Amanda Bliss

Cold sweat ran down Melissa's face as she focused her entire attention on Amanda Bliss.

Time slowed down in her eyes as her brain went into overdrive.

Her chances of winning were abysmally small. She did not want to win against this monster but come up with a way of stalling enough time for Abe to escape and George to come over.

Even the smallest of advantages could mean the difference between her not being brutally annihilated and coming out with her body intact.

Their agility is about the same, but Melissa's other attributes pale in comparison.

To make matters worse, there is no information about her vitality and endurance.

Even without this, Melissa could make a guess because she recognized the name.

'Most of her skills are enough to put me into submission! I'm an assassin goddammit not a fighter! Why the hell is the legendary mercenary Amanda Bliss doing here?!'

...

The Shadow Hive naturally collects information from the underworld known as the black market.

Naturally, Melissa knows of the legendary mercenary Amanda Bliss.

Also known as the Queen Fighter, she rose to prominence around a decade ago in the underworld due to her monstrous fighting capabilities with guns, knives, and hand-to-hand combat.

This lady became known during the underwater conflicts in disputed territory borders between the Aeternum Empire and the Syreni Dominion. It is no coincidence these are happening at portal locations to Diabolus that are situated right on the borders of these two nations.

These portals have been sealed for decades but remain political drama since the two nations have repeatedly contested for ownership of these areas. At the beginning these disputes were friendly discussion between the two.

Since relations are now at an all-time low, mercenary organizations between both sides have been duking it out with occasional fighting.

Amanda is a favorite among mercenaries and very hated among Syreni.

She has caused devastating losses for the opposing mercenary organizations. All assassination attempts and ambushes have failed and caused even more losses for the Syreni.

The Syreni government tried to pressure the Aeternum government into arresting her, but they simply turned a blind eye to the matter. It was only after threats of sanctions that the government finally pressured the mercenary organization housing Amanda to fire her.

Ultimately she retired from underwater operations and returned to the continent.

Shortly after, news came out that she was actually a mind-controlled slave which ruined her popularity among many. She appeared in multiple underworld organizations during a multi-year period, fighting against other organizations who were enemies of the one she worked for.

In fact, the underworld was shaken many times because she managed to destroy several underworld organizations. It got to the point that many were too terrified to buy her.

Two years ago, she suddenly went under the radar and seemingly disappeared after an unknown organization bought her. After that, news regarding any appearances of her became very sparse.

The latest she remembered was that Amanda may or may not be in the Northern Mountain Range.

And now here she is.

...

Seeing how cold-sweated Melissa was against the enemy, Abe gave in and picked up the members. He knew his own limits and did not want to risk the lives of his members.

"I wish you luck."

She faintly nodded but did not look at him.

Abe managed to carry all three members with great difficulty before running at his highest speed.

With him out of the equation, Melissa could sigh in relief a little.

Her [Shadow Daggers] materialized out of thin air into her hands.

"Die." Were the only words that Amanda said as she raised her handgun at her.

"[Shadow Domain]!" Melissa's eyes turned dark as she shouted one of her skills.

A spherical area of darkness engulfed the entire area. From the outside, it looked like a black hole.

[Shadow Domain] - Casts an area of total darkness around the user, granting full strength during the day. Costs a substantial amount of dark magus to maintain longer than ten minutes.

Amanda Bliss remained indifferent even in the total darkness, firing shots from her handgun at different directions.

Melissa was forced to repeatedly dodge these bullets by predicting where Amanda will fire using [Assassin's Sense]. She is not fast enough to dodge a bullet already fired.

'[Shadow Clone], [Shadow Trap], [Camouflage], [Shadow Space].'

These skills were casted repeatedly in Melissa's mind.

Multiple shadow clones and shadow traps were created around the area. At the same time, Melissa released objects from her shadow space above Amanda in the hopes of distracting her even further.

Of course, Amanda was not standing there passively shooting at Melissa.

She pulled out another handgun and fired in all kinds of directions at an insane speed. Each bullet would hit a clone and an object from her shadow space above, destroying them in the process. Every trap she walked into would collapse without even scratching a hair on her.

Despite all these distractions, she would send a bullet in Melissa's direction like the shadow domain even existed. To make matters worse, each bullet is infused with energies that make them even faster and more explosive.

Amanda seemed like she was passively defending, but it was more like playing around.

Melissa knew the moment she became serious would be the moment she would have to escape.

Gritting her teeth, she burned through her dark magus like crazy which sent her speed even faster. Hundreds of shadow daggers condensed out of thin air and were catapulted at Amanda.

Shockingly, they only bounced off of Amanda like they were wads of paper.

'What do I do?! How can I gain some advantage?!'

Melissa frantically gulped down one of her dark magus potions she pulled from her space. Dark magus flooded her body and replenished a large portion of her expended energy.

This however, can only do so much.

If Melissa was a medieval soldier with a sword, then Amanda is a modern tank.

Unfortunately, not much was on her side.

Amanda finally decided to move to the offensive.

She released some of her aura and it instantly began to push back the shadow domain. The entire surface began to ripple and warp as if it was about to collapse.

Just her aura was devastating enough. It consisted of many types of magus energies that were incredibly sharp and full of eternal coldness like a machine completing a task.

In fact, it was a lot similar to George's [Aura].

Melissa's face turned pale as everything was being pushed back despite her repeatedly casting her skills. Even so, determination remained on her face to stall for time.

She condescend her aura to a thin dense layer around her body to increase her explosive power and speed. A sense of rapidly growing danger could be felt by her gut.

She knew Amanda was about to go full-offensive.

Indeed, Melissa was right.

Seconds later, Amanda put away her handguns. She leapt at Melissa's direction with a speed almost as equal to hers.

...

Abe hurriedly ran with the three down the mountain.

His speed was not much faster than an average human. As such, even after so many minutes, he was not even close to halfway. He is the ant atop a giant hill.

He nearly collapsed multiple times as the mountain shook from their fighting.

Hesitation filled his mind and he came to a stop to look up at the fighting. The black hole at the mountain was beginning to warp and ripple as if it was being pushed back.

A terrifying aura escaped from the shadow domain which greatly surpassed Melissa's.

Abe realized his decision to flee was not wrong.

If he had tried to fight, his flimsy defense would have been torn like paper and Amanda would have trampled on him like a bug. The gulf between the two was too large.

Despite this difference, Abe really wanted to help Melissa.

They have only known each other for a few weeks, but she is already friends with Bernice and has helped them a lot in gathering supplies. Furthermore, she seems like a genuinely friendly person.

It felt wrong to just leave her to fight alone and be potentially killed.

'If only I wasn't so weak.'

He gritted his teeth in frustration recalling the powerlessness ever since this mission began.

After much internal struggle that felt like hours to him, he slowly put down the three members next to each other under an area shielded from the freezing winds.

"I'm sorry, but I have to try."

Abe reached into a pocket and pulled out a vial full of a black mysterious liquid. This item would be enough for lifelong retirement, but he decided to use it at this critical moment.

With determined eyes, he gulped the entire vial in one go, and his eyes dilated as power filled his body.

At the same time, Bernice's eyes twitched as if she was about to awaken.

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Notes:

* I may release a chapter tomorrow outside the normal schedule since I'm really liking this part of my novel.