Niklaus sat, contemplatively.
"You know, you really should eat," Sasha was saying.
Sasha had been saying that for nearly a day and a half. As of yet, Niklaus had given her no more acknowledgement than to sit even more contemplatively.
"There's a whole family of rabbits over there, and they are tasty," Sasha said, trying to spark some activity.
For her troubles, she received a contemplative lack of any activity, quite antithetical to the result she was attempting.
"Tell you what, I'll catch and cook it for you" Sasha said firmly, and played around among some of Niklaus' channels, until finding the right channel.
A new Aura burned around the listless warrior, and with the slight odor of brimstone, the entire rabbit family found themselves baked to near perfection.
To praise her culinary sense (even the hair had been harmlessly burned off) Niklaus regarded the voluptuous dinner...contemplatively.
Sasha looked (figuratively) to her contemplative host, looked back to the rabbit dinner, and back to her contemplative host. If she could have slumped down next to him, she would have.
"So what the hell's wrong?" she asked, finally.
She was awarded yet more contemplative silence.
Sasha had the desire to slap him in the back of the head. Although in all fairness, she had just as much a desire to do very succubus-like things to him before banishing him to eternal torment in the fires of Hell, but old habits die hard, after all.
For that matter, slapping him in the back of the head was somewhat impossible, even as a repast, along with any other activity.
But one had to start small, and besides Sasha was feeling more trite than lascivious.
Maybe she could convince him to slap himself in the back of the head....
The image of this scarred shiny man slapping himself vigorously in the back of the head amused her greatly, and it was Niklaus' turn to be baffled for a heartsbeat at Sasha's laughter.
However, her train of reasoning soon poured into his own consciousness, and Niklaus had to admit the image was rather diverting.
However, he was seriously attempting to remain in a contemplative frame of mind, and he quickly schooled his somewhat rebellious mouth back to order.
Sasha did not miss the quirk of his lips, however, and caught him in the act with a triumphant "hah!"
Vanquished at last, Niklaus allowed himself a dry chuckle.
"So what is wrong?" Sasha pressed.
Niklaus sighed. They still didn't trust each other, why should they share anything?
"Because," Sasha said, "we have nothing to hide from each other, and in all fairness, you're holding all the cards, really."
Niklaus doubted it.
"Okay, think for a minute, I know you can. I can babble inanely and ignite Auras, but that's really it. I can't stop you from walking into the nearest temple and having us excorcised. Hell, if I'm reading these channels correctly, I could get you there faster, but that's about it."
Niklaus considered, and saw the reasoning.
"Very well," he began, "I can't imagine you doing anything else but tempting me to damnation using various tricks and guises that I may not be able to perceive in time."
"Good," Sasha congratulated him, "at least you're wary of me. That tells me that you're aware of me and my sisters and how we use our wiles to charm all kinds of humans--regardless of sex, mind--down the wide road to Hell.
"In all honesty, though, you and I are in a slightly different position here. We can't hide anything fom each other, and I mean that in the worst way possible. You know that."
Niklaus nodded. He had awoken many times to hear some of Sasha's more...exuberant...thoughts. She had been a succubus, after all.
"Plus," Sasha went on, ignoring that particular train of thought, "Demons don't have souls. We have essences that deteriorate quickly after death. And after finding out that I survived my own death, I really have no desire to see if I can hop to another host.
"If I showed up on Hell's doorstep wearing you, I'd get what would have been my ass fried along with your ass. Hell isn't exactly forgiving--or even all that understanding you know--and I figure if there are two people to watch over my ass--and therefore yours--we might actually survive longer.
"But are you not bound by oaths of loyalty? Are the Evils not your lords and masters?"
Sasha paused. "You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours. I have no desire to see Heaven win over this worthless mudball world. I help you get the demons out of here, you help me with the angels."
Niklaus was taken aback. He hadn't considered that, when they decided to work together, it would involve betraying the side he had fought on for so long.
