single hand clutched tightly the dagger that had come from nowhere and cut the tourniquet. The Shadow stooped back and kicked two feet into Bondrewd's body, forcing him to loosen his grip.

The Lord of Dawn, tried to grab his opponent again, but he skilfully slid from his grasp and threw something to the floor.

"Bam." The room was filled with thick and acrid smoke with a strange herbal odour in an instant.

"Get back!" Bondrewd shouted angrily, the smell of it was soporific gas, but his helmet and inhumanity would protect him, but not his hapless saviours. The group consisting of Dick, Lana and the manager cautiously stepped back, staying on the edge of the gas.

"What are you doing here, you bunch of idiots!!!" Bondrewd yelled like a slash, his triumph was right in his hands, and he simply vanished into the smoke. Bondrewd was in full seriousness contemplating a plan to kill all his co-partisans immediately. The atmosphere in the room was filled with a cold desire to kill. The group of "saviours" sensed the close approach of death and in indecision began to back away slowly.

"Stop!" Bondrewd shouted, goosebumps ran down the skin of the trio, even they realised that now it would be very painful and it was necessary to run, and urgently.

"What are you doing here, you bunch of idiots?"

"We... we went to rescue you, you've made a hell of a mess here, and we decided to come to your rescue." The manager mumbled uncertainly, who was in the rescue party for some reason.

"Now you get back to where you came from before I decapitate you." The trio nodded in unison and ran back to the bathhouse. When the trio was out the door, the Lord sank to his regenerated legs, the speed of his regeneration was terrifying, but even with it he couldn't lean on them fully.

He almost fell down and returned some of the dark harnesses, the man turned to the wall and swung at the wall, leaving a healthy crater on it.

"Bondrewd, aren't you afraid that the shadow will come back with new powers?" asked the awakened system assistant.

"No, I gave him a good beating, and my gut says he's not going to recover anytime soon, and his reaction to the loss of his arm confirms it." One of the tourniquets darted to the floor and picked up the severed arm, quickly examining it he concluded.

"Clearly human, which is good to see, but on the other hand, a little sad."

"Why?" The assistant asked, with a puzzled tone in his voice.

"I expected more. A ghost or a curse or something unusual, and this is such a bummer."

"Bondrewd, are you all right? You were one step away from death, and now you're so calm about your interests."

"What else am I supposed to do, and as for your claim, you can't catch a fish out of a pond without work."

"And what are you going to do now?" asked the system assistant with interest.

"To deal with his negligent subordinates." Said the Lord and supported by the flagellum headed for the bath.