Chapter 597: Challenges Daimon & Nethereal sisters, Sarah’s version (part 4)
The previous scene caused quite a varied number of reactions, first of all Purplehaze pained scream followed by him retreating as if is ass was on fire, he managed to use the long-distance teleportation ability of a tower to flash away from Yvonne.
Naturally, since there was a barrier covering the battlefield there was a limit as to how much distance he put between them, but it was enough for him to recover from the previous shock and then look at his right hand.
'What the hell was that!', he inwardly screamed, contrary to what the excruciating pain he experienced a second ago, would suggest, he didn't suffer any visible wound, if anything his back was drenched in cold sweat.
Purplehaze returned to the real world after realizing that Yvonne wasn't following up with the battle, he gazed at his opponent just to see the night sparrow girl casually standing there looking at her nails which had now been dyed black.
This of course made Purplehaze feel his heart boiling with rage, however he didn't dare to blindly charge against her like before, instead of that the two pair of energy arms charged their attacks and he flashed to then appear at Yvonne's right.
"Boooom!", the four energy streams blew up a piece of the ground into smithereens, however Purplehaze didn't stop there, his own arms aimed at the sky and as he expected, Yvonne's pretty figure soared upwards as her black feathered wings had appeared on her back once again.
Purplehaze's eyes glowed and a wild smile appeared on his face upon the sight of Yvonne's wings, because thanks to them the presence of Daimon she radiated became stronger, since all the mana he gave the night sparrow girl, was concentrated there.
"Dark Claw Shredder", Purplehaze clawed towards Yvonne, shooting a pair of nether slashes in her direction, while he prepared the next round of attacks from the energy arms, in the direction where he judged Yvonne would move in order to dodge.
So, imagine his surprise when a condescending smile appeared on the night sparrow girl's face, Yvonne snapped her fingers and Purplehaze's spells exploded in the air, at such a distance that not even a single lock of Yvonne's hair was affected.
But that wasn't the end of it, four darkness arrows which were shot by Yvonne's other hand when she snapped her fingers, arrived at Purplehaze not even a second after his previous spells failed to reach the night sparrow girl.
"Damn it!", after experiencing a loss at Yvonne's hands or more accurately one of her nails, earlier, Purplehaze didn't want to take her attacks head on, so he flashed using the teleportation of a rook, managing to dodge the four arrows from before.
Unfortunately, before he could react an arrow landed on his back, the impact actually smacked him against the ground.
With his face covered with dirt, Purplehaze trembled due to anger, he clenched his hands breaking the ground with his fingers, the physical impact of Yvonne's arrow didn't hurt him at all, the arrow was shot without much strength behind it since Yvonne shot the arrow with extreme speed.
However, the angle was especially calculated so that he would be smacked face first against the ground with no other purpose but to humiliate him, or at least that's what he thought.
"You bitch how dare you… aghh!", Purplehaze got up and roared like an angered beast but was interrupted midway by Yvonne casually snapping her fingers, what followed were sizzling sounds produced from the area where the arrow landed, a hole was melted into Purplehaze's back, forcing him to radiate nether in order to subdue the corrosion caused by Yvonne's darkness mana.
Speaking of Yvonne, the voice of the night sparrow girl who was elegantly gliding through the air with a condescending expression on her pretty face, reached Purplehaze's ears not even a second after he finished pushing away Yvonne's mana.
"Heh, why is someone who lost all dignity as a darkness mana user trying to fight at long distance".
Yvonne's condescending voice, burned almost as much as the corrosive wound which was left on Purplehaze's back.
In exchange for obtaining nether, not only he lost his poison affinity but even the original property of his darkness affinity which was corrosion was lost, he went all in in explosive destructiveness, the contrary to what the naturally elusive darkness is supposed to represent.
And here he was, engaging in long distance combat after changing his fighting style to specialize in close combat, it was utter humiliation.
"That's enough, Black…", Purplehaze got back but his spell was stopped midway as he saw a rain of darkness arrows coming at him from every direction, making him interrupt his casting to continuously flash away in order to dodge the seemingly endless rain of arrows.
'Damn it, if long distance is her specialty, how did she stop my punch earlier!', he angrily thought, he was supposed to be the one suppressing the enemy and yet here he was dodging continuously, what's more he found the barrier being an obstacle for him, since he couldn't get out of Yvonne's fire range.