"I'll even let you get rid of the demons first," Sasha went on. "You can get every last one you want, even trying the Prime Evils themselves if you're particularly suicidal, and if we live through it, we'll go after Heaven."
"But why would you be willing to kill your lords before turning on Heaven?"
"Well," Sasha began, "Heaven ain't going anywhere; they have this fetish about rules, and if it isn't in the rulebook, they would sell their grandmothers before giving in. Hell, however, doesn't play by the rules, and as such neither do I."
"But, don't the Prime Evils command your reverence?"
Sasha looked at her host in complete wonderment. "You really don't know what it is you war against, do you?
"Okay, think about this: Heaven is ruled by order and rules and all sorts of little things that micromanage everyone and make life the most pathetic and boring existence ever.
"Hell, on the other hand, is ruled by complete and total chaos, no rules except simple physics, and there's some wiggle room there. No rules, no organizing principles, nothing except who's better endowed and who can use it to slap everyone else into submission. I hear Diablo one time managed to slap..." Sasha paused, "never mind.
"Anyway, the point is, there aren't any rules except don't get caught. Other than that, it's pretty open."
Niklaus thought. For a very long time.
He was having great difficulty wrapping his head around the inherent chaos that comprised Hell's very nature. And, above all, he couldn't help but think that Sasha might still be in some way deceiving him.
Yet, all her thoughts were laid bare to him, just as his thoughts were to her. Surprisingly, there was no deception.
"Well, of course there's no deception," Sasha said reprovingly, "how else could I deceive you?"
A look of incomprehension moved in, set up shop, and had just gotten married to a look of complete bafflement upon the landscape of Niklaus' face.
Sasha sighed. "Any fool can detect deceit. That's why you'll never see a succubus lie to anyone."
She interrupted Niklaus' incoming retort. "Realize mortal, that the truth is a better deceit than an outright lie. Succubi don't lie, it's true, but we rarely tell the complete truth. Our lovers don't exactly realize our origins, even after the fourth or fifth tryst. 'Course," she continued with a slight grin, "most men don't look at our backs, just our backsides. And it's amazing how to distract a mortal from the wings at our back and the horns on our heads. By the time they might suspect anything, other anatomical features are thinking. Women, too, I might add."
Niklaus was prepare a lengthy discourse in why same-sex couplings were against the teachings of Zakarum when Sasha snorted loudly. In a mental sort of way, of course.
"Honestly, out of the thousands of people who live in this world, can you honestly tell me that it's impossible for every single human to be attracted to a member of the opposite sex? I've done my fair share of gambling, and I know the odds are too high against it.
Niklaus found himself with a headache. Maybe it was because Sasha was doing a lot of thinking instead of him, and his cerebellum simply wasn't used to having two minds occupying the same grey matter.
Or it was that he had just learned a lot about the inner workings of Hell, and said grey matter was straining to understand it.
Niklaus liked to think he was intelligent, so desperately hoped it was the first reason.
"If you're so intent to help me, prove it," Niklaus said.
"You want a test of loyalty from a demon, and one who has told you she has existed entirely in circumstances that encourage only disloyalty?"
Niklaus thought. For a long time.
"Yes," he said, finally.
Sasha sighed. Damn shiny men, she thought. More brawn than brain.
"Well," she began resignedly, "you could start by jumping over that rock over there on your right. There are about twenty skeletons coming in from the east, and that rock should conceal you very nicely."
"Wait! What?! Huh?"
"Trust me," Sasha said, scanning with Niklaus' ears, "I'm a lot more saavy when it comes to this; I just know what to listen for. I figure we've got about twenty minutes before they can see us, which will give you a chance to get somewhere good and not visible."
Niklaus dove for the rock.
"Wait here a moment."
Shortly, he heard the clacking of joints and jaws as said twenty skeletons came ambling by.
