Elise confronted the enormous black crocodile, though she kept part of her attention on the battle unfolding nearby. This division of focus put her at a clear disadvantage.
Her power was severely reduced, making her feel as she had in the past, before reaching her full potential. Furthermore, the bodies of crocodiles and equines were too structurally different to face each other on equal terms.
Even so, Elise possessed something her opponent did not: wings and the ability to fly. However, she had to be extremely careful with those massive jaws; getting caught between those fangs would be fatal.
...
Hannah and Tonks, for their part, fought back-to-back, striking at the fish-women. They were surrounded, and the creatures lunged at them repeatedly, though most were successfully repelled.
While the women had been transformed into this aquatic species by the Yakuruna's power—gaining some magical and physical resistance—they were not invulnerable. Several had been Muggles, and a few were witches. The latter retained some ability, but they had spent too much time as mere "concubines," forgetting many of their skills. Facing two witches who had remained martially active for years, the disadvantage was clear.
As they dodged spells and enemy lunges, Hannah and Tonks responded by casting incantation after incantation. Attack and defense intertwined without pause. At one point, Tonks shifted to physical combat: a metallic band on her hand suddenly expanded up her arm, revealing her upgraded robotic limb. With an adrenaline-fueled smile, she landed a brutal uppercut that sent one of the women flying through the air.
The Yakuruna might have been enraged by the scene… or perhaps not. In truth, it might have even excited him. He had many women, and to him, many were, in a sense, disposable. His wives increased and decreased over time; it was natural. Losing a few was of no consequence, as he could always replace them. And Tonks, proving herself so powerful, so active and dangerous… she would undoubtedly be a tempting addition to his harem.
If only he had the chance to look at her.
...
The fight intensified. The Yakuruna was furious.
Although my strength had not yet managed to cause him real damage, each of my blows began to challenge him. Not because of the pain, but because of the audacity. It was as if every impact was a direct insult to his divinity.
Suddenly, he lunged at me with abysmal speed, like a living arrow, tearing the air with his claws.
I felt the impact in my chest. Several deep gashes opened immediately, slicing through flesh and hitting bone. I screamed as I fell back, blood gushing uncontrollably… but it didn't hit the ground. It transformed into crimson blades that shot toward his eyes.
The attack barely harmed him, but it was enough to cloud his vision. I seized the moment and landed several direct blows to his flank, pushing him back while I retreated to gain space.
His expression of rage became evident as he felt tricked. It had been far too long since the Yakuruna had faced a true rival. He was out of practice… and the fact that I managed to attack him in such a way infuriated him even more.
Hot steam escaped his nostrils in a violent snort. He raised both hands and thrust them forward in a devastating motion.
The distance between us was considerable; too much for it to seem like a physical attack. My perception of danger arrived late.
The water of the lagoon rose suddenly, forming a compact wave that compressed and shot toward me like a lightning bolt: a water impact charged with divine power, similar to an absolute Hydro Pump.
Instinctively, I brought my hands to the front. I knew I couldn't dodge it. Neither Apparition nor my blood transformation would work: that attack was imbued with divinity. I felt it would reach me no matter what I did.
The [Wrath] inside me intensified.
My body grew slightly in that split second before impact.
The hit sounded like a cannonball smashing into something solid… or at least, that was what I perceived before everything became a blur. The roar was so brutal that the other battles stopped for an instant, all eyes turning toward the origin of the impact.
When the water finally dissipated, my body was still there. Standing. In a defensive stance.
But I was missing an arm. Part of my side was gone. Internal organs and bones lay exposed in my torso and face, revealing half of my skull.
"Ha… ha… ha… ha…"
A laugh, increasingly inhuman, escaped my throat.
I looked up and stared directly at him. I had felt the destructive divine power tear through me, barely contained by [Wrath] and [Sloth], which forcibly strengthened and healed me. Without them, I wouldn't have survived: that divine power would have poisoned me from within like pure radiation, killing me even without the direct impact.
And yet…
I was thrilled.
I felt something inside me breaking free. Something that had remained chained for too long. Perhaps… because I had never before had an enemy strong enough to wake it up.
Blood surged from nowhere.
It sprouted, crawled, and pooled over my wounds, covering them like a crystalline yet liquid armor. It replaced missing skin, muscle, and organs, functioning as a temporary substitute to prevent the damage from worsening while my body began to regenerate. My lost arm was also recreated: a precarious, crude version formed of solidified blood, still trembling and unstable.
The Yakuruna didn't seem to care.
He knew he had caused me severe damage and launched another wave attack almost immediately, though this time it was weaker. Having wounded me so badly, he assumed it was unnecessary to spend more divine power on me; he could wear me down slowly with minor strikes.
I pulled out my two Jarjacha wands.
Sensing the flow of my sinful abilities, they howled with excitement. Together, they unleashed two magical slashes similar to Sectumsempra, but amplified by both my state and the will of the wands themselves. The attack split the wave of water the Yakuruna had launched, dividing it in two before it could reach me.