Which is laughable, the barrier was especially designed to limit the mobility thus rendering the advantage of being able to fly that the Risha sisters had, the problem is that it only worked if their enemies were to fight them at close combat.
High up at the sky, the enemy queen was about to lose it after seeing Purplehaze not being able to pummel a star ranked mage to death, even after setting up a stage that was completely advantageous for him.
He was instead being chased around like a dog all over the battlefield, the arrows that missed him weren't even corroding the ground, but only leaving shallow marks on the ground meaning that there wasn't much strength behind of them.
"What the hell are you doing, stop dodging and freaking kill her at once!", she screamed
'What strength equal to that of a Lord Knight, he can't deal even with that weak girl, useless piece of trash…", Sheilla's inner cursing was stopped midway by Sarah's mocking voice.
"Even when he focused on long distance, in terms of pure skills, he wouldn't have been able to defeat that birdie, what a loser, but it's also your fault for not spying on others properly~".
Sheilla who was already in a bad mood, felt her blood pressure going through the roof after being looked like an idiot by the crazy girl, unfortunately for her, Sarah hadn't finished speaking.
"What kind of idiot sends her subordinate to fight an enemy who has a stronger, more talented and waaay more beautiful version of said subordinate in his same team~", she added with a playful voice, while letting out a bit of her battle aura while still holding onto Daimon's arm.
As if something clicked in Sheilla's mind, she was reminded of a very basic and simple fact, something that she knew even before she met with Sarah for the first time, she is Purplehaze's cousin.
'T-That bastard, he lied to the Lord, he didn't obtain any illumination for close combat due to the memories in his bloodline, he simply copied this bitch's fighting style!', she inwardly screamed.
Purplehaze's nether was created and powered based on the hatred he felt towards Daimon, he wanted a way to be able to surpass Daimon in what he thought was his field of specialty, since everyone thought that Daimon was a knight after the tournament.
Naturally, Purplehaze had never trained in close combat fighting, he was a mage so suddenly changing his focus without any foundation should decrease his battle prowess, but then he grew close to Sarah, the most talented knight of the young generation in the within the Elemental Sea, or more accurately he grew up being beat up by her every time he approached Jasmine, so it's normal that some of her fighting style stuck up to him.
And that's what gave birth to the close combat fighting combination with long distance elements, the difference being that Purplehaze used those nether stream attacks instead of the poison needles that the crazy girl used.
"It seems like I really underestimated you as a queen piece, to think you taught others how to counter your own fighting style just because your cousin was in the enemy team…", Sheilla's words were stopped midway by the crazy girl giggling at her.
"What the hell are you talking about, while I noticed that loser was imitating me from the very beginning, I didn't say a word about it, he just happens to have really bad luck, to think that out of those three, he'll go after the one that I'm competing against with for the big prize~", she said.
The prize she mentioned was Daimon of course, speaking of Daimon, he couldn't help but raise an eyebrow at the crazy girl, it was the first time he heard about the Risha sisters competing with the nethereal sisters.
'I can only think that mom has something to do with this', thought Daimon, besides the Risha sisters who have admitted to have romantic feelings for him, Reyne has openly shown interest on him, while Jasmine is in the middle of thinking what she wants, as for the crazy girl… if it was up to her, she would have already sealed the deal, so apparently those six had formed some sort of rivalry due to that.
The enemy queen felt humiliated, not only the "champion" assigned to her by her Lord didn't go along with her plans but couldn't even deal with one of the strong members of the enemy team, not to mention that the target she was supposed to capture for her Lord continuously mocked her.
Naturally, the crazy girl who never wasted a chance to rub salt on the wound, casually added.
"I told you; the previous round was just that loser being weak, but this one is indeed one hell of a bad matchup~", she said.
Sheilla finally couldn't hold herself back, her body exploded in nether, she put her hand into one of her pockets and secretly grabbed a small black crystal to then inject some of her nether into it.
Back at the battlefield Purplehaze who was being chased around by a rain of arrows no matter where he went, suddenly stopped midway.
'Aghh… what is this!', Purplehaze tried everything in his power but his body didn't listen to him, instead of that, the nether he had managed to recover after being chased around by the night sparrow girl whose body had traces of Daimon's mana, in other words the one whom he hated enough to awaken nether, rushed through his body, forcing him to use the boosting spell from earlier.
