"You'd be insane to fight that thing alone. You know that right?" Ari's voice grew louder as she tried to get through to me but something else was calling to me.
Drawing me to meet the Storm-King, an act that he indulged after commanding his serfs to clear a path for him.
Tearing off his heavy furred coat, before its clasp hit the stone floors, he had his sword looming over me, bringing it down with earth-shattering force.
Knocking my blade away as it buried me into the dirt.
"Wake Up!"
"What? Who is that?"
"Wake Up! Now! Or you're going to die!" The voice became wrathful after hearing me struggle awake, but it did the trick.
Engaging in the battle, something caught her eyes, choosing to stand back and face the knights that tried to intervene, though I could not tell, not with every single sense faced entirely on the foe I was facing.
A clash born from a storm of swords rang throughout the throne room.
Within the depths of this battle, I found a new sensation, perhaps it was always there, the chains having locked it tight now loosened somewhat.
From out of it something spilled out…pride, passion.
Avoiding each blow, heat from its freezing steel stung against my skin.
With only three blows he could cut me down.
The louder this truth rang in my head, the deeper it pushed my mind, narrowing my focus.
First I couldn't see Ari, then all the spectators in the court, and finally, nothing.
Like a murky haze smothering me, all that was felt was a tingling beneath my flesh.
But even surrounded in this haze, his blade never touched me.
At first I tried to fight the sensation, but the longer the battle raged, the harder it became to resist.
So slowly it loosened, with each sense growing more dull.
Duller and duller and yet, every so often, I could also feel my sword drawing nearer.
Chinking against his brutish armour in the beginning, but now, even against the chilling winds that shielded the Storm-King, I was getting closer, close enough for a shave at times.
But the blue-eyed giant did not falter, swinging the ornate blade from side to side, turning the momentum of each blow into an opportunity for a sword swing from another direction, but I found myself battling the cold far more than I did his blade.
"Something is wrong…" The words slipped out to the notice of the Storm-King.
With that he raised his blade high above, before driving it into the ground.
Letting out an explosive blast that fell upon me like a stroke of lightning, blasting us apart.
Through the billowing streaks of smoke, the Storm-King rushed towards me, but his movements were never a mystery to me.
"Just how far can I see?" I silently wondered, before meeting his overwhelming attack, with our blade sliding past each other, as we returned to an exchange of blows, knowing that less than a handful would be all it took to end me.
Which is why I couldn't even risk one.
Stepping closer each time, no thought came to mind about the spells or skills that could be used, the techniques that could save me or those that were the most opportune.
Instead, the only thing I wanted was to keep the fight going.
Pushing myself as hard as I could, the void that had swallowed all sensation, from its depths, something seeped out.
Something that I could grasp, something that felt both strange yet familiar.
Through the darkness, the world turned grey, the definitive features of the world around me fell away while the figures all gained a hue around them.
The giant whose attacks beared down on me had a sapphire blue light giving it shape, being the most detailed, from his centre, a length of cyan light extended past him to reach me, with the air around it feeling heavy and firm, like something that would push all things out of its way.
Stepping away from the cyan light came with a thunderous rush of wind.
Each time the cyan light drew close, I stepped out of its way.
The light never moved faster than I could avoid, but still carried a sense of dread each time it came closer.
Then the grey that covered the world receded, bringing back into a world of sensations, and the first sight to greet me after my mind was hit with the sudden shift was the appearance of the Storm-King, ready to land a decisive blow.
Raising his sword aloft before its strength crashed atop me, a remainder of my encounter with Ari on the 5th floor flashed in my mind.
"There's no way I can block that" I whispered to myself as my body reacted in kind with me raising my own sword, faster that Hriþ could react, my smaller blade met his colossal one, striking it before it could cleave me in two.
His sword that was longer than I was tall, shook and clanged, sliding over the edge of my sword and burying itself into the stone floor beside me, cracking the surface, with the force ripping through the nearby pillars.
With the brief moment Ari had to ward off the persistent knights, the shockwave that rippled through the room caught her attention, and once again she saw it.
Her eyes were wider than she was even aware of the sight, the stance I took, and the clash between us.
"A Parry!" She murmured, her wandering mind was brought back after she felt one of the knights grazed her arm with his sword, leaping from her blindside, with another attempt, this time to claim her head.
She kicked him away and into the air, from which she let out a screen of prevalent darkness that fell upon, covering the room in confusion as they tried to search for her.
"Vorpal Strike" skill was used by her.
When the screams and death cries of their companions drew closer, the knights desperately tried to aid their fellow knights, only for the glowing glint of violet steel to pierce the darkness, ending them.
But her attention quickly moved to the storm of swords swirling in the centre of the room.
Dashing past the onlookers in confusion after the Storm-King destructive attack, Ari tried to drive her knife into them.
After deflecting Hriþ 's blade, you would think that having disarmed him would be the perfect time to land the critical blow, I know I did, but something else was running through me,
An instinct that shuddered through me, though it wasn't to flee, rather to keep on going, to cast away any doubt, and hesitation. So I swung my sword from my side,
And true to it, Hriþ made his move.
