The violent clash between Valan and Nikolai continues, their blows destroying half the floor and pillars with each brutal clash. Nikolai’s deford beast claws dripped with the dark blood of Valan, the undead Great Elder.
’It’s amazing how strong his body is.’
"Fuck, the fact you’re dead is cheating!"
Valan stood opposite him with his blades extended in front and neon green veins shining across his torn, pale flesh. He took a deep breath, despite no longer needing air and exhaled a dark, purple mist.
"Tsk, what do you an. In battle one should used everything in their arsenal!"
"... Pretentious prick." Nikolai wiped the blood from his cheek while controlling his unstable breathing. ’We’ve been fighting for at least ten minutes.’ He knew that his stamina couldn’t last at this pace, and he either needed to go all out or change the pace.
"Why do you speak such foul words? Volkov. It’s unbecoming of people of our standing!"
Each ti Nikolai mocked or insulted Valan, he’d retort or speak with an elegant twist as if trying to one-up him. Although it should be annoying, Nikolai couldn’t help but smile more, wanting to shut his arrogant mouth.
He found this fight exhilarating.
Punch for punch.
Kick for kick.
Blade for blade.
Claw for claw.
Their movents grew faster as the energy used increased. Both n wanted to defeat the other, but neither wanted this battle to end. Valan’s half-sliced lips twisted into a deford smile, a once handso master now pale, full of scars and wounds.
Shhhhhhhhnk, fwoomph!
Nikolai dragged his claws across the ground, creating a burst of crushed stone and sparks before slashing across the air, creating an arc of black fire.
"You!?"
Valan clasped both hands together and dove at Nikolai. He abandoned defence, penetrating through the flas with both blades, tearing through the danger and ignoring the deep wounds across his shoulders from Nikolai’s claws.
’Damn!’
"Shit...!?"
Thud, shhhnk!
His sudden attack knocked Nikolai back, the sharp blades almost stabbing his neck. Nikolai rolled back with one claw, dragging in an arc across the ground.
"To think you’d avoid that..." Valan flung forward, staggering from his sudden attack. He glanced back at Nikolai, with both arms hanging low. The wounds across both shoulders were deep enough to reveal his bones.
"Oi, you... What’re those symbols on your bones?" Nikolai spat, adjusting his posture.
"Hm? Oh, these."
Valan cracked his neck back into place, the flesh quickly healing, then did the sa with each arm, but the speed and radiance of his veins diminished each ti.
"Well, Volkov. Just think of them as shackles that keep sane."
’What’s this guy talking about?’
Nikolai shook his head and blew out, the heavy air and tension almost fading from his body, as he closed his eyes for a mont. "I’m going all out." His veins tightened, slowing the flow of blood as it mixed while his muscles bulged, and bones creaked.
"I see, finally." Valan smirked, his tone a little sarcastic.
Yet his eyes shone brighter. "Then let follow in kind, witness the Nosferatu Blood Arts!"
Valan ford a combat pose, his blades held high with both eyes closed, almost identical to Nikolai as the green veins inside him began to swell, bubbling with a bright coloured ichor as their surface split.
Wooosh!
A swirl of neon green light enveloped Valan.
A burst of black fire devoured Nikolai, as fur and fangs grew larger.
Valan’s broken body, tightened and condensed, his muscles regrowing, flesh taking on more colours with a blond hue dying his hair.
Nikolai grew to seven feet tall, his thighs and arms doubled in size. With his complete transformation, a seething fla burned inside him as black smoke seeped from the gaps in his teeth.
Their aura enveloped the entire tower.
The density was as if sothing tangible, like rain, as their aura rained down from the top floor.
"Well, You’re certainly one to surprise a man." Valan’s voice sounded human, his eyes no longer cold and dead; he looked normal apart from the bone blades growing from his arms and shoulders. "It’s my honour to et the current patriarch of the Volkov household. I am Valan Nosferatu, forr heir apparent."
No one could deny Valan’s elegance and noble education. Even Nikolai, who despised his existence because of the past.
anwhile, Nikolai, a beast of overwhelming aura, strength and ferocity, maintained his reason and dignity in his current form.
"No, the surprise is mine. Valan Nosferatu." Nikolai’s feral voice rumbled through the air as an ancient horn of war. His claws, like swords, danced through the air. He watched the man opposite him, neither rushing to attack. "It is my honour to fight soone as strong as you."
