Transgression

by Matthew Ashworth

  - “Right.” Lazarus confirmed.

  - “Cael, Ilana, you two know what to do.” Ethel finished off.

  - “Yes.” Both Cael and Ilana confirmed.

  The demons finally heard the approaching army and all paid attention to it. That was exactly what Ethel wanted, and it was their cue to initiate their surprise attack.

  - “Now!” Ethel alerted her team, and together with Lazarus and Balder jumped into the air and then sharply dived down towards their targets on the ground.

  Alastor and Eligos turned to face them at the very last moment, as if they felt them coming. However, by then they had no way of evading the attack. Balder successfully landed on Eligos, whilst Ethel and Lazarus simultaneously collided into Alastor and sent him stumbling backwards.

  - “Time for phase two.” She then said to Lazarus, who nodded in response.

  At that second Ethel sharply turned to her left and flew into the air towards Crocell. She could hear Cael and Ilana landing onto the ground behind her and was pleased that everything so far was working according to the plan. Before she even reached Crocell, the fallen angel took off into the air as well, and the two of them crashed into each other violently.

  The two of them recovered from the collision immediately and began duelling in the air, each one slashing with the blade at the other. After failing to hit the fallen angel with three consecutive strikes, Ethel went on defensive and began dodging the enemy’s attacks. Crocell then took a big swing in order to perform a more powerful strike. Ethel, however, created an energy shield at that instant and managed to stop the strike with ease. That then allowed her to parry the enemy’s attack and to kick Crocell down towards the ground.

  Crocell fell down with force, but got up straight away. Ethel landed on top of her, but was thrown to the side straight after. Crocell instantly pounced on Ethel and pinned her down, starting to repeatedly punch her in the face. Despite getting continuously clouted, Ethel collected some energy and quickly cast another shield. It stopped the next punch, allowing Ethel to kick her opponent backwards and off herself.

  She then hastily glanced to see if Adelais and Azrael were freed. To her relief they were. As planned, Lazarus was stalling Alastor, and Balder was having a fight with Eligos.

  - “Time for phase three!” she yelled to her friends as she flew up into the air to join them.

  Her allies seemed to have heard her and were about to react accordingly, but Crocell caught up with her at that second and grabbed her by the leg. Ethel noticed that, but by that stage Crocell pulled her back and threw her onto the ground. Ethel landed roughly, but managed to pull herself up rather quickly and to continue the fight with Crocell.

  - “Not so fast.” Said the fallen angel and then began swinging at Ethel with her sword once again.

  Ethel dodged the opponent’s sword slashes and continued to patiently wait for her turn to attack. Once she noticed a pause in between Crocell’s attacks, she thrust her curved blade at the foe and successfully stabbed her in the stomach. Crocell retaliated ferociously by grabbing Ethel by the throat and tried to bring her down to the ground, but Ethel resisted, before swiftly pulling her blade out. The defeated fallen angel let go off her and collapsed onto the ground.

  Ethel then briefly looked around to see if there were any other dangers nearby and then jumped back into the air to get back to her friends.

  - “Sorry about the delay. It’s time to pull out.” She spoke as soon as she landed by Cael and Ilana.

  However, at that instant Cael received an arrow from Buer in the chest. The arrow pierced through his armor and injured him greatly, causing him to fall to the ground. In response, Ethel hastily created an energy shield to protect herself and those close to her from further arrows. Ilana reacted quickly too. Since her ability was to heal, she began healing Cael right away. Cael pulled out the arrow from his chest with a grunt and let Ilana cast the spell. The wound he had was deep, but being healed right away could prevent him from passing on.

  Adelais and Azrael stepped closer to them all at that moment and got behind Ethel’s shield as well. Ethel scanned her surroundings one more time whilst holding onto the shield and screamed to Lazarus and Balder once again that they were ready to pull out.

