Lex and Lana wouldn't move, so Frost took the initiative. Danger was just an illusion for the weak, after all.
William Fletcher looked younger up close than when Frost had seen him earlier. His hair wasn't fully grey with some black remaining at the base, and his face only had a few deep creases. It could've been that he was in his mid forties. You would've never known it judging purely off of the grace he moved with. More interesting was his choice of weapon, which was just a simple pistol. This, from what Frost knew, was an 'inefficient' weapon against Voidhunters.
Frost raged and grabbed the few embers of the Void remaining inside of his exhausted body, summoned his blade in the same instant, and attacked.
"Disorient."
The world flipped upside down. Frost felt his body's equilibrium flip and twist. The room around him grew and shrunk and distorted like an impressionist painting. He tightened the grip on his sword in response and focused on finding the enemy. Sending Void energy out in every direction he enhanced his senses and pinpointed William in less than a second. It took everything in his power to stop himself from throwing up, but he dashed towards his foe once more, overcoming the disorientation.
Bam, bam, bam. Three gunshots flew at Frost. He batted two of them away with his unnatural reflexes and took the third shot through the shoulder. Karma, he thought. Even so, he quenched the pain with Void energy and pushed himself to the limit to carry forward, breaking through the wall of whatever illusory spell had been placed upon him and returning the world to a normal state.
William gave no reaction to this. He dodged Frost's sword swing, his back hitting the wall. He was swirling with dark energy like flames licking greedily at his clothes. His eyes, too, were glossed over with darkness and ignited with black flames. It was a strange energy that felt fundamentally different to the Void.
"Hounds," he growled.
Frost's arms exploded with sharp pain. Dogs that appeared to be constructed from pure black flames chomped into them, holding him in place with shocking strength. He howled out in agony as the fangs dug into him, leaving him completely open to an attack from the front.
William spun around and kicked out with trained precision. His boot struck Frost dead centre in the chest. He felt as one of his ribs snapped under the pressure, the rest of the force transferring directly to his body and sending him flying into a table. It broke clean in half, and he slid to a stop on the ground. His sword vanished into Void dust.
[An attribute is being activated: Perfect eye, stage two.]
Lana dodged around the dogs and threw herself forward while spinning like a top, a tornado of blade strikes in an instant that dispelled the infernal hounds and left him wide open.
He dodged backwards and started to weave his free hand in the casting sequence for another ability. Lana rushed forward and swiped at his head even though she foresaw his vanishing. Her blade sliced clean through the middle of… A firefly?
"Sleeping on the job?" William asked Lex. It seemed he'd swapped places with one of the fireflies, and was now on the opposite side of the room.
The man was still stunned from recalling the moment of his 'death', and was now completely at the mercy of William who grabbed him by the lapel and threw his weakened body out into the courtyard. Lex flipped over himself and went still on the ground, still paralyzed.
"Lex!" Lana yelled.
"Stay out of this, kid," William said. "They only paid me for him."
Lana tried to attack him again. She saw a premonition of so many different types of attacks that it overwhelmed her eye, and the next thing she knew she'd lost. William grabbed her by the throat and threw her into a pillar. It whined out in pain and the roof exploded with dust. She coughed and groaned, dropping her sword to the ground.
William raised his pistol and shot her three times in the chest. She convulsed as each bullet struck her, slumping down to the floor.
"Stupid kid," he muttered.
Lex groaned in pain watching this. He was struggling against his own mind's safety mechanisms. Run away. Run away now! He wouldn't listen. He couldn't listen. This time there'd be no coming back if he died. He'd been given his chance. No. William was wrong. His luck hadn't run out yet!
Lex got on one knee and circulated Void energy through his body. "How'd you know about this place?" He asked. "Someone tipped you off. Who was it?"
William reloaded his pistol and cocked it back as he stepped into the courtyard. "It's none of my business. I'm just the guy they send to deal with it."
"You're nothing but a Realmguard lapdog," Lex spat.
"I'm a lapdog for whoever pays. A good one, too." He raised his gun at Lex, fireflies fluttering around the barrel. "I won't miss twice."
"You didn't miss." Lex found his strength and stood up. "I died that day. I was a man then… Now I'm an idea. I'm invincible!"
