The air around Adam began to warp, shimmering with a palpable demonic energy that was thick and heavy.
It was no longer just the ambient miasma of hell; it was a personal dark, malevolent shroud of demonic power, a cloak of pure wrath that pulsed out from him in a visible, tangible heat wave that scalded and simmered upon contact with Saphira's skin.
A shadow was cast upon her.
Adam's tall body stood over her, his form a silhouette against the red sky.
His body, already a masterpiece of demonic royalty, seemed to be reforging itself in real time.
The finger deep, bleeding gash on his chest from her hand-knife sizzled and steamed, as the flesh knitting together with an unnatural speed as new skin replaced the old and gleamed with a darker, more resilient luster.
His combination of fire and dark demonic energies worked in tandem to fight off her red demonic energy, slowing the healing process slightly.
The cords of muscle in his neck and shoulders trembled and looked like woven steel cables, while the horns on his temples seemed to grow darker, sharper, and longer.
As if darkness itself was used to forge his crown.
Every breath he took shifted the air before him, pulling the surrounding demonic energies into his core.
The air was alive, subjugating itself to his will.
Hell a proud mother praising and nourishing her beloved child with more and more demonic energy.
On the ground, Saphira pushed herself up on her trembling arms, the taste of blood and dirt thick and disgusting in her mouth.
Her initial shock at his resilience and strength was now completely overshadowed by a deep, chilling dread.
Her hell's eyes, functioning on pure instinct and habit, weren't needed to see what was happening as she felt the surging demonic mana coming from the devil before her.
It was a scene she was all too familiar with.
With every deliberate, powerful step he took towards her, the concentration of mana surging through his body spiked exponentially. It wasn't a slow gradual accumulation; it was a violent, uncontrolled burst of power.
The energy wasn't just repairing him; it was overcharging him, hammering his physique, coursing throughout his body and fundamentally changing his very being.
He was using the near-death experience, the rage, and the pain as a catalyst.
He was using it to break through to the high-tier!
A realm of strength she had obtained not long ago, was now being achieved by this… this newborn!
Her mind, honed through trials and tribulations of her own, went into a frantic overdrive, processing variables with a speed that pushed her to her own limits.
Glancing backwards.
The shimmering black wall of the defensive barrier rippled slightly at Adam's rampant energies, but stayed an indestructible, mocking prison regardless.
She was trapped inside by the very monster she had intended to ensnare.
Retreat was no longer an option.
Glancing forward.
Adam's aura was solidifying, the chaotic surge of power was beginning to coalesce into a denser, more terrifyingly state; inching closer to a higher realm.
The quality of his mana signature was evolving before her eyes.
Behind him, from the direction of the obelisk, she felt other presences; multiple demonic auras, powerful and fast, though not worth consideration for a devil.
What had truly caught her attention was that among them… a distinct, colder, darker, more refined energy signature outshone that of the demons.
'A devil?!?'
There was actually a second devil that she had failed to account for!
Reinforcements were seconds away, while she was wounded, outnumbered, and her target was undergoing a game-changing power up.
The duo elemental energies worked together to overwhelm her natural healing capabilities. They ate away at her demonic mana and her flesh like a destructive flame.
Aching and dazed, while her forearm was being ate away at by his overbearing demonic mana, Saphira did the only thing a cornered prey could do.
She forced her frantic thoughts to slow down as a calm washed over her.
Panic was death.
Hesitation was death.
In a single, fluid motion, ignoring her injuries, she launched herself from the ground.
There was no wasted energy, nor battle cry.
Her expression focused back to its expressionless, almost listless, predatory state; her pupils narrowed into pin-dots as her hairs stood on end.
It was a silent, desperate lunge.
A final, all-or-nothing gamble.
Her body became a flash of crimson as her body launched like a missile, aimed directly at Adam's heart.
The answer was brutally simple: beating the mid-tier Adam had been a struggle she was losing. Beating a fully realized high-tier lesser devil, especially with his allies converging, seemed like an impossibility.
Her only chance, one that was fading with every passing second, was to kill him in this volatile, evolutionary state; to strike before his ascension was fully consolidated, before his new control over his power was fully stabilized.
Lest he become an enemy she could no longer win against.
It was a race against his evolution.
In a fraction of a second, calm was shredded and the air ignited into a storm of clashing energies.
Saphira, like a crimson blur, wounded, and filled with cold fury laced forward; meeting Adam's advance in a burst of light fueled by violence.
Her strikes were a tempest of precise strikes, each blow aimed to maim and kill, to stop the terrifying metamorphosis happening before her eyes.
Her punches were fast, but always seemed to hit a wall. Her kicks were powerful, but didn't budge his defenses.
With every exchange, a sliver of her focus was stolen by a staggering, genuine amazement.
'He's too young!'
The thought was screaming in her mind, drowning out the sound of their libs striking one another.
Adam's movements were not just powerful; they were robotically efficient.
He wasted nothing; no motion, energy, nor thought expended where it wasn't needed.
A block flowed seamlessly into a sharp blow to her already-bruised ribs. A feint with a shadow-drenched hand concealed a scalding burst of flames that seared her flesh when they slid across her thigh. Her greater strength was put useless as he carried the momentum of her strike towards the air or ground.
He wasn't fighting, he was dancing.
He fought with an instinctual genius that contradicted his single week of existence.
The only reason she was currently hurt, the only reason this fight was even happening, was that first, unexpected counter-punch from Adam.
It was like moving a lever: the reaction had been instantaneous!
He had turned her perfect assassination attempt into a brawl; a brawl where she had not taken his raw, savage talent into account.
Their clash wasn't on Adam's conscious mind.
His thoughts, plans, lusts, and his ambitions, had all been shoved into a silent, dark corner.
In their place was a natural, pure instinct; a river of knowledge he had not learned, but inherited.
This anomaly was the chasm that Saphira, for all her high-tier power and experience from a year of life, could not comprehend.
She was a devil born of a devil, a product of two beings; not a profound, spiritual, mad phenomenon turned physical reincarnation.
She had been taught, trained, and had honed her skills through practice and repetition. Her knowledge was earned.
Adam's was bestowed.
He was a reborn, forged by a crucible called mortality: his past life's extreme sin and suffering. His manifestation in hell had gifted him with hell's blessing, which was a deep, instinctual inheritance woven into the very fabric of his new soul.
Knowledge, instinct, intelligence: it was a latent instinct of combat, tactical cunning, and uncanny wisdom.
Under normal circumstances, accessing it was a slow process of awakening and integration. But now, with his life on the line and his body surging with power, the floodgates had been blown wide open, allowing him to use his talent to the maximum.
Saphira had never received such a blessing.
She was blessed with an inheritance as well, but one that was lacking compared to that of hell's newborns.
In hell, new bloods were considered more talented than average devils born of those lower than Greater Devils.
That is why, to Saphira, his actions were alarming!