Horrus is powerful. Possibly even stronger than Peter himself. His second phase is driving me to my absolute limits, and I was certainly not holding back. The fight with Tom was like child's play compared to this. The number of times I almost died was uncountable. If it weren't for Lily and Rose supporting me, he would have flayed me alive 30 moves ago. His speed is ludicrous; even faster than me with all the spell buffs from Rose. I had learned to dodge at the last moment like what the half-naked guy taught me, only moving when the attack is coming in close, but Lily was the one who saved me numerous times by blocking the attacks from Horrus. He seemed intent on wanting me dead. Probably not happy that I'm still alive from his deadly sneak attack earlier.
Horrus swung his left hand and flamed me with his blue flames. Thankfully, I'm able to negate most of the damage with my fire resist potion, my trusty red dragonhide cloak, and Rend. But I'm certainly getting burned alive every time he uses his blue flames. My fire resist potion doesn't fully negates the heat or last forever.
Rose had been attacking him from range whenever it was clear for her. She seems to be getting the hang of using her urumi now, fumbling less with each consecutive swing. I have a feeling she might end up using urumi as her main weapon over her rapier in the future. Can't imagine what she can do when she uses Fa Jin Zhòu with urumi; it would be insane to be able to hit multiple targets with explosive effects.
Lily took point and fought at the forefront. She knew that Horrus was either not taking her seriously or intending not to kill her. He seems to be dead set on capturing Lily for his 'plans', whatever that is. Not that I'll allow him to do so.
My prediction earlier was accurate. He seems to be resistant to lightning after shrugging off a direct hit from my Lightning Strike or Lily's punches imbued with lightning. She ended up using fire spells exclusively despite being uncertain whether it helps. I used Inazuma powered with Lightning Charge and Tengu-kaze powered with fire spells from Lily despite using Focused Meditation. This state is certainly not Byakko's preference, but as I said earlier, I needed everything at my disposal to even stand a chance at fighting Horrus.
He charged at me once again, kicking Lily aside with ease. He certainly had no intention of fighting Lily whatsoever. She could only use Concentration now as her gauntlets were strangely unresponsive to her. Never knew a legendary item could malfunction like that.
He extended his bone blade in an attempt to stab me once again, but I swatted it aside with Tengu-kaze, hoping the heavy weight would throw him off balance, giving me an opportunity to counter him. But I was deeply mistaken; he easily retracted his blade and struck out once again. My training with Rose is what kept me alive thus far, doing my best to predict when my opponent retracts their blade or extends with the slightest of movements. Rose twists her rapier to the right to extend the blade while the opposite to retracts; Horrus was no different; he moves all his fingers upwards whenever he extends and downwards when he retracts. To others, it might be irrelevant to the fight, but for me, it's invaluable information for me to survive this fight.
Horrus struck out his left hand and shot flames at me like a flamethrower. I dodged to my left and charged at him, constantly keeping an eye on the direction of the flame and his right arm. Things were getting uncomfortably hot now. I don't even know which part of my body hadn't been burned thus far. He struck out his right hand. My first instinct was to dodge immediately, but his fingers barely moved. He grinned, and moments later, he moved his fingers upwards, extending the blade from his palm.
He had me, or so he thought he did. I twisted my body immediately the moment I saw his fingers twitch. He completely missed, giving me an opportunity to strike him. There are precious milliseconds where he needs to retract his blade. I threw Tengu-kaze towards my right, slamming it into his left forearm to prevent him from flaming me.
I was close to him. Close enough to smell his horrible beastly odour and the absurd heat radiating from him, but I pressed on. I resummoned Inazuma on my left hip with the scabbard and reached in front of him. I unsheathed my blade as fast as I could, my muscles screaming at the intense movements. This is probably the fastest iaijutsu I ever performed in my entire life. But the blade narrowly missed him as Horrus had already leapt backwards, far enough that my kodachi's blade only nicked his fur.
