NOVEL WEB 378. Into the Fold
"Go fold yourself, motherfucker," Ike snarled.
The archer gave him an unimpressed look. He stood with a perfectly straight back, his shoulders squared. Silver hair was tied back into a high ponytail with nary a hair loose, and it fell straight down his back, while his V-cut bangs likewise framed his face in perfect straightness. Silver robes with a high collar draped him in straight lines down to his ankles, and tight sleeves wrapped around muscular arms. The only part of him that wasn't straight was his bow, the silver limbs of the structure curved under the pressure of the string.
"Someone's compensating," Wisp muttered to herself.
"Shut up. I think that's part of me. That is… the greater being," Ike quickly corrected himself.
"You can just say 'you.' We all know what you mean," Wisp said.
"Yeah, but… in my head, it's different," Ike said, sighing.
"I bet it's different in his head, too," she replied.
"Can you stop dissing that part of me?"
"I can't even stop dissing you, what makes you think I can stop making fun of Captain Shiny over there?"
Ike sighed again. He looked at the ground. After his initial worry, he'd scanned Mag, and the bird was hurt, but not badly. He would be fine. "Doing okay down there, bird brain?"
"I'm dead," Mag replied, and went back to lying flat.
Ike gave him a look, unimpressed. He knew Mag was a ranged mage, but was he really so intolerant to pain and damage that he'd just 'die' at the first hit? A creeping sensation came over him even as he thought it, that Mag had given up surprisingly easily when he'd fought him… Maybe he really is bad at taking pain.
"Oh, you know what? This is a bird thing. They're really delicate animals, so they overreact to the tiniest damage. You know who doesn't overreact, though?" Wisp bragged, waggling her eyebrows.
Mag jumped up. He took human form and plucked the arrow out of his chest, tossing it away. "Who are you calling delicate?"
"Pigeons can take a beating and keep flying," Ike interceded into this very stupid conversation.
"Yeah, but he's not a pigeon. He's weaker than a pigeon."
"I can defeat thousands of pigeons," Mag protested in frustration.
"I regret speaking," Ike muttered to himself. He turned to Scar. "You okay?"
"I'm… fine," she grunted. Gripping the shaft of the arrow, she snapped it, then pushed it through her body and out the other side.
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"Glad to hear it." Ike turned back to the silver-haired figure, as the giant puppet straightened up beside him. "Two on one? That's unfair."
"In what way is this 'one?'" the silver-haired man asked, gesturing at Ike's party.
"In the way that we share one braincell," Ike replied.
The silver-haired man stared at him. Ike stared back. The puppet groaned upright and turned, reaching its massive hand over Ike. Once more, a shadow fell over him.
"No sense of humor, huh," Ike said at last. He snapped his fingers. "Wisp, Mag! You two take the big puppet. I know you can handle it together."
"Ugh… fine. I won't let him get in my way."
"Get in your way? You—"
The puppet's eyes gleamed. It smashed its hand down on the party as they squabbled, taking advantage of their apparent distraction.
"Ike! You can't—" Scar cried, shocked.
Fwwwwip!
FWOOM.
A thousand spider strands tied its hand back, binding it to the nearest wall. The second it was completely bound, Mag hammered it with a fireball, then a magpie projection. Stuck with the spider thread, the puppet couldn't escape the fireball, and the magpie projection carved into the molten metal. The puppet yanked harder, clearly expecting to break free after the fire, but Wisp's threads gleamed red-hot, full of the fire-element and unburned.
"I can't what?" Ike asked, looking at Scar as the two beasts descended on the puppet.
She stared. After a second, she raised her brows. "I guess you can."
Ike laughed. "They might bicker like kids, but they're just as powerful as us. Maybe even more powerful. Don't forget it."
"Right." Scar nodded.
Silver gleamed in the corner of Ike's eye. He whirled. Lightning flashed around his body, surging to his wrist as he struck. The Hungry Sword intercepted the silver shaft, catching it out of the air in its teeth, and snapped it in two. It munched loudly, chewing down the arrow.
"We were having a conversation," Ike informed the silver-clothed figure.
"If you turn your back in battle, you can't blame me for putting a blade through it."
Ike nodded. "Fair enough. What's your name, Captain Shiny?"
Behind him, Wisp cackled.
The silver-haired figure narrowed his sharp eyes at them. "You can call me Accais."
"And you can call me Lord Kickass, Leader of the World," Ike returned.
Accais frowned at him in disapproval. Wisp laughed, deeply pleased.
"But if you insist, the name's Ike."
"Enough." Accais flourished his bow. So fast even Ike's eyes blurred, he loosed a dozen arrows at them. As he fired, he plucked the arrows out of the air itself, forming them as he drew them. Ike squinted, then widened his eyes. They weren't truly arrows, not at all, but instead compressed air, given the shape of silver arrows by tightly pressed mana.
He laughed. Charging in, he swept his sword ahead of him, knocking down the arrows. One or two got through, only to get knocked aside by Storm Clad. One pierced through his defenses and penetrated his upper arm; Ike yanked it out, careless of the big wound formed by pulling the arrowhead out of his flesh, and the wound healed in seconds.
"Detonate," Accais murmured, while the arrow was still in Ike's hand.
The arrow blasted apart. A hurricane burst from the tightly compressed air, tearing into Ike's hand and ripping it apart. Storm Clad was blown away. Belatedly, he transformed his hand to steel, and managed to save the bottom half of it. The top half was torn apart by the arrow entirely, and nothing but mangled bone and twisted muscle remained.
Ike transformed his hand back, letting it heal. "That's a nasty trick."
"It's not my only trick," Accais said. He faced down Ike as Ike closed in, remaining completely still even as Ike landed feet from him and closed the final gap.
As he finished those final steps, Ike's stomach lurched. Something was wrong. Accais—this close, he could see the man's body was blurry. This was a trap. He slammed his foot down and jumped backward, retreating.
"Too late," Accais said, still poker-faced, and the world became nothing but whirling wind.