Chapter 8: Devouring the Flame
I sensed Caleb's presence depart, his violent aura receding through the northern archway like a storm retreating over the horizon. Yet I felt no urgency to pursue. My attention turned, slow and deliberate, toward the figure still kneeling amid cracked stone.
Albert.
"Why do you look at me with such a complicated gaze?" I asked, genuine confusion threading my voice.
"You're a fucking monster," he spat. The disdain that had once colored his aura was gone now, replaced by something deeper, raw, trembling hatred mixed with dawning terror.
I offered no reply.
"Haha… you don't know what's going on, you fucking fool!" he exploded.
Before my Echo Motion could fully map the shift in his aura, he surged forward. His hand clamped around my face like iron tongs. With brutal strength he dragged me across the ground, stone scraping skin, black robes tearing, then flung me skyward.
Mid-air, he appeared at my side in a flicker of purple flame. His blade descended point-first, aimed to impale me through the heart.
From the side my cane came flying slamming Albert by the side of his head .
"I see," I murmured to myself, calm even as wind howled past my ears. "Tell me… what do you call this talent of yours that burns like a flame through your aura?"
I turned my face as though listening to the very air around me.
Silence answered.
"You see," I continued softly, pointing the weighted end of my cane toward the source of his aura, "I also possess several talents of my own."
His grip tightened on the hilt until the leather creaked.
"I know you wonder why I tell you all this," I said, voice dropping to a near-whisper. "You see… after this, your talent will belong to me."
The words sent visible shivers racing down his frame. His aura flared wildly, purple flames licking higher around his shoulders.
"Albain Flare!"
He vanished in a burst of violet fire and reappeared directly before me. His blade came down in a blazing arc, engulfed in violent, writhing flames that scorched the very air.
I stepped sideways, barely. The edge grazed past my cheek, heat blistering skin.
But I didn't anticipated the follow-up.
A fist slammed into my side, burning through robe and flesh alike. Pain flared white-hot across my ribs.
"I knew you would do that," Albert snarled from my left.
His blade descended again, this time in a smooth, practiced arc meant to cleave me from shoulder to hip.
"You're not the only one that's special!" he roared.
I raised my free hand. Aura pulsed outward in a thin, violet-black veil, slowing the blade's descent just enough. I tilted my head; the edge whistled past my ear by a hair's breadth.
"Echo Pulse."
I gathered aura into my feet, dense, coiling, and drove one heel straight into his chest.
The impact rang like a cracked bell.
Albert flew backward, crashing into the far wall with enough force to shatter stone and send rubble cascading around him.
I stood motionless.
My severed arm, lost earlier in the chaos,.lay on the ground a few paces away. Violet-black tendrils rose from the stump at my shoulder, reaching toward the discarded limb. Flesh knitted, bone regrew, veins threaded. In moments the arm reattached itself with a wet, sucking sound, fingers flexing as though testing their return.
I walked forward, slow, arrogant, cane tapping lightly against stone with every step.
Albert forced himself up from the rubble, coughing blood, mind reeling.
"This guy before me… he is not normal," he whispered to himself, staring at the rapidly regenerating flesh.
"Your two talents are special," I said calmly, spinning the cane once before slamming its weighted end into the ground. The impact sent fresh echo waves rippling outward. "One is fire manipulation, specifically a rare purple flame that burns hotter and faster than ordinary aura fire. The other is a sub-talent: Elemental Clone. You create temporary duplicates infused with your flame essence."
In the pitch darkness of my sight, the echoes painted perfect silhouettes, Albert's true body and four identical clones fanning out around me in a deadly pentagram formation.
"These talents… they waste away in your grasp," I continued. "But that will soon change."
Albert screamed.
"Die, die, die, die!"
All five versions lunged at once, blades wreathed in purple inferno.
I did not falter.
The cane moved, piercing once, twice, three times, four. Each thrust found a crimson point glowing in my inner vision: the core of each clone's flame heart. They detonated in wild bursts of violet fire. The explosions converged on my position.
Flames engulfed me whole.
"Haha,.you fool!" Albert laughed from the center, voice thick with savage joy. "Burn!"
Like a flash, I leaped out of the inferno.
Half my face was charred black, skin peeled away, muscle exposed, one ear gone entirely. Yet even as I landed, violet-black aura surged across the ruined flesh. Burned tissue bubbled, regrew, smoothed. The black cloth that had covered my eyes had burned away completely, revealing the deep, ugly scars that crossed both sockets like twin ravines. I smiled, wide, wild, blood-smeared.
I pounced on him.
Two fingers knuckles, drove straight toward his chest.
Albert screamed as I pierced through armor and sternum, cracking ribs. Blood sprayed across my face.
"Please, someone help me!"
I drove my fist into his nose. Cartilage shattered.
"Please… have mercy… I'm sorry…"
I showed no mercy.
"Why did you and your friend attack me?" I asked quietly, fingers still buried in his chest. "From what I know, I have never met either of you, neither do do i sense the scent of your loved ones on me. So why perform such foolishness?"
His shocked gaze burned into me, I could feel it through the frantic spiking of his aura.
"This one… is not aware of what's going on…"
Disbelief twisted his features. His demeanor changed, fear overtaking rage.
He lifted a trembling hand, pointing ahis middle finger toward my face as though to curse me.
I smiled.
My free hand closed around his throat.
Life-force began to drain, slow at first, then faster. Violet-black tendrils rose from his skin, flowing into my palm. An addictive rush flooded my mind; my head jolted back involuntarily as ecstasy and revulsion warred within me.
Albert gasped, clawing weakly at my wrist.
I tightened my grip.
With a sharp twist, I broke his neck.
Albert's body slumped.
"You proved yourself useless till the end."
Silence returned to the training ground, broken only by the faint crackle of dying flames and the drip of blood on stone.
I stood amid the wreckage, breathing steady.
His talent already flowed through my veins, purple flame and clone essence merging with the countless fragments I had devoured before.
My scars remained untouched.
My sight remained gone.
But my strength… my strength continued to grow.