A World of Darkness

After carefully checking the entrance for traps, Amun gave Josabelle the go ahead to enter the structure, following himself after spotting from behind for any opportunistic strikes. It was certainly a little beyond what one might expect from a government facility inside, though clearly this one was militarily focused. It was lined to the high ceiling with various types of weaponry, ranging from guns to some rather advanced looking powered armor as well as a number of monitors and holograms which seemingly served to give the status of many of the armaments. A lot of it was damaged in some way with many towering shelves knocked down and more than a few of the screens and projections sparking or flickering, but a number of things remained pristine in the dim blue glow of the of the innumerable screens. 

It was then Amun saw it. In a bit of the clearing in the middle of the room was a figure, perched upon a stack of metal, deformed through melting or other means into some sort of a chair. Quite an ominous lead in, but it fit the bill. Indeed it looked like a standard fare sort of demon, but if he knew one thing in this business, it was not to trust things at face value. Josa seemed to see it too because she looked to him and nodded, gesturing towards the catwalk. Amun nodded in return before quietly heading to a ladder, figuring at this point that attempting to lock in this monster was pointless. The best he figured he could do was to hide himself while looking for a weak point and to step in if she got in a pinch.

Josabelle stepped forward into the open, being sure she revealed herself to the creature in front of them. “So, this lady’s been saying you’ve been a bit of a shit lately. I’d ask what your deal is, but honestly, I don’t care.” The figure simply sat unmoving atop her throne, refusing to even acknowledge the imp’s presence. “Guess it would be wrong to come here though without offering some sort of gift.” She raised her spear to the sky, steadying her spear arm with her other and narrowed her eyes. As she concentrated, crackles of thunder could be heard in the midst. “Fulgar Magnam!” she shouted as she let the spear down like an axe, pointing it directly to her opponent. A magnificent bolt of lightning simultaneously crashed through the ceiling, shattering glass upon and striking the target head on. Even from afar, Amun had to admit she’d made an impressive show of strength. As if in slow motion after getting struck, the currently smoky looking figure opened its angry, scarlet eyes and stood up, some of the smoke parting to reveal an unnaturally large and curved red grin as a red substance, perhaps blood, began falling through the smoke to its feet.

“No bullets this time? That’s fine, but I won’t hold back my own. My turn~” it said in a distorted, feminine voice as its eyes shot fully open, dripping the same fluid as the rest of it. In a rapid series of motions, the smoke split into a wall of numerous tiny bullets. Amun’s eyes widened. Normally, these things were limited to becoming other living things and took a fair bit of time to even change into those, much less splitting itself into multiple versions of something. This not only changed into an insane amount of individual entities, but inanimate ones at that. ‘You better be careful out there…’ he thought to himself as he turned his eyes towards the winged combatant.

The hail of bullets stood still for a moment before rapidly shooting towards Josa’s direction. Amun crouched and shielded himself, only able to observe as his comrade flew expertly weaving forward through the projectiles, rolling about in the air as if dancing towards something he couldn’t quite see. After a moment, he realized she was going in for the kill on what seemed to be an almost invisible sphere behind the bullets, still dripping slightly. In a particularly impressive display, Josa kited the bullets around in a loop before diving directly down into the sphere and thrusting her spear directly into it with a lightning coated blow. She was rewarded with a geyser of the blood which she managed to mostly skirt with just a spatter landing on her cheek as she retreated. 

The monster wasn’t done yet though. As Josa flew off, it transformed again into an ifrit, giving a terrifying roar as it belched a number of balls of magma into the air before transforming yet again into a Chenoo, screeching as it threw out its arms and froze most of the surfaces in the immediate area within a flash. Josa shielded herself from the wave of ice with her lightning just before it reached her before diving down to the floor and beginning to skate along it. She guided herself with her spear on the ice as the monster quickly reverted to the previous form and began bombarding her with lava yet again. As she closed in, she made a spinning dive between two balls of the molten rock before gouging out the eye of the ifrit and singed a trail through its face with her lighting as she yanked it up through its face. 

    The monster gave an incredible howl of pain as it clutched its eye socket, staggering Josa just a bit with its incredible volume, and giving it the chance to slash at her with its right claw. Just as it would have hit her, a large shadow formed between the two and shot up into the air, walling off the girl just long enough for her to escape. The bleeding ifrit threw its arms to the side and laughed, before deciding to inform them with its booming voice “So, you wish to fight as well, do you, boy? Then let’s make this an even fight!” No sooner had it made this proclamation than an orb of liquid seemed to form and split from the monster like a cell division. 