  Cael was back on his feet in no time, and everyone now waited for Balder and Lazarus. They were facing incredibly formidable foes and so couldn’t just retreat on the spot. Azrael swiftly rushed to help Lazarus out as he was especially struggling. With a quick dash, Azrael pounced onto Alastor and forcefully knocked him onto the ground. That bought them some time, and both he and Lazarus retreated instantly. Balder too managed to create some distance between himself and his enemy at that stage and pulled back.

  - “Let’s go.” Azrael advised everyone, and the lot of them took into the air.

  The surrounding demons could no longer reach them, but the archers, including Buer, still continued shooting at them. Ethel made sure her shield protected them all from the arrows, but it was sustaining a lot of damage from those and was going to shatter at any second.

  Luckily for them that happened the moment they flew over the wall and back outside of the front yard. Soon they rejoined their army and were ready to continue the fight properly. At that very moment, however, they noticed another army entering the area from one of the other directions. The army seemed to be part of reinforcements for Pandemonium and it was led by Malakai.

  Azrael figured that it was best if he headed to the right hand side of their army, where Malakai was attacking from, and to help out his troops there. His squad – Adelais, Ethel, and Lazarus, followed right after him. It wasn’t long before they got to their desired location and were prepared to face Malakai and the troops that he led. Azrael could see anger on Adelais’ face. For that reason he knew to be careful and cautious. Adelais could charge at Malakai recklessly, what meant he’d need to quickly follow him and to help him out before he would get himself killed. To his surprise, although Malakai kept getting closer, Adelais wasn’t reacting. Aurora finally emerged from the army as well and was now walking side by side with Malakai. Her face looked very stern, unlike how she usually looked.

  - “Go do it.” They heard Malakai say to her, at which stage both him and her dashed forward.

  Malakai charged at Azrael in a hope to stop him from helping Adelais, whilst Aurora sprinted with all speed towards Adelais. Adelais lowered his guard as he got somewhat confused and didn’t want to hurt Aurora. The moment she reached him, she took off the ground and clashed into him. Whilst grasping him tightly, Aurora found herself still carrying on forward with great speed and momentum. Adelais didn’t seem to resist much. As a result, the two of them ended up falling down the hill to a lower area of the sector, disappearing from view of the others.

  Azrael caught a glimpse of that just before Malakai reached him, at which point they began fighting. Ethel and Lazarus were fighting close to their commander and helping out the other troops against the new army that just came in.

  - “Get ready to die, Azrael.” Malakai threatened him just before producing several vertical slashes in his direction.

  Azrael blocked those successfully and then kicked Malakai away, who fell onto the ground.

  - “I am disappointed with your attitude, Malakai.” Azrael replied here, “I see the ill influence of Pandemonium is already starting to affect you.”

  - “I don’t care about that. It makes me mightier than all of you, and that’s what counts.” Malakai retorted as soon as he got back up on his feet.

  Azrael did not bother continuing the conversation and instead continued the fight with a powerful axe swing. Malakai dodged his swipe and resumed attacking. Azrael kept a composed demeanour and decided to block all the attacks directed at him and to attack only at the right time. Although he managed to stay fully focused, he could not help but to wonder if Adelais would be all right by himself.

  Chapter 9

  Love and Anguish

  Adelais could feel Aurora�
�s tight grapple as they flew and rolled down the hill together. He was so confused that he really didn’t know what to do. Aurora’s sudden attack took him by surprise. When the two of them reached a seemingly empty area at the bottom of the hill, they came to a quick stop. Adelais got up first and backed away, not wanting to engage in attack. Aurora, however, got up sharply and drew her pike out whilst breathing out heavily. There was rage in her eyes.

  - “Aurora, what are you doing? It’s me.” Adelais tried to reason with her.

  Without giving any sort of reply, Aurora began approaching him slowly. Instinctively Adelais started to take some steps back. He wasn’t fearful of getting hit; he just didn’t want to give Aurora any opportunity to go mad and reckless. He knew very well that if this fight continued, she would be the one to get hurt the most of them two.