I grinned. Moments later, a diagonal wound ruptured from his bottom right side to his left armpit, along with streaks of lightning along the wounds. He grunted, expecting me to be finished with my strike, but I ain't letting up. It's called Twin K Thunderbolt for a reason. Holding Inazuma two-handed from my right shoulder, I swung diagonally downwards toward Horrus, who appeared to be bracing for my next attack when he saw me swinging. Once again, the effects occurred only after I had completed my swing. The walls of the ravine ruptured from the top first, then it trailed downwards all the way to the ground. A fresh wound appeared on Horrus, yet I did not manage to slice him apart despite the destructive power of the final swing. What are his bones made of? Adamantium?
His wounds were starting to heal, albeit not as quickly as before. Perhaps the lightning streaking along the wounds was preventing him from healing quickly.
"YOU—INSOLENT WRET—ARGH!!!!!!" he trailed off as Tengu-kaze pierced the location where I had predicted his heart might be.
"Consider this payback for the sneak attack you pulled on me," I smirked.
Horrus grabbed the hilt and attempted to rip Tengu-kaze out of his chest, but I can clearly see that he's having a hard time. He adjusted himself a couple of times as his feet were sinking into the ground. Byakko must have activated his maximum weight limit to hold him down.
I quickly checked my fingernails. They were starting to get slightly pale, but I should have enough blood to survive till the end of this fight. I'm definitely having internal bleeding from my stab wound; otherwise, the colour of my fingernail would have returned to normal by now. A quick check with my pocket watch indicated that the blood recovery potion had ended, while the fire resistance potion had a couple of minutes left. I'm running on fumes with the remaining blood in my system. If I run out, no one is able to save me this time.
Rose did not let up and continuously sliced Horrus in all sorts of manners despite him doing whatever he could to remove Tengu-kaze from his chest. Lily, on the other hand, was tapping her gauntlets to wake it up. I could only watch as Tengu-kaze was being pulled out inch by inch. Believe me, I would have gladly taken the opportunity to slice off his head or limbs if I could, but even Kirin's Thunderbolt could not cut through his bones. How're we going to win this? We will lose in a battle of attrition against him.
He has incredible healing factors and ridiculously strong bones. I hate to admit it, but are we even hurting him from all the damage he has taken? At least we knew that demons had a weakness with their brains. But what weakness do werewolves even have? Silver? Rose's rapier doesn't even do anything to him despite being made from silver meteorite. There must be some weakness to him. Everything must have a weakness, no matter what they are.
Horrus was close to pulling out Tengu-kaze from his chest and shrugging off Rose's constant barrage of attacks. I quickly resummoned it to my side, catching him off guard, and immediately Lily went in for a strike. However, despite Lily's bone-crushing punches, Horrus tanked her attacks easily. But there was one thing he was not expecting.
Lily eventually stopped punching when she realised that it wasn't doing much harm. Horrus was looking downwards at her, as though an adult taking pity on a child trying to harm them.
"So, this is what you're capable of without your gauntlets. How disappointing if you think you can harm me with something like this," mocked Horrus.
"You're right. I am not powerful without my gauntlets. I can't even achieve Higher State of Mind without it. But in spite of that, I still have some tricks up my sleeves if you think I'm purely dependent on my gauntlets," she changed her fist into a knife-style.
Her left fist was brimming with an obscene amount of flames as she used Fa Jin Zhòu on Horrus, erupting a massive explosion similar to a dozen TNTs. I wonder if that actually hurt him, but I was not about to sit back and find out. Taking advantage of the situation, I charged in close and struck him diagonally with Tengu-kaze, hoping the wounds that I had inflicted earlier had not regenerated and some continuous damage at the same location might do something.
Horrus was pushed back by our attacks. His fur was badly burned, along with a giant burned mark on his chest. But what caught my eye was a bleeding wound that seemed to be caused by Tengu-kaze. A diagonal cut wound, despite not being deep, was causing him to bleed. None of our attacks had made him bleed before; not even Twin K Thunderbolt. What changed? Is it due to Lily's Fa Jin Zhòu that hurt him enough for me to finally injure him?
"You— BASTARD! THAT POWER BELONGS TO ME!" roared Horrus.
