Chapter Fifty-Six

The wound might have only been a graze, but the bleeding gash had a corrupting energy that forced Harmony to shut off her sense of pain in that arm. As someone used to thinking through the pain, that was significant. Twisting around as she landed, her opponent waited.

"Impale you all, I'm going home! After I crush you, Harmony." Eric bragged.

So many mistakes. [Stride Before the Fall] wasn't ready yet. She'd lost her armor in that attack, having approached Eric only wearing the sealed Night and her new sickle in her hand. For that, all she had to do was wait a day and dress for the part before approaching the kid. Then there was getting fancy with [Final Silence]. That skill would be unavailable this fight, and was probably one of the deciding factors for the young man making this move.

Even more dangerous was the complete and utter disregard of the man as an opponent. Treating him as an afterthought was one thing, but combining that with never fully evaluating him before challenging him was another.

The first time she met Eric was in The Under; she'd dismissed him then due to temperament. Soul sight was in force, and she recognized two of his bonds: a quantum bond attached to a skill, and a pairbond with a streak of chaos in it. He had a good bit of body skills but seemed physically soft, carrying more weight than Tyler did at his heaviest and a head shorter.

While at camp, she never explored what his bonds were.

Hyacinth lept from Harmony's shoulder, shifting large as he did. "Groa…" he started to cry.

Two dozen vines burst out of the ground, nearly as thick as Tyler's arm, stretching more than three times Hyacinth's full length to wrap around and interrupt him mid croak. Not strong enough to strangle him, but he pushed, unable to break them.

Other than noting the stalemate, Harmony didn't have time to dwell on it. The pairbonded chaos item revealed itself.

Similar to Night, the item snapped into existence. The three-pronged weapon was unusual, with the center blade longer than the ones on the sides. It held so much chaos that the air warped around the tool. She imagined it had a longer reach than it physically displayed; a graze might happen a few feet away. Managing chaos was something she'd studied somewhat before she'd chosen to trade the [Chaos Seed] to Max for [Keen Investigative Awareness], and after his use of the skill nearly got her killed. It wasn't a pleasant effect to deal with.

Get out of those vines and let's go! Harmony pushed through her [Familiar Bond]. Eric's breaking the seals meant there was a clock on all this mess, and leading him on a chase while waiting for this to blow over would be best.

Can't! Hyacinth sent back in his rare use of words. The impression was that some magic was keeping him from shrinking and slipping away.

That changed everything. Couldn't rule out that Eric had planned for this situation. She'd fallen for his whiny and incompetent facade, hiding his strength and long-term plans. Everything wasn't a complete loss; having expected a possible fight with Princess Rose, she had plans for how to handle the energy called chaos. Hyacinth probably didn't, and he was closer to the man. Less than ten seconds after Eric had broken his seals, and now she'll be crossing weapons with him. With [Style and Grace], Harmony lunged back into the fray to get between Eric and her familiar.

At least she had brought a weapon to the meeting. It was good not to have made all of the mistakes. This was the time to lean into the violence that helped create the sickle. [Shadowed Graves] spread out to keep the man's attention on her. Let him fight without restraint.

Her weapon swung in to meet his, trusting her strength, and it caught the forked weapon and pushed it back a short bit. "A childish move, Eric."

Chaos surged through, altering the battlefield. Her weapon twisted shape in her hand, the curved blade rippling and bent. It was her blood. [Manipulate Dead] sought to keep it from completely losing shape. Entering the weapon, the chaos energy found a line to strike through, targeting her skill.

If this weapon was anything like Rosaline's arrow, it had the potential to change the skill temporarily or damage it. Having operated under the expectation of getting stabbed or shot by Rose's arrow, Harmony knew what to do. One plan for battle changed to help against a new foe.

Had to be quick about it. If this were her summoned copy from Max, she'd be able to eat it, but the lessons were still there, and that unwanted bond was the key. Hopefully, Saccerate would choke on it. Harmony accessed the oath Maxwell had made to her, ordering it with a command. Devour this chaos. The former knight might be glad to be rid of her, but he still needed the consequences of his mistakes, and she needed to live.

The amount of pull was surprising. She'd expected the need to guide the energy, but the bond pulled with almost the same viciousness it had when it first formed. Bits of her soul followed the chaos, and it ripped the chaos in her system away from its target, not enough to destabilize her, and nothing that led to permanent damage, but a wave of fatigue did fill her, and she found her knees buckling, and Eric leaning in to take advantage of the weakness as Max's bond was taking too much.

Too much might be good enough as the effect yanked her system clear and into the chaos from the man's weapon. Drawn into her, the need and craving were enough that she could see and feel the dangerous chaos being stripped out of the three-pronged blade. Eric's widening grin was unnerving, but only a second passed in the clash until the last of the energy was shoved into Max, and the bond closed. Eric took a step back at the shove Harmony delivered, with her strength returning. The effects of the chaos did not align with expectations.

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"Respect my domain," Eric announced. As the air shifted and [Shadowed Graves] spreading darkness flinched away as the book took control over the environment around him, boxing Harmony in and turning the shadow to a single point below and above her.

The weight and change around Harmony was familiar as she felt her skills locked inside her body, but it was a very poor imitation of the time in the Palace Tower when Maekus Von Trell froze her and a room of people. Compared to that, this was merely annoying and restricting.

It did come with the shimmer of a barrier in the distance. Eric's domain was more than a simple response to her managing the chaos. The rest of the tribe was starting to notice and move into action.