  However, Aurora got tired of approaching slowly and hence darted in his direction swiftly. Upon approach, she thrust her pike forward at him, forcing him to sidestep. Immediately after that she followed it up with an overhead diagonal swing. Adelais rolled out of the attack’s path with dexterity and got ready for the next strike. He refused to attack and hoped for Aurora to eventually get tired of attacking as well. She, however, continued to diligently swipe and stab at him, forcing him to dodge and back away continuously.

  - “What’s happened to you, Aurora? It’s unlike you to act this way.” Adelais attempted to talk to her again.

  Once again, she didn’t even respond to it in any way whatsoever, as if she barely even heard it. During one of her strikes, Adelais parried her attack and got closer so that he could grab and subdue her. She, however, shook out of his grasp violently and elbowed him in the face. The moment Adelais recovered from the hit, he saw her thrusting her weapon at him again. He barely dodged it and once again took a few steps back.

  Upon trying to subdue her a second ago, Adelais managed to catch a closer glimpse of her face, and in her eyes he didn’t see what he saw several interims ago. He did not see innocence and benevolence. This time she was full of hate. Her face was twisted and unnatural. He realised that maybe the demons did something to her, perhaps manipulated her mind. A mixture of emotions flooded him at that stage. He felt somewhat relieved that she wasn’t acting this way out of her own free will, but he was also saddened by what the forces of Pandemonium were causing to this kind-hearted, benevolent individual.

  He decided at that stage to stop backing away and to engage in a fight, but without actually directing his attacks at her. He thought if he could at least aggressively defend against her strikes, she would stop and give up. With the next swing Aurora attempted to perform, Adelais deflected it away with his blade, nearly throwing her off balance. Aurora, without giving up, attempted to hit him again. Once again he parried her attack with force, almost causing her to stumble over and fall.

  Aurora then dashed towards him suddenly and produced a quick kick. Adelais got lost there as he didn’t want to swing his blade at her and consequently got kicked in the face so hard that he ended up falling flat on his back.

  It was at that stage that two of the demonic warriors came from behind him and picked him up. One of them was holding his left arm, another holding his right. They were holding him very firmly to prevent him from getting out of their grasp. Now that he was stationary and unable to block or dodge any of the attacks directed at him, Aurora had a perfect chance to strike him down.

  - “Aurora, think about what you’re doing!” Adelais shouted at her, hoping she would snap out of this madness, “You are better than this!”

  Despite his words, Aurora bitterly readied her pike and then thrust it forward in order to stab it right in his torso. Adelais got charged up with energy by then and his reaction time drastically improved as it usually did when his special ability kicked in. As a result, he reacted incredibly fast to the stab. Just as the tip of the pike approached him, he brought his foot up swiftly and kicked the pike out of Aurora’s hands. As soon as he did that, he tossed one of the demon warriors over his shoulder and then sharply punched the other one.

  Whilst Aurora was retrieving her fallen weapon and the demons were stunned, Adelais picked his sword back up and got ready to face three individuals at once, except he didn’t care about the demon guards and was prepared to kill them.

  One of them took a swing at him almost right away, but Adelais evaded the slash successfully and sliced the demon guard across the torso straight after. The other guard got back up at that instant and tried to attack Adelais as well. Adelais stabbed his sword into him before that guard managed to finish his swing.

  Upon retrieving his blade back out, Adelais saw Aurora dashing at him again. He dodged her first attack and then parried the second one. All of his efforts to subdue her were only proving to be futile. He started getting angry, finding it hard to control himself. Nonetheless, a part of him continued to tell him that he cared for Aurora and didn’t want to hurt her.

