Chapter 93: Edge Set

Chapter 93: Chapter 93: Edge Set

Azgalor looked at the white blade in Evelyn’s hand for a long time.

Then he looked past her, at the cracked blue shield behind her.

"You will try to hold me here," he said. "Good. Hold me."

He raised his free hand and closed it into a fist.

Across the battlefield, every demon still standing turned toward the wall at once. The eight Siege Golems that were left started walking. The Orcs moved in behind them. The Void Knights formed up at the front.

They weren’t heading for the gate. They were heading for the spot where Azgalor’s sword had cracked the shield.

Donald understood immediately. Azgalor didn’t need to win this duel. He only had to keep Evelyn busy long enough for his army to break into the city with everyone watching. A King who took Genesis City wouldn’t lose his seat, even if he came home bleeding.

[Aegis Wards Structural Integrity: 45%]

[Estimated failure under sustained siege impact: 3 minutes.]

"Evie," Donald said. "Keep him here."

"I’ll do more than that," Evelyn said. She didn’t look back.

Azgalor attacked.

He came in with a straight overhead swing, using his full height. Evelyn didn’t step back from it. She beat her wings once and moved to the left. The greatsword hit the glass where she had been and split the ground open in a long line.

She cut at his wrist as it passed.

The white blade hit the void energy coating his sword arm, and something happened that neither of them expected. The darkness on his arm moved toward the blade and went into it. The white metal drank it in.

[Item: Unrefined Astral Blade]

[Absorbing hostile mana... Edge Set: 12%]

The hilt burned hotter in Evelyn’s palm. Her skin blistered, then healed, then blistered again. With the Domain gone, her regeneration was keeping up, but only just.

She tightened her grip.

Behind her, Donald ran back toward the wall. Every step sent pain up his legs. Sylvia rose out of the ground beside him, keeping pace.

"Repair costs four million," Donald said. "I have one."

"I have fourteen pallets of void-steel left," Sylvia said.

"Then that’s what we’re spending."

They reached the base of the wall. The first Golem was already there, forty feet to their right. It raised a pillar over its head.

BOOM.

[Aegis Wards Structural Integrity: 39%]

Sylvia opened her shadow at Donald’s feet. He dropped to one knee and pushed both hands into it until he felt cold metal.

"[Asset Liquidation]. All the void-steel."

[Liquidating: Refined Void-Steel x14 pallets — 3,360,000 Credits.]

[Current Balance: 4,360,000 System Credits.]

"[Defensive Grid]. Emergency repair."

[Aegis Wards Emergency Repair (S-Rank): 4,000,000 Credits. Execute?]

"Execute."

[4,000,000 Credits Deducted.]

[Current Balance: 360,000 System Credits.]

The cracks across the sky stopped spreading. Then they started to close, from the edges inward, the blue light flowing back into each gap until the whole dome was smooth again.

[Aegis Wards Structural Integrity: 100%]

The Golem brought its pillar down on the same spot.

The shield didn’t ripple. The pillar bounced off.

On top of the wall, the Awakeners saw the cracks disappear and started shooting again, faster than before. Arrows and fireballs went down into the packed Orcs at the base of the dome. The Golems kept hitting it. It held.

Out on the glass, Azgalor felt the change. He glanced at the sky.

Evelyn used that half second.

She came in low under his guard and cut across his hip. He turned the greatsword down to block, and the blades met. Void energy poured off his sword and into hers.

[Edge Set: 38%]

He pushed her back with the weight of the blade. She let him. She slid back ten feet on the glass, then air-dashed forward again with [Celestial Ascent] before he could reset his feet.

He swung at her head. She folded her wings and dropped under it. He brought his knee up. She caught it on her forearm and rolled off it to his right side, cutting as she went.

Every time the white blade touched him, it took a little more.

[Edge Set: 61%]

Azgalor looked down at his sword. The black fire along the blade was thinner now. In some places he could see the bare metal underneath.

He stopped using the sword.

He reached out with his free hand and grabbed Evelyn’s left wing out of the air.

It was made of light, but he held it anyway. He pulled her toward him and raised the greatsword for a stab through her chest.

Evelyn let the wing go. It broke apart into gold motes in his hand. She dropped out of his grip, landed on both feet, and formed the wing again a second later.

