"Of course, this thing has regeneration." He thought sarcastically.
As Issei said that, his eyes briefly landed on the area around his feet, where the shadows had rushed from to heal the thing. In its place, there was no shadow anymore.
Even though the rubble had remained unmoved and the moon's position was stationary, the shade that had left its position had completely disappeared from the soil.
Ooh-la-la-la. That is trouble. He thought to himself, grimacing.
Issei did not get much time to think as he felt the thing disappear from his field of vision. His eyes widened, "What?!"
Precautiously, he kicked off the ground and ran in a random direction as his eyes moved erratically to search for the thing. In the place where he just stood, the monster emerged from the shadows, all of its tentacles taut in a thrusting motion to the space where he'd stood just now.
So, not only healing but teleportation through shadows as well. Just what and whose slave was this thing previously?
Shadow seemed momentarily stunned that their surprise had not worked, and its spikes had not drawn any blood. But then they disappeared from its place again.
Issei whipped back and raised his left arm over his chest. The shadow once more reemerged from the ground, doing the same attack. This time, the hardened spikes hit Issei's gear. The clash between multiple of the spikes hitting the outer shell of his boosted gear generated sparks around them.
[BOOST]
Issei's feet dug into the floor. He grit his teeth, resisting the attack somewhat. But the monster changed its strategy, seeing that. Instead of hitting his heart, it pulled back half of its tentacles- only half, putting more stress on the rest, pushing against the gear- to keep his made-do shield occupied. While the rest thrust for Issei's other vitals: two for each eye, one for his forehead, and one…one for his groin.
Issei's lips twitched, "Smartass." He focused on the soles of his feet and generated a compressed blast of flames. The reaction force threw Issei's body to the side. He used the momentum to let half the spikes slide past the magical glove. And much to the stray's frustration, the rest hit empty air once again.
[BOOST] [BOOST]
While Issei was in the air, circling the standing Stray, he put up his right palm right before its face, and grinned. "Pack up, prick."
A very simple and quick-to-cast spell formed over his palm. It glowed brighter and brighter as the gear announced the repeated boosts. Finally, when he was satisfied with the output, Issei poured all the multipliers to raise the temperature and volume of the spell, and fired it point-blank over the monster's face like a high-pressure flamethrower, "Boom!!"
It was that moment that Issei first saw something remotely resembling seriousness on the stray. The monster panicked. It brought together all the surrounding shadows before its torso as a shield. Simultaneously, it tried to escape by sinking back into the shadows.
Thankfully, it wasn't fast enough. And the hastily put-together shield had already been accounted for.
[Penetrate]
The torrent of fire melted through the writhing, shadowy shield like a needle through a fabric. It also ignored the cross-shaped wall formed from the tendrils, as it continued through and completely pulverized the upper half of the stray.
It continued on its path, eviscerating all the concrete slabs and clutter in its path and charring the earth, making a sufficiently deep canal in the field.
Issei clicked his tongue. It would've put down anything else, but not this particular one. He'd seen it sink halfway into the floor by the time the torrent reached it. Furthermore, he'd seen it, at the last moment, slice its own body by the waist so that the flame does not spread down and the whole of him doesn't get eviscerated.
"Crazy thing." He whispered, staring at the standing lower half at the other end of the field. He raised his hand, conjuring about a dozen spears behind him, all pointing at the remaining body.
[BOOST] [BOOST] [BOOST]…
The dozen multiplied to form a two dozen, then almost fifty, and kept multiplying till a wall of such spears lined behind him. It was game over. Once he fired it all, there was no chance that thing could survive it while healing the rest of its body.
But therein lay a problem. The stray was not healing. There was no shadow rushing towards him. That made Issei a little queasy.
Whistle
Nevertheless, his arm fell. And with it, hundreds of flaming spears whistled his tune. They all sizzled through the air, homing in on it. Even then, it didn't move.
Issei's breath hitched.
Something was wrong.
The spears reached their destination. The fiery judgement mowed through the rest of the lower half, razing it to the ground.
Something was very wrong.
"Kkkh-hihihihi…."
Shadows. This stray monster controlled shadows. And shadows were made not only by the rubble lying around. Fabrics also created shadows. Weaker and shallower they might be when compared to the opaque objects, but they left a shade nevertheless.
And right before leaving his house, Issei had draped a jacket over himself. And its shadow formed over the shirt Issei wore underneath.
"Ughh…"
From within, small prickly spikes dug into Issei's flesh, turning him into a pincushion. They were not particularly deep, just about two inches even in the deepest area. Possibly because the strength and density of spikes depended on the depth of the shadow.
