Aether Nexus: Curse of Love & Hatred

“Soulful Technique: Hollow Illusionary!” The mysterious man roared out with an unbridled sense of power behind it. The massive pressure he emitted put everyone on high alert.

As Director Stewart readied himself for the impending confrontation, he clasped his hands together, causing his prayer beads to collide, producing both an intense aura and eerie resonance.

However, to his dismay, a bewildering scene unfolded before him—An array of mystical weapons materializing out of thin air. Spectral swords, glinting axes, sharpened daggers, each a mere mirage, yet bearing an undeniable threat and swirling ominously around his adversary.

“Where did those weapons come from!?" Director Stewart alarmingly thought before yelling to his comrades behind him. "Everyone! On guard! Kueo, take care of that disgusting worm! We will not let this intruder encroach on the Council's property!”

“Roger! Wha—!?” Kueo responded as he turned back around to face the thing that ate Henzo, only to find its wiggling tail just above-ground.

Realizing that it was burrowing underground, Kueo shot two chained sickles from under his black cloak, narrowly missing the protruding tail. “Dammit! It's underground now!”

“You'll see soon enough he isn't just some mere ‘disgusting worm’, you hypocritical pigs!” The man yelled as he threw his spear in the air and crossed his arms in an X-shape. “Enclose!”

The order commanded each mystical weapon hovering around the man to go forth and hone in on the strongest soul in the vicinity. The recipient of this onslaught would be a bald monk with perpetually shut eyes, religious tattoos all over his limbs, and prayer beads in hand—Director Stewart.

In response, Stewart used his own ability. “Soulful Technique: Divine Ricochet!”

The prayer beads on his neck and shoulders suddenly burst off in every direction. Normally, each bead would just clatter to the floor—Director Stewart's beads were different however.

Divine Ricochet allows Stewart's prayer beads to rebound off any surface, even each other, with greater power for a limited time.

Just as each bead seem destined to collide with their designated targets, they pass through each other. Startled, Stewart instinctively raised his guard, bracing for an attack that never arrived. The illusory weapons vanished before making contact, leaving him momentarily exposed.

Before he could re-calibrate, the intruder caught and sent Jukill hurtling through the air with a swift hammer throw.

Fortunately for Stewart, his reflexes were quick, sidestepping the deadly projectile in the nick of time. Leaving Jukill embedding itself into the wall. Unfortunately, in the same instant, a searing pain erupted in his gut as the intruder's soulura-infused punch caved in his stomach, sending the director flying back. Saliva mixed with blood spewed from his mouth.

“Director Stewart!” One of the guards called out and rushed to Stewart's aid, using his own body to catch him.

Unbeknownst to the intruder though, most of Stewart's beads were still ricocheting off the walls behind him.

With unforeseen and calculated precision, the beads streaked through the air in such a way that some beads bounced off each other midair. Setting up for four of them to be directly propelled towards the intruder.

He caught on to this and sidestepped himself to the left, dodging the first two. As the last two rapidly approached, the man's gaze sharpened.

“Cursed Technique: Hollow Void!” He yelled within his mind, urgently raising both arms, of which mouths, like Guspane's, materialized at the palms.

Tongues from the conjured mouths shot forth and grabbed the beads, pulling them inside their seemingly ethereal abyss to satiate their endless hunger.

Alas, the man didn’t take into account the first two beads’ continued trajectory. With only two quick bounces, they once more launched themselves at the man, catching him by surprise this time.

Thinking he could block such attacks with only his arms, the man would be further shocked when the two beads blew straight through his being. Both arms and torso, leaving four small, but gaping wounds in their wake.

Staggering back a bit, the man would notice a sudden shift in the air right behind him, heralded by the arrival of another figure. It was Captain Hosok—capitalizing on Stewart's distraction and swinging his renowned flail without saying a word.

The man readied his left arm to block the spiked metal head hurtling towards him. But just as it approached, a ripple of energy coursed through the flail.

As a devious smile formed on Hosok's face, in an instant, the flail doubled in size. “FLAILED CORPSE!” Hosok sadistically roared, relishing in the moment of released blood-lust.

The impact easily shattered the intruder's blocking arm, sending him into the right wall and crashing through with astonishing force into a neighboring corridor. Dust and debris exploded into both corridors as a result.

“Gehahaha! That felt great! Damned fool! Did he really think he could take us all on!?”

One of the guards stared in awe. “No way… That strike was unbelievable…!”

Being proud of his captain, another guard explained what happened. “Obviously, that was the captain's signature move, Flailed Corpse. By swinging with all his might, then using his Soulful Technique, Flail Menace, to increase the size of his flail before impact, he can hit with enough force to make even mountains crumble! I wouldn't be surprised if our little intruder was no more than a mere red stain now.”

“That’s fine and dandy Hosok, but who the hell is going to fix that wall? Henzo’s dead!” Kueo shouted, annoyed at such recklessness.

“That’s CAPTAIN Hosok to you boy! And just do it the ol’ fashioned way. You youngsters have no respect nowadays. If only the director let me train the new recruits myself. Too strict my ass!”

“Speaking of Henzo, we still need to take care of that wor—!” One of the guards started to voice his concerns, only to be interrupted suddenly, never to speak again, as his head was cleanly lopped off its shoulders.

The culprit: Jukill, flying from the wall it was embedded in earlier.

Narrowly dodging the same fate, only receiving a small cut on his left cheek, Hosok looked in disbelief as the spear flew into the thick wall of smoke produced from his own attack. As he, and soon after everyone else, looked on at the smoke, a soft thud could be heard.

After a brief moment, a strong surge of wind pressure would push the wall of smoke into the main corridor, effectively creating a huge smokescreen. It was thick enough to not allow any of the guards to see beyond arms length.

Taken aback, Hosok looked around in a frenzy. “What the hell!? Don’t tell me he survived!?”

“Seems he did…” Commented the last captain among the group—Captain Palon. As the thick haze swirled, obscuring almost everything around him, he closed his eyes and focused his energy into his back.

Suddenly, four insect-like appendages burst forth from his back. Thin, sleek, and glistening with an eerie sheen, these appendages were covered in a dense mesh of jet-black hairs, like the hair on his head. The fine hairs acted like a radar, sensing for any movement, no matter how small, around him.

Posed for combat now, the hairs quivered slightly, notifying Palon of an approaching figure. “With these hair receptors, I can distinguish anyone via their footsteps, their weight, how much air they displace, even the way they breathe. Judging by the fact I can sense sickles, the person behind me is Kueo—But something is off…”

Turning around to confirm his suspicions, Palon would be appalled, as the man he saw was none other than the intruder. “Crap! My hairs have never failed me this badly! How did he get right behind me this fast!?”

As the man reached out his hand, Palon quickly severed it with one of his insect appendages, following it up by piercing his opponent's heart and neck with cutthroat precision. All of it was done in one fluid motion.

“Something is still off! The body I'm seeing vs the body I felt as I pierced through doesn't match!” Palon thought to himself as he retracted his bloodied insect legs, perplexed by his visual to physical dissonance.

However, after only blinking once, the gruesome truth revealed itself as he could only look in horror—the body he had just slain was, in fact, Kueo's…

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Next: (Chapter 15) Conflict on a Doomed Island: Part 3