The stab went over her shoulder.

She was inside his reach now, right in front of the open wound in his chest. The black blood was still running.

[Edge Set: 79%]

Not yet. She needed one more clash.

So she raised the white blade high, toward his face, and let him see it coming.

Azgalor did what any fighter would do. He brought the greatsword up across his face to block.

The blades met. The last of the void energy on his sword went into hers all at once.

[Edge Set: 100%]

[Unrefined Astral Blade: Edge Complete.]

The white light along the metal went still. The edge, which had been rough and unfinished a minute ago, was straight and clean.

Evelyn let go of the high block, dropped her body under his arms, and drove the blade forward into his chest wound with both hands.

It went in to the hilt.

Azgalor made no sound at first. He looked down at the white light shining out of his own chest. Then the light reached his core, and he roared, loud enough that the Orcs at the base of the wall stopped fighting and turned.

He grabbed Evelyn by the throat with one hand and lifted her off the ground. She held on to the hilt.

"Donald," Sylvia said quietly. "She can’t breathe."

Donald was already moving. His legs were shaking and his Strength was back to 85, and he had nothing in the gauntlet. He looked at Nyx.

"Nyx. Something small. Fast."

Nyx shot off his shoulder, went through the nearest Void Knight, and came back.

[Familiar (Nyx) engaged target: Void Knight (Level 55).]

[Skill Triggered: Phantasmal Siphon.]

[Nyx has stolen: +20 Mana, +15 Speed.]

[Abyssal Impact Pile Bunker: Chamber 32/86]

It wasn’t enough to hurt a Demon King. It didn’t have to be.

Donald ran in under Azgalor’s raised arm and drove the gauntlet into the inside of his elbow, the one joint he could reach.

"Deposit."

The piston fired. The blast was small, but it hit the joint from below, and the arm bent. Azgalor’s hand opened.

Evelyn dropped. She landed on her feet, still holding the hilt, and pulled the blade out of his chest as she fell back.

White light came out of the wound behind it.

Azgalor staggered three steps backward. He put a hand over his chest. The wound wasn’t closing. The holy light was still burning inside it.

He looked at the wall. The shield was whole. His Golems were pounding on it for nothing. His warlocks were gone. His treasury was gone.

He looked at Evelyn, standing with the white blade raised, ready for the next exchange.

Then he did the math.

"A dead King keeps nothing," Azgalor said. His voice was rough and low. "A wounded King can still bargain."

He put two fingers to his mouth and whistled.

The chariot came across the glass, pulled by the two Hellhounds that had survived the orbital strike. Azgalor stepped onto it.

"Fall back," he said.

He didn’t shout it. He didn’t need to. The army turned as one and started back toward the rift. The Golems left the shield. The Orcs dragged their wounded. Nobody broke formation.

Azgalor looked back once, at Donald.

"The Circle will hear your name, Investor," he said. "They will not come one at a time."

The chariot went into the rift. The army followed it. Then the purple lightning along the edges of the tear went out, and the rift folded shut, from the sides toward the middle, until there was nothing in the sky except gray clouds.

The wasteland was quiet.

On the wall, someone started cheering. Then everyone did.

Evelyn lowered the blade. Her hand was red and blistered around the hilt. She didn’t let go of it.

Donald sat down on the glass because his legs wouldn’t hold him anymore.

[Defense Successful: Genesis City.]

[Enemy Forces Repelled. Demon King Azgalor Retreated.]

[Massive Experience Awarded.]

[Level Up!]

[Level Up!]

[Current Level: 26]

[Vessel Damage: 47%. Regeneration active.]

Then one more window opened, in red.

[Notice: You have been Marked by Demon King Azgalor.]

[Notice: The Circle of Demon Kings has opened a file on ’The Investor’.]

Donald read it twice and closed it.

Evelyn walked over and sat down next to him. She laid the white blade across her knees. It was still giving off a low, steady light.

"Garrick’s going to want it back," she said. "He’ll want to finish the grip."

"Let him," Donald said. "But it’s done."

"It’s done," Evelyn agreed.

Sylvia came up out of the ground on his other side and sat down too. Nyx landed in Donald’s lap and went to sleep.

For a while, none of them said anything.