That would make sense, since his jacket wasn't made of the thickest material, and it was open from the front. But it didn't need to be. What the depth couldn't do, the numbers covered for it. There were hundreds of shadowy needles piercing his skin.
"God…cough…dam…cough…." He got played. Issei hissed through the searing pain.
A few feet away from him, the stray emerged, still missing half of its body. Had Issei been in a better state, he would've asked how, without even the upper body, it could radiate as jovial energy as ever.
Alas, right now, he was having trouble thinking about anything but red. He was bleeding all over. If he had a functioning immune system, he might've lived. But he did not have that. He was a cripple.
Each wound prickled, and blood trickled out like sand through a closed fist. Together, as the hundreds of wounds bled, it took the blink of an eye for Issei's shirt to soak red.
And it was not about to stop. Not until he had nothing left to bleed. He had to get the phoenix tear. Somehow, he had to defeat this thing and had to get the tears in the next sixty seconds, or he was done.
"Fire guy!!" At least, they hadn't run with his hope and money. Issei laughed, choking on his blood immediately in the process.
He grit his teeth and forced his eyes to focus. Right in front of him stood the stray, grinning giddily but doing nothing otherwise. It could've kept the attack, but it didn't. Instead, it chose to regenerate the rest of its body first. The small rivulets of pitch-black shadow flowed over to him and slowly reconstructed its missing body.
Right, It thought of him as entertainment after all.
Issei looked around, a sharp pain blurring his consciousness at the movement. There was still all of the shadow left in the warehouse for this monster to use. Just blowing it up won't do. It'd just heal itself again and again.
First and foremost, he needed to find a way to dispel the shadows. The shadow is the shortest when the light falls perpendicular to the object, right? He could try that, but how? He can't just conjure a big sun's imitation and hang it in the middle. That would just cause the objects on the edges to project much stronger and darker shades.
What if he conjures thousands upon thousands of miniature firefly-sized light spheres and spreads them evenly? That sounded good in his head. But would that even work, all those different sources creating different angles with different objects? What if it doesn't? He didn't exactly have the luxury for miscalculations. Issei groaned in his mind. God, he should've studied more.
Just as he was bashing ideas in his mind, despairing, watching the stray knit itself back together, Ddraig's helpful advice arrived, [Did you forget who you are?]
Issei rolled his eyes, 'Not right now, Ddraig!'
[I am not joking, partner.] He said in a grave voice, [You are the Red Dragon Emperor. My host. There is nothing in the world that you can't just power through.]
'Oh, off with the motivational dialogue, dimwit! I am dying here!!'
[Just torch everything.] He said plainly, [Break your arm and let my powers overflow.]
'What…' Issei was about to retort in his mind when he caught himself. That…actually sounded pretty reasonable. If he put fire to everything above and under it, would it still cast a shadow?
Surely not, right? And even if it did, it should be weak enough for Issei to clinch the victory.
The more he thought about it, the more convincing it sounded. Finally, the pressure of the clock won, and he decided to just go for it.
"AK-ckkcough…" He began to shout a warning to the girls, but all that came was a gargled nonsense. Yeah, those two have to do something themselves.
Finally, he looked up and made contact with the stray devil, whose face and body had almost healed, and gave a toothy and bloodied grin, "You think this fighting shit is entertaining, right?'
[BOOST]
Issei raised his left arm…
[BOOST]
…and waves upon waves of the purest form of draconic energy rolled off him…
[BOOST]
…the Stray cockroach felt something off and immediately blinked and made some distance between them, looking at him warily. Issei let him. It didn't matter…
[BOOST]
…he was going to burn. Everything within the barrier was going to burn. His extended arm twisted abnormally, unable to bear the sheer unadulterated power. And his vision blurred. Right, he was still bleeding….
[BOOST]
[BOOST]
…He'd forgotten about it momentarily, overcome by the excruciating pain of channeling one of the heavenly dragon's powers through his defective form. His feet wobbled…
[BOOST]
…The Stray Devil perhaps realized that maintaining distance was meaningless and decided to attack Issei. It teleported right before him and punched a hole through his heart.
[BOOST]
[BOOST]
…It didn't matter. He couldn't feel the pain over the burning sensation anyway. The blood pooling at his feet had already become a puddle; a little more was not going to change anything anyway.
His survival solely depended on whether or not the tear reached him in time. Issei grinned. He yanked the monster by the arm and headbutted him with all the power he could muster and whispered in a small voice, "Blazing… huff…inferno of… searing …huff…flames."
[Blazing inferno of searing flames.]
The last thing Issei saw before collapsing was the red briefly turning orange, and then the orange went black.
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Finally, 15k words! Woo🎉🎉