Augustus Mansion Raid Part 7

Faster than the rest of the pack, two cheetahs blitz Iris at incredible speed. Following right behind those two is a lion. Disregarding the fact that it's made out of cotton, the lion roars loud enough for the whole mansion to hear. Stopping herself in her tracks, Iris kills her momentum and slices through one of the cheetahs that couldn't stop itself in time. Just as she figured, they may pack a punch, but they're easy to cut through. Overwhelming strength and physical capabilities in exchange for no defense. If these were real animals, it might have been a different story. The Lion catches up and pounces on her, Iris is able to stab through the bottom of its chin, preventing it from biting a chunk out of her. Even though it shouldn't weigh that much, it still feels as heavy as a lion would on top of someone. The stuffed animals somehow also retain their weight, this is the power of a curse. However, with her blade already through its body, she's not at a disadvantage. After a couple of seconds of struggling, she slices through it and promptly cuts down the second cheetah that lunged at her. Charging at her now are 2 bears, 2 snakes, and a gorilla. The gorilla grabs one of the snakes and launches it at her after whirling it like a whip. It's flying at her fast, but not fast enough. Iris splits it in half down the middle and pushes them instead of running away. She bounces off the wall over the gorilla and cuts off one of the bear's arms. She feels like she can win in close-quarters combat against the rest now that the cheetahs and lion are out of the picture. The gorilla is a beast on its own though, it's huge and quick. It attempts to grab Iris several times at a scary speed, but she evades them all. Pounding the floor in anger, it follows with a devasting left hook that could take anyone out if landed, but Iris uses this to her advantage. With precision, she leaps off the fist mid-swing which gives her a boost in speed midair which allows her to cut through one of the bears. The last snake wraps around her body in an attempt to strangle her, Iris leaps off the wall again, this time doing several spins that manage to untwirl the snake. As soon it falls to the floor, she stabs through its head. Now just one more bear and the gorilla are left. Chloe turns the corner riding on top of the eagle. Iris is a bit worried now, she hoped to take these 8 animals out before the female vampire caught up. She decides to remain in her position, dodging the bear trying to maul her. Chloe hops off the eagle as it picks up the human with its beak and crashes into the wall at the end of the hall. The eagle put itself out of commission with that, but it dealt a lot of damage. Iris coughs up blood. She can feel her limbs giving out and her vision going blurry. But this isn't enough to put her out of the fight, not even close. Iris yells, it could be seen as a battle cry, this was to get her mind from falling unconscious. The bear and gorilla rush her with their battle cry. With one slash each, Iris cuts them down.

"Hm.. Not bad." Chloe slowly approaches her, she's about 15 feet away.

With her curse, she can create living stuffed animals and toys, some of which have their own abilities. Iris puts her sword up and gets ready to run at her before she can create any more animals. Suddenly, the door next to her starts to creak. It's being pushed open by someone, or something. Once the door is open enough, a human-like doll reveals itself. In a second, it blows itself up.

***

Just as Kagura started overwhelming Sabeh, he wasted no time activating his curse. Kagura tries to back away because she has no idea what this vampire's curse could be. She was half a second too slow though and gets her blade snatched.

"Oh. You've got good moves to be able to disarm me."

"Hey, I'm flattered. Would you still be up for that date?"

"Sure. I'd love to stand you up."

"That might not be so bad."

Sabeh tosses her weapon to the side and hand-to-hand combat begins. Kagura is throwing out fierce hands, but the vampire is simply enjoying the show, parrying her attacks. The tables have turned, and Sabeh starts dishing out some hits of his own. The one being overwhelmed now is Kagura, she hasn't gotten hit yet, but she knows his attacks have greatly increased in force. When she seemingly gets an opening, she strikes him in the stomach. Not just stopping with one, about a dozen gatling of punches follow that deal no damage. Sabeh let all of that happen, so she backed away to figure out what his curse is.

"Your curse must grant you even more strength than you already have as a vampire."

"Yep. A monkey could figure that out. To be exact, it triples my physical capabilities. I don't like it though, it's a boring ability. I'd rather have something flashy like the Chidori."

"Sounds cool. Should I feel bad for you?"

"Nah. As much as I hate to say it, it fits me."

Meanwhile, Shinatsu was close.

Near to grasping the essence of her alter blade.

She opened her eyes to find herself in an unknown place covered in mist. Yet, she instinctively knew where she was.

Bellowing thunder was accompanied by purple lighting blasting about in the gray sky.

Ahead of her was a concentration of aura with an array of four colors: purple, black, orange, and blue.

She reached her hand out.

'Is that… my soul?'

Opening her eyes back to the real world, purple lightning begins sparking from the blade. It wraps around Shinatsu's hand, but she doesn't feel any pain. She can use the alter weapon's ability.

"Haha, you're kidding? It's only been a few minutes."

"Shit."

"You ready?"

"Let's go."

A lion's roar resounds throughout the mansion, signaling for the battle to continue.