Chapter 207: In a moment
*Bing-Bong*
The author was originally going to leave the violence as it was in order to preserve the innocence of any young minds that were reading this work by happenstance.
However, they remembered they put a fucking age rating on this book for a reason, so any scarring or screaming is the result of the reader’s decision/shitty parenting.
Without any further ado, here’s the play by play.
*Bing-Bong*
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Before Zhen Yue had a chance to nobly sacrifice her honor, the kaijin swooped in and slaughtered a majority of the offending party in the matter of seconds, a mere moment in time.
First, Spring Brawler landed behind two of the Acolytes furthest away from Zhen Yue and the enemy Aether Masters and promptly punched a hole through their abdomens in order to grab the two Acolytes in front of them by their heads and twist them one hundred and eighty degree backwards, meaning they were somewhat concious enough to see their accomplices bleed out to death and the twisted shining smile of a spring limbed monstrosity. If only these fools weren’t so lazy and actually held the unconcious Zhen clansmen as shields as opposed to just lamely hold them up by the chin.
Next, Razor Maiden dropped in the middle of the group, claws first into the head of an unlucky Acolyte, essentially scrambling his brain with ten different knife-like claws while making a demented acrobatic handstand of sorts.
The poor sod couldn’t even scream as Razor Maiden used their head as a fulcrum, and decapitated three more Acolytes with her sword legs in a beautiful crescent shaped slash. Not one to leave anyone out, she made sure to take their head off too by wrapping her legs around their head and…squeezing.
Lastly…Nepherage didn’t slaughter her targets, because she had to deal with the two Masters and also needed to be significantly more delicate due to one of the aforementioned Masters had a chain wrapped around the neck of hostage…that or she had to smack the both of them so hard that it launches the rapier wielding jackass into the chain wielding one and forces him to let go of his weapon.
[Precision…too much work!]
She went with option two.
Coming in from Sieger’s side, Nepherage condensed her aether into the shape of a huge battering ram, complete with a ram’s head at the end, made of molten volcanic rock.
[Lava Ram!]
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[Lava Ram] was a Terraqi/Ignati intermediate Ethereal aether art that is normally only used in siege battles or against large sized aether beast, due to how unwieldy using a battering ram as a weapon can be. However, this limitation could be overcome if the practioner of the art had a monstrously large physique or at least had some monstrously absurd level of physical strength. Luckily, Nepherage technically had both in spades.
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“Huh? Bwah!”
“What the-oof!”
Sieger was sent flying into Gregory as a result of being blind sided by Zhen Liu’s primary puppet’s surprise attack, and as totally according to plan, forced the latter to let go of his chain and subsequently freeing Ricardo from the chain noose.
Zhen Yue was so utterly shocked at the sudden turn of events that it took her minute to realize what had just occured.
‘Did…did Zhen Liu’s puppets just act on their own?! But he should still be at the party…right?’
When the surprise attack had occured, she had assumed it was a band of monsters or something coming to take advantage of a bad situation, but once she had realized that the members consisted of Zhen Liu’s unusual assortment of puppets, she went from scared to confused.
Under her confused gaze, the spring limbed brawler puppet and the dancer made of of blades proceeded to grab the unconcious Zhen clansmen and move them away from the courtyard. Meanwhile, the red jade one walked up to her.
“Zhen Yue! Are you alright?”
And proceeded to talk…with Zhen Liu’s voice.
“Z-zhen Liu?! How? What? Why?!”
“I learned how to control my puppets from long distances awhile back and how to connect my senses other than sight to them,” Nepherage smoothly lied in Zhen Liu’s voice, as she was instructed, “I had the feeling I should keep this particular ability of mine secret. Turns out I was right.”
“W-what the fuck just hit us?”
“Gah! Get off me man!”
“Give me a minute.”
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Sieger and Gregory proceeded to pick themselves up after being unceremoniously slammed into each other and proceeded to try and understand what had just occured to them.
“Did I just get hit by a fucking mountain goat or something?,” Sieger complained as he rubbed the spot on his arm that Nepherage hit point blank with her battering ram. Unfortunately, it was his non-dominant arm she had smashed and the bastard managed to throw up an aether shield based on instinct. If he had been an Acolyte, his arm would have been smashed to pieces or he’d be meat paste by now.
“I don’t fucking know, but you made me drop my weapon! Now that Zhen Clan bitch has-”
*CLANG!*
Before Gregory could complain further, his iron ball and chain landed with a loud noise right in front of his feet. Sieger and Gregory were confused at the sight, until they saw that the one who tossed it at their feet was the rather nefarious looking puppet that belonged to the formerly crippled young master of the Zhen Clan.
“Pick it up.”
“What the fuck?! It talks?!”
“It must be a trick.”
“Oi, fuckheads!,” Nepherage said more forcefully to grab their attention, “pick it up.”
Gregory was happy to get his weapon back, but the manner in which he being commanded to do so both angered and confused him.
“Why?,” he asked while narrowing his eyes at the “puppet”.
“Because unlike you and your family of sneaky, backstabbing inbred mutts, I still have a modicum of honor in my bones. And I preferred to tear you limb from fucking limb when you’re at your so called best. So pick up your little toy, so I can use it to properly snap your neck with it,” Nepherage explained as her body began to glow brighter and burn hotter. At this moment, she looked essentially like a devil straight from hell, ready to pull some sinners back down with her.
Needless to say, these words angered the two Aether Masters of the Wolfe Family. Gregory picked up his weapon and began to rapidly circulate his aether through it and his body, while his companion Sieger did the same with his rapier. The shadowy images of a wolf with a strange hammer-like tail and one with vestigial wings began to overlay Gregory and Sieger respectively.
“I don’t know how you’re fucking talking, but I’m going to enjoy breaking you,” Gregory challenged.
“After we’re done with you, we’ll deal with the little princess next!”
“Why wait?,” Zhen Yue interjected. Blade in hand and bestial moon tattoos glowing, Zhen Yue walked up to stand next to Nepherage, ready to end the lives of the miscreants that dared to harm her clansmen.
Unbeknownst to all of them, a third party with a peculiar eye was watching them, sending their images back to people who had a rather vested interest in the outcome of this fight.
“Oh man, oh man, Grand Elder Harold ain’t gonna like this…,” the spy muttered to himself.
The poor sap had no clue how true that statement was going to get.
