The White Haired Demon Slayer (Part-15)

***Luca Adaleigh***

How... how long have I been fighting?

Something happened... I remember hearing a loud war horn, reverberating through the walls... and that's when everything got worse.

All of a sudden, the monsters who had been attacking me out of lust to kill, now were enraged. They didn't care anymore for their safety, like a relentless rush of death, wave upon wave coming at me with sight of no end coming any soon.

That was 45 minutes ago... no it's clearly been much longer than an hour since the horn.

I'm... bleeding...

Where, I don't know. Is it from my mouth, or is it inside? No, the pain... It's everywhere.

The monsters can't hit me when I'm in God Mode. They can't even see me coming. Is it why they don't fear me?

Perhaps.

One moment they are attacking, the next they are dead. But to me, it's as if they aren't even moving. Everything slows down, slashing off their heads is as easy as passing my blade through a fruit. Cleanly cut.

In God Mode, I cannot be stopped.

In God Mode...

Yet I bleed.

It's as if my heart is being crushed. It's as if my lungs are burning. My muscles are screaming. My head feels as if it's going to split off.

I cannot keep this up.

If I could, I would. No matter the pain.

Ah, it happened again.

As I rush, killing everything in my path, I stop. Wincing, stumbling as a spear rips into my left thigh. It hurts. So much. Fuck. Even in my pain, I look behind and barely dodge an arrow as another lodges itself in my shoulder.

In a single moment just as my blade was about to decapitate yet another goblin, it felt as if my heart stopped. My God Mode stopped, sending a wave of pain and exhaustion through my body. I tried taking a whiff of breath but instead got stabbed by a spear in my leg.

These moments of weakness, the moments when I am left vulnerable due to my inability to keep God Mode going, are when they strike.

They finally see me, and in an instant put their blades into me. I don't even know all the places I have been stabbed, slashed, and cut anymore.

If nothing else, I have my speed. Always have. Always will. This is my greatest weapon.

I scream out in pain as I quickly stumble back, taking blades out of my body and instantly turning God Mode back on.

And there, now I see. Once again everything has seemingly stopped. I rush once again, dashing through the room in one swift motion, killing over 20 goblins in my path.

My opponents are all regular goblins and hobgoblins, but numbering in the hundreds, even they get overwhelming.

Stabbing, slashing, cutting down their numbers, as efficiently as I can. Even then I see no end. Every hallway is filled with more and more goblins coming in endlessly.

I dash three times more, thinning their forces even more. Every dash takes more from me. But I don't stop.

There is no way out. There is no end to this. I have nothing left in me. My stamina has all burnt out. My bleeding won't stop.

Even then, come death or suffering.

I will fight.

.

.

.

***Sylvie Bransford***

We cannot hold on anymore. This is the worst-case scenario.

I don't know what happened. But something changed. A large battle horn sounded across the entire monster spawn, and suddenly all the monsters got enraged beyond compare. Literally started to throw themselves at us, with only our bloody deaths on their minds.

Elaina has become desperate. She is giving it her all but going too far. They broke her bow, even with the strong, pulsing wind around it. We have been forced completely into close combat.

She has given over completely to her battle instincts. She is no longer thinking critically about her actions. And I think I partly understand why. Due to the pain she has been enduring in the last one hour since the horn sounded.

I am trying my best to deflect and protect her as best as I can, but she is no longer staying within my area of defense.

Too many injuries cover her body and my healing can't keep up. Coating her hands in a torrent of wind, she is blowing away enemies with every punch, but the recoil of the wind magic blows are devastating her arms completely. Each attack has equal power to one of Ren's punches, which is really impressive, but her arms are under immense pain to the bone. The recoil of every blow shocks her all the way to the shoulder and beyond. I can tell since my mana is in her, trying its best to keep healing her.

Combined with the immensely powerful and near-lethal attacks that sometimes manage to find her body every time she leaves my area of defense. My healing really cannot keep up with all her damage.

I am really giving it my all just to keep her safe, and I am now getting really low on mana too.

As I continue to deflect and counter lethal attacks, Elaina once again pounces, both hands covered with powerful spinning torrents of air. She strikes a large group of goblins with both hard hands, with the wind torrents sending them flying away, killing them all. But as she reels in shock from the recoil mid-air, before she could even land, a large hobgoblin with a massive spiked gauntlet punched her right in the chest.

Elaina screams out in pain as she is blown away, her eyes turning bloodshot, spewing blood from her mouth all over her breastplate.

The moment I saw the punch coming for her, I had started rushing again, deflecting everything around me, not even caring to counter any attacks.

Once again, this is what has been happening every time she leaves my side, but she has never been hit so hard. The damage is so much, my mana in her body already got spent trying to heal her and I cannot get any updates on her condition.

Even then, spewing even more blood from her mouth, she stands up, looking right at the monsters in front of her with rage. She can't even gather wind magic on her arms anymore, but she is still raring to fight.

Another hobgoblin starts swinging his axe, to end her while in her weakened state. I step up just in time, deflecting the axe off the hilt of my sword, and returning a swipe across his neck with the tip of my rapier, instantly slitting his throat.

As the goblin dies, I grab Elaina's breast plate and throw her behind me, slamming her back against the wall.

There is no time to think, there is nothing else. I sheathe my rapier and rush to put both my hands on her. Oh my goodness, her rib cage has been badly shattered, multiple bones broken with one lung and her liver both punctured by them. Her heart has barely avoided being crushed.

Without a second thought, I pull every last bit of mana from deep inside me and dump it into her body, hoping to heal her as quickly as I can. I feel weak, but that is of no concern, Elaina must live.

And then it happened...

For the first time in the entire night, I was struck.

And it was bad.

From my shoulder blade to my torso, one slash, cut deep across my back. The strike was so powerful it tore right through my back armor. For a moment I didn't even register, until it felt really cold and I could feel blood trickling down my back.

Ah, this pain...

"SYLVIEEEEE!!!!!!" Elaina screamed out.

My arms collapsed and I fell forward, my head hitting the wall by Elaina's side as my body dropped over her.

Elaina held my body, crying out my name. Ah, her eyes look so bewildered.

Should I just give up? Should I just let this feeling take me?

I have no mana left in me. I cannot heal myself. If I used my life force to heal, I would instead die instantly, as that's all I have left. Very little of it.

Hmm.

I quickly turn on my feet and cut the head off the hobgoblin behind me.

This is no time to fall.

"Fight."