CALAMITY CORE : FREE THE WORLD

CH.23 'W.M.D.'

Another combination of tendrils joined the first, and they began to spiral as the energy radiating from Andrei became something even the other fighters on the opposite end of the Chimera could feel. Lowe brought his free hand up as flames enveloped it, and as he struck the conjoined flesh of the tendrils, rat fangs chewed into his hand for only a moment as he put his arm into the punch, focusing as a flash of crimson light called forth the end of his spell.

"... Flare!"

Another flash of light, then a third combusted forth into a glorious lightshow of explosive red and black. Each of the tendrils was blown to pieces, burning blood raining down on the clearing now as Andrei entered the stage.

Crimson-black flames still enveloping his sword, he swung it forward at another tendril as it came, faster than they had before with Hirano and the brothers. Dismembering one, his blade lodged itself in the ground as a pool of blood spilled from the now writhing mass. Andrei felt as the blood in his veins grew hot, and he felt his flesh on his hands burning as he threw a downward punch at a defensive flesh wall, lighting it ablaze. "Hattori, if you're still around, get outta' here. I'll handle it." Andrei yelled, a certain calm underneath his rough tone.

Hirano heard the voice and covered his face with his robes as the flames washed over the Chimera. He grabbed hold of a recovering Hattori, and the vampire lunged for the trees, watching as a second explosion came from seemingly nowhere overhead. Something piercing the treeline, he ducked for the bushes alongside Hattori, and they watched as a sword cut through the mass of bodies and slammed into Andrei's leg, twisting his knee backwards. Keeping quiet, they began to crawl through the forested land, hoping that they would get away undetected.

As Andrei's knee twisted back, he yelled out in anger and pain. He looked down at the thing that had lodged into his leg, but not the bone. Before he could reach down to grab hold of it, the weapon, a sword bulkier than his, but not quite as long, flew backwards through the air, enveloped in a golden-red fire. "Shit-..." He winced as he took a step forward.

Now that the heat had been redirected from himself and his friends towards this new threat, he batted away a stray tendril with a punch, then grabbed his leg. Pulling hard, his bones popped back into place, and blood spurted from his wound. Still fuelled by the pain, he pushed down on it with a step to test it, and rocketed forward back into the fight as something landed in the crater left by Hattori's fall. From both ends now, the Chimera was surrounded, and a sickening crunching caused its open ribs to retract, forming a black boned-cage around its core.

Punching into it, Andrei put his muscles into overdrive with what felt like only a little effort. The fire on his hands began to spread up his forearm, stopping at his elbows for the moment, but with that, the whispers of Ra seemed to become loud... a sound that he had not heard for some time. For a moment, he could almost make out what they were saying, but there was nothing truly decipherable. "Shit... gotta' keep it under control..."

As he threw another punch, and his other arm was enveloped with flames, just as his coat now was too, he gritted his teeth. By now, he wasn't able to realize that he and the mysterious attacker had put the Chimera on the defensive. He felt his flesh burning to a point, but eventually, the pain began to fade as his nerves were shot. "C'mon Andrei... can't lose it like that again..." he told himself, but his voice was a different story, simply incoherent yelling as he was thrown into a frenzy.

The Chimera, now assaulted by incinerating fire on both ends, retracted into itself, the bodies of rats oozing away as though they were flushed into the forest. It was forced into fleeing by the unending assault, and now revealed to Andrei the being that had dislocated his leg with a single toss of their blade.