One of Corren's countless, motion-blurred hooking punches suddenly folded against his bicep, causing my attempt to parry his gauntlet to whiff. My head tilted around his shoulder, just enough to spot the cloud of mist Veronica was surrounding us with up to our hips from a few feet away. Ripple Stride quickly pulled my momentum from the both of them, arching around a tree and leaving Corren punching at air for a split second. His eyes remained deadlocked onto me, which is probably why it took his legs out from under him to notice the cloud of mist surrounding him dissipate with a bright orange flash. Corren's fists fired at his backside, leaving a streak of clear vapor behind him. Seeing his head whip around to locate Veronica, my blades slapped together firing a bolt of lightning. Corren had already turned to chase down Veronica, causing my Lightning Bolt to pierce through the bottom of his boot rather than his neck as intended. Corren let out a guttural, breathy growl as he dashed to the side and abandoned chasing Veronica entirely.
With little concern for Veronica's ability to hit me with her stupid little mist to steam skill, my focus remained trained on keeping Corren from escaping again. Given the element of surprise, I'm not sure whatever visual skill I earned earlier will do me much good before he lands something critical. Not to mention we'd spent quite some time fighting since my last elimination now, meaning I'm probably burning through my mana pool. Corren has to go first, while Veronica's assumedly large mana reserves should top me off plenty after she's gone until my next battle.
Ripple Striding after Corren, I noticed his clothes and gear alike was badly charred or warped from the hip down. That, and he wasn't bouncing around like a fucking bullet in a safe as he had been earlier. Pleasantly surprised to see Veronica's attack had done some damage, my blades hummed with lightning mana slashing and stabbing after Corren's vital points. His fists quickly adopted a double image flying out in every which way, mixing in counter punches and parries with his movement skill. I made a point to only use form strikes, at least until I could be certain it wouldn't be a vital waste. It didn't take long for our exchange to be cut short by a wall of mist that collapsed in on itself, compounding into dozens of small floating balls of water. In an instant, each one extended into spears and came hurtling at Corren and myself indiscriminately.
Corren once again noticed the third party involvement far too late, even looking confused at seeing me abandon an opening in his guard to grapple hook a tree branch and swing away. One liquid spear grazed his shoulder, immediately letting out an audible simmer on impact before my eyesight was yanked skyward. Summoning my hook to reeel shut, my legs rocked forward allowing me to flip upside down midair to catch a peek at my two opponents. Corren was actively bolting directly into a tree, narrowly avoiding a barrage of fluid spears. The 6 water constructs flying after myself fell well short however, falling into piles of steaming water onto the forest foliage. Tucking my head and knees into my chest, I managed to finish my flip and land in-stride.
*WHOOSH*
A pair of fluid replicas of Veronica's trident whizzed past my head and chest as I turned to chase after Corren, giving me a moment's pause that allowed the speedy pugilist a moment to take off further into the forest. Determined not to be caught off guard by this guy again later, I sprinted right by Veronica who was still hurling ranged water skills in my direction. One replica collapsed into the tree behind me, splashing scalding hot water across my back. The burning sensation was certainly different than what my scars occasionally wrought, feeling almost like ice water until the pain set in. Gritting my teeth, I continued pursuing Corren figuring I'd leave her in the dust relatively quickly.
Corren's body wasn't much more than a thumb sized blur when I resumed my chase, though he must've slowed down out of comfort as I quickly caught up to the speedster. My arms spread wide aiming to take him out before alerting Corren of my presence, when I felt another terrible burn scream across my shoulder. The pain caused me to audibly groan, clearly alerting Corren who punched the air and rocketed off course. Peering over my shoulder, my eyes damn near popped out of my skull seeing Veronica trailing only 20 feet being me, albeit falling behind rapidly. Her form was surrounded by mist, apparently increasing her movement speed enough to toss a few more fluid Tridents in my direction. My head whipped back straight as a grey glimmer flickered from my periphery, cursing myself internally as Corren's fist bashed into my chest knocking me off my feet and right on my ass. Corren punched straight down, rupturing the air above me and launching himself up and landing another air punch above himself. Immediately, his body rifled down at me with his whistling gauntlet trained for my skull.
My boots pressed into his chest as he flew down, using his momentum to roll back and launch Corren over me. His fist still bashed down, blasting the air giving him enough extra lift to flip forward onto his feet. Veronica suddenly emerged from a wafting mist wall, only to be greeted by dozens of strikes to the face and ribs. Corren appeared to have built some resentment toward the battle mage, as he bore zero hesitation in directing his looping strikes around her guard in abundance. Veronica's head and body recoiled in several directions before the milky wall of mist she glided in on rolled over the both of them. There was a brief pause once their forms disappeared, the silence broken by Corren's blood curdling cries as he emerged from the top of the boiling steam cloud.