Gripping his buried blade by its handle and snapping a frozen shard of steel from it with one hand while the other held on the remnants of the sword.
Armed in both hands, he reacted to my attack, only for a cloud of darkness to flow around us, blinding it long enough for me to run him through him with my sword, carving up his arm, while something else seemed to do the same as with his other arm.
Throwing the giant back, he tried to support himself but couldn't stand as his wounds spurted out blood.
While he struggled, the veil of darkness subsided, with the outline of the figure that joined me in the attack becoming more clear.
"That is you, right, Ari?"
"..." Though her response was only filled with silence.
Her lips were moving but I could not tell what she was saying.
With what looked like her expression of panic about her as she shook me to get a response, as she pointed to the wounded giant, now with attendants at his side, carrying stone boxes all etched with strange markings that resembled runes.
"I mouthed the words to let her know that I understood, but she still decided to act. Despite how lithe her form was, her strength was undeniable even without a weapon, as she threw a punch at me."
"Why did you dodge that, you idiot!"
"I didn't think you'd hit me that hard" I said after wincing from the hit, with a noticeable drop from my HP.
I asked again to stop before she accidentally killed me.
"Oh whatever. At least you're acting right again. What was going on, you ignored me the moment you started fighting that giant."
But as she said this, my mind wandered over to the giant.
"Hang on, for a second…it isn't over…"
"It would seem that 'King' confidence was well founded. He has not sent mice into my court. Haha, now he knew what he was doing." With some struggle he was able to lean over, with the attendants rushing to use all their strength to open the stone boxes.
Despite their impressive frames, it took great strain for them to do so.
Raising his arms and placing them in their hold which were carvings made into the floor around him.
The attendants began to bleed onto them before quickly filling them with his blood.
Whatever was happening, it had to be bad.
Something that even Ari could see, pulling out her knives before rushing ahead. So did I.
Darting past his attendants to finally end the battle, when a sudden crackle followed by a loud boom shook the throne room.
"Tools of ceremony are not meant for dealing death. No, only the arms of war." The Storm-King's words carried the raw intention of the thunder itself as we reached him with our blades, a sudden bolt of lightning ripped through the ceiling and rained upon us all.
"No, there are no mice, not at all. For I am beset upon by wolves." Clashing against my sword with a thunderous shockwave, the arcs of blue and white gave way to his fist, bound in armour of ice and silver, the blow fell upon me.
With little that was possible beside driving my sword true.
What felt like a second of wave of force tore through my body as we slipped past each other from our clash, the wave spread through the court.
Once the dust had settled, the room that had hosted curious nobles was now a court drenched in blood painting the very walls.
Before we could respond, Hriþ had already made it out for me.
Now, his gigantic frame embodied a bolt of lightning, with flashes of white and blue bursting out from each swing of his sword, he moved with an erratic frenzy through the room.
With Ari trying to disrupt the giant's attack with a use of her smoke cloud skill instead of diving deeper into the shadowy mass to attack Hriþ, she instead moved about the room, disabling the remaining occupied and distracted knights, blow after blow, the sound of sparking iron lit up the darkened sections of the throne room.
"And now the wolves try to claw out my eyes." The hefty voice of the giant echoed through the room, before the freezing storm manifested once more within the darkness that flowed outwards, when an explosion of light went off.
In its wake, the icy marble floors were now scorched and marred with soot, with the veil of darkness blown away, while Ari drove her blade into the nearby knight, too distracted by their attempt to weather the blast.
Her attack was cut short by a blow from Hriþ , slashing through her last minute attempt to deflect the blade away, only to be driven through several pillars.
"But what are the beasts, without their fangs…" Rushing me soon after before sending another armoured punch at me.
In a similar moment of haste and panic, I brought up my blade just as Ari did, only for the blow to completely disarm me as his punch made contact.
"You were amusing, but you have made a mess of my court. I will slay you now, and hang your pelts on my walls."
'He's fairly talkative for a monster.' A joke that I couldn't hold in, perhaps it was an attempt to ease myself with the idea of my own mortality
The giant would end us soon, that much I could feel in my bones. And yet, again continued to smile, with a mouth of blood, and a hand cusping what I hoped wasn't broken ribs.
He was a new challenge, something the Messenger no doubt was aware of, and yet he puts the prospect of any hope I have beyond his blade.
"Beyond his blade?" I thought about that statement, reminding of that grayscale world I had occupied, and everything that came before it.
For a moment I felt like an idiot, but a moment to think my next decision through before I did something rash again.
"I cannot fight him as a mere monster." I had experience fighting monsters wielding weapons, they were always the ones that gave me the most trouble from what I experienced.
Perhaps, the problem was treating them all the same.
I looked upon the Storm-King, a living bolt of thunder and lightning, wielding a blade carved from the clearest ice, He was more of a warrior than any sort of monster.
"Then let me face a warrior in battle"
"Equipped. Ghoststeel Longsword: A+ Rank"
"Equipped. Ring of Ash and Blood: A Rank"
"Equipped. Duellican Razor: A Rank"