Necrophiliac

Eris inspects the bullet she was holding out to the boy. The shell burned into the skin of her fingers. She pulls the bullet and pieces of her skin away and drops it on the ground.

"I'm sorry," she said. "It wouldn't be fair for me to give you someone else's gift. Right?" she says as she looks back at Cassie. Both of the girl's hands tightly gripped the handle of her pistol as the green aura around it faded away. Cassie circles around the girl as she tries to move in next to Chan. Eris runs in to block her path to the boy. Cassie tries to dash the other way, but Eris keeps up with her, getting as close as having Cassie's barrel pressed against her chest.

"You wanna die that badly, fine by—"

"If I didn't catch that bullet, where would it have gone?" Eris asked. Cassie loosened her finger, but called the woman's bluff as she tugged it back. However, she found herself holding nothing as she locked eyes with Eris. Cassie dropped her arms and looked around only to see no one was there.

"Is this what she did to Chan?" she wondered aloud. She remained still as she awaited her opposition. Soon, Eris ran toward the girl with her blade in hand. Cassie remained still before immediately placing her hand where her gun would be. Before she could fire, Eris cut the girl's arm off. Eris smiles, but her face suddenly changed as Cassie's fist slammed into the woman's face. Back in their reality, Eris finds herself soaring closer to Chan. The shaolin uses his chi to conjure a dark sphere of energy and with the swing of his arm, the sphere slams into the woman. Eris makes no sound. Instead, she takes a deep breath before pushing her stomach forward, as if she were a child pretending to be pregnant. The Dark Sphere bounces off of her belly, shifting into the skies above. Eris whispers a chant, and the sphere implodes. The shocked look on Chan's face was more than enough for Cassie to understand what happened.

"You've broken through the spell too?" Eris questioned in an uncomfortable tone. "I can't say I'm too surprised. You're mind is so fractured, it took more than a few seconds to reach your memory nodes. You poor soul. What traumas have you endured?"

"What are you talking about," Cassie questioned as she rubbed her left temple. "And what happened to my—" Cassie looked at her hip, noticing that the weapon was still attached to the holster.

"I have never met Mortals who could break from my Death Stare. Is this the true power of Earthrealm? No, there was one—"

"Stop toying with us!" Cassie said as she punched toward the woman. A green ball of energy escaped her fist and struck Eris. However, the woman seemed to have absorbed the impact of the attack as the energy from it was channeled into her hand. Using her chi within, she fires the ball of energy back at the girl. It narrowly misses Cassie. It was not because she was fast enough to dodge it, but because of Eris' own lack of control when it came to using her chi. Chan activates a flare on his foot to propel him toward Eris as he directs his fist toward her face. She quickly grabs his fist and pushes it toward the ground. Chan stumbles and turns around, only to be met with the sting of Eris' palm against his cheek. Cassie sneaks up behind the woman and puts her in a full nelson hold. As she pulls tighter, hoping to snap the woman's neck, Eris' chuckles with excitement. The bones in her body began to pop in and out of place as she slid out of the maneuver. As her bones returned where they needed to be, Eris slams the back of her head against Cassie's stomach. The girl falls to the ground reaching forward as she gasped for air.

"Not a fighter huh?" Chan commented as he raised himself up.

"I didn't mean to hurt you like that," she commented. She turned to Cassie. "Honest."

"How…," Cassie coughed as her breath caught back up with her. "…how did you slip out of a full nelson like that? You shouldn't even be able to move."

"I told you both. I believe I might be in love with the two of you." The girl rubbed her face. "Have you ever felt it? Would you even know? Chaos derives from actions with no meaning. Chaos is always dynamic. No one knows the true meaning of love, only their own views on it. It truly is indescribable!" Eris raises her arms in the air as if she were giving the sky a big hug. However, she was brought back to reality by Chan's boot against her chest. As she lands on her back, she stares into Chan's eyes as he stood above her. Immediately, the boy was put into a deep trans as she'd done before. Chan fell back and the girl hopped to the feet. Cassie aims her gun at the girl as she dashed off. Her finger tugged the trigger, but she was stopped by Chan as he raised his hand in the air. With the girl out of their sights, Cassie lowers her gun and jogs to Chan's rescue. She grabs his arm and pulls him up.

"Why did you stop me?" Cassie questioned. "I could've taken her out with that shot."

"I chased her all the way here. She was afraid I was going to kill her. Yet, she never tried to kill me. Even when she had the opportunity to. Why is that?" Chan explained.

"Does it matter?" Cassie asked.

"No," Chan said. "Or at least, not unless we learn otherwise."

"Maybe she's part of your destiny," Cassie mocked as she flapped her hands in the air.

"Come on Cass," Chan said.

"We're at Cass now?" she smirked.

"I thought I'd broken the habit by now," Chan said. "That what I use to call you on the other side. Being personal with the four of you during those years was how I helped break the four of you out of your shells. I knew what it was like to be responsible for the lives of others. If it wasn't for the friends I made on that island 17 years ago, I don't think I would've survived my first match, let alone the tournament as a whole."

"No favorites?" she asked. Chan shook his head. "I won't be mad if it wasn't me," she snickered.

"Jin was Kung Lao's cousin," Chan responded. "I've always known him, even if he didn't know me very well."

"Jin?" Cassie shouted in disgust. Chan shrugged.

"Enough of that," he said, "we should follow her and see where she takes us." Cassie sighs as she holsters her pistol.

"Might as well," she responded.

End of Chapter 21

I wasn't planning on doing an A.N. this week, but after finishing this chapter and releasing it a day later than I planned to, I'm deciding to go through with making one. First, you may have noticed that this chapter and the last have been pretty short compared to past chapters. This is where I've encountered a double edge sword with this arc. Everything in this arc was already planned long before summaries of the other arcs were completed. Everything I've written and planned beyond this arc was done to prevent frequent hiatus' and story changes along the way. What I did not consider is how much content would be in each of these chapters. The summaries are already much longer than the summaries of chapters in previous and future arcs. However, the summaries for this arc are more specific due to the amount of information that will be revealed to the main character throughout it. With this chapter in particular, I did not realize I never completed the summary, meaning it was only half complete. There was nothing I could add that wouldn't occur later, thus the short, abrupt ending of the fight. For that, I will apologize.

Second, the chapter was late by a day due to irl festivities that I expected to be taken care of earlier in the week. However, that festivity did not occur until yesterday and thus the chapter was late. However, this issue should not be as prevalent as before. As mentioned earlier, this arc was written very long ago. Many of the chapters are 25-50% complete (with the next chapter falling into the latter with only one scene left to write for it). The ending scene of the arc is already completed as well, thus it should be a smooth weekly release going into the rest of the month and June, the month this arc should be completed.

(Upcoming—Broken)