This person, he’s strong.

That was what I thought when I began clashing with this person. He had black hair, just like me. And the armor he wore, it was without a doubt, a treasure.

But even then, I need to kill him.

With every swing of that silvery sword of his, he freezes my miasma, hindering my attacks perfectly. I can’t continuously attack him, and it’s obvious that he doesn’t think of me as a proper opponent. Alright, I’ll show you what I can do.

Pleasure filled my head, as I fired that spike at him, instinct telling me to fire straight at his shoulder. It cut through his armor, in to his flesh. The miasma felt like my own body, so I felt it. The flesh tearing when meeting with the sharp point of my spike. The edge being drenched in that thick warm liquid.

I want more~!

The reddening in my vision intensified, as I felt my miasma darken even more. I kept firing the spikes at him, hoping to pierce through his shield, hoping to kill him. But, contrary to my expectations, for some reason, he suddenly gets healed, the wound gets closed.

His eyes turn clear, as he bends down, with his sword at the ready. His expression had changed from before, as it had become cold. I see, he was getting serious.

I fired off two of the miasma spikes from my back, and kept them connected to my body. They pierced the ground a few meters away, and I pulled myself towards it, making the spike act like a grappling hook. All the while, I kept up the offensive, and sent the spikes flying at him from all the directions I could fire at.

He danced through the barrage, blocking and parrying a few of the spikes, all the while heading through my attack, edging towards me. A trace of fear sprang in my heart, as I saw him get closer and closer. He was dangerous.

The biggest disadvantage was that whenever his sword touched my miasma, it froze up, and for it to break free, it takes quite a while. That sword, it’s quite a nuisance.

Thinking that, my attack scheme got replayed in my head. My attack scheme was bland, since I can only fire spikes. It makes my strategies extremely limited, and my attacks get predictable very soon.

But, due to the gas like nature of my miasma, I can only form stuff like that, and harden it to some extent by arranging it in a compact way. I did that unconsciously, and by doing so, the hardness surpassed a normal sword’s, but the nature of a gas still remained in it, as its’ weaker than what I need it to be, due to the free and unrestrained nature of a gas. I need more flexibility, more things I can create.

My mind was accelerating, as it thought up strategies. The voice in my head did not complain, because what I did, I did to kill the foe before me.

I raised another jaw trap, creating a mouth of dark miasma to pop up from beneath the ground, and for the spikes to dig into his flesh, to cause him pain, to teach him what I felt.

What did I feel?

I could feel that I forgot something, and that it was important. My mind was a blank slate, but there was a dark unknown matter at the corner of my mind. It pulsed and grew, bit by bit. But because I didn’t remember, it couldn’t grow up too much, because it had nothing to feed on.

He shatters the jaw trap by freezing it and breaking through it. Since I had stopped the attack for a second, he immediately dashed in, at frightening speeds. He got dangerously close, and thrust his sword towards my chest.

Instinct took over my body on seeing his approach, as two miasma spikes shot out of my shoulders, and moving high up, and then piercing the ground on either side of me, moving in an arc. Strengthening them, I used them as supports to push myself up, into the air, away from the dangerous attacks of the foe.

But, as if he had expected it, he immediately stopped and jumped up, and swung his sword, intent on finishing me off. The miasma shot out of my chest, and pierced through the trunk of a tree, splinters flying in all directions. I pulled myself in, and crashed into the tree, through the trunk and fell on the other side, gasping.

It had hit me.

I could feel the stinging pain on the side of my leg, where a huge gash had opened up. But instead of bleeding, a pattern of frost was spreading across my leg, numbing it. My leg was deprived of sensation. It was a strange feeling, like I had lost a leg. I could see it, I could move it, but I could not feel it.

But it was not the time for admiration of the wound, because from the air, he swung his sword, in a horizontal arc, aiming at where I was. A huge arc of silvery white gas spreads through the morning sky, cutting through the wind, intent on killing me.

I need something to counter it. Something more versatile. I want to build stuff that I can use as weapons, weapons to kill him. My miasma, I want it to be like small particles, so that I can create what I wish with it.

Sand.

As soon as I thought that, my miasma thickens, and falls to the ground, like a huge tidal wave. It had turned into sand, just like i wished it to. I can feel the entirety of the black sand that was in the area, and I summoned it all towards me.

It came rushing, following my command. I had more control over the miasma now, as i could feel almost every hint of the black sand in this area.

The sand swirled around me, like a huge whirlpool of darkness, waiting to eat up everything, with me at its center. The freeze wave was almost upon me, and I raised both of my hands, clenching my teeth, and sent that huge amount of black sand at the wave.

I had noticed a weakness of his freeze ability. It froze whatever it touched, meaning, even the simplest barriers can block his attack. Once the barrier froze, I just had to let it crumble. The regen time for my black matter was constant. So if I break it into little pieces, they’ll all regenerate at the same time. In a second.

A huge shell of black flew into the sky, against the silvery white arc. They clashed in the air, and black was illuminated by the light.

In the air, a mystical figure was suspended. A beautiful union of black and silver.

I clench my fist to shatter the figure, letting it drop to the ground. By the time it falls it’ll have become black sand again, so I did it immediately.

Like glass breaking, the sculpture like object shattered, illuminated by the sun’s light. It exploded, and fell to the ground.

As the dark sand vanished from the sky, the site became clear.

An angel stood there.

The man that came to fight me. He floated in the sky, with the cold silver sword pointed at me. On his back, two spectral wings were present, which could be seen faintly. He stood poised to attack me, to kill me.