The problem is that this special state was destroyed by Lance, damaging the mana circuits used for it, so by activating it without having properly recovered, he experienced a living hell of pain, that being said and while blood was coming out of his mouth, nose and even his eyes, thanks to the vitality he drained out of the sacrificed rook piece, he was healing at the same time as the damage was being done.
So, the only downside was the hellish pain he was experiencing, well, that and the fact that he had lost control over his own body, speaking of which he didn't understand what was happening, until a deep angered voice echoed in his head.
'You have a lot to explain to the Lord, but for now, enough playing around, kill that bitch, don't worry as long as there is still something left of you, the Lord can patch you up later', following Sheilla's dead serious order, Purplehaze's body, against his will, turned around and rushed towards the night sparrow girl who had been chasing him since earlier.
Yvonne frowned for a second, she felt something was off about Purplehaze, but she paid no mind and simply drew her bow to then release a rain of darkness arrows on his directions.
With an emotionless expression, Purplehaze dived right into the rain of mana arrows, but unlike earlier, he was fast and coordinated enough to dodge most of the arrows while flashing through the air to reach Yvonne, not only that he actually punched the few arrows which he couldn't dodge and ignored the sizzling sound caused by the darkness corrosion on his flesh.
Seeing Purplehaze charging at her in such a reckless way, made Yvonne snort, mana circulated through her black feathered wings as she flew away at high speed, only to stop midway as she was stopped by the barrier, she changed her direction with an elegant maneuver but was met with the barrier once again.
"What…", the night sparrow girl snorted, the barrier had shrunken all the way until the spot where she was floating, cutting her way of retreat, she wasn't surrounded by it but the only direction in which she could advance was the one from which Purplehaze was coming, in other words she was forced to clash head on against him.
Practically at the same time when the barrier intercepted Yvonne for the second time, Purplehaze appeared in front of her, his body covered with nether in that beastly form he used to fight against Lance.
"Booom!", without any cast or sound, Purplehaze punched frontwards, his fist seemed to roar due to the air pressure caused by it and the next thing that could be heard was a loud explosion.
Yvonne who took advantage of the impulse caused by injecting more mana into her wings, managed to dodge the attack by a bit, she looked at her previous position and saw Purplehaze whose attack had teared a hole into the barrier while at the same time his fist became a bloody mess which started healing at fast speed.
"There is no way a weak-minded trash, actually ignored pain and used such a strong attack in a skilled way, who are you and why are you interfering in my fight", said the night sparrow girl.
The technique behind that attack surpassed what Yvonne judged Purplehaze to be able to do with his current level of close combat experience, he went from being a mere copycat of the crazy girl, to an experienced fighter with his own style in a matter of seconds.
"Impressive, to think you could notice it based in just a single random attack, the more reason to get rid of you I guess", Purplehaze's mouth opened but his lops didn't move at all, also the voice that came from his mouth was actually that of the enemy queen, in other words Sheilla, apparently, she could not only force Purplehaze to act against his will, but also control him.
Purplehaze flashed and appeared next to Yvonne, his right fist aimed at her chest forcing the night sparrow girl to dodge to the side, just for her to be intercepted by the two sets of energy arms, the first aimed to grab onto her wings while the other aimed at her face.
The night sparrow girl flashed using the teleportation ability of a knight piece, but found herself in a dead end by the barrier changing to block her way while Purplehaze had already caught up with her.
"Booom!", like cannons, his fists caused explosions when he punched in Yvonne's direction, just the impact was enough to make the barrier shake, in case you wonder why he didn't put this much strength in his attacks when he was fighting Lance, it's not because he didn't want to, but he couldn't.
Technically, anyone could pull off an attack a few levels above his current realm, the problem is the consequences that said attack would bring to you, forbidden spells work that way.
In this case, with every of those heavy punches that Purplehaze threw, the flesh of his arms ripped apart and so did his mana circuits, they were restored the next second though.
"You see this is how you should have fought from the very beginning, you think the strength the Lord granted you was for your petty obsession with that mortal girl, no, it was for you to fulfill the mission assigned to you!".
Seeing Purplehaze finally making advantage of the barrier and the castling trick which she asked her Lord to prepare for her, Sheila was elated and directly made him go on a rampage.
Thunder-like explosions echoed all over the sky as Purplehaze pursued Yvonne, she didn't even have the change to draw her bow before being forced to dodge one of those mountain-shattering punches.
