Chapter 31: Blood Feud
Kratos and Caladrius walked past the twins and dashed forwards to the Deadmen. Kratos wore a twisted smile as he dodged a series of knifes from Haru's wing before Senji swung his Crow Claw in an attempt to decapitate the man. Kratos countered by swinging a crimson greatsword just as big as he was down at Senji locking blades with the slightly larger man. Haru then took flight and threw down knifes with both of his wings. They all hit their target making the Prime Deadmans back into a pin cushion but he didn't seem to car as he pushed Senji back. Then one of the Deadmen, Hornbill if Haru was remembering right, ran around to flank Kratos. He formed an axe-blade at his hand and drove it right into the blood-sword wielding mans shoulder embedding itself down into his chest. Hornbill could have sworn a blow like that would kill anyone but for some reason as Kratos turned he just looked pissed. A hand grabbed Hornbills face lifting him up while still suffering what should have been a fatal wound and simultaneously overpowering Senji. Even though his vision was partially obstructed by the hand he could hear his taunt with no problem.
"Coward." Kratos then closed his hand crushing the front of his opponents skull killing him instantly. As the blood axe-blade fell into a puddle Haru screamed out at the loss of life.
"NO!" He then dove down in an attempt to finish what his comrade had started and cut the man down. As he swooped past the murder his wing was caught on a massive amount of blood arms causing him to come to a very sudden stop. Haru felt helpless as he was being pulled closer to the seemingly immortal man who's shoulder was starting to glow and close the wound he had received. Maybe it was just the whiplash having some sort of effect on him but Haru couldn't recall his wing or even shoot his knifes at the man who now had his free arm holding a dagger out to pull Haru into face first. Seeing that his opponent was distracted Senji moved to the side and in the blink of an eye deactivated his Crow Claw getting free of the bladelock. He then placed his palm over his closed fist and channeled as much blood as he could into the small pocket of air between his hands. With a deadly grin he yelled out.
"Invisible Black!" With a shockwave that threw Haru back Senji hit Kratos with a series of strikes which as the name suggested were invisible to the naked eye. Kratos felt his chest getting cut apart but did nothing to stop the blows that eventually cut away at the majority of flesh leaving only the tattered remains of bone as well as a few organs. But Kratos still didn't seem to care. After all his heart was mostly untouched.
"Not bad, but I was expecting more." With and open palm strike Senji was knocked back but landed on his feet. The Prime Deadmans wounds once again started to glow but now it was a little clearer what exactly was happening. First his blood moved forming the shape of whatever it was replacing, then it solidified before slowly morphing into said part. Senji and Haru shared a look and with no real plan decided to see if the same tactic would work better the second time around.
Caladrius jumped much further into the air then should have been possible and shot a tendril right through Hunters shoulder. She then pulled herself down at blinding speeds at the older teen. In her free hand she formed what looked to be some kind of demonic pitchfork with a jagged spearhead in the middle and two sickle like blades at the sides. Before Hunter had the chance to channel his blood electricity through the tendril it was severed and the thirteen year old was being held in place by Minatsuki's whips restraining the girl before a few more whips started slashing away at the girl. Hunter looked to his savior in absolute shock. He couldn't believe this was the same psychotic girl who got off to treating her brother like some sort of stress ball. Then again he wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth.
"Thanks." It felt weird even thanking the short haired woman but he didn't have much time to contemplate this as twisted blades sprung out from Caladrius's wounds before the young girl started to spin cutting herself free and landing on her feet in front of the two.
"You can thank me if we aren't dead in ten minutes." Caladrius gave a sweet smile that was nowhere near as convincing as when Minatsuki did it before running at the duo. Hunter shot a bolt at her but she seemingly blinked to the side and kept running. Minatsuki threw a few supersonic strikes at her but none of them hit their marks as she kept blinking just out of the way until she got close enough to throw a blade covered punch that Hunter just barely missed the brunt of. His arm was still cut open by a few of the blades but that was how Caladrius learned about the defensive capabilities of Hunters blood. All of the young teens nerves spasmed painfully as the blood moved around her body burning and shocking her. Minatsuki used this opportunity to deal some damage and with a single whip moving faster than even Caladrius could see took the girls legs off. Just then Hunters electricity wore off and re reached out to grab the leg only for a bowling ball sized ball of blood to slam down onto her hand before flying into her face sending her onto her back. Hunter was caught off guard by this but Minatsuki just rolled her eyes. "Took you long enough to jump in." Vulture then stepped in between the two before recalling her ball to float around her.
