Chapter 17: Desolation

[ A/N: Had technical issues, so here's yesterday's release today. At the rate it's going, we might have today's chapter tomorrow instead also.]

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Lyra still stood, clearly down to her last leg. It was clear she was in no shape to fight any longer. She had already gone passed her limits, especially considering the strange symptoms that constantly plagued her body, weakening the young Huntress little by little.

Lyra had ignored and fought through all of the pain and numbness she felt. Yet she stood, arms hung loosely, organs damaged and bones fractured.

She glared with half-open dull eyes, her azure eyes held a lightless glint of dim shadows of cold focus.

Their expressions faltered in disbelief.

"She's still standing!"

"But it's clear she's barely conscious. Wall scums as they are, you have to give credit to this one being a true warrior, even during her final moments." 

The attackers silently all acknowledged the animalistic tenacity held by their opponent. But that didn't mean they'd let her live to tell.

"Don't, don't underestimate me..." As soon as Lyra trickled those words, a thick stream of blood poured out her mounth and pooled at her feet. The light in her eyes dimmed and Lyra's body fell forward into it.

She had passed out.

The room was still and quiet.

Until—

"Sis!"

One of the women turned her heads and expressed her surprise at the little girl that ran out for the battered Lyra.

Addy was crying with tears in her eyes. She sniffled over Lyra's body, soaked in her own blood with cold fear and uncertainty.

The attackers quickly recognized the little girl at a thorough glance and the one with an injured throat riled up and shouted.

"Hey, little girl, get away from that Devil. She's dangerous!"

Addy paid no attention to the cries of those of her Tribe, and continued to stare with trembling lips at the paling figure of Lyra

"S-sis...big sis...!" She silently called out with shaky breath and slowly reached a trembling little arm to shake her body.

She was hesitant, unsure; wouldn't Lyra feel even more hurt if she shook her? But she wasn't moving, her chest wasn't heaving? What was wrong with her? She looked hurt, she was still.

She was dead?

Addy felt cold, at the same time, the woman from before stepped forward to withdraw the little girl but then sharply stopped as a loud shriek broke from the Addy's lips in a hoarse cry.

"Big bro!! Sister Lyra... sister Lyra isn't moving! Brother Huey!!..."

And before anything could register in the minds of all those who heard—

—The Earth rocked.

A shockwave rolled over the ruined building, ripping apart the entire ceiling and roofing, what remained of it, revealing the darkness of the clouds—

And the black cracks that tore fissures in the sky.

[BANG]

There was another shockwave, one that wrecked another portion of the grey heavens.

[BANG] 

And another.

[BANG]

And another.

The earth rocked as if on the very edge of collapse. Harsh winds blew like howling cries of a cataclysmic storm, and the Earth surface rolled with oragn rupturing shockwaves as powerful bangs incessantly resounded from every possible directions.

The women felt a dreadful wind through their hair, then a shock impact that threatened to shift their joints out of place.

 One of them, the one with an injured throat halfway through healing puked blood on one knee, unable to withstand the pressure.

The other shielded her face with her hands from the debris that flew and traveled through the spreading force and shockwaves as more fissures and bangs continued to appear.

The final woman took Addy Into her safety, shielding the little girl from the flying debris and ferocious wind. 

A loud bang resounded once more, unraveling another shockwave as the woman swallowed down the blood that threatened to spill from her mouth from a ruptured organ.

"What...what is happening?!" The second lady, the only one unscathed, managed to raise her head and peered up toward the swirling dark clouds of the breaking sky.

Other than the parts of the sky fractured open by black tapestry of cracks, and the weird behavior of the swirling black clouds, she couldn't see anything.

No. Her eyes couldn't follow up with what was happening.

A great pressure from a heavy shockwave reached her at a mind boggling speed. Time seemed to slowly down for the lady at her final moments.

Yet she still couldn't see—

—the battle at the speed of sound that happened before her.

The shockwave hit, and the following second the lady exploded into guts.

Huey had merely run passed her and all of her organs imploded from the force.

If the event that happened were slowed to the physical limits of the human eye, a fierce battle raged on bringing about absolute desolation to the surroundings

"Ahahahahahahaha—ahahahahaha!! " Huey's cry travelled underneath the explosive shockwaves and spread of unadulterated destruction.

His black sword cut treacherous paths through the space at amazing speed. This held even more terrifying as a single sword swing replicated ten dozens, each with tremendous force and incomprehensible power.

He moved fast enough to course tremors and bangs in space, each point his blade met with the chained fists of his opponents, a portion of the sky fell and space literally shattered.

His opponent, the burly man was overwhelmingly pushed back all through the exchange. After their first exchange, the tables had turned, the burly man was no longer the attacker...he was set completely on the defensive.

Evasive even.

This continued for a while.

The two opponents shattered the fabric of space simply from their collisions and amazing speed. To the eyes of others outside, it was like an assaulting storm — it resembled the end of the world.

The women couldn't follow up with their eyes. They couldn't see the overwhelming battle and suffered from the mere force and shockwaves of their movements.

