Chapter 227: Trio [II]

The first grey-winged fighters came up the ridge path in a tight group of five. They looked ferocious.

But that didn’t matter.

Josinia moved before they finished spreading out. Travelling Spark left her hand in a powerful white line and punched the lead man in the chest, then jumped into the woman at his shoulder.

Both seized up as if they had just been struck by lighting from the clouds and dropped, wings twitching against the stone.

The remaining three broke left and right at once, hoping to create a pincer attack.

"I’ve got control of the mid-range, Thea" Josinia said, already pulling another charge into her palm.

Thea dropped to one knee beside a thick patch of vine-weed growing out of a crack in the ridge and forced Wither Touch into it.

The plants greyed in seconds. Cold death energy gathered in her hand, and Ouroboros Circuit pulled it into a usable circuit immediately.

She felt the power of both life and death flowing through her body, making her feel like a snake devouring it’s own tail.

A grey-winged Delphinium man rushed Josinia off the angle.

Josinia fired again. The spark clipped his wing joint and staggered him, but a second fighter closed in on her aggressively and scored a shallow cut across her upper arm.

Josinia hissed and stepped back, purple skin already wet with red blood.

"Thea."

"I’ve got you."

Thea pushed the stored circuit into Josinia as a restore. Life energy washed through the cut and sealed it fast and efficient enough that it seemed there was never even a cut in the first place.

Her health has been restored in less than ten seconds.

At the same time Thea raised her other hand and fired a ranged death pulse into the fighter who had cut her. The black line crossed the gap and struck him in the ribs. He folded with a choked sound as the withering effect tore through him from the inside.

It was the first time she had tested death on a man.

Kalon stayed a few paces back and to the side, watching both of them work.

He was pleased with what he was seeing.

More grey-wings poured from the lower structures. Eight this time. A couple carried reinforced spears. One had a heavier presence than the rest and barked for the others to surround the purple one first.

Josinia clicked her tongue and stomped, raising a short earth ridge that broke their first rush. Travelling Spark snapped out again and jumped through two of them before the charge faded. She was breathing harder now, wraps clinging to her breasts with sweat, pink eyes locked forward.

Thea took the lofe another strip of plants along the ridge wall without looking away from the fight.

The ouroborus circuit was complete once more.

She sent the restore into Josinia the moment a spear tip cut Josinia’s thigh, then snapped a death pulse into the spear-user’s exposed neck. He dropped before he could finish the follow-up thrust.

"Nice," Josinia called out, realising that how useful it was having Thea by her side.

"Keep moving," Thea shot back. Her cropped top was damp against her chest from the pace of it, blue eyes sharp with focus and a bit of fear.

A fighter broke past Josinia’s line and came straight for Thea.

Kalon stepped in only then, as he knew that the attack would hit, and could potentially be fatal.

He caught the man by the front of his armour and drove him into the stone hard enough to end it in one hit, then moved back out of their space again.

"I’m here if you need me," he said. "Keep going."

They did.

Josinia held the middle of the ridge and forced the remaining fighters to enter through her spark range.

Every time she took a hit, Thea was already converting plant death into a circuit and pushing life back into her.

When the grey-wings clustered together for a joint attack, Thea stopped healing for a second and fired death pulses into the gaps instead, dropping one, then another, each shot leaving a body greying out on the stone.

The heavier grey-wing finally committed.

He smashed through Josinia’s next earth ridge and slammed her backward with a wing-boosted shoulder charge.

"Agh!"

Josinia hit the ground hard, breath knocked out of her.

Thea’s face became worried.

She drained a whole patch of vine at once, stored the circuit, and fired the death pulse straight into the heavy fighter’s centre mass. The ranged wither hit clean.

He staggered, roared, and still tried to finish Josinia on the ground.

Kalon blurred in, kicked the man’s supporting leg out, and left him open.

"Josinia, finish him."

She was already up on one knee. Travelling Spark punched into the opening at point-blank range and dropped the heavy fighter the rest of the way. His body hit the ridge and stopped moving.

The last two grey-wings tried to run.

Thea took one with a death pulse between the shoulders. Josinia took the other with a chasing spark that jumped once off a metal post and finished the job.

Then the island went quiet.

Bodies lay scattered along the path and the upper shelf edge. The plant patches Thea had used were grey and dead against the stone.

Josinia stood with her hands still faintly sparking, sweat running down between her breasts, purple chest rising hard under the damp wraps.

Thea stayed a little bent forward with her hands on her thighs, cropped top stuck to her skin, blue eyes moving across the cleared ridge as if checking there was nothing left standing.

Kalon walked over to them.

He looked at Josinia first, then Thea, and the edge in his expression eased into a real smile.

"I’m proud of both of you," he said. "You fight incredibly as a pair."

Josinia’s pink eyes warmed at once. She wiped blood from the corner of her mouth and let out a breathless laugh.

Thea’s shoulders dropped, some of the leftover tension leaving her as the words landed. She glanced at Kalon, then at the dead plants and the bodies, and nodded once.

"Thanks," she said quietly. "I needed that."