ToTT: Chapter 12

Chapter 12
July 19th X792

Midnight Reckoning. A guild with an untouchable kill count. In one year along, just four of their members accounted for over 5000 murders, which they claim to be "acts of rightful vengeance". Their master is known as Ikarus. They all wield incredibly dangerous Last Resorts; classed as forbidden spells due to their destructive power. Ikaris, however, is the exception. She is from, and she wields a legendary blade that has been transfused with numerous amounts of Lacrima containing Death Magic.

The battle.

Sif and Ikarus were keeping up with each other, metal clangs ringing out rapidly, katana vs rapier.

Brianna was using both her sword and her free hand to combat the teenager, Maximus Yukimura.

Alex was clashing with Michelle Himura, who seemed to be using virtually identical Magic to his own!

Brooke, Violet and Akabane had all been trapped and immobilised in wires that almost had a mind of their own, their caster being Yukio Nakahara.

Eugene and Marco Takahashi were locked together in a shoving match with their swords; their blades pressed together for the moment, as Marco glared down at the shorter Swordsman.

Josh had attempted to stop the blonde from reaching his father, Hayden, who was currently incapacitated, only to be stopped himself by a change of gravity around him, with the clear source being Yamada Takahashi.

Rapidfire gunshots echoed across the land as Ezra and Marina Kurosawa, the one who murdered Dean shortly before, engaged in an aerial gun duel; however, Ezra seemed to be on the defensive. Blood was dribbling from his left wrist, and he was using his right hand to apply pressure to stop it. It also seemed that Marina had an identical pair of jet-boots to Ezra's, flying around after him, constantly firing her guns, which seemed to be a pair of Sub-Machine Guns.

Artemis Morioka, the blonde woman from before, was standing over Hayden, and reached down to grab him by the neck, a shadow over her eyes, a dark smile on her face.

Eugene looked back up at his opponent without showing any sort of fear or trouble. In fact, he was finding this easy. "Halt." He said activating his magic. This caused Marco's sword to become stuck to Eugene's light blue one with no hopes of getting it off. Eugene's sword in turn was stuck to his hand. "Freeze." The light blue sword lit up and then started to freeze up Marco's sword traveling down towards his hands. If Marco didn't let go of his sword, he'd be frozen in no time.

Back where Hayden and Artemis was, a spark of fire interrupted Artemis from grabbing Hayden. Kai stood in the way in place of Josh. He also made a small fireball explode in front of Yamada's face to make him falter a bit.

With Brooke, Violet and Akabane, who were still tied in wires, the youngest had a plan. She summoned plants from the ground that spit acid on the wires, setting them free. She then fired cactus needles at machine gun speed at the caster of those wires.

The Wire Mage manipulated his wires to function like whips, blocking each cactus needle with a flurry of whiplashes from them.

Marco, meanwhile, glared at Eugene, only for his expression to turn into a smirk. Incredible heat was generated from his body, to melt the ice that had been casted upon his sword, and was even starting to scald Eugene's hands. Promptly afterwards, the sword literally began to grow to gargantuan proportions, but even Marco looked surprised by it. He stumbled back holding the enlarged weapon, only for it to shrink back down.

"Don't let that stupid Dragon Slayer destroy your weapon, Marco, or else.", Michelle snapped at Marco, while grappling with Alex. "It's the only one you'll get, and if you let it get destroyed, Leona will destroy you.", she continued, before throwing Alex down roughly to the floor and straddling his stomach. A long object slid out of her sleeves, which she gripped between her fingers. She looked down at Alex, who happened to be blushing, but at the same time glaring. It was obvious why he was blushing; a pretty girl was literally straddling him. Michelle smirked almost viciously.

She leant down so her face was inches from the boy's. "It's been a while since I've met a boy as cute as you.", she said with a sultry tone of voice, as her long, silky cherry blossom hair cascaded down the sides of her face, and brushed past Alex's.

"Get the hell off of me, you wh--Agh!", he yelped in pain as Michelle jabbed the needle in her hand into his neck. Alex felt himself unable to move, or even use Magic.

"Let's not use such bad words...especially near children.", she said as she glanced towards the youngers; Josh, Violet, and Kai. "Speaking of things too inappropriate for children...", she whispered as her face lowered towards his, "How about you and I..sneak off somewhere nice...quiet...and dark when this wears off from your body, hm?", she said with a mischievous giggle.

"Like I'd even think about going anywhere--Mmmf?!", he started to shout before being interrupted by a pair of gentle, rosy lips being planted on his own. Michelle's! Brianna spotted this, and she looked like someone had just punched her in the gut, while at the same time having also insulted her. Alex attempted to struggle, but he gave into the kiss...but not because of the inability to escape. Michelle had placed him in a trance with some sort of Magic!

Meanwhile, Ezra had managed to trick Marina, and found cover so he could heal his wrist where the woman had shot him multiple times. After, Ezra Requipped an advanced type of sniper rifle into his grasp. He turned and rested on his knees, with his chest against the rock he used for cover. He rested the sniper on its legs, as he put his eye near the scope. He slowly panned the area until he found the girl soaring around in the sky, looking for him, obviously with an itchy trigger finger. "I just met them and I'm fed up with them.", he thought to himself. He closed one eye as he charged his Magic Power into his rifle. "Stinger Shot!", Ezra casted. Marina heard the voice, but when the pinpointed, it was too late. She was hit by the attack, and was engulfed in a small explosion.