Tyler's maul crashed into the nearly invisible barrier. Most watched the battle with shock. Hyacinth was tied up, and no help was coming; her best skills were unavailable or hampered. Even if she broke her seals, there was no guarantee [Stride Before the Fall] or [Final Silence] would become available in time. At least there was a clock, and Eric was a talker. She could use that.

"You have an anger problem, Eric."

The young man, even past his first evolution, couldn't be that old, with the round face of youth, accentuated by his weight flushed red in anger. Harmony might have missed it if she wasn't looking Eric in the eye [Recall] let her catch that moment, a flicker of astral energy blinked in his head.

"Burn you! No, I don't."

Not enough to keep him talking and burning up time as he launched himself at her again. The ground exploded at his feet as he leaped at her.

That's a waste of energy, giving up so much for an impressive visual effect. It revealed the man's inexperience. [High Kick] was snide in its opinions. That didn't make the attack unproblematic. [Small Armor] worked with [Poise and Bearing] to shift her out of the obvious reach of the attack.

Eric's landing broke up rocks with his cratering impact, sending chunks into the air. He leaped again, pushing what advantage he had, kicking up more dirt as he did.

[High Kick] contributed to a slide as Harmony had [Cold Touch] create a slick of ice for her to skate away sideways.

Eric's domain constrained her skills, limiting them to the point where, unless she had her hand around the man's throat, there was no trusting her cold skill for any other use.

This was a messy situation. [Recall] clocked the fight at twenty seconds so far. Too bad she couldn't get him to monologue. The question was, could she keep it up for eighty more seconds? Breaking your seals kept you in for far too long, and how far could she stretch it against Eric's hidden power? On the man's third leap, he landed with a wobble and kicked up more dirt.

Harmony committed to cleaning up the problem he was causing her. She didn't respect him. Hiding his power. Using others. Disrespectful glances. He clearly had the strength that could have carried him further, but he let his anger be used against him. Time to see if that wobble was real or fake.

First was that nasty domain. [Shadowed Graves] was still burning light in a spot above her, constrained but pushing against it. As strong as Eric was unsealed, maintaining his domain and keeping the aspect that prevented Tyler, Loap, and any potential interference meant he had a choice to make when she chose to contest it. [Renew Spirit] shocked through her soul, recovering some and adding extra strength to her active skills, she timed it with a beat of her heart and flexing out with stamina. Darkness pulsed out, reinvigorated by the attention.

It was a small crack, but the sky ripped with shadows that extended just far enough to cover her opponent with a fresh hit of fear.

It was nice to be able to breathe again, but even better, she could now make Eric choke. He'd kicked up a lot of dirt in his wasteful attacks. Dirt was one thing she was very familiar with tidying up over the years, as workers and guests at Coodly Manor couldn't help themselves from tracking heaps of the stuff on busy days. [Dust] gathered the haze, and she moved in to attack.

The wall of brown slammed down into Eric. Harmony moved in to follow it. A sickly green energy flashed in the brown dust storm, and Harmony could feel her control over the particulates drop, causing her to dance back as corrupting energy ate the dirt. The same attack Eric started the battle with that left her arm feeling weak.

One skill battled against another. [Dust] won out, but the thin mist of dirt wasn't close to a choking hazard as it left Eric painted brown and blinking it out of his eyes.

Irritation would have to do. The man had countered so many of her skills that it was likely he'd planned this eventuality. It was time to add what he couldn't expect.

"Kneel!" The full force of her authority entered into her command. The last challenge had her practice again and again with the underused power granted by being a royal. Here, Eric's perspective will matter. Did he feel she had any rights to that prestige? Did being the leader of this little tribe grant her power over him?

He fought with a pained, dirt-cloaked grimace. But his knee did bend slightly.

That let her get within striking distance, but the same could be said for him. A skill echoed in Eric, and his three-pronged weapon shot out. Less a gamble and more a collection of lessons on how to tell a story of how this fight would be finished, Harmony let the fate she'd built up numbing her arm slip out. What had been [Ink Heart] changed the odds as she wrote the story of what would happen in this moment. His weapon would go where she wanted it, but not too far off. Again, her blood sickle intercepted the weapon, catching it as she twisted to lock it in place.

This was going to hurt. [Disintegrate] graced Harmony's fingers interacting with [Claim the Remains of Power], a barehanded strike. But she knew all about the violence of plunging her hand into a target. For this, she got up close and used her smaller size to strike Eric, just under his rib cage.

Harmony's hand went into his body. It was not about trying to steal a skill, but the added penetration and feel. She had to make sure. Chaos, the corruptive energy, all floated in his system. That bit of dark astral energy didn't seep off any skill as [Claims the Remains of Power] evaluated what was in Eric with the help of [Keen Investigative Awareness]. There, inside of Eric was a foreign interloper, thin chains attached to the young man's being.

As that evaluation was going on, Harmony's hand gripped Eric's heart, and she felt it beat in her palm. [Mend] was in reserve if this hunch failed, he could be a little dead, and she could revive him. Maybe. Right now, his life was in her hand.

Eric stared down at her. "Do you really think the dungeon rescues those who die here?" he asked softly. He sounded like a fat, whiny little kid, too used to getting his way and finally realizing his mortality. Maybe she wouldn't need to do this.

"I hope so," Harmony answered.

That is when the snake in the water reared its head, tightening inside Eric's system. Chains of astral energy stroked something in his head. Rage flashed in the boy's eyes. "You twisted necro weasel!" Skills were flaring up, too.

Harmony let her sharp nails, still lingering with [disintegrate], cut his heart to a stop and then held it still with a touch of [Cold Touch]. [Mend] was ready just in case to attempt a revival. The entirety of Eric snapped out of the Ascendant Games, leaving her with a bloody arm and rising anger.

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