Before the clash, I wonder how we might look to the common man: two figures, one enveloped in murderous crimson, the other cloaked in verdant green, both shooting toward each other like meteors, power coalescing in our palms, lightning streaking in our wake and scorching the earth we traverse over.

  Rather than directly clash, I pull taut Meteorfang’s middle links and bring them up for a block. When Souta makes a downward swing at me, upon impact, his lightning flows through his katana, clashing against the red lightning of my kusarigama. CLANG!!! We are suspended midair for a moment as the fury of our clash breathes out beyond us, lightning webbing and spitting outward to blacken the fields.

  His katana scrapes with sparking resistance against the chain. But there’s a reason I pulled it up—that’s because all forward momentum, when suddenly halted, now turns back. And the other ends of the chain—both ball and kunai—strike out forward and wrap back ‘round towards Souta’s head.

  He notices just before they hit. Abandons his struggle. Kicks off from my chest to flee to the ground. But not before the kunai slices off a strand of his hair.

  I pursue, diving, whipping Meteorfang at him with calculated violence. He desperately parries the chain as we fall, the clang of steel on steel harmonizing loudly with the incessant sizzles of lightning.

  He’s young. No older than fifteen maybe. Yet there’s a determined and frantic necessity to each movement—an eagerness mixed with nervous intent. I can tell by his style that he’s well trained—just not experienced. I’m the opposite.

  But I’m also older, stronger, faster, and I carry more hate in my heart. So I will win.

  When the ground nears, Souta strikes at it with lightning while fending off my diagonal lashes. I find that move strange at first. But then, the grass grows to follow the branching green of his bolt, and it welcomes him in a soft embrace, halting his fall.

  What in the hells? His lightning has the power of nature? Is that even possible?

  I shake my head. Why think about that? No point. Just adapt and kill him.

  Surprisingly, rather than use his momentary grounding to strike up at me, Souta flees. He skips with lightning directly into the oncoming plagued.

  I grit my teeth and hit the ground—imbuing my legs with lightning to take the fall. I sprint after the boy.

  He disappears into the thronging mass of rot and death as they climb over each other, rolling like a single interlocked mass, stampeding in chorus.

  I have no time for this.

  I splay my hand out, charge up a large bolt, and fire it off. It streaks without the Aether outlining—I don’t need precision here, I need chaos. And chaos is what I get. The lightning blasts into the horde, exploding body parts into the sky, raining ash and blood and guts and worms.

  It helps that the blast chains along the interlinking limbs of the plagued, so even those infected on the fray of it are now stunned. It gives me leeway to drive past that initial mass and wheel on Souta.

  He throws a cursory bolt back at me, but it's small—almost like an afterthought. I take it head on, infusing lightning into my front to war against it. His bolt fizzles out.

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  However, he disappears once more as the plagued surround me now. He’s confident that they won’t attack him, which means that Thraevirula is probably in full control of them. Or at least, most of them. I spot some adults making limp swipes at his blurring form, yet their attention is mostly focused on killing me. The children don’t bother though—those ones are probably easier for Thrae to control.

  I have to fend the plagued off once more while simultaneously keeping an eye out for the shogun. That proves to be a hard task: I make mistakes. One plagued swipes at my leg and scores a bloody gash along the calf. Another gets close enough for a worm to burrow into my skin—I burn it out from the inside with lightning, but the pain lingers.

  Finally, a flash of green catches my eye in the sea of black. From my flank, Souta dashes, slashing quickly at my side. I raise the chain just in time to block his passing blow, but his lightning scorches on my hip and makes me stumble straight into three plagued who draw me in with spidery limbs. They mount on top of me and begin to rip. I scream out as their mandibles pinch and tear into my arm—wildly, I explode lightning from my body. The cuts they made are shallow, but any damage isn’t worth it. I can’t over-rely on my regeneration

  I vanquish the infected on top of me with my lightning, only to spot the green of Souta’s incoming attack.

  I dodge again, running my back into more plagued, spinning, whipping, blocking, kicking. It's too much. I can’t deal with all of them and Souta at the same time. He’s playing it smart too—hiding among their masses and striking only when I’m most distracted.

  The paradigm must shift. He can wear me down like this. I can’t afford to wait—even if Aether and Meteorfang have extended my time using angel dust, I still only have two amulets left, and there’s no telling how many he has.

  Create distance.

  I spin the kusarigama around me in a deathly circle of crimson, killing all who enter it. The whirlwind of red gives me some space to watch for the green. And the green comes from above—as I expected, for it is the only opening I left.

  He took the bait.

  I look up and meet Souta with my leap. I abandon the kusarigama to its spin, merely leylining its center with a single Aether thread extending from wrist. Yet that thread is long and it doesn’t hinder me as I reach up to a surprised Souta and bat away the flat of his outstretched katana. At the same time, I put my other hand to his chest and pump lightning through it.

  He goes flying with a streak of maroon.

  I pull on the Aether thread, bringing Meteorfang back into my grasp, before hunting after him. I need to keep him in the air.

  He coughs and spins to recover, making his body small by coiling up and trying to find his place amongst the horde once more.

  Only, something else bursts from the ground.

  Umbrahorn.

  The hammerhead arcs up and whips his tail into Souta’s back, sending him directly at me.

  I punch my arm out and Meteorfang obliges, wrapping around the boy shogun’s catapulting body.

  Saegor. Make your move already.

  As if on cue, I hear the steady rumbling of a charge. I risk a glance to see a great mass of particolored elemental spirits emerging from the briars at the right flank of the Sorayvladian army. They charge with thunderous effect and it feels as though the entire valley is shaking with the great baritones of war.

  I know I’m supposed to keep the plagued busy, but now that Saegor has at least initiated his attack, hopefully he and Kiren have something planned for both the whales and the plagued.

  Besides, what other choice do I have? On the ground, I’ll lose. But in the sky? I own the sky.

  So I whip Souta around and send him up to the clouds, following after him, trails of green and red now climbing into the heavens themselves, all while the ocean of hell yearns below and from its center forms a tower of rotting bodies reaching high, climbing, and hungering for the soul of one rebellious slave.