"Well I know just how much you love to play. It would have been rude to jump in earlier." As she said this Caladrius reattached her left leg and was going for the right one Hunter stopped this by firing another bolt at the girl making her kick off the ground awkwardly and forming a blood replacement in mid air. As the young teen landed she glared at the three and crossed her arms.
"You know it's not fun when the other people won't even give you a chance!" Minatsuki was about to throw out whatever insult she could think of on the fly before she noticed the girl getting ready to lounge at the group. The short haired girl started slashing away at her opponent again but only realized that was what she wanted after even more blades sprouted from her skin. She then jumped right for Vulture who sent the ball right through Caladrius's gut only to have this attack ignored almost entirely as a large spike formed from the gaping hole in the young Prime Deadman's gut. Hunter couldn't react in time as Vulture was tackled onto the ground so powerfully that she slid a few feet back. The woman tried her best to pry the smaller girl off but this only made her wounds worse as several important arteries were sliced open in the struggle. Then Caladrius went in for a bear hug wrapping her blade covered arms around Vultures neck cutting open her neck down to the spine.
Rin, Ganta, Chaplin, Idaki, and three of the remaining Deadmen worked to keep the forgeries at bay. Rin had set up a spike barrier that would fire at any forgery that got to close while one Deadman, Buzzard used his branch, a ten foot tall spectral projection of himself to keep the blood snakes from landing a hit on any of the Deadmen. Ganta and Chaplin fired their branches at the Forgeries while the two fastest kept them from sneaking up on anyone. Sparrow dodged and weaved around one of the Forgeries keeping just far enough to get out of the way when a snake was sent for her. She was the first of the six to die. She had gotten cocky and had ran in to slowly while trying to land a hit with her drill. Stork, another of the runners went next. He hadn't gone out do to simple bad luck however, they had surrounded him and bitten him all over at the same time resulting in instant swelling up. Then one of the masked creatures jumped on him causing him to explode.
"Damn this isn't good!" Ganta yelled firing a shot that was dodged by a spinning Forgery who then dashed forward only to end up impaled on a jagged spike.
"Relax kid as long as me and Buzzard are alive they aren't gonna touch you." Rin looked away from the impaled Forgery for a split second but it was long enough for it to send a snake to bite her hand. Idaki lit it on fire in retaliation but it still pushed itself off of the spike and attempted to jump over them. It was ash before it even made it to the other side. Rin's fingers started to swell and she began to panic. Without any warning Chaplin sent her branch into her wrist before the spiky ball expanded taking her hand off. Rin fell down screaming and holding her stump to her chest as her entire barrier fell into a puddle leaving them in a much worse position. Chaplin was at her side before she had finished her first scream and was holding her still.
"Im sorry, there was no other way! Old man get over her you need to cauterize this!" Idaki joined the pair on the ground before getting to work burning the wound in an attempt to close it. Ganta and Stork worked to keep the Forgeries at bay while the others kept Rin from bleeding out shooting at and swatting the Forgeries away respectively. But even so the masked mad men were getting closer.
"Shit what do we do?" Unbeknownst to Stork a Forgery had snuck up behind him and sent it's snake to bite him in the shoulder. In retaliation he used his blood projection to rip his killer in half. Thinking quickly he ran out to the other Forgeries getting their attention and doing his best to keep them busy for as long as he could. He didn't last very long but what little time he bought made all the difference when Mockingbird dropped from the ceiling.
Jason wasted to time after giving his order taking a step before stomping down at Alex's head. Alex rolled out of the way just in time and swung his leg in an attempt to kick his brothers legs out from under him. The hit landed but Jason didn't budge. Feeling a hand clamp down on his shin he tried to prepare for that to be crushed as well. Thankfully for the older twin that didn't happen, instead he was flung even further away from his allies landing on his dislocated shoulder before sliding into the reinforced glass. Alex pushed himself up as Jason started to stride over. Gritting his teeth Alex covered both of his arms with blood, from his clawed hand to his exoskeleton like armor. Alex shot his claws at Jason who simply took the hit getting impaled in the shoulder, chest, and arm. Rather than recoil in pain like a normal person however Jason grabbed the extended fingers and pulled them to him. Alex was once again off of his feet as he flew face first into a backhand from his little brother. Alex hadn't even been down for a second when the voice screamed at him.
