Fragments of Ash Vol. 1 (Urban Fantasy)

Chapter Nine: Ava vs Malphas

It was a cold night. The grotty alley at the back of the bar stunk of all sorts of garbage and the tension in the air did little to distract from it. Smoke billowed from the grates on the sides of the street and the moon barely managed to slice through the tall buildings that stood on either side. The entire bar had managed to pour out into the street to watch the fight, the ruckus they were creating however, was drowned out by the intense focus Ada had on her opponent. Or at least, the amount of focus she could muster with alcohol playing with the blood rushing through her body.

Ada took a wide stance and clenched her fists. Start off with physical attacks, and then finish with lightning, that should be enough to take him out. A massive target like that shouldn't be too difficult to hit. She could taste that bounty money.

"So when do we start?" she shouted, she was getting restless, she could see him standing on the other end of the alleyway, waiting.

"Just wait," Malphas said as he drew his massive broadsword. It must have been custom made, no human would have been able to wield something so monstrous. He was silent for a moment, Ada wondered, was he actually taking this fight seriously? She had assumed that he'd underestimate her, most people did, what with her size and age; but perhaps he knew more about her than she thought. Malphas grabbed a random glass bottle from the ground with his large, disgusting hand.

"What are you doing?"

"When the glass shatters. We start. Keep your eye on it," he threw the glass into the air.

The air was thick with tension; all the spectators kept their eyes on the bottle as it slowly spun around in the air, and then sunk towards the earth. Ada and Malphas maintained their stance, they stared each other down and waited to hear the sound of glass shattering.

And then it did.

Before the glittering shards could even settle on the ground, the two zoomed towards each other at lightning speed. Ada was shocked at Malphas' swiftness, but regardless of how fast he was, her speed rune made her faster. As he lunged his sword at her, she ducked on reaction and threw her fist into his jaw, the increased force created by her strength rune almost toppled him over. She was shocked that she managed to get the first strike, and in that moment of blind glory she missed the fact that he had already regained his composure. He delivered a thunderous headbutt to her skull and sent her crashing to the floor. As she lay on the shattered concrete, he approached her, his sword still drawn. The image of a violent and fearsome person standing above her wasn't an uncommon one, it was something she had seen throughout her whole life, always trodden down upon by someone or another, she had thought mastering the most powerful art in the world would have helped her, but this beast was strong. All the emotions from her youth: fear, despair, grief, they were starting to leak back in. Malphas was powerful. Resilient. She had made a terrible mistake.

Malphas drew his sword and thrust it through the air aiming to cleave the fallen mage in two, to his surprise, she managed to catch the blade in both hands. Ada grit her teeth and scowled, she wasn't going to give up. She screamed and generated an electric charge through the sword that sent a spark through the metal and burned Malphas' hands. He dropped the sword and growled. Ada got back on her feet and consequently dashed forwards and socked Malphas in the face as he tried to recover from his burning hands. The Hunter responded with knee to the stomach. Again and again and again. The two exchanged blows. Neither one worked on their defence at all; Malphas' armour stood strong and Ada's shield spell was doing a stellar job keeping her in the fight. But Ada's lack of hand to hand combat proficiency was starting to show. Malphas was starting to get more shots in, the shield spell was starting to lose its potency because of how much he had pounded on her; she was starting to feel the damage.