"Same," a voice boiling with rage said from behind.
Lightning crackled across the ground and sparked up William's legs. An immense presence could be felt weighing down each and every combatant indiscriminately. Lana was out of the fight, and William had assumed that the other brat wouldn't be stubborn enough to get back up after that beating. Of course, he had no idea who he was dealing with.
Frost Direshard accessed the second level of his enhancement. His body protested and cried in pain as the last bits of his energy were expended. His body cracked with lightning, the edges of his eyes sparking and dancing across his cheeks. His innate element — as he'd learned on Dragonsfold — was lightning, the very embodiment of chaos and disorder.
He'd surpassed his limits with emotion alone. This was only a temporary solution. No matter how angry he got, he had to face the facts. He was already drained from training, and now he was pushing it too far. It was like working a muscle after you'd already strained it. At this rate, his whole body would shut down in less than a minute.
To some, that meant to quit.
To Frost, it meant he had a minute to finish this.
"Who exactly is this damned kid?" William asked, agitated. "You're bringing good talent into your fool's errand."
"You can't fight him, Frost. Even as you are right now," Lex warned.
Frost was already in midair. Lightning crackled and rippled across the ground beneath his feet as he moved with a massive thunderclap. He kicked so quickly that the sound of it trailed behind. William raised his arm to protect the side of his head, forearm rippling with black energy and absorbing the brunt of the strike with relative ease. They froze in that position like a statue depicting a grand battle.
William snapped his hand to Frost's ankle, holding it tight. Frost leveraged the hold and spun, kicking him in the opposite side of the head. William stumbled and caught himself on the doorway like a drunkard. There was a look of confusion in his eyes like he couldn't believe he'd been struck, and then they turned to pure anger. He'd acknowledged Frost as a threat to pay attention to.
Lex finally acted, sensing that the battle might be turning in their favour. He leapt and used his downward momentum to slam William across the face. His head snapped to the side at an unnatural angle. Frost came at him next, hitting him under the chin and clanking his jaws together. Lex followed up again with a shot to the liver. They went back and forth hitting him until Frost eventually buried his foot in the man's chest and sent him spiralling away.
William's back hit a training dummy which exploded with hay like a sliced pillow. He breathed heavily, but he didn't look to be terribly injured even after a beating like that.
"Don't let him rest," Lex said.
Frost summoned his sword back and tried to close the gap. As he did, his enhancement ran out at that precise moment. A wave of pain exploded through his whole body, convulsions of senseless pain. His eyes went blurry, and he stumbled forward like an old man with bad knees. Nonetheless he struck out at William, who swatted the sword blade away with his bare hand. Frost's legs gave out, and he fell to the ground.
Lex couldn't believe his eyes. It seemed like things were going better than expected until only a moment ago. Could it be that Frost had only managed to keep up second stage enhancement for thirty seconds? What about Clay? If that bastard got his ass up, it might actually be an even fight.
Somehow, it came down to Lex. Then again, it felt right. This was his revenge to take, after all.
"A sad show," William said to Frost, who was hyperventilating on one knee.
Frost gritted his teeth and looked William straight in the face. "Go fuck yourself–"
William raised his pistol and shot Frost straight through the forehead. The boy's eyes rolled into the back of his head and his body flopped to the ground. A pool of blood slowly started to gather beneath his head. His body let out its last few twitches of life as if struggling to hold on, and then went still.
"A waste," William noted.
"You–" Lex looked down in shame. Lana was dying against the pillar to his right, and Frost had just been killed before his very eyes. This was all his fault. He'd gotten cocky thinking that he might be able to stick it to the Realmguard. It was all the result of Lex's greed and selfish desires. They were dead because of him, and they'd died for nothing.
He'd be next.
"Sweet Eternity." He muttered to himself, finding faith in his final moments. He focused his Void energy and enhanced his body, opting this time for the second method as his emotions overflowed. When he turned his head up to William again, his eyes were bubbling with particles of water. "Eternity… Help me strike this man down!" He cried.
"Tsch." William pulled out a knife in place of his pistol and sliced his hand open. It drip drip dripped blood onto the ground around his feet. "So you've regained your wits," he said, "let's see what you've learned."