"Don't just take it, fight back!" Placing his hands next to his head and pulling his legs up Alex kicked up off of the ground narrowly missing Jason before landing. The older brother swung his claw at his twins head but the younger ducked and delivered a rib cracking jab to his side before moving his head up at a speed that could best be described as neck breaking right into Alex's jaw. Alex was forced back by this but not being the type to give in because of something like a few broken bones Alex jumped right back in throwing a blood enhanced strike right at his brothers sternum. But being the faster of the two, Jason raised his arms to block the blow. And then Alex just kept hitting punch after punch connected with arms the arms of Jason who just waited for his brother to tire himself out. While Jason was waiting for an opening however Alex had already created one and with his unfractured arm stabbed his full hand into Jason's gut. Alex realized this backfired when he felt his arm get forcibly pulled into the air and saw his twin pulling back his own armored fist. The strike wasn't the fastest but it more than made up for that in power shattering Alex's armor and breaking both bones in his arm. Alex let out a blood curdling scream as he fell to his knees holding the now useless limb. Jason watched for a moment before looking back to the battle he could see that four of the Deadmen were dead and another incapacitated. This annoyed him as they should have all been very dead by this point, well all except for Hunter and Ganta but they knew that.
"You know who to spare now stop playing around and kill the rest!" He turned back to see Alex standing and looking livid. His broken arm was now his claw and his other the blade. He probably didn't even know it but his eyes had gone from their violet shade to pure crimson. He was getting stronger, it was time to get serious.
As Haru sprout his wings once again Kratos held out his hand. Senji prepared to unleash another Invisible Black when he saw something coming towards him at high speeds, reflexively he swung hitting two blood knives thrown by Haru. The third however hit his shoulder. Understandably enraged by this he yelled out to his confused ally.
"What the hell!?" From Haru's perspective the blades had shot out on their own and swerved around Kratos. He knew for a fact he couldn't do that on his own.
"Senji that wasn't me!" Oh right it was some other Deadman who shot knives and was standing behind their enemy.
"What are you on about?" Haru didn't know how but he had an idea.
"I think he made my bran-" Haru was thrown to the ground when Kratos hit him with the force of a car with his shoulder. Kratos cracked his neck as he turned away from the blond man saying.
"You talk too much." Senji ran forward with Crow Claw ready to once again cut the man to ribbons. His enemy once again held out his hand and stood still. Senji was about five feet away when his arms were thrown down with Crow Claw going into his legs. The sudden blow from himself sent him to the ground right in front of Kratos's feet. Senji instantly tried getting to his feet but a backhand put him on his back.
"No, god dammit! NO!" Senji tried to get back up but a shoe to the chest stopped him as he was pushed back onto the ground. Kratos reformed his greatsword and raised it up and prepared to cleave the Deadman in two. That is until Haru's wing stabbed through his chest. Well saying it went through his chest was underselling it, The wing was about halfway through the man's body and had almost bisected him. Not wanting to get the violent man a chance to retaliate Haru threw him across the ring. Haru panted for a moment before falling to his knees, Senji stood up and helped Haru up putting the smaller man's arm around his shoulder. They needed to get some backup, or at least get some distance between them as Kratos would no doubt be up at any moment. As he turned back to the Deadmen he saw Mockingbird fall from the ceiling.
"Took ya long enough."
Caladrius looked down at the corpse she was sitting on and placed her hand over it's chest. Vultures blood then started to retreat back into her body before flowing up into her cuts. Minatsuki's eyes widened at this as she expressed her disgust.
"The fuck is she doing?" In a less fucked situation Hunter probably would have understood this was a rhetorical question.
"I-I think she's taking her blood." She didn't need to call him a dumbass, her face got that point across well enough.
"No shit Sherlock, how the fuck is she doing it?" Feeling a little insulted Hunter responded in a rather defensive manner.
"I don't know, why don't you ask her?!"
"Yeah, ask me." Both teens turned to see the girl standing before them now with no visible wounds. Minatsuki reacted swiftly slashing at the twisted imp at speeds she couldn't even see. Even so all of her attacks were dodged with ease. As her frustration increased the whips grew less accurate and powerful in favor of blinding speeds.
"Stay the fuck still!" Caladrius licked her lips before dodging under one particularly wide swing and closed the distance. Minatsuki didn't even have time to gasp before a swift kick to her ribs sent her to the ground. She felt fine at first and tried to push herself up but then a sudden excruciating pain caused her to collapse. Placing a hand on the spot that had been kicked and immediately felt the wet spot on her dress, however one glance down revealed that it wasn't just a spot. A deep crimson was spreading quickly from her ribs and had almost reached the opposite side. That was bad, really bad, her ribs were probably fucked actually she knew they were as one rib was peaking out of her side and to top it off something important was either torn or punctured by said rib. Shifting to her knees wasn't as painful but still hurt like hell itself. Caladrius was standing in front of her looking almost bored. Then her smile returned as her hair sprung to life as it mimicked Whip Wing.