They were, quite frankly, horrible. Minions who in life were so consumed by hatred that they attracted the special attention of Mephisto, the eldest Prime Evil. With fell necromancy, he raised them and welded their fell human souls to their corrupt bodies, to return them as a fleshless army upon Sanctuary.
Paladin were, primarily, trained to fight Mephisto's undead in all incarnations.
"Notice the marks on their skulls," Sasha was saying, alarmed at the thought forming in Niklaus' mind, "those markings denote them as Champions, elite among their peers. And there are about twenty of them. I'm not sure attacking them would be a good idea."
"This would be an excellent time to prove your loyalty," Niklaus idly reminded her.
"I didn't think suicide fell into that category," Sasha said sharply.
"If you trust in me, and I trust in you, we'll vanquish our foes," Niklaus returned confidently.
Sasha was very unconfident. Yet resigned to his decision, she explored his channels for a moment. Finding one, she ignited it.
The effect surprised even Niklaus. Electricity arced over his entire frame for a minute before settling in Silence. Stepping out confidently, he faced the entire crowd head on.
It was not the move of a sane mind. The skeletons might have realized this but they were so consumed by their hatred they did not so much take notice as they did charge with equal insanity.
Sasha, however, was not insane, and quickly contemplated the odds of transferring to another host.
They were less than stellar.
Niklaus, however, was unperturbed. On the contrary, he felt more power course over his frame than he ever had with Heaven's blessing.
"This'll do," he said.
He intercepted the lead skeletons at the same time. Catching the left skeleton's axe smartly on his sword, he brought in neatly to intercept the right skeleton's sword. Flicking his sword quickly, he disarmed each and parted skull from body. The now-airborne skulls found themselves flying away from combat into a tree to nestle snugly in a crook in the base.
Their vantage point allowed them to view the shiny man disarm another two and send their weapons flying towards the tree.
Then they didn't see anything at all except oblivion.
Meanwhile, Niklaus dispatched another two in quick fashion, and was moving onto the next pair when he realized they sported two weapons each.
Niklaus stepped back to consider. It gave the rest of the group time to encircle him.
He noticed a little too late.
However, he did notice, and his eye narrowed just slightly.
Sasha realized it was a wink.
It was a wink.
Niklaus was winking at the enemy?
Oh hells, he is insane.
Desperation started to creep in, and the Aura of Lightning began to fade.
"Hold!" Niklaus commanded, and there was something there that made Sasha obey. There was an unearthly confidence in his voice that commanded trust and loyalty.
The skeletons, however, heard Niklaus' odd command, and assumed it meant he would very much like them to stay back.
Upon seeing no real reason to wait, they promptly swooped in, sensing impending death.
Niklaus braced.
Silence quavered, then twitched.
Five skeletons went down.
Sasha blinked. No, she was pretty sure she blinked *after* the skeletons went down.
Wait, she thought, I can't blink, I'm dead.
Then when did those skeletons drop?
Niklaus didn't give her a chance to catch up, but drove into the next skeletons, the ones that were wielding two weapons each.
Perhaps "drove" was too weak a word. As a matter of fact, the Paladin had developed a specific form of attack derived from a senseless and reckless attack headlong into insane odds with extreme risk and minimal chance of survival.
With a knack for understatement, they called it Charge.
Indeed, Niklaus Charged directly into one of the dual-weapon skeletons. The fortified mass of ossified bone and magically reinforced joints never stood a chance.
The other magically bolstered skeleton would have afforded the shiny man a look of shock had it had any muscles left. It probably would have had a look of shock as the shiny man glanced at him with an idle look of righteous fury before swinging Silence through it's ribcage.
However, it exploded violently into a dust cloud from the sheer force of such an enchanted attack, and thus would have been unable to show any facial expression even if it had the musculature necessary for such a feat.
Niklaus tore though the few remaining skeleton Champions and suddenly found himself at the feet of a very tall, very armed demon.
Specifically, the demon bore four arms, and each ended in a taloned fist curled around wicked scimitars.
