Page 371 of Light Leech

Sha was already on top of his wave but flew towards me before returning to attack CarNin.

I stood my ground, hoping he or Ralia within him would have some solution to prevent our approaching demise. I couldn’t help but be disheartened by the scoreboard.

Heaven’s General Sha of the Journeymen: Fourteen.

Boarrior of the Journeymen: Nineteen.

Chucarrier the Nihilist: Thirty-six.

CarNin eyed us with a poisonous grin. She took slow steps towards us, gnashing her teeth as we locked eyes.

I looked at Sha, seeing if he and Ralia had any new solution. He rode towards me on his wave and stopped at my side with CarNin still approaching at a steady pace.

“The hound cannot endure much longer,” Sha said. There was no hint of Ralia’s spunk. He pointed to the scoreboard.

Chucarrier the Nihilist: Thirty-five.

“It lost a point without us dealing a wound,” Zhu noted.

Sha nodded. “The plagued fiend is not meant for glory.”

He reached out. I took his hand and stood atop the wave without sinking.

We soared towards the hound, then took a sharp right to avoid its bite just as it was coming down on us. We weaved beneath it and around its legs, striking at the tendons in its legs without respective weapons. Just before attacking the final leg, it kicked back, taking an awkward fall to knock us off of the wave and onto the edge of the arena.

Sha split his wave, giving half to me as he stood on the other. We remounted, having taken only two points of damage, and soared towards CarNin on opposite sides.

The waves crashed on CarNin’s head, smashing the sides together and breaking its jaws with the force of the light-infused wave.

I stood and stopped my wave in awe, looking at the creature as it decayed more each second. Flesh receded. Muscles atrophied. The cracks in the visible bones stretched like glass under pressure.

Sha stole the might from my wave and crashed into CarNin with twice the might, tossing the hound off of the edge.

He glanced at me before the hound returned to the plain. “Can you finish it?”

I checked the scoreboard.

Heaven’s General Sha of the Journeymen: Thirteen

Boarrior of the Journeymen: Eighteen.

Chucarrier the Nihilist: Fifteen.

I waited for the hound to drop back onto the field before saying, “Why? What are you going to–”

“I asked if you could finish it, not if I could explain myself. Answer now.”

“Yes. I believe I can.”

Sha nodded and jumped on a summoned wave. He soared off the edge of the field but did not fall into the abyss. He continued to the second field and began slaying the other competitors’ legends who still waited commands in their turn-based form of the game.

It was a slaughter.

CarNin ran for me on semi-healed legs. Her limp did not tame her fury. While she was injured and continually dying, I was not exempt from failure.

I gripped my staff with furious tenacity, filling it with a familiar black light. It bled from the prongs of the tale’s end like waterfalls of mist. Her gaping mouth tempted me to jump inside and wreak havoc from within, but I had not grown quite desperate enough.

I pounded the ground with the butt end of the staff right before she reached me, causing a tombstone covered in her worms to rise up. She stopped just prior to impact, but I had already prepared my rake’s swing to destroy the tombstone, covering each piece of cursed rubble with black aura. The Rocky chunks bombarded her like asteroids, piercing her decaying pelt like bullets.