"I see."
Valan glanced up at Nikolai’s towering figure, his smile different.
’Well this is strange.’
Nikolai shifted to the side, then shot forward with both claws dug into the ground, dragging behind him, creating a path of black fire.
Valan propelled him forward with the tap of his foot. He moved both blades like a seasoned fencer and twisted around Nikolai’s strike.
Clang, Shhhhing!
Two bone blades t several black claws, the force blowing both n off the ground as green light t black fire. Their movents like shooting stars, gleaming green blades cutting and arcing at the shadowy beast. While black claws tore the surroundings, pushing the undead to the limit.
"Damn it!"
"Grrrr!"
Boom!
Nikolai’s leg smashed into his abdon, sending the undead flying. He stabbed both blades into the floor to slow his movent. But the werewolf chased him down, and with a second kick, the necromancer’s right blade shattered.
"!?"
A look of shock spread on Valan’s face as Nikolai’s claw swung upwards, tearing through his abdon like a sword through pudding.
Shhhh!
Blood spurt from the wounds, almost comically, but the undead’s pale face showed no humour.
"How frustrating."
Valan didn’t retreat and threw himself into Nikolai’s next strike, letting the remaining bone blade carve across the beast’s collarbone while his free hand ramd forward like a spear.
Crack!
His fingers pierced Nikolai’s side. Flesh split, ribs flexed, black fire gushed out like steam from a ruptured engine. Nikolai roared, grabbed Valan’s wrist, and crushed bone in his grip before tossing him aside.
"Gh—!"
Valan smashed into the wall with a groan. His body fell with a low thud. He dropped to the side after his body destroyed the wall with a deep crack. There wasn’t any movent as Nikolai stepped towards him slowly.
"You’ll die if you don’t avoid this..." Nikolai’s voice lacked tone.
He lifted his claw high above his head and, without waiting, swung it down.
Fwooom!
Valan twisted away, his shattered arm hanging uselessly, ichor leaking in thin streams. His abdon was still split open, organs half-regrown and half-lting under the residue of Nikolai’s fire. The elegant calm on his face cracked for the first ti, a strange expression that made Nikolai hesitate for a mont.
"You... You’re really... a monster," Valan muttered, with a bitter cough.
Nikolai stepped forward, claws dragging furrows in the floor. "You’re one to talk."
"Heh!"
They clashed again.
Each collision blurred the edges of the room, shockwaves punching holes through the walls. Valan’s technique carved trenches through Nikolai’s hide; Nikolai’s raw power battered Valan’s body into a collapsing, twitching shape that refused to fall.
Finally, Valan staggered, one knee buckling as his right arm began to dissipate into ashes.
"Tsk... not yet," he rasped.
A regretful tone, his eyes that shone with life pierced into Nikolai’s. "Forgive , for everything. We couldn’t go again him..."
"W-What?" He then noticed the black marks fading from his bones; the more they faded, the more human Valan beca. "Y-You, don’t tell !?"
"Haha, so you notice, as expected from our eternal rivals. Well, it’s a secret, so don’t spread it. Okay, you damn mutt!"
’To think that the Nosferatu use a strange magic to control even the heir...’
Nikolai leaned down, at least to watch as Valan crumbled into dust. In this short but arduous fight, he’d gained sothing deeper: the knowledge and ability to use his aura, to mix the gifts from each of his wives into one.
But he didn’t enjoy this ending.
Nikolai lood over him, steam rolling off his massive fra.
"Then stand up. I’m not finished."
Valan’s eyes shone with vibrance, his lips trembling as they curved into the annoying, sarcastic smirk he used to mock Nikolai earlier.
"I’d love too!" He planted his remaining hand against the floor, muscles trembling as he forced his broken body upright.
Crack.
"Ah... well, a sha."
Sothing shattered. His eyes widened, pupils shrinking to pinpoints as the neon veins across his chest shattered like glass. A sharp gasp left his lips before his entire torso collapsed into ash.
A fractured green orb clattered free of the dissolving ribcage, bounced once, twice, then rolled to a stop against Nikolai’s foot while still faintly pulsing with the last trace of Nosferatu sorcery.
"Eh?"
Nikolai reached for the orb.
Shatter!
The orb exploded the mont his claw touched it.
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