Dreadgod (Cradle Book 11) (129)

Arrows blackened the sky even as Yerin’s Final Sword lit it up again, but Lindon didn’t need Dross’ prediction to see where this battle was going.

At this rate, Malice was going to wear them down.

Yerin didn’t have the madra reserves to fight for another hour, while Malice could go for days. Lindon could keep up in endurance, but as soon as Yerin was out of the fight, Malice would be too much for him. Especially with the support from Moongrave keeping him locked down.

Malice knew it as well as he did, which was why she kept dancing around them. Minimizing the damage. Herding them where she wanted them to go.

She was fighting them like she would a Dreadgod.

Techniques split the sky and scorched the ground, and Dross pushed himself to keep them ahead of the fight, but they were going to lose.

It was fight until they were killed or captured, or give up Mercy and return another day.

[One of those options has a much higher success rate, if you were asking me,] Dross said. [Which you weren’t.]

Lindon knew that. If they left Mercy with her family, she would be fine. He and the others could increase their power enough to fight Monarchs, even finish at least one Dreadgod weapon. That would make the battle even, and they could throw enough weight around to retrieve Mercy.

He wanted to do that. It was a perfectly reasonable plan.

If only he was willing to move forward without her again. Advance the rest of the team.

And he was not.

For his entire life, he hadn’t had the power to make his own decisions. Now he did.

So he was going to.

Dross cackled to the point that Lindon wondered if his other personality had returned. [You know what, I like it! Win or die is more fun when you’ve chosen the fight yourself, isn’t it?]

Then a crystal hand emerged from Malice’s chest. A third crystal hand.

Oh no, Lindon thought.

Mercy punched her way out from inside the void space where she’d been trapped. She crawled out one giant fist at a time. Malice seized her by the shoulder…until Mercy threw her mother off.

She drew up to her full height, two amethyst titans facing one another. Mercy roared, and a phantom image appeared behind her. It was a tall, striking woman, like an empress. The same one who had appeared behind Malice during the fight against the Dreadgod.

Mercy drew her fist back, then punched her mother.

[She’s lost herself,] Dross said in horror. [It was too much.]

If that was true, then it was all the more reason to end the fight quickly. Lindon lashed out with dragon’s breath as Yerin brought the Netherclaw technique down on Malice with a swipe of its Forged claws.

Malice twisted her daughter’s arm back. “That…is…enough!”

Then she punched Mercy down into the ground. The earth quaked for miles.

“You idiot,” Malice roared. She slammed her foot down on Mercy’s armored chest. “Listen to me!” She hauled Mercy up and pressed their helmets together. “You don’t ever fight against the family. Ever.”

Mercy’s blows slapped against the sides of Malice’s armor, but the Monarch had her in an iron grip.

“Fight for us, or we don’t need you.”

She drew her foot back to kick Mercy’s armored form.

Dross’ madra blazed through Lindon and Yerin at the same time, and the world slowed for both of them.

A copy of the spirit appeared beside each of their heads, and Dross squinted in Malice’s direction.

[You know, it’s strange. She’s starting to look a lot like Harmony.]

Yerin, Lindon thought. Are you ready? Dross conveyed his mental voice, and it was brittle with the cold of the Void.

Yerin’s response, by contrast, burned with fury. You crack her out of that armor, and then you can watch me gut her like a fish.

Dross will show you. In thirty seconds, you’ll have a sword at her throat.

A Monarch might have any number of unknown life-saving mechanisms that Lindon had no way of knowing about.

But he was going to make her use them.

His black flames, his cleansing tide of pure madra, and his Dreadgod arm all harmonized with his will of destruction. The Void Icon sang, closer than ever.

And Yerin blazed with such anger that the fabric of reality warped around her.

The Monarch’s colossal foot swept at Mercy, but it slammed to a halt against a tiny speck that shone with silver-and-red power. A tide of wind blasted over the land, reaching as far back as Moongrave, but Yerin didn’t budge an inch.

Yerin didn’t have a full-body Enforcer technique, but with the more-than-physical strength of the Steelborn Iron body, she didn’t need one. She gathered all her power into her shining sword.

Malice focused on her, but Lindon had already moved.

His right hand pressed against the back of her neck. Shadow rushed over him, and dominating will.

Lindon Consumed it all.

Her bloodline armor began to dissolve into his arm. It was made of shadow, force, and a vow to protect so powerful that it had engraved itself into the souls of generations. Akura Malice’s bloodline legacy.

It was all food for the arm of the Slumbering Wraith.

Shadow madra Forged into blades and swept at him, but he weakened them with the Hollow Domain. Then he allowed them to land.

They cut his body and his spirit together, but he healed as fast as she damaged him. Malice’s stolen power now ran through his Bloodforged Iron body.