I was trying to figure out what the rods do, but it became apparent in a matter of seconds. When I activated mana sense, I saw red strings of mana flow out from the tips of the rods, and into the demon.
No, "strings" is an understatement. They were more like climbing ropes, around the thickness of an adult's arm.
"Ahaha, do you still think you have a chance against me? With an infinite supply of mana, I can regenerate my original body back!" His veins bulged, and his back muscles convulsed.
Each of his wings grew twice larger, now filling a quarter of this room. The next moment, he raised his head.
"That's one creepy look you've got. Mind not staring at me like that?" I got ready to use my full speed in avoiding his attacks.
"Yo, River. You got any trump card or something? Cause now's a good chance to use it. By the looks of things, his speed will increase by around.. ten times." Blood brought out the bad news.
"He's gonna be ten times faster, you say? Welp, let's just hope for the best." In an attempt to catch the boss off guard, I attacked him with my manipulators.
His wings grabbed all four manipulators and crushed them to dust. Those will take a few hours to auto-recover.
"Welp, that didn't work. What now?" I asked the goat head.
"Just try not to die. Maybe he has a weakness." I guess that's my last option, isn't it?
I saw a flash of light and jumped to the side of the room as fast as I could. That same moment, an explosive attack happened right behind me.
I grabbed onto one of the rods, and, using it as a monkey bar, swung around, turning my momentum back at the boss. He dodged the attack with little effort, though I did manage to tear off one of his wings along the way.
The boss stood still for a moment, to recover his wing, and I took that chance to use [devastating attack]. That, combined with Blood's [gravisphere] [reverse polarity], allowed me to throw a really heavy blow at him.
"Nice try." The demon wrapped himself with a few wings, completely negating my attack. I got thrown back as a result of such a punch, and he didn't miss out on an opportunity to attack me while I was immobile.
"One swing was all it took to bring your head off your shoulders. How pathetic." He picked my severed head by the hair, doing a victorious stance.
"*cough* What?" The boss coughed up some blood and looked down, only to see my right hand pierced through his chest, holding his heart.
"You thought I'd come unprepared?" I squished the heart, popping it. I'm glad I drank a potion of instant recovery.
"Ha. Hahaha!" The hole in his chest healed up, trapping my hand inside. He grabbed onto me with two of his wings and proceeded to shred me to pieces. My body kept recovering, and this cycle went on for about twenty minutes.
The chalk-white room was now stained with red color. I don't have any more [instant recovery] potions, so as soon as the duration on the last one ends - I'm done for. He threw my body to the ground, thinking that I'm gonna be in too much pain and shock to move.
"I don't know how you're recovering so fast, but there's gotta be a limit. I'll just leave you be for a little while." He turned around.
"I've experienced worse pain than this, fucker." I jumped to my feet and started circling him, dashing from wall to wall, floor to ceiling.
Now!
With precise timing, I attacked him using the blood blade, but he kept perfectly redirecting my attacks at the ground, also taking a cut at me whenever I was down. There were 30 seconds of the potion left.
"Just give up already. You've shown all your trump cards and skills." He waited until i tried to attack again, and pierced me with a wing.
"Ya think so?" I smiled.
He felt pain and looked behind. Three wings were cut off.
"Damn. Just die!" He swung at me, but I wasn't in his grasp anymore. Another wing was missing.
The demon fiercely turned around, expecting me to be there.
I clicked him in half, several times.
"No kind of speed can bet teleportation. It's instant." I teleported all around him, cutting him hundreds of times every second. My speed is insanely high but compared to this guy, it's not that impressive.
Because of his fast reaction, I couldn't cut him more than twice at a time, otherwise he would do the same to me, but with [teleport], his reaction speed becomes a lot less effective, nice he can't guess where I'll be until he feels the pain.
Now, what makes things so great is that he feels a lot less pain than humans, and because of that, it takes him way longer to realize where the damage has been done.
"And now, you're just gonna take hits until you die~ This is so great." I slashed away at his infinitely recovering flesh.
Can we just appreciate the fact that Tetra is just standing there, in the corner, watching the fight play out?
Well, she can't really "watch" it, since they're moving too quickly, but you get the point.
Seeya next time~