  He didn’t even know whom to blame at this stage. Was it Malakai’s fault? Did he force Aurora to embrace the darkness? Maybe Malakai wasn’t at fault, but the demons were. He kept asking himself all these questions whilst Aurora was viciously attacking him. He wondered if she chose this path herself. It seemed unlike her, but he hadn’t known her for long. Maybe she had it in her to be that way.

  Aurora finally kicked him again, causing him to fall down. He realised this foolishness was going to go forever unless Aurora was stopped. The only way to stop her was to injure her. She wouldn’t cease attacking by herself. However, he didn’t want to injure her. He didn’t have it in him.

  Hastily he got back on his feet and attempted to reason with her one last time.

  - “Aurora, if you won’t stop this, I’ll have no choice but to fight back. Please don’t let me do this.”

  After a brief pause Aurora resumed attacking. Adelais parried her attack, then grabbed her with his off hand and gently tossed her onto the ground. She simply began getting back up to continue the fight.

  “What do I do? She wouldn’t give up. If I don’t do something, this will go on for a long time. She needs to be stopped. I just have to do it properly, without causing her too much harm. I have to do it. It’s my only choice.” Adelais kept thinking, feeling the turmoil inside of him.

  As soon as Aurora was fully up, she waited, trying to find a suitable method to attack. Adelais kept patiently standing on his position, waiting for her to perform her next swing. He had to be very watchful there and to make a decision in an instant. If he didn’t defend right, he could cause her more harm than intended. The moment Aurora took a step forward and swung, Adelais reacted swiftly and slashed her across the right arm with his blade. He made sure the hit was firm to disarm her, but not strong enough to dismember her limb.

  In a cry of agony, Aurora grabbed onto her wound and dropped to the ground. She kept clutching it tightly and screaming. Her screams pierced deep into Adelais’ soul, much more efficiently than her weapon ever could. He quickly rushed to help her up, but the moment he knelt down, Aurora shoved him away. He realised she was still in her trance and therefore wasn’t yet subdued. However, she stopped attacking and wouldn’t get either of them hurt from this point on.

  - “I am very disappointed with you, Aurora.” Adelais spoke coldly at that point, “You gave in to this madness. I actually thought you were strong.”

  - “Get away from me!” she suddenly yelled at him, “I don’t want to see you again! You only brought me pain!”

  Her words gave Adelais an excruciating chill all over and he was on a verge of ending his own existence. He felt guilt and hate taking him over.

  - “In that case, I will leave you in this abyss, just the way you want it to be. If you ever reconsider, I will welcome you with open arms, but as you are right now, I despise you.” Adelais stated bitterly, not knowing whether he even meant those words or just said them in a heat of a moment.

  Then he turned around and began making his way back up to help out his frien
ds. They still needed him and still cared for him. He wasn’t going to waste any more time on her. She no longer cared for him. She no longer even cared for herself. Trying not to look back at her, Adelais left, even though he was pretty sure he heard Aurora starting to weep moments before he finally took off into the air.

  Chapter 10

  Fight or Flight

  The big battle just outside of the front yard of the Den’s palace was still happening, and none of the sides could prevail over the other. Azrael was still fighting Malakai, whilst Ethel and Lazarus, along with many others, fought against the reinforcements Malakai brought to the sector and the demons which attacked initially.

  Some of the units from the Abyss that Malakai brought were very quick and agile shadow warriors. Azrael often noticed those try to attack him whilst he kept fighting Malakai. Nevertheless, his allies had him covered and made sure that the shadow warriors did not reach him.

  Very soon Azrael and those nearby heard Adelais’ shout coming from the distance. Both Azrael and Malakai turned in the direction of the sound and saw Adelais coming into the battle at full speed, looking enraged. Azrael was relieved to know that Adelais made it. Just as Adelais reached them, however, he charged straight for Malakai.

  - “Adelais, wait!” Azrael shouted to him.

  To his surprise, Adelais stopped in his tracks. He thought that Adelais would completely ignore his warning, but he didn’t this time. Within seconds Adelais backed a bit and joined his commander.