Augustus Mansion Raid Part 8

"Oh shit… I might be in trouble."

Purple lightning overtakes the surrounding area, even Kagura has to back up. This is Shinatsu's first time tapping into the power of an alter weapon, also setting a new record for it. Naturally, it's still extremely difficult to control. Sabeh makes a futile attempt to escape its range, as a blast of lightning running up the floor captures him.

Purple lightning differs from its normal counterpart in the fact that it saps the energy from those it touches, fatiguing them. The surge on Sabeh only lasted 3 seconds before Shinatsu fell to one knee from exhaustion.

'Did that one attack drain me this much?!'

However, this isn't a one-on-one. Kagura is there to follow up. Sabeh's body has been left feeling heavy after that attack. Thanks to his curse though, he's able to exert enough strength to jump all the way up to the ceiling grabbing onto a chandelier, evading Kagura's attack.

"Aaaaahhhhhhhhh… HAAA!"

Shinatsu somehow pushed another attack out, even more violent than the last pointed right at the vampire dangling in the air. It would seem this attack would be impossible to dodge, but he uses the chandelier to swing up and kick off the ceiling at great speed just barely escaping the range of the lightning. This attack takes even more out of Shinatsu and causes her to fall on both knees this time. Sabeh's trajectory was going straight to the girl who wouldn't be able to move for the next few seconds. Not missing a beat, Kagura is there to protect her and lands a slash. Not just one, but a relentless charge of slashes ensue. Sabeh can't dodge all of them, Kagura lands hit after hit after hit, all deeper than the last.

Shinatsu gets up and tries to blast off another attack since she can't control the output. Not to her surprise, she's unable to. It appears two of those large attacks is her limit right now. It's a miracle she was even able to get off one at all. She's not out of the fight yet though, and goes to backup Kagura.

"I think we're close to the time limit Shoyo gave us, he should be coming in any minute now."

"Huh? The strongest Hunter is gonna be here. I've enjoyed my time with you lovely ladies, but I'm afraid this is where we part ways. Adieu!"

"Oi! You're not going anywhere!"

***

Iris appeared to be caught up in an explosion. Chloe assumes that she died in it, but she's waiting for the smoke to clear. She had set up dolls across the entire mansion beforehand. In a split second, Iris comes dashing out of the smoke. Even though she hadn't dropped her guard yet, she still couldn't react in time and got sliced clean in half horizontally. Iris with her exceptional reaction time was able to jump back far enough to avoid getting scorched. She couldn't totally avoid the explosion though and came out with burn marks down the left side of her face and body as a result, including on her eye. Taking a look at the vampire's body, Iris sees cotton coming out of the open parts with her body suddenly looking like a doll. This is a doppelganger, Chloe herself was never fighting. The real one was lying in a room playing with her dolls this entire time.

"Tch." The vampire clicks her tongue as she stops gleefully swinging her legs. She didn't think she's actually have to fight. Chloe gets off her bed with a sour look getting ready to fight for real. Iris on the other hand doesn't waste a second going back to Diego.

What she sees when she gets back to the grand foyer isn't what she was expecting.

'Th-These two are actually dancing.'

Drenched in sweat, the two have been busting moves nonstop. They get even wilder by the second.

"Fantastic! You're great kid!"

"Ha. You're not too bad yourself."

"I'm cranking it up a notch. Let's see if you can keep up."

Inyaki's dance moves get more flashy and dynamic. But Diego isn't going to let this vampire outshine him. Building up so much sweat that he starts to feel hot, Diego strips all of his clothes off while still busting moves. Iris quickly covers her eyes, but jumps in pain from moving her left arm too fast.

"YES! DON'T STOP NOW BOY! YOU MIGHT BE MY BEST OPPONENT YET!"

Diego is so locked in he doesn't say anything anymore. They're both dancing so hard, it's as if they're invoking impact frames. At the same time, the two throw out their final move.

"Huff… Huff… Huff…"

They take a few seconds to catch their breath. Inyaki walks up to the naked Diego and offers a manly handshake.

"That was damn good. Let's call this a draw."

"Heh. Fine by me."

The human and vampire shake hands after having the most intense dance-off of the century. Iris looks on in disbelief.

'What did I just witness?'