The barrier cracked.
A thin fracture spread across the crimson shell in a spiderweb snap—
CRRRK—
then another—
CRACK—
Elliana's descending leg didn't stop.
The moment the first crack appeared, the entire barrier shattered.
A ring of red light burst outward like a ruptured membrane—shards of energy flying off in molten streaks—
and her heel, glowing with condensed shadow-force, continued its deadly arc straight toward Ivan's skull.
Ivan's eyes widened—not with fear, but with a predator's thrill.
His hand snapped upward.
Her heel met his palm, hard enough to crater stone.
CRUUNCH—
His wrist bent.
His forearm bowed.
Bone splintered under the force, jutting through the skin in a white spike.
Ivan hissed through his teeth—yet his fingers tightened around her ankle like iron hooks.
> "Varmint you—won't."
Even as shattered bone ground beneath his skin, regeneration flooded the limb—crimson tendons weaving; bone snapping back into alignment; muscle resheathing itself in seconds.
His crimson eyes narrowed.
He flicked two fingers of his free hand toward the sphere.
The blood core pulsed—once.
The response was instantaneous.
THHRRAAAM—
Every single blood blade—every floating shard, curling crescent, and spear-length fang of crimson steel—
pivoted.
They locked onto Elliana's real form.
Ivan's voice was low, vicious, and absolute.
> "—escape."
The hallway erupted.
Hundreds of blades pierced straight through Elliana's body, converging from all sides faster than breath.
The sound was a wet, sickening SHHK-SHHK-SHHK—
a rapid-fire storm of tearing flesh and ripping shadow.
Her form jerked violently as crimson steel impaled her from every angle—
torso, ribs, stomach, spine, throat—
shredding her silhouette into ribbons of blood and black mist.
Shadow bled from the wounds in thick, vaporous trails.
Her eyes flickered once—silver narrowing—
before her body burst into a cloud of pitch-black smoke torn apart by the force of the impact.
Ivan inhaled sharply, a triumphant grin cutting across his face as he tightened his grip on her fading ankle, holding only vapor now.
> "Got you."
He raised his other hand as the blood blades twisted back toward him, seeking fresh orders.
Crimson light radiated from the sphere, pulsing like a second heart in his palm.
Ivan sneered at the fading mist.
> "Let's see you slip from this—"
The shadows above him stirred again.
Something moved.
Something silent.
Something not yet dead.
The shadows above Ivan coalesced.
Not drifting. Not forming. Already there.
A second Elliana stepped out of the darkness beside him as if she had always occupied that space—silver eyes cold, leg already raised.
Ivan didn't even turn.
He didn't have time.
Her heel slammed into the side of his skull.
CRRKK—!
His neck snapped sideways with a violent, meaty crack, his head whipped nearly a full quarter-turn before consciousness could catch up. His vision flashed white—black.
Ivan staggered, the bones in his neck bent at a sickening angle, regeneration struggling to ignite through the shock.
He didn't fall.
Because Elliana didn't give him the chance.
She twisted mid-air—spinning with lethal precision, shadow-force spiraling around her like a tightening storm—and her other leg shot out instantly.
No pause. No breath. No wasted motion.
Her heel drove into his sternum with crushing focus.
WHUUMPH—!
The impact detonated through his chest like a sledgehammer. Ribs buckled inward—crumpling like wet paper—crimson cracks spiderwebbing across his torso as the force blasted him backward.
Ivan's body tore through the corridor's stone wall—
KRAAASH—
—shattering it into a spray of rubble and dust.
He hit the floor on the other side, skidding in a ragged, bone-bent heap, blood threading from his mouth as regeneration clawed desperately at the catastrophic damage.
His neck still hung at the wrong angle. His ribcage was a caved ruin. His breath wheezed wetly.
Elliana lowered her leg with glacial calm.
No triumph. No tension. Only the cold efficiency of a predator ensuring the kill was real this time.
The shadows curled around her feet like loyal hounds.
Ivan tried to rise—fingers trembling, teeth bared.
Elliana stepped forward, and the air tightened.
Ivan rose.
Slowly.
Unsteadily.
His body jerked once as his neck twisted back into place with a nauseating series of snaps—bones grinding, cartilage popping, vertebrae sliding into alignment beneath steaming skin.
SHK-K-KT—
His head straightened. His breath steadied.
Crimson eyes locked on Elliana with a cold, murderous hatred.
He didn't speak.
He didn't roar.
He simply charged—crimson blades orbiting him like a storm, hurtling toward her with lethal intent.
But they never reached.
Because Elliana was no longer where she had been.
She moved—
No, she appeared.
One instant she stood across the hall.
The next, she was before him, silhouette unfolding from the shadow on his own chest.
A dagger of absolute darkness formed in her hand—thin, curved, and impossibly sharp.
It swung for his head in a single, merciless arc.
Ivan's gaze went wide—then dark—instinct screaming, body reacting without thought.
He dodged.
Barely.
The blade hissed past his temple like a whisper.
But the attack was never meant to stop there.
SHLNK—SHLNK—
Two streaks of black flashed.
And suddenly his arms were no longer attached to his body.
A beat of silence.
Then—
THMP—THMP—
Both severed limbs hit the stone at his feet, dark blood spraying outward in two perfect arcs.
Ivan exhaled sharply, breath hitching as the shock caught up.
Of course — here is the continuation again, clean, sharp, and perfectly matched to your established style:
---
Ivan exhaled sharply, breath hitching as the shock finally caught up—
>Dam—
—and then his entire body contracted.
Every muscle seized at once.
Not from pain.
Not from fear.
But because something hit him.
HARD.
It slammed into him with a terrifying, bone-breaking force.
WHU-THAAM—!!
The impact folded his body inward, spine bending with a brutal snap as the force detonated through him like a hammer carved from shadow. His ribs crunched audibly—crushed flat in a single instant—and his breath escaped in a choked, strangled wheeze.
Then he was launched.
Not thrown.
Not pushed.
Fired.
Like a projectile.
His body tore backward across the hall in a blur—nothing but a mangled smear of motion—
CRAAASH—
He hit the far wall with enough power to shatter the stone on contact, exploding it into a crater of pulverized marble and drifting dust. Debris rained around him in heavy chunks, the floor trembling under the force of the collision.
Ivan sagged inside the crater, chest a collapsed ruin.
Bone jutted through shredded flesh.
Blood poured in thick streams down his torso.
His vision swam, eyes flickering unfocused.
He couldn't process what hit him.
He only felt the pain — vast, crushing, absolute.
And then the dust parted.
Elliana stepped through.
Silent.
Cold.
Her leg still extended from the kick — the one that folded him like wet parchment.
Her eyes were silver steel.
Her shadow curled at her feet like something alive.
Ivan's mouth opened in a ragged gasp, horror finally catching up.