6: Downfall of Pride

One look at the woman and Defolta could tell that she was a person of no good. The woman was dressed in black robes with feather designs that matching a raven. She also possessed a beautiful face, with ebony black hair and rosy, red lips.

"What the Hell!? here did she come from, Nekowa!?" Defolta despite being mentally in pain, still managed to communicate with the cat telepathically.

"I don't know!!" Nekowa panicked, "It's like she just appeared out of thin air!! Perhaps she utilized some form of Illusion Magic!!"

In any other situation, Defolta would no doubt admire such a beauty, but if said beauty was trying end her existence, then Defolta would not hesitate to punch her lights out and send her pummeling to the ground.

"What do we have here?" The woman strutted around Defolta arrogantly and eyed her with interest, "A little girl managed to infiltrate my camp. How very rude of you. I was away for a while to do some business, and color me shock when no one of the guards greeted me in the entrance."

That explained the mysterious woman's absence back when Defolta was assassinating the bandits. Defolta, as much as she would love to respond, was now incapable of doing so, due to the continuous pain still invading her head and getting worse with each second passed.

"And base on how quiet this camp is, followed by the stench of blood, I can only assume that you manage to murder every last one of my followers. Are you a fellow witch, perhaps?" The woman's face turned frown upon seeing that no one was getting to her aide.

"Oh, where are my manners, my name is Matilda, a Wild Witch as you so harshly call us." The woman Matilda proudly introduced herself, "And unfortunately, my name is the last thing you shall ever know. I am simply doing you the courtesy of letting you know the name of the one who shall end you tonight."

"O-oh yeah!?" Defolta struggled to even impart her words as her shaking arms reached the dagger on her waist. Her efforts proved to be in vain when the grip on her blood-covered dagger slipped and was accidentally hurled right near at Matilda's feet.

"S-shit!!" Defolta continued resisting but it was no use. Her entire body slowly by slowly went even lower to the ground with her two arms now serving as her last ditch of support of life.

"Pathetic, how the assassin has fallen." Matilda laughed conceitedly, demonstrating the sheer might of her magic as she dominated the Magical Girl's mind. She then stared at the dagger with a dark glint in her eye, a wicked smile once more forming on her triumphant face.

"P-please, m-make it q-quick." The pleading voice of the girl was certainly music to Matilda's ears and oh, she was having none of it.

"This primitive weapon of yours… A pitiful small knife, such is the cowardly weapon of the one who stalks the shadows, a worthless, lowly Assassin." Matilda said with disdain and picked up the said weapon, "Now that I think about it, you are no Witch, for why rely on the shadows when you can just use the full might of magic at your disposal to crush your adversaries?"

To prove her point, Matilda chanted a set of words, a catalyst to unleash her gigantic cloak of flames, displaying an impressive amount of fire surrounding her body. It was the testament of how powerful she truly was, her potent magic in full sight for everyone to dazzle in her very presence.

"To perish by the full force of my magic is an honor, an honor that sadly you won't receive, filthy shadow rat." Matilda uttered with disgust and deactivated her flame cloak, approaching Defolta slowly with the dagger still in hand, "Instead, you will die by the cowardly weapon you used. Oh, I shall take pleasure in seeing you bleed to your last breath and slowly and painfully die as I carved this dagger in each and every one of your delectable entrails, little girl."

As the dagger gradually closed in on Defolta's throat, the girl, without any warning, swiftly snatched it and with unnatural speed, sliced Matilda's throat which effectively reversed the situation overall.

"W-wha!!??" This time, it was Matilda's turn to struggle while covering her neck in a futile attempt to stop the bleeding. She also could not form any comprehensive words, "H-haa?"

Defolta stood up like nothing happened and even had the audacity to dust the dirt away from her clothes. To add salt to the wound, she just formed a simple smile on her cute face.

But for some reason, the simplicity of Defolta's smile scared Matilda a whole lot more than any adversary that she had faced so far.

"I see, it appears that you cannot cast any sort of magic without the aid of your voice. What a flawed system of magic you Witches had." Defolta sat down with her legs crossed, facing Matilda directly while still retaining the sick smile of her own, "I bet you are wandering as to how I was able to recover, I reckon."

Even without an answer, well, a comprehensive one at least courtesy of Matilda's sliced throat, Defolta indulged her, nevertheless.

"You see, it was all an act, Matilda." Defolta answered, causing Matilda's eyes to widen with shock, "One look at you and I could instantly tell that you are of the egotistic kind, always so full of themselves and love to hear the sound of their voices. Therefore, I purposely feigned weakness to allow you to pander yourself in your self-deluded arrogance. To make things even more interesting, I even made a gamble. Do you know what kind of gamble I made?"

Defolta's answer was in the form of yet another set of unintelligible words, and the Magical Girl just sighed in response.

"I gamble with the fact that your own arrogance will be your downfall, and congratulations, you have proven me correct!" Defolta said with glee while resting her face on her left hand. She then twirled her dagger, eyeing it like it was a precious toy, "This knife that you despise, dagger actually, I intentionally threw it at your feet to induce you with the idea of hopefully approaching me close and killing me with it. Oh boy, and it actually fucking worked, and once again, you can thank your arrogance for that."

Defolta then turned her eyes around the vicinity as she was looking for something. When she found what she was looking for, Matilda could have sworn that the girl's smile turned even more cruel as if she had found a new plaything to toy around with.

"Ah, villains like you, I know that many of your kind are around this wretched world, this world which by the way, did not in any way gave me any good first impression ever since arriving here." Defolta said and finally stood up. She subsequently dragged Matilda's body by her long hair as her laughable struggles of breaking free were all for naught.

A wooden pole stood tall and Defolta tied Matilda's body a little bit high up with her two hands bound behind.

"M-m-mers-hii." Matilda was slowly losing all signs of life in a painful manner, but sadly for her, Defolta was not in the mood to provide her a swift merciful death.

"Mercy, huh?" A cold grin was all Matilda received from the Magical Girl, "Funny, your victims most probably said the same thing, but nope, they're all dead. Did you know? Ahh, who am I kidding, you definitely know… One of them was a girl, a girl who had not even reached puberty. She was raped by your men and strangled to death when they were done with her. And I find it strange that you would allow such a dreadful thing, considering that you are a woman as well."

"NN—nnoo, I—" Matilda tried to protest, but the time for words was over and her fate was sealed.

"Nope, your words are wasted here. Save it when the time comes for your judgement in death. You absolutely need it when facing the devil himself." Defolta said and stroked her chin like she remembered something, "I also recalled you saying that you are going to carve my delectable entrails, yes?"

In an instant, Defolta rapidly slashed Matilda's belly, causing her intestines to fall off hanging, much to the very horror that was now evident in the dying woman's crying eyes.

"As a Magical Girl of Love and Justice, it is my sole duty to make you, an evildoer, an example for other evildoers out there. Any despicable villains out there is going to suffer the same or equivalent fate as you, for this is my word and bond as Defolta!!" The Magical Jack of all Trades declared rather cutely, despite her horrendous take of how she handled the entire situation.

Regardless of all that, it was of no doubt that her conviction burned ferociously, and the bright flames of her resolve marked a new path that would shake the very foundation of this very world itself.