My swing missed, as I thought it would, but striking my opponent down hadn’t been my real goal. What the swing had accomplished, and quite well to my estimation, was to drive her back. Her, I could see now. She was a young half-elf woman, dark of hair, and with a form which told of her experience in combat situations. Her skin was shiny, peppered with glittering jewels which caught the light from the glow orb, like shards of ice embedded in her skin. She’s also dropped her dagger and drawn her sword. A smart move when combating a weapon with a longer reach, I knew. Not that it’d do her much good against my warscythe.

Despite my restorative abilities the burning in my neck was getting worse, not better. I reached up and felt the hot wetness of my blood, but the wound itself was nearly shut. So it wasn’t that. I caught a glimpse of some reddish crystal on the dagger at my feet, the one that the half-elf had dropped. The burning had to come from some form of poison then. And it must have been a potent one at that, if it was something strong enough to overcome my healing.

That puts my on a timer, I grimaced. I had no doubt that my restorative abilities would eventually burn up whatever poison the assassin used, but the effects could incapacitate me long before it happened. And even if it didn’t, the growing pain could prove too distracting against an opponent as skilled as the half-elf appeared to be. As much as I enjoyed toying with my opponents when I could, it was in my best interest to end this fight quickly. I focused my mind on the thought as I flicked my pooled blood from my claws.

The elf spoke as the blood splashed into the ruins of the furniture underneath my feet. Fire blazed as the molten liquid quickly ignited the dry, cracked splinters beneath me. I heard her words, but let them flow over me. It didn’t matter what she had to say. All that was left was the slaughter. I left my face split into a feral grin within the rising flames around me. And then I summoned my power and my hand flew towards my enemy, a magma shot hurtling from it with wicked speed.

But I wasn’t going to leave this fight to a simple, if powerful, explosive bolt. As soon as the shot left my hands I was in motion, the full weight of my inhuman abilities propelling me forward with blinding speed. In my hand, echoes of green lightning crackled along the black stone length of my warscythe. I’d willed the lesser form of the blade’s deadly enchantment to life. Already a razor edge as light and strong as mythril, the blade would now effortlessly pass through shielding magic and steel as if they weren’t even there. The magma shot would explode as it approached the target and then I would hurtle through the resulting explosion, my own innate fiery nature protecting me from it, and would cleave through her with a single stroke.