Marina yelled as she was surrounded by the explosion, and when it ended, she coughed as she fanned away smoke. She looked in the same direction, but Ezra was gone! She looked startled, and began to panic, looking all around her. She suddenly got a chill, and shrieked as she whirled round to see an ominous-looking figure silhouetted by the setting sun even though it was mere feet from her.

The figure, Ezra, raised a single .44 Magnum pistol so that its barrel was aimed at her. "Spark Shot.", he said abruptly, as Marina was hit by an electrical bullet that stunned and paralysed her, causing her to start falling from the sky. Her gun remained with her due to its strap. Ezra watched her fall for a few seconds, before throwing a card down at Marina with decent speed. When it hit her, the girl was absorbed into the card. This was Ezra's Card Dimension spell. Ezra used his Requip to send the card containing Marina away.

Back on the ground, Sif and Ikarus were continuing their bout. The two were equalling swing for swing, evenly pushing each other back every now and then. Suddenly, a black mist swarmed Ikarus' blade, looking almost like a thin flame. Sif looked surprised, but immediately retaliated. Electricity surrounded her rapier, and she hold it vertically in front of her.

"Come.", Ikarus said. Short and sweet. She burst forward into a sprint.

"Gladly.", Sif responded with as she did the same. "Thundering Blade!", she casted. The katana with a mist of death. The rapier with the might of the storm. The two weapons clashed in the middle with a large explosion.

"Your sword is still stuck by the way." Eugene said rather nonchalantly as the melting of the ice did nothing to unstick their swords. With a small smile Eugene made both of his swords and Marco's disappear through the use of his portal box. Making his opponent's weapon disappear as well was only possible because they were stuck together being thought of as one object with his swords. Immediately afterward, he let loose a loud clap that wreaked havoc in Marco's mind as he fell over. This gave Eugene the chance to draw his third sword and render him unfit for further combat with a hit to the neck that blocked off his oxygen intake temporarily which would soon knock him out. "I'll return your sword after the battle is over maybe?" He said to Marco as he fell unconscious. It doesn't seem as if they have too much ill intent... Something's going on. Eugene thought to himself before heading over to Brianna.

"Brianna, I think I've figured out your origins. I have this one technique to teach you." Eugene said with a small smile as he grabbed onto her hand. "I do recall you pestering me to teach it so might as well make it now. You want to get that girl off of Alex right? Don't worry, it won't be able to be copied either due to it's nature. Repeat after me."

"I am Steel. Steel knows no fear. Steel knows no doubt. When faced with my enemy, I hesitate not. I am a weapon to destroy these. Steel Blood Transformation!" As Brianna repeated these words both she and Eugene began to glow with a red aura and pretty soon both of their eyes and hair also turned red with red X markings appearing on their faces. "This will give us a boost up in terms of physical ability and mental calculation speed. Let's go!" He then charged towards Artemis who despite appearance was having trouble with Kai while he left Brianna to do as she wished.

Artemis managed to get past Kai's fire soon enough, and knocked him dozens of metres away with a simple slap. When she heard something coming at her, she whirled round to meet gazes with Eugene, smirking.

Meanwhile, Brianna was sprinting at Michelle. The teenage half-Wolf tackled the girl off of the entranced Alex, following up with a swing of her sword. Even with her abilities being enhanced, her sword swing was still blocked by Michelle; her needle had grew taller than her, and had been used to parry the sword! The force of the impact generated small shockwaves in multiple directions. The two were going at it like a cat and dog, Brianna was pissed. And it was obvious to Michelle, why she was. "What's wrong? Is that young man your boyfriend, or are you just too scared to say anything to him?", she said with a blatant mocking vocal tone.

Sif and Ikarus were all over the place, however Ikarus eventually knocked Sif onto her back on the ground, and swung her sword down towards the Unchained Soul member, but it was caught by Sif using her rapier to block. Ikarus, however, had incredible strength, and the edge of her death-blade was slowly getting closer to Sif's face. "A simple knick would be all that is needed to take your life-force away.", Ikarus spoke, with no emotion in her face. Sif let out strained grunts as she attempted to fight back, pushing harder; stopping the sword getting closer for now.

Shuriken came out of nowhere towards Artemis and that was just what Eugene needed to disappear from view and then all of a sudden, a gas surrounded her, making her feel tired as she almost fell down on one knee before getting hit in the back by something which caused her to get nausea akin to an extreme case of seasickness. "You people said that you were assassins that don't play by the rules right? Well, it just so happens that I'm an assassin as well and I don't play by the rules either." Eugene said in a rather cold tone before knocking her out. ''From what I remember about these guys from the guild's archives, it's hard to imagine them doing this. Which worries me. That's why I have to make sure not to use lethal force.'' "Kai, get Wolf some healing potions." He said to the boy as he returned, throwing him some glass vials which contained some drinks that would help a person regain their strength quickly although it tasted terrible.

Eugene then went to help Sif as she seemed to be in more danger. He fired some arrows at Ikarus to detract her attention away from Sif. At the same time he called out to Brianna. "Brianna, keep your cool! Remember what I taught you. Keep your head cool but your heart on fire." He then continued to get Ikarus's attention.