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294 - Vs. Flesh Sculptor Pt. 2 [Sturmblitz]
🕑 Added 2023-09-08 06:12:11 +0000 UTCNeither Victor’s Servitors nor Lady Zefaris’ Phantoms truly had wills of their own, and if he just ordered his Servitors to act subordinate to the Phantoms unless an override command was given, any control conflicts would be minimized. The artificial cores passively fuelling his servitors combined with the remnants of a warrior’s fighting will would easily equal, or perhaps even surpass, Old Kanbu’s Dragonfire Reignition technique. Moreover, the numbers of Lady Zefaris’ Phantoms surpassed the limit of what she could maintain, so lightening the strain would allow her to express her full arsenal.
Thanks to his unique connection to them, he could still command his servitors from this distance, and alongside the reconfiguration command, he also sent Lady Zefaris an aetherwave message detailing his plan.
For now, he had to remove himself from the fight, and thankfully, the Flesh Sculptor didn’t consider him enough of a threat to send more than a pair of beasts after him.
“Fools,” rang out his second internal monologue.
He noticed the sculptor’s hold over her beasts weakening with distance. Normally invisible, he could see them; the hair-thin umbilicals of red aura that connected them to her. Perhaps… Perhaps he could just cut those strings and try to assert his authority.
“We would only get in the way as we are if we tried to rejoin the main battle.”
Spending some of his own stored-up reserves, Victor sent a tendril down the side of the building, into a top-floor room. There were corpses there. A double suicide by way of sparklock. He didn’t worry about it.
“May as well use these abandoned dogs for experimentation.”
With his source of fuel secured, he bound the beasts at once, bathing them in bonefire without wait until they were immobilized.
“We shall require an understanding of their internal structure to usurp them, so that we may change them beyond their creator’s understanding before she can try to reassert control.”
One of his flesh-brambles split apart, forming a number of special tendrils, ones which Victor had only learned to form recently. Thin, gangly, supremely flexible, with a needle-like point and eyes set right behind it. He could see through them, if he focused with an unerring precision. The structure of an eye was far more complex than he had anticipated in some ways, yet also far simpler in others.
“Truly, that is what made Koschei the King of All that Lives: A supreme anatomical understanding beyond all others.”
“Then let this battlefield vivisection begin.”
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Zefaris hadn’t been entirely sure what Victor had meant by his message, but it clicked when she saw his servitors gather in front of her and twist into humanoid forms, opening their backs towards her. She just had to reach out and grab them, just like Zel had done to Midnight Wolf back in Agartha.
With no more effort than a thought, the servitors were hers to control, and like men stepping into tank suits, her Phantoms took shape already midway through entering into their new vessels. The merge was almost unsettlingly seamless, but Zefaris, Mata, and Vaceran had to fight twice as hard to protect them in this brief time of vulnerability.
“An improvised combination technique?! How quaint!” the Flesh Sculptor cackled, but her shift of target priority showed that she took it completely seriously.
Phantom Manus, both Inquisitor Phantoms, both her Sword and Gun Phantoms, and three of her Formless Phantoms all found their places within the ten shells Victor had provided. The instant they sank into their boney forms, something changed.
There was the lightening of the strain on Zef’s soul, making it easy to call out her remaining two Formless Phantoms and even the Tankman Phantom, but that was perhaps the least of it. The monochrome of Victor’s bonefire blended with the pale-blue of Zef’s Phantoms, imbuing all their attacks. They were slower in pure movement, that was true, but any loss of mobility was made up for by being able to put rocket-thrust into any motion. Moreover, they acted with just a touch more independence, requiring a bit less micromanagement thanks to the assistance of Victor’s servitor-spirits. Their guns blazed with both spirit and bonefire, blades cut spirit and flesh alike, leaving the lingering scourge of bonefire to calcify the wounds.
EMBODIMENT FORMATION
FIERY VESSELS FOR THE DEAD
MAGUS GESTALT HANIWA MARCH
A phalanx just fifteen strong marched ahead, with but one to serve as commander and fire support at once, but that was enough. This alone turned the tide against an encroaching wave of twisted flesh.
As most of the Phantoms carved ahead, the Tankman Phantom served both as heavy fire against the Flesh Sculptor and cover for Zefaris. She had finally found the time to make her move. The Flesh Sculptor was losing patience, and so, Zefaris set her plan into motion. The occasional stray bullet, the occasional flash of light from her eye, that was all it took to set it up. The Flesh Sculptor was too busy dealing with her and her allies’ onslaught to notice it.
A command to her Phantoms was the final straw.
All at once, they spread out and opened fire on the Flesh Sculptor. She caught on and sent the flying knife right at Zefaris, but the Nameless Phantom shot it out of the air, sending it hundreds of meters off-course before the Flesh Sculptor managed to reassert control.
A barrage of dragonsteel shot and slugs, imbued with gelum, crashed in from all directions. Previously frozen in time upon the surfaces of her kinetic mirrors, now released to strike their prey, forcing the Flesh Sculptor on the defensive.
BELLADONNA SIGN
RECOLLECTION OF IKESIA’S FALLEN
PHANTOM SCRIPTURE: GHOST PLATOON
Five gleaming coins soared skyward, each painstakingly forged by a divine smith, each glistening in the sun. Zefaris relished seeing the Flesh Sculptor’s eyes go wide as she saw her raise her gun, but not aim at her.
Perhaps five shots of dragonshot were a waste, but Zefaris didn’t see it that way.
In the span of a second, she flickered five times, and nearly instantly, five comets of blazing gold soared skyward. Death’s Lieutenant held up its pistol, but the sudden deluge of draconic power made it twist and grow, expanding into a golden, dragon-mawed cannon in a near-instant.
