Chương 36: Chapter 35: A Proper Death

1, 200, 000 Will. That was the staggering sum of the Total Resonance Output radiating from the five overlapping fields surrounding Hephryx's body. Mathematically, that sheer volume of kinetic potential should place him a full tier above all Strategois. That is not the case, Elma realized, her eyes narrowing. His fields did not share the same hum, meaning they belonged to entirely different Resonance bands. He couldn't stack that volume of power into a single elemental output.

Still, the anomaly of housing five distinct affinities within a single body was terrifying. How did he do this? Behind him, four Alloys rapidly raised their weapons, leveling their blades directly at Silk.

"Master Lucien, order your guard to drop her weapon!" one of the Alloys barked.

"Silk, what the hell is the matter with you?" Lucien shouted, frantically grabbing her arm and trying to force it down to no avail.

"He is a guest of the estate! You cannot do this!"

"Stay back," Silk commanded. She violently shoved Lucien behind her, her blade never wavering.

"Answer my question," she hissed, her attention locked on Hephryx. Hephryx let out a long, exaggerated sigh and looked past her to Lucien.

"She is treating you like this? Did Lady Nina not instruct you on the proper rules of interaction regarding this unit? You never let her form an opinion." Hephryx brought his fist down into his open palm in a show of theatrical anger. His gaze shifted back to Silk.

"I have suffered a lot of disappointments lately. I never thought you would be one of them."

"Answer me!" Silk shouted. Elma watched her sister in deep confusion. Silk's emotional restraint was completely fracturing. What was the matter with her? Hephryx seemed to finally register Elma's presence. His gaze drifted to her, then snapped back to Silk.

"You draw your blade at an unsafe distance around the young Lady? You really do need... reform," he purred, a dark, unsettling grin spreading slowly across his face. The air warped in front of him. A thick, dark, gooey substance materialized, condensing into a floating, viscous sphere. Dozens of thin, needle-like black tendrils began to slither and spread outward from it. Is this Bio Resonance? Elma wondered. Silk's eyes blew wide for a fraction of a second. She hadn't known her creator was a Resonant, either.

Dropping her center of gravity, she locked into a defensive stance. The black tendrils shot forward like vipers. Fission: Pyroclast. The roaring inferno engulfed Hephryx, instantly incinerating the dark tendrils and blowing the Alloys and the heavy double doors of the manor straight out into the yard. Silk glanced down at Elma with a stark note of shock, the green light reflecting off her armour. Elma tightly closed her fist, cutting off the thermal output.

With an instinctive gesture of her other hand, she summoned a strong gust of wind, aggressively venting the thick black smoke and dust outside to rapidly assess the damage. The scorched aftermath revealed itself. A shimmering, translucent sphere—an electromagnetic field? —completely covered the space where Hephryx was standing. Spectro. The sphere dissolved, revealing Hephryx standing perfectly unblemished in the center of the blast radius.

A deeply annoyed smile twitched on his face as the pools of molten rock cooled rapidly around his boots.

"You even made friends—" Hephryx started to say. Silk shot forward. The kinetic displacement of her launch blew Elma off her feet. Silk slammed into Hephryx, but he caught her charge with two razor-sharp, spider-like limbs jutting from his back. They collided with a thunderous crack, then blasted completely through the scorched door frame, their bodies dissolving into a blurring flurry of rapid exchanges. They left the manor, taking the fight into the open grounds.

"Damn it," Lucien cussed, punching the stone wall.

"That goat headed, stubborn girl." Elma hit the floor, rolled instantly, and wove four water auxiliaries. Bracing them against the ground, she quickly propelled herself after them. As Elma sprinted out of the shattered manor doors, Silk's airborne form nearly crashed directly into her. Silk twisted her trajectory at the last microsecond to evade the toddler.

She slammed into the ground, burying her blade deep into the earth to ease her momentum, but the force still carried her until she crashed heavily against the walls. Elma looked ahead, squinting against the sudden glare. High above, the three suns were nearing their convergence point in the sky, washing the estate in bright light. She lowered her gaze to Hephryx. Four massive, segmented spider legs were anchored to his back, lifting his body high off the grass.

Hephryx smiled smoothly, noting the mechanical similarity between their constructs before she even fully processed it.

"I like your thinking, young Lady. But I genuinely cannot understand why you fired at me like that. I mean you no harm." Elma did not answer him immediately. She maintained an unblinking eye contact with him long enough to cause a flicker of confusion behind his smile.

"Then stop attacking Silk."

"I did not attack her," he replied, feigning innocence.

"She drew her blade first. I was simply attempting to fix her. No harm to her was ever intended—" Fission: Slag Rounds. Hephryx opened his palm, weaving more of the dark, gooey substance in front of him. With a sharp clench of his fist, he instantly condensed the material into a massive pane of diamond. The green orbs detonated violently against the shield, failing to leave a single scratch on its surface. He casually waved the smoke away, dropping the diamond shield to reveal that same forced, condescending smile.

