Fragments

Ch.24 - Creeping Dread

Another impact of unimaginable strength sounded through the war-torn settlement, forming a series of jagged holes leading from the factory's top floor to the very bottom. As if experiencing an earthquake, the building shook violently every time an attack of such devastating magnitude was unleashed, becoming less stable by the minute…
"...what's happening..? Where am I..?"
Tariru, painlessly sensing there's basically nothing left of his body, was miraculously still alive, buried under heaps of rubble.
"He actually caused me… To black out? How terrifying… When was the last time that happened?"
Disjointed, unfocused thoughts flooded the man's head and the regeneration of his torn limbs drastically accelerated, producing enough force to slowly push whatever old remains of the factory covered him.
"It'll cost me, but I need to speed things up… If they all were this powerful, I can see why you wished to wipe out Ecclesia, mom… If I kill one of them, will you be proud? Will you acknowledge me?"
The man, with his upper body hung downwards like a zombie, silently stood up, silhouetted by brown and gray dust. The flesh and bone around his arms and upper body bent, stretched and bulged rapidly, while he slowly climbed a hill of shattered concrete, just when Reuel leapt down the wide opening, crashing down like a meteor.
The visibility in the area was poor, the brutish, furious man's landing cleared it only somewhat. Falling, loose pipes creaked and loudly fell on the floor, shards of the demolished ceiling rolled down tiny hills formed by rubble…

And atop the largest, situated before Reuel, an abhorrent aberration came to light.

With his left arm pointed outwards, Tariru's exposed ulna and radius joined together in a hollow oval, devoid of tissue and veins, his hand disappearing… The transformation continued up his arm and stopped at the shoulder blade, around which the skin inflated like a balloon, pushing away the surrounding skeleton and causing the limb to jerkily raise and lower, droplets of blood flying from it.
What morphed before Reuel's eyes… Was a cannon of flesh.
The gut-wrenching sight was impossible to not observe despite the horrific nature, but it wasn't the only transformation, as Tariru's right, although incomparably less violently, became a long, thin blade of bone from his elbow down.

"..." Reuel had no words to express, but not out of shock… He simply didn't care enough to comment on the Reaper's absolutely deranged actions, wanting nothing but to kill him.
Usually, he enjoyed toying with his foes, loved making them feel the disparity in their power, but this time was different…
He wanted their duel to be a one-sided slaughter.

Tariru resumed the conflict, aiming his cannon arm forward and mixing in a bloodthirsty grin rivaling Reuel's with deep focus. The air stored inside the protruding sac was discharged instantly, the booming resonation was scarily accurate to an actual firearm…
A calcified copy of a full-metal jacket swept past Reuel's calf, who just barely managed to back away and avoid a serious injury, his eyes locking onto the projectile from between his forearms, which were raised defensively. It shattered on impact, partially burrowing into the ground with shocking force, considering only air propelled it.
"Why did he aim for my legs..? Is he trying to make me immobile? Whatever… If he gives himself a peashooter, I'll break it– and kill him."
Reuel leaned forward, curling his fists and beginning to charge a strike, unbeknownst that…

His opponent had already leapt into the air.

"So that was just a distraction," Reuel thought, relatively unsurprised, choosing to immediately leap backwards and avoid an impending slash.
Yet, when Tariru crashed down, a diagonal, heavily bleeding gash still formed across the man's chest and abdomen, and the blade hit against a rock next to his boot.
"What? I dodged that…'' With a frown, he observed the distance between them, his clothing staining a dark red and droplets of blood soaring through the air.
The bone sword was unnaturally long at a second glance, as thin as a needle.
"So he extended it, that tricky son of a bitch…"
However, the battle hadn't turned completely in the Reaper's favor yet. Reuel advanced forward, stomping down on the blade to keep it in place and immobilizing Tariru, who received a downward hook right after.
His neck twisted from the impact, nearly breaking, but he didn't falter, and raised his cannon to Reuel's neck, the barrel of which morphed into a conical, trypophobic cluster of holes.
At the sight of the weapon, he immediately retreated, narrowly dodging a buckshot of bone shards that scraped his jaw, but also freeing his enemy's sword.