Chapter 96 Realization - The Will to ….

In the air, Azi infused what magic energy he had left into his arms as his veins glowed blueish white. Coming from behind its head, he brought his fist down on the giant centipede-like monster. His punch impacted the top of its head while it was mid-motion to attack Shizu.

Caught off guard, this again caused the monster to be knocked to the ground. This time Azi gripped its head with his other free hand as he fell with the monster's head. Once he got his feet on the ground, he then tugged and rolled it over to reveal its side. Shizu took the chance to again slash at its underbelly, but she infused her blade with fire magic.

A long black gash was made in the monster's underbelly and this time she saw that her attack was effective. The monster's wounds from her previous attacks seemingly disappeared so she thought to burn the monster to death. Taking note of Shizu's change in style of attack, Azi saw how the initial wounds of the monster had disappeared and suspected that magic was at play.

He infused his goggles with inspection magic to examine the monster's body and saw a large source of magic energy coming from the forehead right in front of him. The magic flowed from this source and moved to its new wounds. It began to heal and Azi deduced that it was likely regenerating from whatever was in its head, so Azi moved to remove the source of magic energy.

Still gripping the monster's head with his left hand to keep it pinned, Azi punched away at the carapace with his right.

Not able to infuse another punch due to the prolonged fight and a need to act quickly, Azi had to hope that his gauntlets could break the carapace.

With his first punch, the carapace cracked so he quickly followed it up with another punch and this time got a better grip on the monster's head as his left hand's fingers began to dig into the monster's carapace.

As Azi continued to punch at the monster's forehead, the monster attempted to lift its head but was unable to muster the strength when Shizu and Kajima began to attack its underbelly with their blades. An enormous amount of blood gushed and it befuddled the two warriors on how the monster could bleed so profusely.

The monster howled in pain and attempted to lift its head again but was unable to as Azi's raw strength was holding it down. To ensure that he would not be pushed away, Azi had used his magic tethers and had them created from his feet. These tethers connected him to the ground like a plant rooted to the earth.

The monster squirmed but Azi, Kajima, and Shizu were unrelenting in their efforts to kill the enormous monster. Less than a minute passed and after a few good punches, Azi was able to break the carapace and saw a blue stone in the monster's head.

He was breathing heavily as the magic tether's, while easy for him to form, drained at his mental stamina. Making a hasty decision, he ripped the blue stone out of the monster's head and proceeded to put all his efforts into keeping the monster pinned.

The monster did not notice Azi's action of ripping out the stone as it was very loosely connected with the monster's flesh and its attention was more drawn to the two humans attacking its underbelly.

Kajima and Shizu at this point had brought down numerous attacks on the monster, but now saw that their inflicted injuries were persisting.

Seeing her chance, Shizu infused her blade with the maximum amount of magic it could hold in an instant. The process would cause her to feel fatigue after her next attack, but took the opportunity her battle instincts had picked up on.

Aiming for a killing blow, Shizu positioned herself to the monster's neck and with a single crimson slash, which was followed by a red flash, the monster's head was sliced away from its body.

The lower half of the monster's body violently writhed which knocked Kajima and Shizu a few meters away. Azi fared much the same as his grip on the monster came loose. The impact was light so they received no major injuries besides a slight bruise.

Soon the remains of the monster stopped its writhing and Shizu let out a sigh of relief. She then looked around and saw that Nosuri and Ougi were running to her position. It seemed that Nosuri and Ougi had killed the small swarm of gengiri without issue.

"Lady Shizu! Are you ok?!" Asked Nosuri in a loud and concerned tone.

"I'm fine. Help the wounded and get Jerome's men to an apothecary. They were somewhat foolish to follow Jerome, but they did help in this battle."

"I understand." Affirmed Nosuri. "Ougi, please find an apothecary."

"Yes sister, but it seems we already have someone here to help." Said Ougi as he pointed in the direction of the village.

Shizu turned her head in the direction of Ougi's outstretched finger and saw, to her dismay, Rulu aiding a mercenary with his wounds. He had a broken arm as he was knocked away and fell on it.

Her concern rising, Shizu began to run to her sister to tell her to get to safety as the area was still too dangerous. Before she could say a word while in the middle of her stride, she saw the remains of the monster suddenly move and felt a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach.

The decapitated centipede-like monster, had risen its lower half up from the ground and the bloody stub where its head once was. The stub began to bubble with purple blood and flesh, in a few seconds the monster regrew its head and it roared at the first thing it saw which was Rulu and the mercenary.

Enraged and seeing an easy prey in its direct line of sight, the monster chose to brutally kill whatever was in front of it in the most horrid way its primitive mind could think of.

Straining its body, blue tipped spines protruded from in between its front carapace and soon launched itself as it propelled the spines like a blow darts, but its speed and momentum was intense as it made a sharp and audible sound as it traveled through the air.

Rulu, who was kneeling beside the injured man, looked on in fear and attempted to protect the mercenary with her body as she covered the man to get between him and the spines directed at her. Before the blue tipped spines got to her, Rulu felt someone hug her from her behind.

Rulu felt a few reverberations through the person that was holding her. When the reverberations stopped, she then peeked through her shut eyes and looked around, she saw that the person holding her was Azi and that he had covered her from the attack with his own body.

In a panic, Rulu asked.

"Azi! Are you o….."

Azi slumped forward onto Rulu who could now see around him and saw that there was a black spine protruding from his lower back. Rulu thought to herself and remembered what Shizu had told her. She was not a warrior, she could not fight. She then thought that if it wasn't for her, this would not have happened and felt guilt well up in her heart.

