Nightmare Realm Summoner

Alex’s domain exploded out around him, hazy Riftwarped Qi warping the air in a wide ring. He wasted absolutely no time in calling Spark to the field as well. Glint was still dead, but he wanted to save Encore for if one of his other monsters fell. There was no point overextending now and getting punished for it later.

He wasn’t the only one to act. Claire activated her own Partial Soul Manifestation, summoning forth a torrent of howling pink petals that tore past Vaxon, leaving several bundles attached to his heavily armored body in their passing.

And Aaron — well, he readied his coin. There wasn’t much else he could do yet.

Vaxon raised his sword once more, watching Princess considerably more warily than he had been a moment before. It was clear he hadn’t expected to find his sword entirely useless against a corpse. But his distraction didn’t last long. He blurred, launching toward them and bringing his sword down in a black streak.

Princess lurched to intercept him. She brought the Baveroth around once more, this time bracing it before herself. Vaxon’s sword slammed into the dead bear’s corpse with a heavy thump. Princess skidded back, leaving a thin trail of sludge beneath her feet — but still, the corpse held strong.

“This is just disrespectful,” Aaron said.

“Shut up. We’re working with what we’ve got,” Alex said. “He wants to die, doesn’t he? Who cares how?”

Princess swung the Baveroth. Its limbs flailed through the air as Vaxon — wisely — stepped out of the way, letting it pass him by harmlessly. A mixture of incredulity, pain, and amusement twisted across his features.

“You cannot be—” the rest of Vaxon’s sentence was lost in a pained cough as he suddenly lurched forward. It seemed his body and mind disagreed about letting him talk any longer.

He accelerated, launching himself past Princess and slamming down directly in front of Alex, swinging for his head. Alex was pretty sure Vaxon hadn’t been moving this fast the last time they’d fought.

But Alex hadn’t had a Partial Soul Manifestation then either.

He teleported.

Vaxon’s blade carved harmlessly through the air where Alex had been a moment before. His efforts rewarded by the loud crack of Claire’s whip. The thorned weapon struck one of the petal bundles stuck to his armor, detonating it with a bang.

Smoke coiled from Vaxon as he staggered back, only for Claire’s whip to wind around his arm and yank him back taut. Surprise flashed through his features. She’d actually stopped him.

Vaxon yanked his arm back. Claire was yanked off her feet and torn through the air, sent flying directly toward him. The huge man raised his other hand to grab her. But, before he could, her wings snapped down. She adjusted her angle, still using her whip’s binding to pull herself toward the giant.

Her knee slammed into his chin with a crunch. His head snapped back and he stumbled a step. Princess drove herself into Vaxon as Claire leapt free, her whip uncoiling, and the two of them plummeted to the ground with an earthshaking crunch.

Sludge splattered across the ground as Vaxon’s blade tore through Princess. He shattered one of her masks instantly, clearly remembering her weakness, but she wasn’t limited to just one head anymore.

Alex didn’t let the moment of advantage go to waste. Glass carved down his arm to emerge from his palm in a glistening spike.

Then he teleported once again, appearing just behind Princess and Vaxon. The top of the large man’s bald head was perfectly exposed to him.

He thrust his hand forward.

Aaron flipped his coin.

Vaxon’s body shuddered. His movements slowed.

The piston on his back fell.

There was a massive thump.

A wave of pressurized air slammed into Alex’s chest with enough force to tear the breath from his lungs and launch him backward. He narrowly managed to teleport before he was thrown free from the boundaries of his own Partial Soul Manifestation.

Alex landed on the ground beside Claire, skidding several feet back as his teeth gritted.

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An enormous weight bore down on his shoulders, trying to grind him into the dirt.

The piston on Vaxon’s back thumped once more.

Aaron fell to one knee, wheezing. His limbs trembled desperately, but he couldn’t stand again. Alex could barely move himself.

Vaxon grabbed Princess, launching the huge monster off himself. She hit the ground in a splatter several feet away from him. Then he drove a fist into the ground, his metal body screeching as it fought against gravity to lift him back into the air.

His movements were impossibly slow at first. Aaron’s magic was holding him back, but it couldn’t last forever. Within seconds, Vaxon had regained the majority of his speed. The piston on his back pumped once more, forcing all of them back into the ground.

Princess pushed herself back upright. Her body was actively melting away from the force bearing down on her, but she still threw herself at Vaxon in an attempt to stop him.

His blade carved through the air. Her two remaining masks shattered, and her form hit the ground in a rain of sludgy black droplets that quickly transformed back into energy and returned to Alex.

