The Old City

0.68: Moonlit Clash Part 2

"When will I begin 'paying' for that?" called the woman with the sing-song voice that didn't match her savage demeanor. She danced away every time Relia tried to get in close, and her damn bird always tried to attack her from behind. The thing was silent as it glided across the air, which made it impossible to track except by the small shadow that sometimes appeared in the corner of her eye.

Relia finally brought her axe down on the woman, but she blocked it with a long, slender blade. She was surprisingly strong for her size – that would be the magical augmentation – but unlike Relia's axe, the blade itself was not enhanced and with another heavy whack, it shattered

"Right now, you bitch."

Relia brought her axe high now and swung heavily down.

But suddenly the weight was wrong. The axe became light and Relia's balance was thrown. She crashed down next to the woman and twisted to see what had happened.

Her great axe had been rent in two, the steel blades completely severed from the handle.

Standing over them was a new man, clad in black even though the sun was high and the day was hot. His wide hat covered his face, except for two small glints of red where his eyes should have been that betrayed his bloodlust. He carried a blade so chipped it might have been used to chop at stone.

Relia knew that look, too. She grabbed the top half of her weapon, now just a wide blade with a small, half-hand handle, and pointed it at him. Despite his intervention, he didn't seem to be the eagle-woman's ally. At least she didn't have to fight two-on-one.

"You'd sneak up on a woman from behind, huh?"

"You are hardly a woman."

Relia launched herself at him with her dwarfed axe and sliced at him from strange angles. She wasn't used to this close-range fighting, but she was still effective. It carried much more force than the chipped blade of her enemy. But the chipped blade was clearly made of sturdy stuff, to have survived so many ferocious blows. It would not break from Relia's axe.

The eagle-woman rose and Relia released a groan. She didn't want to fight them both right now. Not when she didn't have her full weapon.

But the woman didn't attack her. Instead, she launched at the man. They were going to tag-team him.

But why the Hell was she helping?

The Black Phoenix Hideout

Relia lurched back to pull her axe out of the Enforcer's head. She stumbled. It would take months to get used to this ridiculous weight distribution. It would take longer to learn how to do everything with one arm. And that arm was now hanging like dead weight.

The bastard who'd taken her arm was just ten meters away, but the other Enforcers were cramming around her, trying to take advantage of her now that she was injured and bleeding. Bleeding? Is that why my head feels so dusty?

She didn't have time to worry about that. She shifted her grip low on the axe and swung it in the widest arc, slicing through two Enforcers. A third raised his shield to block, and thanks to the others who'd slowed its momentum, managed to absorb the blow.

But Relia didn't give him another moment of thought. She stepped into him and yanked the axe free, then stormed toward the bastard behind. With a ferocious bellow, she reached back and looped her axe overhead, forging trail of blood in the air, until it connected with the man's shoulder. The blade sunk in and she relished in the fear that shown in his eyes at that moment, knowing death had come for him. Then, she brought her left arm back – her stub – and drove its cauterized end into his nose, breaking it.