"Weak points," Niklaus demanded, caught in his lust for battle.
"Joints, 'specially the elbows and knees, watch the scimitars, they work independently," Sasha demanded back, caught in her lust for...well, anything.
The monster swooped in, and Niklaus found himself on the defensive. Indeed, the weapons worked independently, and Niklaus found himself operating largely on the defensive.
The demon bore on, it's sallow skin pulling tight to reveal a jagged smile.
Niklaus was very skilled with a sword, and although he deflected each sword with preternatural skill, occasionally a scimitar would nick in and Niklaus found himself a new wound.
Sasha became so frustrated, she couldn't see clearly. Her frustration turned into rage, and rage became BloodLust....
The Aura of Lightning that had helped Niklaus so well before disappeared to be replaced by the Aura of the Fanatic.
Niklaus struck with renewed vigor and speed, and at last the two parties were on equal terms.
However, they were only evenly matched, and Niklaus and Sasha both knew that it know came down to a matter of endurance.
And Niklaus was already sporting several wounds.
Niklaus' mind worked overtime. There had to be a catch, some clue....
"His arms are jointed the same way," Sasha realized.
Ah hah! Indeed they were, and Niklaus knew how to exploit it.
He dove through the flurry of swords, chancing the few cuts he received, and found himself to the side of the monster before it could react.
The four arms were lethal face-to-face, but when the opponent was at the side, they got in the way of each other.
Niklaus' measured cut could have been seen as an act of benevolence to allow the demon more mobility against such a vector of attack.
However, one would have to be another demon to appreciate such a gesture as anything but the next-to-last stroke.
Indeed, once Niklaus had disarmed the creature, he followed through with a vicious chop to its neck, sending the head spinning to the ground. One profuse spurt of dark blood (which unfortunately caught Niklaus) later, and it was over.
Sasha's BloodLust sated, she extinguished the Aura of the Fanatic and Niklaus sank to his knees, exhausted.
"Okay, so maybe the direct approach wasn't the best," he conceded.
"You know, you really should eat," Sasha was saying.
Sasha had been saying that for nearly a day and a half. As of yet, Niklaus had given her no more acknowledgement than to sit even more contemplatively.
"There's a whole family of rabbits over there, and they are tasty," Sasha said, trying to spark some activity.
For her troubles, she received a contemplative lack of any activity, quite antithetical to the result she was attempting.
"Tell you what, I'll catch and cook it for you" Sasha said firmly, and played around among some of Niklaus' channels, until finding the right channel.
A new Aura burned around the listless warrior, and with the slight odor of brimstone, the entire rabbit family found themselves baked to near perfection.
To praise her culinary sense (even the hair had been harmlessly burned off) Niklaus regarded the voluptuous dinner...contemplatively.
Sasha looked (figuratively) to her contemplative host, looked back to the rabbit dinner, and back to her contemplative host. If she could have slumped down next to him, she would have.
"So what the hell's wrong?" she asked, finally.
She was awarded yet more contemplative silence.
Sasha had the desire to slap him in the back of the head. Although in all fairness, she had just as much a desire to do very succubus-like things to him before banishing him to eternal torment in the fires of Hell, but old habits die hard, after all.
For that matter, slapping him in the back of the head was somewhat impossible, even as a repast, along with any other activity.
But one had to start small, and besides Sasha was feeling more trite than lascivious.
Maybe she could convince him to slap himself in the back of the head....
The image of this scarred shiny man slapping himself vigorously in the back of the head amused her greatly, and it was Niklaus' turn to be baffled for a heartsbeat at Sasha's laughter.
However, her train of reasoning soon poured into his own consciousness, and Niklaus had to admit the image was rather diverting.
However, he was seriously attempting to remain in a contemplative frame of mind, and he quickly schooled his somewhat rebellious mouth back to order.
Sasha did not miss the quirk of his lips, however, and caught him in the act with a triumphant "hah!"