Shizu, seeing what had occurred, was relieved that Rulu was safe but was unaware of the state Azi was in since she could not see the spine in his back. It seemed that the monster was unable to continue its attack so Shizu moved quickly with Kajima, Ougi, and Nosuri to engage the newly revived monster.

While the four fought, Azi was still conscious and was breathing painful breaths. He was able to activate his barrier spell around his back to a lesser effect to block most of the spines, but it seemed that the last spine had gotten through.

The blue tipped spines seemingly dug into his barrier for a moment before bouncing away, but it seemed that his barrier faltered at the end as the last spine seemingly looked as if it was drilling into his barrier.

It penetrated his barrier and then his body. Luckily it was embedded into his lower back and not into any vital area such as his major organs. The pain was bearable as most of the projectile's momentum and speed was dampened from his barrier.

He fell over as exhaustion began to overcome his body and he could feel as if the pain was attempting to knock him out. To keep himself conscious, he gripped his hands into fists that were previously laid flat on the ground.

In his right was the blue stone that Azi ripped out of the monster but he had disregarded this and squeezed a bit too hard. The blue stone broke and he felt energy flow into his core from his right hand.

This lessened the pain and he could now refocus his mind.

He heard Rulu ask again if he was ok and he nodded in affirmation and asked.

"What about Shizu?"

Rulu pointed at the ongoing battle a few meters away from them and Azi, with some help from Rulu, turned to see what was happening. The battle was not going well, the monster's carapace was undamaged but it seemed that it lost its regenerating abilities as Azi saw that its smaller legs were not regrowing.

Since Azi was not there to hold the monster down, a killing blow was difficult to inflict. Shizu was also fatigued and Kajima did not have his halberd with him to break the carapace. Nosuri and Ougi were also unable to land a killing blow as they were not equipped to handle heavily armored targets.

Getting to his feet, which caused Rulu to protest, Azi moved to join the battle.

"You can't! STOP. You'll DIE." Yell Rulu, tears welling up in her eyes.

But Azi brushed off Rulu's words. His mind was focused as the energy he had received from breaking the blue stone had an unknown effect on him.

Azi felt fine, but the blood dripping from his back would tell people otherwise. Before he could respond to Rulu, he suddenly felt a rush of images fill his mind. There were random images of places that seemed familiar but felt also unknown to him.

But there was one scene that he could recall with clarity. It was the visage of an wrinkled old man in a black suit as he laid in a wooden casket. Azi felt the feeling of loss, regret, and then anger.

Worried by his sudden pause, Rulu put her hand on Azi's shoulder to get him to sit down but reeled back in pain as soon as she felt his shoulder. Her hand felt as if it was just lightly burned and Rulu wondered if it was just her imagination but soon saw steam emit from Azi's body and the snow around them began to melt.

With a sudden gust of wind, Rulu's hair was blown back as Azi ran forward with great speed and covered the distance from the battle in only a few seconds.

*****

"Damnit! Ougi! Nosuri! Fall back! Get everyone out of here!" Ordered Shizu.

Nosuri hesitated to follow her orders as it would mean leaving her leader exposed to danger but this was quickly dismissed as her loyalty training as a senshokenishi kicked in and she begrudgingly accepted Shizu's orders.

Before she could take a step, everyone heard a loud booming sound from Rulu's position. Nosuri's eyes widened as she saw Azi's figure as he ran with great speed while his body looked as if it was on fire.

Flames emitted from his arms and shoulders and the snow beneath him melted with every step. With the momentum from his powerful steps, Azi jumped and then slammed his fist onto the monster's forehead from above. He was so quick that no one had time to say a word.

The centipede shaped monster's long body reverberated and it slammed to the ground with an audible booming sound. The monster looked to be visibly shaken as its head started to tremble and cried out in what everyone could interpret as fear.

With an even louder war cry from before, Azi let loose more of his punches with his flame infused arms. This continuous onslaught kept the monster stunned, as its brain was getting rattled around in its "Skull"?

Everyone quickly understood that Azi was purposefully attempting to pin the monster with whatever strength he had and attempted to quickly kill the monster. They all attacked, and after a couple minutes, the monster's smaller legs began to go limp.

Everyone except Azi sighed in relief. With their guards still up, the group noticed that Azi had continued to punch the monster's head even after it was dead. He had already broken the outer carapace and had begun to work at tenderizing the monster's brain.

Purple blood covered Azi's face, clothes, and fists but he did not care as he continued to pummel the corpse.

Shizu walked to Azi and could see the spine in his lower back. She felt concern rise in her mind and worriedly frowned.

"THAT'S ENOUGH! STOP!" Commanded Shizu, her tone concise and sharp.

But Azi did not listen and she witnessed Azi continue to punch away as he had an enraged expression on his face. While his expression looked ferocious Shizu felt a chill run up her spine as she saw that his eyes looked empty and hollow, she then overheard what he was mumbling to himself.

"IT DIES, KILL IT, AND IT DIES. IF NOT, I'LL DIE, KILL, NEVER AGAIN. I NEED TO KILL, KILL, KILL, OR… I'LL DIE."

Disturbed, Shizu could not long hold back her concern as she moved to do something drastic. Climbing up and getting behind him, Shizu ripped the spine out of Azi's back and he screamed in pain, but it brought the light back into his eyes and he stopped his mumbling.

He groaned in pain and fell back, where he was promptly caught by Shizu. As his blood and the monster's blood stained her clothing. Shizu looked down and saw the somewhat distant state of mind that Azi was in. It was likely that he was going into shock and promptly ran off to get him some medical attention after giving Nosuri, Ougi, and Kajima some instructions.