Cold blooded 4: The keys and the stones

Chapter 16

Ajin's POV:

"You can leave this to me Sally. I've got a feeling they won't need to deal with overkill as a way to go out." Bartholomew smirked. "Yeah yeah, just make it quick." Sally couldn't help but smirk as well. That little wedding crasher... I remembered her too well.

Nagima gritted their teeth, and got on the attack. They stood up and shot a multitude of dark red crystal feathers. In response to that, Bartholomew got in what looked like a tai chi stance, and started knocking away every single one of them at a high speed.

Jeremy took this opportunity to speed blitz his way behind Bartholomew, using his blue flames. Bartholomew saw this and grabbed one of the feathers, slicing Jeremy's palm before any fire could be unleashed from it.

It looked like Bartholomew's hand was burning just from being in contact with the new feathered material. However, I couldn't actually see the burn on his hands. And with a swipe of his hand, Bartholomew made an explosion appear in front of him and Jeremy, knocking Jeremy back.

After that, the sorcerer jumped high into the air, and shot what looked like black and bluish green lightning out of his hands. Nagima stopped shooting their feathers for a moment, and enlarged his wings to protect themself.

The blast made contact with their wings, but it seemed to have no affect. No explosion, no light tricks, nothing. Instead, it felt like Nagima's wings were seeping with dark power. "Trash." Nagima spat before flying up to the hovering sorcerer.

They got ready to punch him right in the face, but he blocked it. Nagima kept trying though, every punch ringing in the air for what felt like miles. "Ah I see. You've unlocked a form that makes you to not only absorb magic, but gets stronger with every negative emotion you feel." Bartholomew blocked every single punch one hand.

It made sense, but why would Nagima be feeling so negative in the first place? But I knew that was a dumb question. I awkwardly turned to Max, and I could see that everyone else was doing the same. "What?" Max had no idea.

"You don't know sh*t about me!!" Nagima kept punching without rest. Finally, Jeremy blasted off the ground with a restless blue passion blazing from his body. He tried to sneak a strong punch behind him, but Bartholomew blocked it with his other gloved hand.

"You are so pitiful." Bartholomew's eyes lit a glow. Before they knew it, he had grabbed one of Nagima's arms too. Then he threw them both towards the ground. But with style, they both landed on their feet. Despite the small craters.

Bartholomew raised his hand, and an army's worth of black swords appeared from above. Once he put his hand down, the swords rained down upon them. Luckily, Nagima was able to expand their left wing and absorb the swords, protecting them and Jeremy.

"Why're you hiding from me kids?" He clenched his fists, and deadly static took hold from it. "We're just getting-" Bartholomew moved his hands mid sentence, and he vanished, reappearing right in front of Nagima as if he was going to give them a deadly punch. "-started!" His punch made contact.

It was too quick for Jeremy or Nagima to react. They winced at the attack for a second, but Nagima looked like they were barely damaged by that attack. If anything, it just made them look even more mad.

So they grabbed him by shoulders, holding him in place as if they were waiting for something. Until Jeremy attempted to strike his fiery fist right through his back. But Bartholomew had a copy of him hop out of his back, and tackle Jeremy to the ground, also burning in the process.

Jeremy kicked the clone off of him to a nearby tree, and continued to blast a line of blue fire at it. "Worth it." I saw Bartholomew say before he grabbed Nagima, and flew them both into the forest. Crashing into an unnaturally rising stone headfirst.

Instead of knocking them out, Nagima wrapped their wings around Bartholomew's persistent body. Then, in the blink of an eye, blood red flames erupted from Nagima's crystal red wings. The heat by itself was burning the nearby trees.

But for what felt like minutes while Jeremy was watching them cook Bartholomew alive, there then came a time when we saw a big black sword go straight through Nagima's stomach. And just like that, I could feel my heart pound.

The sword ceased into ashes before Nagima's wings turned back to normal, forcing the fire to go out. Their body went limp as the scar was slowly beginning to fade away with a crystal feather to make up for the wound.

However, Nagima looked like they had lost consciousness already. "He... he's gonna kill them..!" Zaina said. "NAGIMA!!!" Jeremy's entire body was erupting in blue flames of rage, rushing at Bartholomew with the quickness.

But without another word, his body was getting sucked in towards Sally's hand. Once Sally got a hold of him by the head, she slammed him into the ground, and a wide pool of darkness molded into the dirt, and kept him in place.

"Be a good boy, and stay." Sally looked down on him. My blood was starting to pump out of this world. Bartholomew looked like he was healing, but I could tell he was slightly weaker now. "Damnit, I underestimated you..." Bartholomew forged an iron sword out of his palm.

"You may have gotten a good number on me... but I will always win." He got ready to slice their head off. And without another thought, I lost it. To heck with Nagima wanting to prove themself, I wasn't gonna let them die.

All of a sudden, it felt like everything froze when I started moving in my invisibility. And as I got closer and closer to Bartholomew, my malice grew.

So with a powerful flick of my finger, I blew his brain out into the atmosphere.

I could feel the centered gaze of my friends fall upon me like a spotlight. I remember the feeling. Except I wasn't really seen as a monster, but as a protector. They felt thankful that I saved them before any of them could.

I turned to look at Sally and Jeremy who both had different expressions. Jeremy just looked like he was full of thanks, but Sally gave me a familiar look of disgust. However, I could sense something else deep within her soul.

'Do you feel that?' Don asked me. "Fear." I answered. 'Yeah, she's afraid. What's your game plan for her now?' I could tell Don felt what I was feeling, and knew my answer already. "Not my first time being angry..." I stomped towards Sally, shaking the ground with every step.

"I'm taking no prisoners. My eyes flared with gold as my red and purple aura smoked and steamed off of my body, responding to my anger.