He noted Elma's intense stare locked onto the black residue lingering in the air.

Indulging her curiosity, he wove more of it.

"You do not know what this is?" The dark substance swirled lazily above his open palm.

"It is a temporary copy of the remains of our creator. The fundamental matter from which all life stems. Today, scholars call it Charbo."

So it is Bio Resonance. Silk suddenly flashed to Elma's side, her armor battered.

"Go back inside now!" she shouted at the toddler. Elma ignored the command completely, her green eyes rigidly fixated on the swirling material in Hephryx's hand. This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

"It is the only material Bio Resonants can weave," Hephryx continued, adopting the tone of a lecturer.

"They usually require assistance from other Resonants, or specific environmental conditions, to achieve what I'm about to show you." Water, alongside other Flow variants Elma didn't immediately recognize, suddenly materialized in his left hand. Simultaneously, dense minerals and fine Geo elements aggregated in his right. He brought his hands together. The elements flowed in perfect synchronization, merging into the swirling mass of Charbo.

"But even then," Hephryx whispered, his smile stretching to a terrifying width.

"They would never be able to be as good as me." The swirling mixture began to rapidly mutate, transmuting into a dense, buzzing cloud of glowing fireflies. They swarmed outward, their abdomens rapidly flaring with lethal thermal instability. They were about to detonate. Elma's hands snapped up. Barometric Coffin. The swarm froze, detonating at a safe distance. Silk didn't wait for the light to fade. She launched herself directly at Hephryx, her blade trailing a lethal silver arc. Hephryx merely smiled.

He raised his hand, weaving raw gravel and water. The elements mixed in mid-air, swirling into a thick slurry that slammed into Silk mid-leap. The wet concrete engulfed her track, hardening almost instantaneously and trapping the guard inside a massive boulder in the sky. Before gravity could even pull the heavy sphere to the earth, Hephryx wove a volatile cloud of black powder keg directly over its surface. A single spark from his finger ignited the dust.

The resulting explosion shattered the concrete and threw Silk backward across the grass, taking her out of the equation. Elma retaliated by unleashing a chaotic barrage of Water Drills and Slag Rounds. The combined attacks formed an inescapable wall of projectiles tearing straight toward him. Hephryx vanished. The wall of projectiles tore uselessly through empty space. Void, Elma screamed internally. The pressure warped directly behind her.

Hephryx materialized smoothly from the void, reaching a hand out to grab Elma's shoulder. But his fingers only met a sudden flash of green light. Hephryx's smile faltered. His eyes suddenly blew wide. A sickening crunch echoed through the clearing. A Water Drill punched cleanly through his back, erupting violently from the center of his chest in a spray of blood. Standing directly behind him, Elma slowly lowered her raised hand.

Hephryx coughed violently, thick, dark blood spilling from his mouth and splattering against the grass. He stood still for a long moment. High above, the three suns finally locked into their convergence point. A blinding, unified light washed over the estate, momentarily easing the frantic rhythm of Elma's breathing. The harsh illumination threw the damage into sharp relief—the gaping hole punched cleanly through her creator's torso was unmistakably fatal. A cold, small smile carved its way across Elma's face.

This momentary agony was absolutely nothing compared to the decades of systematic torture he had subjected her to. But at least she was able to give him a sample— Then, the shredded edges of flesh and bone began to shift. The massive hole in his chest was slowly knitting itself closed. He can heal himself, Elma realized, letting out a sharp gasp. Bio Resonance seemed hard to use but it's extremely versatile when wielded by an expert. Good. Her green eyes widened.

I was only just getting started— A sudden, blinding spike of pain drove straight through her skull. Elma collapsed to the ground, her equilibrium shattering as a crippling dizziness washed over her. Above, the solar convergence broke, plunging the yard back into uneven, shifting light. Slowly, Hephryx turned around. His smile was completely gone, replaced by a mask of raw, unfiltered rage. Elma opened her mouth to pull in air, but her lungs seized. She couldn't breathe. Something… in the air.

She lay flat on her back in the damp grass, her small chest heaving in a suffocating panic. Hephryx loomed over her, a towering shadow blocking out the sky.

"You wretched little thing," he hissed, the venom in his voice thick.

"You have completely pushed your luck. You should have been dead a long time ago." He lowered his frame, crouching directly over her paralyzed form, and leaned in to whisper directly into her ear.

"Tell me... how did you survive that stab? How?" He knew about it, Elma's mind raced, even as a high-pitched, deafening ringing filled her ears. The assassination attempt. He knew about it. Hephryx clenched his fist, his knuckles cracking— A sudden, blinding golden light engulfed the clearing. It was a suffocatingly radiant warmth. Elma's vision completely whited out, but the paralyzing grip on her lungs instantly shattered. She gasped, frantically pulling the newly purified air into her burning chest.