Seeing a golden opportunity, my grapple hook spiraled out from my forearm, looping around a tree branch and yanking myself up in the air. Corren abruptly used his fists to dash straight downward, his pained groan creating a doppler effect as my blades swung out just a millisecond too late. Amidst searching the forest floor for a decent landing spot, one of Veronica's watery trident replica's glimmered as it spiraled past my twisting chest. My thoughts twitched at how close she'd come to shooting me out of the air, wondering if I ought to turn my attention toward the battle mage.
My feet squished into the soft forest soil, my vision vibrating with the impact of my stiff landing. Corren had already begun zig zagging around Veronica, slowly closing the distance. The woman bore pure rage in her scowl, though she kept it solely directed at me regardless of Corren's unsubtle approach. Part of me considered shouting a warning to the battle mage, knowing her abilities had done valuable damage to Corren and his timing.
With all my focus trained on Corren's strange, grey Flow-paths slicing across the forest in crossing patterns, I dashed forward to intervene in his attack. Dealing with Corren's speed felt entirely too mentally and physically taxing, knowing she was a consistent thorn in his side. That's when both her arms thrust forward, sending two horizontal waves of mist wafting quickly at my direction. My eyes shot open in surprise at her blatant neglect of Corren, barely managing to Ripple Stride out of her mist's path. Both clouds folded around two skinny trees, audibly sizzling as it appeared to absorb willingly into the bark. I'd barely managed to settle into a stable momentum when Corren finally made his move.
*WHOOSH*
The speedy pugilist blasted the air with both hands, rocketing his twisting form straight at Veronica's side. The mage's body remained firmly pointed at me, though I could just barely see her eyes gland to the side. One palm merely bent up at her side, summoning a massive block of thick mist.
*SLAP*
Corren's full momentum slammed into the cloud, sounding as though he'd just belly flopped off a cliff. Still, his dripping fist emerged through the back of the wall after a single second, slamming into Veronica's ribcage. The battle mage bent in and flexed with the strike, pulling her arm up and wrapping up and around Corren's shoulder. The speedster tried to throw another punch with his free hand, leaping fully from the thick mist. Veronica barely twisted her hips, yanking Corren off balance causing his punch to nearly slam back into his own face. Her foot rose slightly, catching behind Corren's stumbling knee-pit. Corren immediately lost his footing, punching at the soil to launch himself back to his feet.
*CRUNCH*
"ARGH! Ff-fuck.." Corren growled as Veronica hunched down, letting his launching momentum crank his shoulder. The speedy pugilist punched away from them both, firing himself back into Veronica and letting another body shot rip to her gut. The blue skinned battled mage bent in, only now letting her eyes drift from me.
"You're weaker than I anticipated.." Veronica sneered, stomping her boot down on Corren's foot and snatching his second arm under the elbow.
*WHAM*
Corren's head recoiled back in response to Veronica's skull bouncing off his already bloodied nose, releasing one arm in the process. The speedy pugilist let a two-piece combination rip, one at the battle mage and another attempting to escape. His body whiplashed back, his foot still firmly locked under Veronica's boot. Totally off balance, Corren had no chance to mitigate the back end of the battle mages trident smashing into his skull. I slowly jogged to a stop several yards short, realizing my assistance may not be necessary.
"This is what you were 'busy' with? THIS?!" Veronica angrily hollered at me, lifting Corren's dazed face by the chin and twisting him to face me. His eyes suddenly rolled back from his skull, Corren's fist flying up under her arms and smashing into her jaw. Veronica's head rocked back, though her grip on his arm remained firm. Corren tried to dash a way, ripping his arm from its socket causing his body to fall limp in her grasp.
"How embarrassing." Veronica hissed, whipping her bloodied lip before pulling up the pugilist and thrusting her trident through Corren's chest.
"Uugh…sonuvab-"
Ripping the prongs out, Veronica plunged them straight back through Corren, interrupting his final words and no doubt hoping to end Corren's life quickly. Realizing what that meant for her resources, my blades slapped together firing a Lightning Bolt at the pair. Veronica didn't appear to notice the streak of lightning as quickly as she had Corren, barely twisting leaving his ragdolling body in her place.
*ding*
My vision was momentarily engulfed in the bluish flash my Death Echo released after each elimination thus far. A solid surge of energy shot through my veins as I failed to fight the devious smirk that came with this small victory.
"Ha-ha, once again someone else solved poor little Tommy's problems for him. Yeah, it's fucking hilarious how inept the fabled 'Chosen Of Perunious' truly is, isn't it?" Veronica snarled, her nose twitching as she tossed Corren's corpse to the ground.