Shit. How fucking strong is this guy?

“I am sorry,” Vaxon said. “You should not have come back. But I had hoped you would be stronger.”

Alex gritted his teeth.

Then Vaxon was in front of him, his sword raising into the air.

The blade fell.

Alex teleported.

Vaxon’s weapon dug into the ground where he’d been with a metallic screech. The huge man paused, then turned toward Alex. He pulled the blade free of the ground. Instead of trying to finish off any of the others, he lumbered in pursuit.

It wasn’t hard to tell what Vaxon was doing. Even though he couldn’t just let them win the fight, it seemed he still had at least some degree influence over his body.

He’s trying to buy us time. But… damn. I forgot how damn dangerous that piston thing on his back is.

Claire let out a snarl. She forced herself up to one knee, flicking her wrist toward Vaxon. Her whip snapped through the air, striking one of the petal bundles on the back of the giant’s head.

An explosion rocked the air and he stumbled forward with a groan of pain. Smoke rose up from the back of his head as purple liquid wept from a new hole at the back of his skull. It hadn’t been enough to kill him, but it had definitely gotten his attention.

He turned back toward Claire. It seemed his attempts to make his body to chase after Alex could only go so far. Vaxon blurred, accelerating toward Claire.

Threads spun out from within the blue void in Spark’s core. The spooled to bind around Vaxon, trying to pull him back, but he tore through them like a bull through a china shop. They barely even managed to slow him. Fortunately, Spark had reached for more than just the giant.

His threads grabbed Claire and Aaron by the waist. Spark launched them into the air, throwing them toward Alex a moment before Vaxon’s sword slammed into his slender midsection — and passed right through it. The giant stumbled slightly from the complete lack of impact.

He’d had no idea that Spark didn’t have a physical form. Aside form his threads, his body could only be harmed by soul weapons. But it didn’t take Vaxon long to adapt.

The ground shattered beneath his feet as the piston on his back thumped once more. He turned toward the three of them.

Pain and hesitation warred across Vaxon’s features. He was clearly doing everything he could to hold back. To stop his body from moving. It didn’t look like he was accomplishing much at all. It just wasn’t his body. He was nothing more than a helpless witness within his own flesh.

Alex gritted his teeth. His legs shook beneath him, but he slowly forced himself upright. It would have been entirely impossible to stand before he’d gone through Body Tempering. But compared to some of the worst that he’d reached within the Forsaken Grounds… this was just barely tolerable.

Claire caught his eye from the ground. Her finger tapped the ground. She could still move. Then her eye flicked to Vaxon’s leg. She didn’t say a word. But she didn’t need to.

Alex looked to Vaxon. Then he bared his teeth.

“Come on,” Alex said. “Let’s not drag this out.”

“You did get stronger,” Vaxon said. A small smile pulled at the corners of his pained expression. “You can withstand my pressure, now. Don’t fail me. Just a bit more.”

Vaxon shot forward, appearing before Alex in a blur, his sword already streaking down as the piston on his back thumped to release another wave of pressure.

But Alex didn’t dodge.

Instead, a white metal manacle slammed down on his wrist. Chain links clanged, linking to his massive white anchor as it crashed to the ground harmlessly behind Vaxon.

Claire’s whip cracked through the air. It grabbed onto the giant’s arm and yanked it down, pulling the blow away from Alex and sending it slicing harmlessly past him.

The move left Alex and Vaxon just a foot away from each other.

And even as Vaxon raised his sword to swing again, Alex was drawing on the Singularity Core.

It turned over.

His anchor accelerated, tearing through the air in a blurred streak as it shot right into the back of Vaxon’s skull. It knocked his head forward with a loud crack. He stumbled, losing his balance.

Then he fell.

Vaxon’s eyes went wide for the brief instant it took him to pitch down toward the ground — and right into the blade of razor-sharp glass emerging from Alex’s other hand. His hand had already extended to stop himself from falling face-first into the ground. His body knew that it needed to protect its head.

But it was too late.

The spike lodged deep into one of Vaxon’s eyes.

There was a long second of silence. Not one of them so much as moved. The only sound was the sizzling hiss of purple liquid dripping to the ground.

Then the faintest of smiles pulled across the giant’s mouth.

“You actually did it. Who would have thought?” For once, his voice didn’t sound pained. “Thank you.”

Then the brilliant purple light behind Vaxon’s eyes flickered out. The piston on his back ground to a rumbling halt. And, with a final screech of metal grating against itself, he collapsed to the ground.

Power poured into Alex in a wave. It told him what he’d already known.

Vaxon was dead.