Lue gripped his sword tightly and stepped back. Sweat poured down his body as cold dread hugged him from behind. " What is this thing…"
His hands shook as irrational fear washed over him, like a mist on a rainy day, What are you. Why am I…
Lue's body trembled, tremors seizing control of his body. Everything he could control was taken away from him by fear.
I am scared? What… No, Lue swallowed his saliva as a smile curled up his mouth, No that's not it… it's not fear… Ha!
He extended his sword forward , pointing it at the monster."Is that all? That's the best you can do? You call this overwhelming? All you managed to achieve is bring me pleasure of battling a strong opponent!"
Yes, the pleasure of this battle is great… How could I fear anything? I'm a grandmaster for heaven's sake!
"Really?" the cloaked figure said, his pitch-black cloak hiding his identity.
"What else could it be! I am a grandmaster!" Lue shouted.
The figure stayed silent as he slowly gazed at the monster named Atropal and said "You did well, now try to kill him"
Atropal slowly lowered its hands. At this second shivers crawled down Lue's spine. He sweated blood. Everything shouted within his senses to run.
The moment Lue realised everything he covered his eyes with his left arm. It felt like the only move he had left.
Atropal pressed its palm to its chest. Its eyes that were sewn, split cleanly open, ripping through flesh, the string hanging on each side.
His eyes shook from side to side before stabilizing. His broken pupils looked towards Lue as barely visible green light bled through them, spreading across everything within his eyesight. The moment it touched any life, life ended.
Trees crumbled to white dust. Birds fell from branches, and hit the ground, turning to ash before they hit the ground.
And then the light reached Lue. He braced and waited. But nothing came.
"Hahaha!" Lue laughed awkwardly as he looked with his eyes closed at his hands, still solid.
He gripped his hands tightly, adding "I'm alive!"
"As expected" the cloaked figure said, "Go all out. Either way, your life is of no benefit to me anymore,"
I see, everything dies as soon as it acknowledges the light… At least that's what my senses are telling me. All I need to be is to be blind!
Lue, while pointing his sword at the monster, shouted, "Come!" afterwards he dashed right at him, slashing its arm cleanly.
But Atropal blocked the attack, taking the attacks head on with its body. But nothing came out, no blood, just a hole where the skin was.
Wherever Atropal looked, death came. Trees within his sight crumbled to ash. Grass withered. Birds fell mid-flight.
Grinning from ear to ear, Lue said "Don't dread, monster. I have to take your life. A price for taking one life has to be proportional, right? You had it coming when you came to life!"
Lue jumped back as a bluish glow flowed around his fist. He released his grip as the ground shook, magical chains grew out of the ground. Metal chains with deep red blood flowing down them.
They spun around the monster and tightly gripped him.
The chains tightened. Atropal's scream ripped through the forest.
It echoed everywhere, and might even reached Mytri himself. Then silence remained for Lue, as even sound died within its sight.
"How does this being even come to life… disgusting" Lue said as he looked around at the devastation, ash covering the atmosphere, restricting the sight barely to a few meters ahead.
Then the figure with a skull necklace around its neck slowly stepped forward moving through the ash, barely visible to Lue kept speaking "You want to know? The dead won't speak of my secrets… will they?"
"You don't know that!" Lue shouted back, as he kept glancing at the monster, and seeing it struggle against the chain's. Its mouth contorted in a scream, but he could not hear its scream.
"Right," the figure said while watching Lue, "Once upon a time, there was a great man, an impeccable hero who wished to glance upon a goddess, a beautiful goddess. He thought 'since I had achieved many great things, I deserve to see the goddess'.
"He embraced it, with his potent skills he traveled far and wide to the east, where the goddess led the people after descending from the heavens.
He sliced and slashed through the people who opposed him, to see his goddess
and one day he had reached her temple, where she lived. He walked up thousands of stairs up towards her chambers and after ten days he reached the gate, pushing them open he went in.
he gazed up where the goddess sat on a throne, to him her beauty was heavenly.
He had eyes that with a single glance healed anyone, and he looked at her and pleaded 'Goddess! I had brought good upon this world! let me live with you!'
But goddess turned her eyes at hims and looked into his heart and immediately said 'no'
But the hero couldn't understand why, he pleaded but got no response he wanted so he pointed his sword at the goddess saying 'If i can't have you no one can' and lunged at her.
The goddess smiled far wider than any human could and was amused by it, she raised her hand at him and said 'Your greed and lust had brought doom upon you. This will be your penalty' and she swiped her hand and sent him to the ground.
She took away his healing eyes and replaced them with death, anything he looks at, as long as it acknowledges it, dies.
That punishment fitted in the goddesses eyes and she casted him out from her sanctuary.
From that day onward, the hero Atropal vanished from history."
"Quite lengthy, but that was who he was, and he is your opponent. Funny, isn't it?" The figure said.
"Quiet the opposite," Lue said as he sliced at the monster, who broke out of the chains and lunged at him.
The monster gripped its hands into fists and pounced at Lue, but Lue blocked its attacks with the side of his sword.
The monster exhaled, vanished from Lue's sight, and reappeared behind him.
With one swift move it kicked Lue into his side, sending him flying into the dust of ash, disappearing in it.
The figure slowly turned towards where Lue landed and added "I whispered to him the idea…"