…fuck?
"You forgot the part where I get all the credit too." I shouted back after a brief pause, trying my best to press on her obvious hatred towards me. Where it stems from I'm not entirely sure, other than I've accrued some sort of reputation through my patron.
"I get why she hardly spoke a word of you, she must've known you're little more than another filthy, power hungry fucking rat who got lucky when it mattered." Veronica replied through a scowl, twirling her trident easily in one hand.
"Aren't we all?" I replied with a slow shrug. Veronica's eyes somehow widened even further, her lips trembling with rage.
"NO. While you were bathing in privileges of the gods favor, I've earned every ounce of power, every learned skill, every single experience point, ALL of it by my-fucking-self!" She screamed back, her light blue skin a deeper blue around her face.
"Look, you got me all wrong lady. I'm sorry, how did you say you knew me?" I asked, genuinely confused why she used 'gods' plurally. I only ever met with mine since I'd been chosen, outside of an extremely brief chat with Phanthu. He was exactly itching to throw gifts my way either, other than a pretty ring.
"How do I…you still don't know who I am?!" Veronica furiously bellowed, heavily arching her brow. Before I could reply, her trident swiped rapidly around her body sending several mist clouds rushing in my direction.
"Damnit!" I accidentally shouted aloud, leaping to the side narrowly avoiding the first mist cloud. My arm extended out, firing my grapple hook around a tree branch and pulling me further up to avoid the second. Another pair of trident replicas forced me to land back to the ground into a roll, once more narrowly avoiding the final watery projectile.
"You filthy privileged bastard, stop running and show me something!" Veronica wildly shouted, slashing across the air and whipping her thick mist horizontally at me. The mist immediately began audibly steaming on approach, the heat absorbing into my cowl as I dashed and leapt over the steam. This time however, I made sure to leap towards the battle mage and slap a Lightning Bolt in her direction before landing. Veronica raised her hand wide eyed, summoning another wall of fog that seemed to absorb my bolt. Still, forcing the mage on her back foot bought me enough time to close the gap between us. As I shuffled forward and swiped forward, the back end of Veronica's trident suddenly extended out under her armpit, hitting directly into my shoulder. The blow killed the Flow in my own strike, effectively halting all its momentum.
No way.
Veronica twisted back, stabbing her trident out towards my neck. Metal slapped with a grainy smack as my blade deflected the strike, dashing forward and slamming my elbow into her cheek with the same arm. Veronica's jaw felt deceivingly strong, her head hardly snapping back. Suddenly, I felt a warm grasp wrap around my wrist.
FUCK!
Without thinking, my free fist slammed into Veronica's jaw as I ripped my hand free from her grasp. The battle mage let out a frustrated growl before swinging her trident at me. Pulling the blade hilts apart, my chains looped around the end of her trident. Before I could step forward and capitalize with a stab to her throat, the trident immediately released a steam cloud, causing the air itself to melt audibly. My foot pressed into her chestplate instead, kicking off and platforming out of the rapidly dissolving steam's touch. Seeing an opportunity to keep the timing unpredictable, Ripple Stride immediately pulled me back into melee as the steam dissipated.
Veronica's flow flared through her back leg just before I leapt into a final stab through her gut, using Flow Inverse on my foot to halt my momentum into a slide across the soil. Veronica spun back around launching her trident up from hip height, ejecting a massive steamy replica of her thrusting prongs out clearly expecting me to be in striking distance.
Predictive, but h-
*sniff*
A heavy ashen aroma wafted from just outside her steamy strikes range, its assault on my sinuses giving even my thoughts pause. Then, the unmistakable burn of true hatred filled my chest cavity for a mere moment. My foot slammed onto the dirt in front of me, goading Veronica into launching consecutive trident replicas from close range. Twisting back, the tridents spiraled past my spinning hips and midsection as I narrowly avoided her attacks and leaned back in to counterstrike.
Before thrusting my blade forward, Veronica's own Flow-pathing suddenly ignited a bright red from her back foot. Confused, I leapt up and narrowly over Veronica's shoulder bailing out of my strike. I caught the glimmer of the fog cloud emerging in front of the battle mage as I landed behind her, landing a stiff kick to her calf and a slash across her ribcage. Readying a final blow, Veronica's entire body released a cloud of steam all at once, forcing me to once again retreat to avoid being burned.
"Oh I get it, one human picks up Flow and the entire pantheon has a fucking conniption!" Veronica scoffed, launching a thick cylindrical stream of steam directly toward my face. I nearly stumbled bending back to avoid its touch, hand springing back to my feet with a newfound urgency realizing what she'd just said.
Great. She fucking knows Flow.