My mind roared at me, to kill him. It frustrated me, that I couldn’t kill him yet. Responding to my feelings, the black sand swirled around me, faster than ever. I knew what I had to do. I had to sink my hands into his body, to tear him apart limb from limb.

I shot into the sky, the black sand supporting me as a podium underneath me. I created another layer of sand to swirl around me, as a protective layer, as I rose in to the sky, and faced the man on equal grounds.

“Demon”

He spoke to me. Demon? I don’t care. I just need to kill him.

“In this sky, we shall finish our battle. I challenge you to a fair duel, demon!”

He yells out some incomprehensible stuff. Who cares. Just let me kill you. Blood blood blood.

Urk! MY mind hurts. The sand gets more aggressive, and my body is tensing up for a fight. Stop it. I’ll kill him. Just keep the pain away. I can’t take it!

The pain slowly fades, and my vision clears. The left part was still red, but I could see him.

The one I had to kill. Kill him.

My thoughts swirl into the same direction, and for some reason, the desire to kill intensifies. I just had to kill him. I couldn’t sleep easy if I didn’t kill him.

He charges towards me, his sword raised. His wings flap as he flies towards me, ready to thrust the sword through my body.

I swing my arms, as if holding something, I visualize it in my mind. A weapon that I had seen only once. Once, when…

I fall onto my knees, my head splitting with pain. Once when, what? The moment I thought that, a pain surpassing the voice came, making me feel like my head was being turned inside out. I couldn’t yell, I couldn’t think. All that was there was pain.

It was a critical situation in such a fight. I recognized that. He was already almost near me, I could feel the chill from his sword, the temperature around me dropped substantially. The closer he got, the colder it got.

Wrenching myself free from the pain, I continued with my attack. I swung my both of my hands down, right hand ahead of the left. I close my eyes, to imagine it in my mind perfectly.

Visualize it. Come on.

*BOOOM*

An explosion breaks out, and the shockwave ruffles my hair wildly. I open my eyes, and stare at the weapon in my hands.

A humongous black scythe, with a handle almost 2 and a half meters long. The blade was an arc, extending from the handle horizontally, a thick 1 and a half meter long blade. It tapered towards the end, into a sharp edge like a bird’s beak. The underside of the blade was sharp enough to cut through steel. The underside was jagged, with a carnivorous appearance. Black sand swirled around the blade, like a mystic aura.

The man’s eyes widened, but he had managed to block my swing. The scythe was just above his shoulder, threatening to slice and dice him. But at the last moment, he had raised his sword, blocking the scythe’s advance.

The sword continuously tried to freeze the scythe, but the sand on the scythe kept moving, renewing its layers again and again, preventing the advance of the ice.

He spreads his wings and flaps them, backing off from me. Without letting him get away, I swing the scythe, willing it to extend. To slice.

Blood.

It covers the scythe, a beautiful red on the black. It flows from the man’s hand, as my scythe slices through his arm. It falls off, down into the ground, an arm.

The moment I saw it, an animal instinct took over me. To take that arm, and bite into it. To tear through the flesh with my teeth, and wet my throat with the delicious taste of blood. The reddening thickens, completely blocking my vision.

At that moment, it happened.

I watched their fights, it was as entertaining as fighting itself. Compared to me, they were like fledglings trying to flap their wings and fly into the sky.

I could easily kill them all, but I stayed back, since just killing them would be boring. To let them fight and let out their excess adrenaline, and even enjoy myself in the process. Isn’t that what’s better?

I watched the fights, all four of them.

The draconian fared somewhat against their opponents. They survived. The new girl got a bad match, and she would die today. Doesn’t matter. We of Ascalon do not need weaklings. The strong belong in the Ascalon.

Augustus was as always, playing with his food before eating it. He needed to be careful with that attitude, in case someone took advantage of that attitude of his and killed him. After all, carelessness is one’s greatest enemy.

Orthius, well his fight was interesting. They fought evenly, continuously parrying and slashing. Even with their soul armaments out, they could only fight this much huh. Have the demons gotten weaker?

I divert my attention towards the real battle. The battle in the skies.

The hero’s sword…. Gjaltrosia. The frost king’s holy sword.

The Frost king, Kong Kyagruyock, the predecessor of the current Emperor, was renowned for the northern expedition he had lead. He became the head of the expedition, to take down the Frost Dragon that was terrorizing the northern territories. It lived in a secluded territory, and all the people that went along with him died along the way. In the end, he used his last breath to plunge the sword into the Frost Dragon’s heart, killing it. The valiant actions of the king made a God decide to bless the sword.

The holy sword Gjaltrosia was born.

“To think this hero got it. Did he go to the Frozen lands?”

The Frozen lands were cursed by the Frost Dragon’s dying roar to be a frozen wasteland forever. The cold there is almost impossible to survive in, and the monsters that lived there were enough to kill even the toughest warriors.

“On the other hand…”

He gazed at No 17. He was truly a gem. He devised a new way to use his black miasma and turned it into sand. It was more efficient.

“Ou… A scythe huh. True, keeping the outer layers in constant motion keeps the freeze from spreading.”

Slowly, Altrock came to a realization.

‘If I let him live… The complications won’t be minor. His growth rate, even though fueled by rage, is without doubt, extraordinary. It might become a threat to Ascalon. There's no doubt that he won't co operate with us. I’ll have to kill him then, huh.’

Altrock gazed around, and finally decided.

‘Right. I’ll put them all in one spot and finish it off. It’s getting late anyways. The hero is a threat too. The draconian… Well, I’ll kill them too’

Finally, Altrock began to move.