This continued for around a minute before the barrier had reduced enough to barely cover fifty meters.
"You are trapped like rat now, prepare to…", Sheilla's words were stopped midway by Yvonne whose voice had taken a much more condescending tone.
"Prepare to what?", she skillfully dispelled her wings and fell from the sky, elegantly landing on the ground, to then calmly walk towards Purplehaze.
'There it is, that look in her eyes again, take distance!', inwardly screamed Purplehaze, seeing Yvonne's amber eyes shine with pure unadulterated contempt.
"Nonsense, rip her to shreds!", listening to Purplehaze's wary voice, Sheilla snapped, she was the one controlling him now and just with that, she brought his battle prowess to another level, to the point that she regretted not having done so from the very beginning.
It wasn't her fault though, she truly had high expectations for Purplehaze, since he was quite compatible with her Lord's blessing, but he turned out to be a disappointment
Purplehaze turned into a blur and appeared in front of Yvonne, his six arms all drew backwards as he prepared to launch an all-out attack with the intention to turn the enemy into a pile of minced meat.
But then Sheilla's triumphant smile froze as she saw Yvonne casually pointing her index finger towards Purplehaze.
"Aghhh!", a pained scream could be heard from high up in the sky, that was Sheilla whose connection with Purplehaze was suddenly broken, she immediately looked on the battlefield's direction.
"Nightmare Phoenix Dance, Mage Crushing Stance", just in time to see Yvonne's pretty lips moving to let out a few words as she calmly dodged the first two punches coming from the energy arms, with an elegant turn, she positioned herself at Purplehaze's side, her left index finger touched his shoulder and the two sets of energy arms disappeared, leaving behind bloody wounds on Purplehaze's back.
Purplehaze turned around, his fists aiming to finish what he started, but Yvonne's right index finger blocked his nether cladded real fists, just like earlier the impact was dispelled like it was nothing, she proudly spoke the name of the technique she used, loud enough to make sure that Daimon listened to it.
"Nightmare Phoenix Dance, Knight Crushing Stance".
"Blegh!", just like before, Purplehaze felt an ungodly amount of pain, which added to the toll on his body, forcing him to vomit blood, the shock got rid of the leftover control that Sheilla had over him, which forced him to continue the last order given to him earlier, he tried to turn around to flee, but was stopped by… another Yvonne?
This one however was completely made out of darkness mana, that being said this second Yvonne was able to speak as well, she turned into a black flash that appeared behind Purplehaze a second later.
"Nightmare Phoenix Dance, Soul Crushing Stance", by the time she finished her sentence, purplehaze's eyes turned backwards and he collapsed on the ground, foam and blood coming out of his mouth.
"Weakling", casually said Yvonne as she prepared to pierce Purplehaze's head with an arrow.
"You, if you could overpower him this easily then why didn't you do it earlier!", Sheilla's scream reached Yvonne's ears a second later making the second Yvonne which was made out of darkness mana to smirk.
"That would have been too good for him, that trash dared to bare his fangs at this lady's lover, so only complete humiliation was enough to make up for it~", after saying that the second Yvonne turned into a black stream that returned to Yvonne's body, not without winking at Daimon's direction while throwing a kiss at him.
Yvonne who could feel a bunch of gazes falling on her right now, inwardly cursed this new lineage ability of hers.
"Ahem, don't pay attention to that, I had to adjust my technique since his mana flow changed thanks to that woman's interference, otherwise this would have ended sooner", she said with an obviously blushed face, not only because of what the other Yvonne said but because she was half lying and knew Daimon could tell.
Up in the sky Daimon didn't know whether to laugh or cry, that darkness mana Yvonne was the spitting image of the narcissist and cheeky personality change she underwent when she used her wings with her own mana.
'First Liliana and now her too, did my mana triggered something?', he wondered to then glare at the enemy queen, who had taken advantage of the moment to try and pull off the same trick from before, in other words, sacrificing a rook to save Purplehaze.
"It seems like you have forgotten, I'm a king piece as well", with a snap of Daimon's fingers, the invisible portal which had opened below Purplehaze's body, preparing to transfer him in secret while Yvonne was distracted, was blocked by a certain undead head maid's shadow portal, allowing Yvonne's arrow to pierce Purplehaze's head, killing him on the spot.