"Who do you think you are, Nami?" I said mockingly, in my usual tone.
But my voice no longer sounded human.
I ran straight at him.
I jumped, trying to kick him while charging another energy slash with the wands, but the Yakuruna caught my leg and dragged me toward his jaws, ready to ignore the magical attack and trade wound for wound.
Then it happened.
My back flexed and twisted unnaturally. Flesh tore with a wet sound as a pair of fleshy wings erupted suddenly. They unfurled immediately and violently struck the Yakuruna's head, stopping his bite mid-motion.
In that instant, my wands released the slashes.
The Yakuruna was repelled and forced to let go of me.
The area fell silent.
The others could barely follow the fight during these brief moments of pause; the rest of the time, everything happened too fast and too chaotically to see clearly.
The Yakuruna floated at a distance, staring at his chest. Two slashes marked his body: they weren't superficial, but they weren't fatal either. Even so, they were the first real wounds he had received in this fight… and ones he hadn't suffered in a very long time.
His eyes turned red with fury. The insult was intolerable. His killing intent toward me was absolute.
I, for my part, writhed slightly in the air with a savage gaze. My wounds healed fast, but in a grotesque way: my arm regenerated halfway, and the missing areas were reconstructed imperfectly until returning to normal in a terrifying process. The wings on my back deformed, dissolved, and remade themselves constantly, evolving from an underdeveloped form into something increasingly perfect… wings similar to those of a dragon or a demon.
"Let's break the flesh," I uttered.
My mind was no longer functioning with full efficiency. My mouth and jaw also began to expand unnaturally.
With these new wings—which didn't even need to flap—I moved through the air and reached the Yakuruna, who floated before me supported solely by his divine power.
The struggle resumed, but this time it was much more fierce.
My abilities had never been used to their maximum… because they had no defined maximum. Throughout this entire battle, I had been growing, strengthening little by little. Perhaps in an inefficient way, but a deliberate one. I had allowed it to be so because of that constant feeling that something was awakening in me… something that gave me a sickly pleasure.
Now, with two additional limbs, I had more opportunities to attack in unnatural and strange ways.
The Yakuruna, totally enraged, did not lag behind.
Without worrying about whether he would have to seclude himself for the next several years to restore the divine power he was spending, he attacked with everything. The water stopped behaving like an element and became his body: it turned into liquid roots, into infinite tentacles that stretched through the air, the jungle, and the lagoon, attacking me or simply saturating the space with their presence.
From the bottom of the water, a weapon emerged.
An ancient spear shot into the air and fell into the Yakuruna's hands. With it, he pierced my body without hesitation, and I felt divine power coursing through me from the wound. It was a special weapon, like my wands… a conduit for something superior.
The power the Yakuruna was releasing was enough to make the entire area tremble. The earth vibrated, the air compressed, and Hannah and Tonks were knocked to the ground by the shockwave.
The fish-women were also affected at first, but soon their excitement replaced their bewilderment. With the power of their god unleashed and the water rising into the air, those who previously had trouble in land combat gained the advantage.
They darted in and out of the massive floating ribbons of water, attacking the girls with greater ferocity. They decided to give it their all, just like their husband.
The two Hufflepuffs began to find themselves seriously overwhelmed. Not only were the sirens stronger than before, but their methods of attack were becoming increasingly intense and chaotic.
Tonks had already started using consumables to repel them, even the death ray integrated into her robotic arm, but that energy was not inexhaustible.
Fortunately for them, a spectral cold flooded the area.
Several ethereal swords flew out and crashed into the fish-women who leapt toward them, violently repelling them. It was the protective magic Helena had left over Tonks, a good practice for her skills as a ghost-Witch.
I was still fighting the Yakuruna.
At first, I lost ground, receiving constant wounds while he unleashed all his abilities without restraint… but only at first.
My body continued to change.
From my back, in addition to the wings, blood tentacles emerged—auxiliary appendages that assisted me when I lost limbs or was momentarily restrained. My body dripped blood constantly, not just from wounds, but from my own reserves.
If the Yakuruna tried to drown me… I could do something similar.
Blood fell into the lagoon as we fought in the air above it. It was a completely disadvantageous environment for me… but I didn't care.
I was having a blast.
"We are very much alike…" I said, though my voice was now that of a monster. "Powerful… perverted… evil, perhaps. But I am the one who's going to survive in the end."
My mouth no longer had lips. It was just a cluster of sharp teeth, enormous, demonic, with an abyssal void inside: an infinite vortex that seemed to devour everything.
My body mutated with every wound and every surge of strength. I didn't mind receiving damage as long as it wasn't fatal… and almost no wound was. Unless they attacked my soul directly.
And even then, the clone sleeping in the fief, using [Sloth] at maximum power, could handle that.
This fight was far too exciting.