Each blow Huey and his opponent exchanged, released shockwaves powerful enough to tear apart mountains and gouge open new oceans.

Even the tectonic plates weren't exempt from this brutality.

The spectators watched as new land mass rose — mountains formed and crumbled, and thick bolts of purple lightning broke the sky.

Then there was thunder like the rumbling of a giant's bellow.

The exchange of blows, the impacts gouged the earth forming deep craters and building structures in the surroundings seemed to randomly explode into debris and dust.

Huey simply swung his sword with maddened fury, the ominous black blade spreading literal chaos into the air. He didn't relent so this meanst his opponent never stopped raising his wrapped fist to block or defend.

The man was already amazing enough to be capable of moving at such speed to begin with. Even the collision of his fist with Huey's swings was enough to wreck the desolate planet.

But even he was beginning to lose ground he never even had.

A single slash form Huey was like over ten dozens diabolical swings, and it only took a few more of this calamitous exchange for the burly man to realize —

Huey's sword held no pattern.

No—

—He's swordsmanship was random, only consisting of relentless swings over and over again. 

The burly man prided himself in being a warrior, that was why he could tell...his opponent wasn't taking him serious.

It wasn't as if Huey had no experience wielding a sword. He was just physically better, and in every other way and aspect, that anything he does would simply overwhelm whoever he faced.

Just like so; he had entrapped and forced his opponent in a single set of action — rise, defend and withdraw. Then repeat.

Over and over.

The man realized; Huey was never actively trying to cut him. He just dominated by forcing him in an endless loop. And there was nothing he could do about it. He was overwhelmed, his mind body and pure instinct all focused on defending and blocking the next swing of his attacker that he couldn't spare a single thought of an idea to break out of this suppressive matrix.

If he split his concentration even for half a second, then it was over.

And it was over really quickly.

After deflecting am immeasurable amount of blows, the vast disparity between their physical capabilities became clear all too quickly.

"Ku...!"

The man's shoulder joint shifted from a force of impact resulting in a swift second of respite. He couldn't raise his fist to dodge the next round of swings that came at him and faltered

The swift second lasted for what resembled a swift eternity, Huey's blood red eyes and pitch black sclera imprinted a soul-deep image into the mind of the man all through that quick moment.

The blade, with nothing to stop it in its trajectory like always, fell quickly for his head...or that was what the man thought—

"Just kidding." Huey mocked and smashed his knee into the side of the man's face.

[BANG]

Air exploded and the figure of the man hazed only to re-matiliarize a kilometer away into an abandoned building structure as the whole thing exploded and crumbled into dust.

The wind that picked up throughout the course of the whole cataclysmic battle reached a sudden stop and exploded forth at the center, unleashing one final shockwave throughout the surrounding.

The women grabbed hold to something to resist against the pressure that persisted a full two minutes.

Until finally — the incessant sounding of loud bangs reached a stop.

And once more the world seemed to still. The cracks that formed fissures in the sky and space closed, and the heavens healed within that short time.

The terrain however was forever terraformed with large hills and small sized mountain tips rising from certain parts of the land at odd angles.

Massive piles of rubbles moved and the figure of the big man emerged from within. He wasn't unscathed but wasn't at all badly injured.

Bruises and small gashes adorned his exposed torso and his mane like hair was it completely disarray.

He rose up and fit his dislocated shoulder back and spat out a mouthful of blood. His eyes caught the figure of Huey floating silently in the air above as a massive grin tore open on his face.

The next second, the massive man broke into loud, heavy laughter.

"Hahahaha! This is amazing! The best, I say! Absolutely outstanding! Hahahaha!!"

Huey silently watched from above with still motionless eyes. He stared aloofly at the loud man below, his lustrous long black hair fluttering lightly in the gentle breeze.

The big man rose his large arm and pointed up at him with a large grin.

"You! You are a strong opponent. A powerful warrior! And it is without shame that, I, Barack Barkar, Chief Warrior and Guard of Ntuli Tribe, admit to my loss and incapability of defeating you without showing you my true power!'

Huey's mask twitched only slightly as his eyes narrowed.

'True power?'

Barack had shouted this proclamation at the top of his lungs, so his words hadn't failed to reach the ears of the surviving women some distance away and their expressions shook in shock and fear.

"Chief! Is he saying he's going to do it here? — show his ancestral form to a mere Scum of the walls?!" The woman with the slit throat uttered a protest.

The man retracted his hand and nodded deeply. He had just admitted his defeat, but his grin still largened in excitement.

Then he lowered himself and took a form, reminiscent to a martial art pose. The chains wrapping around his arm and fist rattled as he crossed his arms partially over his face.

"Let me show you the true power of we who you call 'Outsiders'." He grinned larger and from a high vantage point above, Huey could spot the man's dark mane hair slowly turn white.

And then the next second, the man proclaimed.

"Bloodline Release!"

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(A/N: Did I go a bit overboard?•́⁠ ⁠ ⁠‿⁠ ⁠,⁠•̀)