Whatever toxic, anomalous pressure Hephryx had woven into the atmosphere had been completely overwritten. The intense illumination held for few intense seconds before abruptly snapping out of existence. Elma blinked rapidly, her green eyes wide as she processed the sudden devastation. She was sitting in the epicenter of a localized apocalypse. The surrounding damp grass had been instantly reduced to a trail of drifting gray ash. Pockets of fire flickered through the heavy, lingering smoke.

Through the haze, the heavy clicking of metal boots on scorched earth approached her. Valerius stepped through the curtain of smoke. His massive frame radiated lethal intent, his heavy solar sword drawn and aggressively glowing with the remnants of that same golden light. Elma's mind stalled. Had he attacked her? Or had he targeted Hephryx? Why was she completely unharmed while the entire environment had been incinerated? A dry, wet cough echoed from the dirt behind her. Elma turned her head.

Hephryx had been utterly devastated. His elegant, towering form had been reduced to a shriveled, blackened husk of scorched flesh and smoking bone. The ruined creature staggered, attempting to push itself upright. Valerius crossed the distance in a single step, grabbing the charred man by the throat and violently slamming him back down into the ashen ground. Valerius raised his glowing sword high with his right hand, preparing to cleave the scientist's skull in two.

"I didn't... attack her... Valerius," Hephryx managed to rasp through a ruined, heavily blistered windpipe.

"He speaks the truth, my Lord! The young Lady and Master Lucien's guard are the one who attacked him first." one of the battered Alloys shouted, stumbling out from the perimeter where Elma's thermal blast had previously blown them. The rest of the surviving patrol quickly gathered behind him in defense of the guest.

"Still," Valerius growled, his voice dropping.

"You attacked back."

"We still need him, Lord Valerius." Nina was suddenly standing at the edge of the blast radius, her presence as quiet and pragmatic as ever. Valerius held the lethal execution stance for a long, tense second, his bright orange eyes burning into Hephryx's ruined face. Finally, with a heavy grunt of disgust, he hurled the charred scientist out of the ash trail and onto a surviving patch of untouched grass. Elma watched in morbid fascination.

The moment Hephryx's blackened flesh made contact with the soil, the green grass rapidly melted, transmuting into that same dark goo. The Charbo absorbed directly into his ruined body. His blackened skin instantly sloughed off, replaced by fresh tissue. Even his black feather coat stitched itself back together from the surrounding carbon until he looked exactly as he had upon his arrival. Valerius stepped over to Elma.

The lethal golden edge of his blade flickered out, leaving only the massive crimson hilt strapped across his upper back. His terrifying aura vanished, instantly replaced by parental concern.

"Are you okay, little jewel? Did he hurt you?" he asked, dropping to one knee beside her.

"I am not hurt," Elma stated, quickly calculating her optimal narrative.

"It was I who initiated the attack against him. I thought you said he was the one who sent the killer." Valerius stared at her for a second before throwing his head back and laughing loudly, completely unfazed by his toddler's attempted murder of a state guest.

"Hahaha! Of course you did! But we don't know that for sure yet. If it was him, then we will deal with him properly. Come on." He reached down and hoisted Elma into his massive arms. Resting against his armored shoulder, Elma kept her face blank. Hephryx knew she had been stabbed, something even Valerius did not know. There were only so many ways he could have learned that, and none of them reflected well on him. The more she thought about it, the more certain she became that Hephryx was connected to what happened.

Whether he had planned her assassination or simply knew more than he should have, it still meant he was involved. Elma tightened her grip against the gold of Valerius' armor. That alone was enough to place him on her list. She would make sure he received the attention he deserved. She pivoted the interrogation.

"What took you so long to intervene?" Valerius cleared his throat, suddenly looking highly uncomfortable.

"Well, we were warned by your mother that you would most likely be physically fighting the new maid today. She strictly ordered us not to interfere." Elma's eyes narrowed dangerously.

"We thought the explosions were just from you two fighting!" Valerius added defensively.

"You allowed that deranged woman to be assigned to me?" Elma hissed, her voice dipping into genuine anger.

"It... it was your mother's call!" Valerius stammered, frantically looking around for a distraction. His eyes locked onto the scientist.

"Look! He's healed!" he announced loudly, pointing at Hephryx with the forced enthusiasm of someone pointing out a bird to a distracted child. Hephryx stood up smoothly, elegantly dusting off the lapels of his freshly regenerated coat. He offered a polite, immaculate bow.

"I did not expect this level of hospitality after such a long travel." Valerius's eyes narrowed.

"Huh? Are you questioning our hospitality?" he shouted.

"Of course not," Hephryx smiled smoothly, though his dark eyes flicked to Elma with a lingering, venomous promise.

"It hasn't truly started yet, has it?"