Vanquished at last, Niklaus allowed himself a dry chuckle.
"So what is wrong?" Sasha pressed.
Niklaus sighed. They still didn't trust each other, why should they share anything?
"Because," Sasha said, "we have nothing to hide from each other, and in all fairness, you're holding all the cards, really."
Niklaus doubted it.
"Okay, think for a minute, I know you can. I can babble inanely and ignite Auras, but that's really it. I can't stop you from walking into the nearest temple and having us excorcised. Hell, if I'm reading these channels correctly, I could get you there faster, but that's about it."
Niklaus considered, and saw the reasoning.
"Very well," he began, "I can't imagine you doing anything else but tempting me to damnation using various tricks and guises that I may not be able to perceive in time."
"Good," Sasha congratulated him, "at least you're wary of me. That tells me that you're aware of me and my sisters and how we use our wiles to charm all kinds of humans--regardless of sex, mind--down the wide road to Hell.
"In all honesty, though, you and I are in a slightly different position here. We can't hide anything fom each other, and I mean that in the worst way possible. You know that."
Niklaus nodded. He had awoken many times to hear some of Sasha's more...exuberant...thoughts. She had been a succubus, after all.
"Plus," Sasha went on, ignoring that particular train of thought, "Demons don't have souls. We have essences that deteriorate quickly after death. And after finding out that I survived my own death, I really have no desire to see if I can hop to another host.
"If I showed up on Hell's doorstep wearing you, I'd get what would have been my ass fried along with your ass. Hell isn't exactly forgiving--or even all that understanding you know--and I figure if there are two people to watch over my ass--and therefore yours--we might actually survive longer.
"But are you not bound by oaths of loyalty? Are the Evils not your lords and masters?"
Sasha paused. "You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours. I have no desire to see Heaven win over this worthless mudball world. I help you get the demons out of here, you help me with the angels."
Niklaus was taken aback. He hadn't considered that, when they decided to work together, it would involve betraying the side he had fought on for so long.
"I'll even let you get rid of the demons first," Sasha went on. "You can get every last one you want, even trying the Prime Evils themselves if you're particularly suicidal, and if we live through it, we'll go after Heaven."
"But why would you be willing to kill your lords before turning on Heaven?"
"Well," Sasha began, "Heaven ain't going anywhere; they have this fetish about rules, and if it isn't in the rulebook, they would sell their grandmothers before giving in. Hell, however, doesn't play by the rules, and as such neither do I."
"But, don't the Prime Evils command your reverence?"
Sasha looked at her host in complete wonderment. "You really don't know what it is you war against, do you?
"Okay, think about this: Heaven is ruled by order and rules and all sorts of little things that micromanage everyone and make life the most pathetic and boring existence ever.
"Hell, on the other hand, is ruled by complete and total chaos, no rules except simple physics, and there's some wiggle room there. No rules, no organizing principles, nothing except who's better endowed and who can use it to slap everyone else into submission. I hear Diablo one time managed to slap..." Sasha paused, "never mind.
"Anyway, the point is, there aren't any rules except don't get caught. Other than that, it's pretty open."
Niklaus thought. For a very long time.
He was having great difficulty wrapping his head around the inherent chaos that comprised Hell's very nature. And, above all, he couldn't help but think that Sasha might still be in some way deceiving him.
Yet, all her thoughts were laid bare to him, just as his thoughts were to her. Surprisingly, there was no deception.
"Well, of course there's no deception," Sasha said reprovingly, "how else could I deceive you?"
A look of incomprehension moved in, set up shop, and had just gotten married to a look of complete bafflement upon the landscape of Niklaus' face.
Sasha sighed. "Any fool can detect deceit. That's why you'll never see a succubus lie to anyone."