The ifrit reared its horns and began to charge down Josabelle in a rage as the other form shifted into… a fighter jet?! Amun leaped to the side and rolled to avoid the craft’s collision in a brilliant burst of flame into the catwalk. From the smoke, a reaper appeared, brandishing the scythe that the species had become synonymous with using with its lifeless eye sockets filled with ethereal flames. However Amun was ready. With unnatural speed, he lunged forward and snapped the scythe in half against his opponent’s skeletal chin before kicking his opponent into the air only to catch up with a jump and greet it with his fists as he slammed them into its skull, cracking it as the creature was slammed down into the partly broken catwalk below and warping it further downward with his crash. Amun let gravity help a bit more and brought his foot down onto the monster with a horrific smash which sent it crunching into the shelves below, bouncing between them on the way down. Amun gripped the railing of the broken path as he responded to his opponent “Sorry pal, but if you expected a weakling observer, then you’re sorely mistaken.” 

‘This thing is no joke, but it’s just not possible for it to keep this insanity up too long. It must be destroying its transforming like this...’ he thought as he glanced over to check on his partner. He watching momentarily as she thrust her spear to the ground only to chain herself to it with magic and use her momentum to kick the ifrit before recalling the spear to her hand with the her thunder chain and jab it into the monster a few times. Just as Amun turned back and began to swing himself up onto a stable bit of the walkway, a massive magma orb came shooting up from below. It was all he could do to shield himself as best he could with his shadows and to let himself be launched across the room. The massive impact melted and destroyed the less heated parts of where he was hanging as he himself was shot clear over to the other fight, right at Josabelle. With quick reflexes, she kicked and diverted the trajectory upwards, killing most of the momentum and giving him a chance to land. Amun shifted himself to land at her 6, facing the second ifrit with his back to hers. 

“What was that about you not being a weakling observer?” asked the cocky imp despite the dire situation with a slight smile. “Now isn’t the time, did you notice they’re in the same form now have ceased transforming so much?” replied Amun, as he straightened into a defensive stance. He continued “They’re not even attacking right now. They’re trying to overwhelm us with raw force, but they’re getting weaker themselves.”

“That’s great and all, but do you actually have a plan?!” asked the imp, getting impatient as the two monsters approached and seemed to be charging up attacks. Amun thought fast, a bit nervous himself before noticing a long wire on the ground and smirking. As the demons shot their magma shots, Amun yanked and ripped the cable off the ground before slicing it at the other end. “Give me your spear!” he yelled as he ran along the wall in an effort to dodge the volleys spewing at him. “What?! Why that of all things?!” asked Josa in confusion as she flew through her own enemy’s barrage. “Just do it and start charging a lightning strike!” screamed Amun as he flipped about, playing an increasingly literal game of ‘the floor is lava’. “I swear, if you lose it…” she mumbled before starting her chanting, tossing it as carefully as she could to Amun’s outreached hand across the room. 

Amun made a massive leap as he caught the spear, quickly wrapping the wire end to end around the spear in his air time. As he reached the ceiling, he positioned his feet to hit it and shattered it as he kicked off towards the more injured transformation. The bulky creature had little it could do as Amun came down and embedded the spear down halfway through the creature’s torso. “NOW!” he yelled as he leaped away. Josabelle proceeded to release her spell causing her now massively electromagnetic spear to pull down all of the massive steel shelves in the immediate area of the monster as well as their goods directly onto it. Mighty as it might have been, the sheer mass and resulting force was enough to pulverize about any creature quite well. The creature’s magma blood spurted all about forcing Amun and Josa to move lest they fall to an accidental last stand from the creature. 

As life faded from one, the other screeched an incomprehensible roar. Both monsters began to fade back to smoke before joining together in the center of the cleared area. However this time instead of the earlier smoke figure, a pure white maiden of impeccable beauty appeared before them. With her lustrous form and great white wings, one could only describe her upon first glance as angelic. And yet, in this new form, an eerie, disturbing aura arose. The previous incarnation felt like nothing compared to this. It drowned out the senses in a way Amun could only see as terrifying. As the woman opened her blood red eyes and smiled as tears of blood began to stream down her face, he began to understand why.