Chapter 24: Duel x Storm I

They were far weaker, and relied too much on cheap tools and trinkets.

They… Or should she say… He? That was clearly a man, no matter how you put it.

Soon, it would be a dead man, more precisely.

Body shape wasn’t something you could fake, even with five layers of armor. Foggy as they were, her eyes were still far too keen.

“No one threatens my territory and gets off lightly, do you hear?”

He hadn’t used another batch of poison on her yet, despite his heavy breathing after so many close calls. She could tell. He had used up all of he had.

The White Lady did not know what kind of armor he was using, but the sheer fact he felt the need to wear it in the first place gave her a lot to think about. He was a very late haema user for sure. Seeing by his poor ability at canalizing it, he likely had little experience in its use.

Also of note was his mask. Why would he need to hide his face, if shifting to enhanced form was more than enough to hide one’s features? She could see no exposed skin whatsoever, the only possible opening was on the back of his head, but he always made sure to keep it turned back and blocked off.

Most puzzling of all was the complete lack of a scent. Perhaps some kind of chemical cleanser? Though those were just as rare as allicin poison, at that point barely anything surprised her anymore. His patterns were becoming more and more predictable, and she got the feeling he would run out of strategies sooner or later.

The only thing she really couldn’t figure out were his choices in positioning. No matter how she looked at him, all movements, every single one of them, seemed somehow artificial. Fake. They were unnatural. Too blunt. Rigid. Like he wasn’t actually human, but some kind of… machine? Or, more accurately, a large puppet being controlled by invisible strings.

Most of all, he never stopped moving, nor did he ever slow down, not a hint of weariness aside from the breathing itself. It was as if his mind was an element entirely separate from the body, as if he’d been possessed by a second entity. Possessed. Yes, that was the best way she could describe it.

It was by far the most unsettling detail about that thing, if she, again, could even call it a person. It piqued her curiosity, not that that mattered in the end, either.

All she knew, otherwise, was that he seemed hell-bent on keeping his face hidden, but that did not bother her.

No doubt, he was afraid of something. Afraid of being found out before his own haema enhancement wore away, afraid of getting hurt.

The worst thing that could happen to someone during the night in that city was just that: pain. Death was no longer an issue, nor was disease. There were no consequences for anything.

So, that could only mean she was dealing with a coward of monumental proportions. And, that also meant that the moment the going started getting rough enough…

“... Let’s see, then…”

The masked aggressor brought out one of his handguns, firing wildly at her while throwing knives at random angles with his free hand. But even with just one hand to consider, they were far less, and came far less frequently than she felt they should. His supplies were emptying, then. He was running out of junk to throw at her.

He tested her body, how long it could endure. She studied his mind, how exactly to break through it. But their one goal was the same: to find weaknesses they could exploit.

None of the bullets nor the blades were hitting her now, and she reached him in an instant, heavily bending over in order to more easily evade the projectiles and leaping forward, aiming to fracture his ribs with a single jab. If she couldn’t tear through, she could always break it all at once.

Suddenly, though, he vaulted over her, scraping off several pieces of concrete as he rolled on the roof, and restarting his firing and hurling routine before even getting up.

Several of the blades managed to graze both her arms and torso, about three or four piercing right through her lower back, but even with that she did not go down, pulling each weapon back out in rage. The girl then realized could no longer feel her left arm. Two of the knives had pieces right through it, both slightly above her elbow. But she did not care for that.

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He had clearly having a hard time getting back up. His fall during that maneuver had damaged it to some extent, and even with that ghastly movement of his he showed difficulty moving any further.

The pale girl grinned, vicious.

That was it. Just one moment more and she would be able to incapacitate him for good. She sprinted at him once again, hurling her fist toward his gruesome, black and white face. In a desperate stroke, he forced himself back up, thrust his last two knives in her direction, gripping them both with his right hand.

The pair of deadly hands passed right beside each other, only barely grazing and struck their respective targets. The fist aimed at his face, however, wound up lower than intended and struck his lower chest instead. The sharp weapons, on the other hand, missed the girl’s neck by mere millimeters and stabbed deep into her right shoulder.

The two predators were frozen in place for a single instant. Both were dry out of air, and drowning in pain as well, though the they barely seemed to realize it.

They just stood there, staring each at each other’s face, or rather, into each other’s mask.

She could hear only the deafening noise of her own grinding teeth.

Her hand wouldn’t go any further past that plating. His blades wouldn’t stab any deeper than they already had.

“…get… off…!”

She raised her left leg to kick the masked foe away, but he’d reacted sooner, hitting her in the stomach with the heel of his boot.

The girl flew far behind and landed on her back. Holding onto the stricken area, she tried to get back up, but her sore body wouldn’t move properly. She looked ahead, watching as he clumsily staggered in her direction, repositioning through his fingers the two knives he’d pulled back.

“The hell…?”

She’d barely even hit that guy once, yet he was moving like he’d just been run over by a bus or something. Like, he  actually seems to be in pretty bad shape. But why? What was she missing there? Even someone with such poor affinity to haema should be able to do something about that…

She rose up once again and sprang towards him, dodging another knife, but her movements soon fell short and she started losing strength again, as the long, silver sword came out and to fill his left hand and swing towards her, striking again and again, from countless different from left and right, more times than she could count, sending her back onto the hard floor once again in a burning, bloody pulp.

He was in bad shape, alright… But she wasn’t any better. She lay feebly on her back at the edge of that roof now.

Before she could move any further, the blade closed in over her face, its tip stopping short of her nose. It was useless, trying to run. She cursed under her breath.

“Now then, shall we… get down to business at last?” he started, attempting in vain to hide the exhaustion in his voice. “There is one thing I need from you… and one thing only, so listen carefully...”

The one-note voice she’d heard before had been replaced by a mildly annoyed, somewhat childish-sounding intonation.

Something had clearly set him off, and that meant more danger. She had to get away, fast.

However, no matter where she tried to turn, the silver blade would move to obstruct her sight.

“Oh? Still trying to escape… even now? It’s futile. I’m sure you are aware… that with a single trust of my hand, I could turn your face into a bloody work of art, right here, right now… And as you should know, there’ll be no coming back from that. Even for the likes of you, Miss Griffith.”

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