"Oh you fucking bitch." Minatsuki had killed dozens with that branch of sin, and from how they had screamed it seemed to hurt. Maybe this was that karma crap she had been told about. Before she could be cut to pieces a blast of red electricity hit her in the back and Caladrius seized up once more. Then with a sudden serge of bravery Hunter ran up and delivered a haymaker right to the violent girls temple sending her to the ground where she lay still. Hunter dropped down next to Minatsuki and immediately realized he didn't know what to do, she looked bad but maybe she felt... Not so bad?
"Are you alright?" Minatsuki gave him a look somewhere between a glare and shock, did she LOOK alright!? Seriously one of her fucking ribs was sticking out, her once yellow dress was now sixty percent red, and she couldn't stand, but he still needed to ask? God he was either retarded or horribly naive. Probably both. A shrill scream broke her train of thought as Hunter looked up and quickly jumped over Minatsuki firing another bolt at the girl who sidestepped the attack faster then he could see. She reformed her demonic pitchfork like weapon but this time from blade to blade it was as wide as his torso, and from her wrist to the tip it was as long as his arm. Hunter held out his hands in an attempt to reform the blood ring he had formed only once before, however he got a much different result as a five foot wide blast of static shot out. Unfortunately like all other attacks she dodged this and out of the corner of her eye he saw her dragging the three pronged weapon on the ground. He turned just in time to have debris thrown in his face. He quickly grew confused as he felt as though he was facing the ground, then the pain in his sternum, upper left lung, and gut caused his vision to blur, and finally something rushed up his throat and out of his mouth, something that tastes like Iron. Then his vision slowly came back to him and what had everything made sense. She was holding him up in the air like some kind of trophy, having impaled him with all three prongs. He grasped at the middle one in a desperate attempt to keep himself from slipping down further. He looked the imp dead in the eye and saw excitement that put Minatsuki's to shame, it wasn't arousal, but more the sense of power a child would get from ripping the wings off of a butterfly.
"You will look beautiful dead." No, nonono this was bad, he couldn't die now! He wanted to avenge Max, he wanted to clear his name, he wanted to find out the truth from Alex! Well apparently the universe wanted him to do all that too. Caladrius's blood dropped to the ground with Hunter who turned just in time to see a stream of blood shoot out of her mouth at the speed Hunter would compare to holding your thumb against the end of a hose, she dropped to her hands and knees as she kept producing more and more blood. She did eventually run out, and when she did she started to cry like the petulant child she was.
"WHY? WHY AREN'T I ALOUD TO KI-" She never got the chance to finish as the area around her head seemed to distort from Hunters point of view. The the girls skull exploded in a mixture of blood, bone fragments, and pieces of meat that he couldn't tell if they came from her face or brain. The body fell to the side revealing Minatsuki standing and wrapping up her side with Whip Wing as some sort of makeshift bandage. She smirked as she used her blood to get him back on his feet.
"So, you alright?" ...Did he LOOK alright!?
Alex swung his blade down embedding it into the spot his broth had stood in less than half a second ago, damnit how was he so fast? As he looked to where he thought Jason had dodged he felt a fist hit the back of his skull sending him face first into the ground. He barely felt it, whether it was because of the adrenalin or because most of his blood was outside of his body he didn't know, didn't care either. Getting back up he turned to see Jason still didn't have his blood out. Feeling pretty insulted by this he ran forward pulling his clawed arm back, the feeling of his broken arm being forced to move was almost enough to make him fall, even with how little he was feeling. He jumped into the air thrusting his claw at his brothers chest hoping to end this with a stab aimed for his heart. Jason merely raised an eyebrow before catching the armored forearm. To be fair the blow pushed him back a few feet but at the end of the day this did nothing to harm the younger of the two who let out a disappointed sigh.
"I thought you would have stopped using this after I broke it." With one squeeze his armor shattered and his broken arm was defenseless as Jason sunk his claw into his upper arm earning a suppressed grunt from the older brother. "But now it seems I have to take it." Then with one sold pull Alex's arm was ripped off just above the elbow. Alex felt nothing at first, no shock, no pain, no anger. He just stumbled forward barely hearing Jason drop the severed limb. Alex fell to his knees and held out the remainder of his arm out, a jagged point that used to be his elbow stuck out half a foot from the wet crimson flesh. Then it all set in, the agonizing pain, the cold shiver from how much blood he had lost, and the realization that his arm was gone. As all of his blood fell to the ground he did the only real thing he could. He screamed.