She interrupted Niklaus' incoming retort. "Realize mortal, that the truth is a better deceit than an outright lie. Succubi don't lie, it's true, but we rarely tell the complete truth. Our lovers don't exactly realize our origins, even after the fourth or fifth tryst. 'Course," she continued with a slight grin, "most men don't look at our backs, just our backsides. And it's amazing how to distract a mortal from the wings at our back and the horns on our heads. By the time they might suspect anything, other anatomical features are thinking. Women, too, I might add."
Niklaus was prepare a lengthy discourse in why same-sex couplings were against the teachings of Zakarum when Sasha snorted loudly. In a mental sort of way, of course.
"Honestly, out of the thousands of people who live in this world, can you honestly tell me that it's impossible for every single human to be attracted to a member of the opposite sex? I've done my fair share of gambling, and I know the odds are too high against it.
Niklaus found himself with a headache. Maybe it was because Sasha was doing a lot of thinking instead of him, and his cerebellum simply wasn't used to having two minds occupying the same grey matter.
Or it was that he had just learned a lot about the inner workings of Hell, and said grey matter was straining to understand it.
Niklaus liked to think he was intelligent, so desperately hoped it was the first reason.
"If you're so intent to help me, prove it," Niklaus said.
"You want a test of loyalty from a demon, and one who has told you she has existed entirely in circumstances that encourage only disloyalty?"
Niklaus thought. For a long time.
"Yes," he said, finally.
Sasha sighed. Damn shiny men, she thought. More brawn than brain.
"Well," she began resignedly, "you could start by jumping over that rock over there on your right. There are about twenty skeletons coming in from the east, and that rock should conceal you very nicely."
"Wait! What?! Huh?"
"Trust me," Sasha said, scanning with Niklaus' ears, "I'm a lot more saavy when it comes to this; I just know what to listen for. I figure we've got about twenty minutes before they can see us, which will give you a chance to get somewhere good and not visible."
Niklaus dove for the rock.
"Wait here a moment."
Shortly, he heard the clacking of joints and jaws as said twenty skeletons came ambling by.
They were, quite frankly, horrible. Minions who in life were so consumed by hatred that they attracted the special attention of Mephisto, the eldest Prime Evil. With fell necromancy, he raised them and welded their fell human souls to their corrupt bodies, to return them as a fleshless army upon Sanctuary.
Paladin were, primarily, trained to fight Mephisto's undead in all incarnations.
"Notice the marks on their skulls," Sasha was saying, alarmed at the thought forming in Niklaus' mind, "those markings denote them as Champions, elite among their peers. And there are about twenty of them. I'm not sure attacking them would be a good idea."
"This would be an excellent time to prove your loyalty," Niklaus idly reminded her.
"I didn't think suicide fell into that category," Sasha said sharply.
"If you trust in me, and I trust in you, we'll vanquish our foes," Niklaus returned confidently.
Sasha was very unconfident. Yet resigned to his decision, she explored his channels for a moment. Finding one, she ignited it.
The effect surprised even Niklaus. Electricity arced over his entire frame for a minute before settling in Silence. Stepping out confidently, he faced the entire crowd head on.
It was not the move of a sane mind. The skeletons might have realized this but they were so consumed by their hatred they did not so much take notice as they did charge with equal insanity.
Sasha, however, was not insane, and quickly contemplated the odds of transferring to another host.
They were less than stellar.
Niklaus, however, was unperturbed. On the contrary, he felt more power course over his frame than he ever had with Heaven's blessing.
"This'll do," he said.
He intercepted the lead skeletons at the same time. Catching the left skeleton's axe smartly on his sword, he brought in neatly to intercept the right skeleton's sword. Flicking his sword quickly, he disarmed each and parted skull from body. The now-airborne skulls found themselves flying away from combat into a tree to nestle snugly in a crook in the base.
Their vantage point allowed them to view the shiny man disarm another two and send their weapons flying towards the tree.
Then they didn't see anything at all except oblivion.
Meanwhile, Niklaus dispatched another two in quick fashion, and was moving onto the next pair when he realized they sported two weapons each.
Niklaus stepped back to consider. It gave the rest of the group time to encircle him.
