"This—! This is—!" Geno stared in disbelief at the figures before him.
A saber, a longsword, twin blades, a rifle, a naginata.
Five figures, each corresponding to one of Geno's group of five; aside from being the dark red color of Filth, they were practically the five of them in the flesh.
"Drowned Dreamers! Go! Seize the future in your own hands!"
Though they lacked a touch of sentience, these Drowned Dreamers of Geno and the others still retained the appearance and power of Geno's group.
Soon the Drowned Dreamers of Anby and the rest squared off against their originals.
Feeling out the familiar movements and techniques, the coordination of Anby and the others was easily torn apart.
"Damn it! It's just like looking in a mirror!"
Number 11 showed her impatience as she faced a Drowned Dreamer identical to herself.
This feeling of fighting against oneself really was awful.
But the more dangerous matter was that, bogged down by the Drowned Dreamers, the group was now unable to stop Dagalle's assault.
"O Lord! I shall bring You that which You seek!"
Muttering deliriously, Dagalle came attacking toward Geno.
And Geno, equally worn down by the fight with his own Drowned Dreamer, was utterly unable to respond to Dagalle's moves.
"Damn it! In that case—!"
Watching the onslaught of Dagalle and Drowned Dreamer-Geno grow ever more relentless, Geno finally couldn't endure them any longer.
At once he released his original form to deal with them.
Reverted to his Ethereal form, Geno had a far easier time handling his own Drowned Dreamer, while the latter showed no sign at all of transforming.
It seemed these Drowned Dreamers, though much like them, couldn't fully copy all of their abilities.
At the same time, Geno noticed that Dagalle, having released the Drowned Dreamers, had grown much weaker in power.
"Looks like these clones you've created run on your own power."
Geno saw through Dagalle's trick, but even so he still couldn't withstand him even with his power split apart—at most he could only tangle with the man.
"That which the Lord seeks shall, in the end, be fulfilled."
Dagalle remained as deliriously raving as ever; Filth gushed from his hands once more, this time coalescing into a dark red spear.
Dagalle swung the spear to meet Geno's longsword.
And in the course of the clash, Geno found that the Ether longsword he'd formed was gradually being eroded by the spear in Dagalle's hand.
Watching his weapon transform bit by bit into red Filth, starting from the blade's tip, Geno decisively cast it aside and then formed a brand-new sword all over again.
"That which you cast aside shall become the blade that cuts you down."
As Dagalle's words fell, the longsword Geno had discarded turned completely dark red, then floated into the air and came attacking toward Geno.
"Tch! Turning my own gear against me?! Where'd this cult outfit even crawl out of?!"
Faced with the betrayal of his own weapon, Geno's eye twitched—how were this Sacrificial Ghost's abilities so bizarre, and every one of them some mind-screwing trick like defection or copying.
Yet relying on brute resistance alone, Geno really couldn't hold out, and soon dense wounds appeared all over his body.
Trying to self-heal with his Ethereal body, Geno found these wounds were laced with Filth, suppressing his regeneration.
"Every last one of them a disgusting tactic! A boss like this in a game would be a total piece-of-crap mob!"
But reality wasn't a game; running into an opponent like this, Geno, helpless as he was, could only keep stalling.
His teammates were all caught in grueling fights too; the only one he could rely on now was himself.
But time, at this moment, had become Geno's enemy.
As his wounds mounted, Geno's stamina and Ether were being drained in vast quantities.
At last, Dagalle seized an opening and drove the spear in his hand into Geno's belly.
"Guh-ahh!"
A mouthful of golden blood spurted from Geno's mouth, dripping to the ground where it dissipated away as the most primal Ether.
This single blow left Geno utterly without any room to fight back.
He felt the Ether within him slowly draining outward, while his body grew ever heavier.
Apart from his still-lucid consciousness, he was now no different from a vegetable.
"O Lord, did You see?! Your faithful servant has completed Your task!"
Dagalle's enormous single eye snapped wide open; his frenzied look, as though he meant to bulge the very eyeball out of its socket, was enough to scare to tears any child who refused to sleep at night.
The others noticed Geno's current state too, yet tangled up by the Drowned Dreamers, they could barely safeguard even themselves.
Trigger, too preoccupied with the situation over here, even got caught flat-footed by her Drowned Dreamer and took a vicious hit because of it.
"Ngh! This is going badly!"
Just as had been said before, this monster truly was more than they could handle.
Abilities aplenty, astonishing power—so strong, impossible to defeat.
As the Drowned Dreamers gradually surrounded Trigger and the others, Dagalle showed not the slightest interest in it.
Its entire attention was fixed upon the now-immobilized Geno.
Reaching out once more, it seized Geno, then its enormous golden eye bored intently into Geno's face, as if to see clean through his flesh, his very heart and liver.
"Why are you the one to receive the Lord's favor, why does the Lord prefer you?! Why?!"
Watching Geno's utterly blank expression, Dagalle felt his envy grow so intense it was practically plasmolyzing him.
A guy like this—blessed and too oblivious to know it—just the sight of him made Dagalle seethe!
But it had no intention of explaining anything, and promptly made to leave with Geno in tow, while those Drowned Dreamers were on the verge of launching their final assault on Trigger and the others.
"Free fire!" "Loyalty!" "Body and mind as one!" "One strike, certain kill!"
Lightning, flames, and bullets—at these all-too-familiar techniques, Trigger and the others now wore looks of something like despair.
Yet even so, in the end there was one who refused to give up just like that.
"Hmph! If you lot are supposed to be us, then I'll just surpass myself to show you!"
Number 11 glared furiously, every muscle in her body beginning to tense.
Then her whole being entered a wondrous state—and so did Anby beside her.
'What's this?!'
From Trigger's vantage, the Ether aura around Number 11 and Anby suddenly shifted, then began to swell at breakneck speed.
Number 11 sheathed her blade, then flicked a switch, and flames blazed up along the edge once more.
Anby, mirroring the very same motion, joined the hilts of her twin blades, and the majestic light of thunder reappeared.
Next, flame and lightning wound around each other; Number 11 and Anby, without so much as a word between them, coordinated in perfect sync.
Lightning and firelight interwove; two elemental forces that should never have melded reacted with one another here, and the mighty energy intercepted every one of the Blasphemers' attacks—and even delivered a counterstrike.
And this would be the beginning of the counterattack.
____
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