What is he talking about? Power? It took me a while to process what he meant until I saw blue flames swirling around Tengu-kaze. W—what? Did Byakko manage to steal his power from the previous time I threw it at Horrus?
"This power—is unstable. I will need full focus to keep it going. Kirin, swap with me. Time for this bastard to have a taste of his own medicine," Byakko spoke through my mind.
Will Kirin even entertain his request? As the main host, he sort of has some authority over Byakko and usually ignores his requests.
"Go. I'll support from the side," replied Kirin.
W—what? What happened after I regained consciousness? Did these two come to an agreement after I almost died?
I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. Upon exhaling, steam seeped out of my mouth. I suppose I really am more proficient in using Bloodlust over Focused Meditation. It is so much easier for me to activate Bloodlust, but it's a risk-reward state. I'm not built like a tank, unlike John, who can take massive amounts of punishment and I'm certainly more powerful and defensive when I use Focused Meditation. That's not to say Bloodlust is not powerful, but it's not my nature to use anger when I fight. It is a delicate balance between proficiency over power for my case.
"How… is this possible? Now you're using Bloodlust? A being capable of using both Yin and Yang? I can finally see why you were chosen as a Champion. Things are certainly getting interesting now," he readied himself on all fours.
"Interesting indeed, how I'm able to make you bleed with your very own powers. I guess your 'God' didn't grant you immunity over your 'gifts'. Allow me to deliver your soul over to him directly, or her," I snickered.
"Bold of you to assume you can defeat a Vessel when you don't even know who you serve," he leered.
"Oh, I don't need to assume; I had already killed one of your kind under my thumb. And you're next," I smirked and initiated the fight.
"W—what?!" he shouted at my remarks.
I made sure to summon my spectral cloak with Rend before engaging him. This will be my last chance summoning it for today, so I need to make sure to end this fight within 30 minutes. Horrus met my blade with his own, and we exchanged blows. With unholy speed, we attacked, blocked, or countered one another. Bloodlust had always been focused on offence rather than defence, which was where Inazuma came in handy. Seemingly my arm moving by itself, Inazuma blocked most of the attacks, making full use of its weightless nature to block both of Horrus's bone blades.
"Who had you killed?! Which Vessel?!" he roared in anger.
With every passing millisecond, my skin and clothes were getting burned to a crisp. Being such close proximity with him, I knew full well that it was going to be more than just 'comfortable' fighting with him. But at the very least, I can say the same about him. He was getting burned from my blade too. Passive aura works both ways, I guess. And what I was glad to see was that any wounds caused by Tengu-kaze, he cannot heal them no matter how big or small. Finally, I found his weakness!
"Getting hot, isn't it?!" he grinned.
"I can say the same to you. Your fur isn't looking too shabby," I smirked back at him.
"Haha! It's been years since I had such heated battle. To think the three of you would actually get my blood pumping. Enough talk, let's turn up the heat!" he roared.
His blue flames rose with intensity. I'm going to end up with third-degree burns throughout my body when this is over. Or I'll become Kentucky Fried Zen or something. The price to pay for facing a Vessel of a God. But the thought of killing him and ending all the beast attacks occurring around the world, it is certainly a small sacrifice to end it.
Lily came over to my side when we broke ways during my clash with Horrus. I warned her to stay away from this battle as the heat from Horrus's flames is scorching and her red dragonhide cloak alone is not enough to deter the heat. At least I have Rend and my cloak to help me despite the effect of the fire resist potion having worn off. She slapped me lightly on my cheek and poked her index finger on my collarbone, warning me that we cannot win unless the three of us fought him together. And the idea of me dying once again is not something she wishes to experience again. Not when she still stands.
Rose leapt and landed on my right. I guess all of us are going to be scalded by the end of this.
"My body burns hotter with every passing second. Now, who will rise from the ashes? Me, or you three. Let the final battle commence!" he roared with fury and charged towards us with all four of his limbs.
"Ever heard the saying 'If you could make God bleed, people would cease to believe'? We will kill you, just as we did to Baku!" I roared as I met his charge with Lily. We cannot afford to fail when the stakes are these high; no matter the cost, we must win, even if we end up dying.