He noticed a little too late.
However, he did notice, and his eye narrowed just slightly.
Sasha realized it was a wink.
It was a wink.
Niklaus was winking at the enemy?
Oh hells, he is insane.
Desperation started to creep in, and the Aura of Lightning began to fade.
"Hold!" Niklaus commanded, and there was something there that made Sasha obey. There was an unearthly confidence in his voice that commanded trust and loyalty.
The skeletons, however, heard Niklaus' odd command, and assumed it meant he would very much like them to stay back.
Upon seeing no real reason to wait, they promptly swooped in, sensing impending death.
Niklaus braced.
Silence quavered, then twitched.
Five skeletons went down.
Sasha blinked. No, she was pretty sure she blinked *after* the skeletons went down.
Wait, she thought, I can't blink, I'm dead.
Then when did those skeletons drop?
Niklaus didn't give her a chance to catch up, but drove into the next skeletons, the ones that were wielding two weapons each.
Perhaps "drove" was too weak a word. As a matter of fact, the Paladin had developed a specific form of attack derived from a senseless and reckless attack headlong into insane odds with extreme risk and minimal chance of survival.
With a knack for understatement, they called it Charge.
Indeed, Niklaus Charged directly into one of the dual-weapon skeletons. The fortified mass of ossified bone and magically reinforced joints never stood a chance.
The other magically bolstered skeleton would have afforded the shiny man a look of shock had it had any muscles left. It probably would have had a look of shock as the shiny man glanced at him with an idle look of righteous fury before swinging Silence through it's ribcage.
However, it exploded violently into a dust cloud from the sheer force of such an enchanted attack, and thus would have been unable to show any facial expression even if it had the musculature necessary for such a feat.
Niklaus tore though the few remaining skeleton Champions and suddenly found himself at the feet of a very tall, very armed demon.
Specifically, the demon bore four arms, and each ended in a taloned fist curled around wicked scimitars.
"Weak points," Niklaus demanded, caught in his lust for battle.
"Joints, 'specially the elbows and knees, watch the scimitars, they work independently," Sasha demanded back, caught in her lust for...well, anything.
The monster swooped in, and Niklaus found himself on the defensive. Indeed, the weapons worked independently, and Niklaus found himself operating largely on the defensive.
The demon bore on, it's sallow skin pulling tight to reveal a jagged smile.
Niklaus was very skilled with a sword, and although he deflected each sword with preternatural skill, occasionally a scimitar would nick in and Niklaus found himself a new wound.
Sasha became so frustrated, she couldn't see clearly. Her frustration turned into rage, and rage became BloodLust....
The Aura of Lightning that had helped Niklaus so well before disappeared to be replaced by the Aura of the Fanatic.
Niklaus struck with renewed vigor and speed, and at last the two parties were on equal terms.
However, they were only evenly matched, and Niklaus and Sasha both knew that it know came down to a matter of endurance.
And Niklaus was already sporting several wounds.
Niklaus' mind worked overtime. There had to be a catch, some clue....
"His arms are jointed the same way," Sasha realized.
Ah hah! Indeed they were, and Niklaus knew how to exploit it.
He dove through the flurry of swords, chancing the few cuts he received, and found himself to the side of the monster before it could react.
The four arms were lethal face-to-face, but when the opponent was at the side, they got in the way of each other.
Niklaus' measured cut could have been seen as an act of benevolence to allow the demon more mobility against such a vector of attack.
However, one would have to be another demon to appreciate such a gesture as anything but the next-to-last stroke.
Indeed, once Niklaus had disarmed the creature, he followed through with a vicious chop to its neck, sending the head spinning to the ground. One profuse spurt of dark blood (which unfortunately caught Niklaus) later, and it was over.
Sasha's BloodLust sated, she extinguished the Aura of the Fanatic and Niklaus sank to his knees, exhausted.
"Okay, so maybe the direct approach wasn't the best," he conceded.