No plan survives first contact with the enemy.
It was something Aerion au Mávros, his father, had once told him.
It was something he had understood long ago, something he had experienced many times before…but even then, he didn't expect their plan to deviate so far.
Originally, Seirios was meant to keep the chimera's attention on himself, using his superior body and powerful talent to fight directly against it, whilst Artorias assisted him through the shadows.
With his talent, Seirios wouldn't need his eyes to react to the spawns' attacks and would be able to avoid its insidious mind hex without limiting himself.
Artorias on the other hand would be his assistance, using the shadows around them to get in fast, land a powerful strike, and vanish before the chimera could react.
It was a weak plan, but it was simple, effective. It was a plan which focused on their unique strengths and worked around any limitations they had.
The plan had fallen apart within a simple second.
'I was wrong.'
Whilst the idea of the chimera not having anything to cloak itself with had seemed promising, it turned out that it was the creature simply playing a trick on them.
No, it wasn't a trick, he told himself. It was an intentional ruse, born of a mind too smart and too twisted to ever be able to predict.
They had paid for making such a mistake with far too much blood.
Seirios had become a useless variable within an instant, falling for the chimera's mind hex, or something resembling it, that had left him all but catatonic.
Artorias on the other hand, only had one option, he had to fight.
Sharpened claw met steel blade with a clang, an echo which resounded through the street around them and seemed louder than normal.
His ears rang with the noise, and he slipped into the shadows before the chimera's other claw could take his head, the wind generated by the force of the strike whipping through his hair.
Reappearing behind it, he pulled the horn of the hell hound out and with all his meagre strength, pushed it through a small gap between two of the golden ridges and into the chimera's lower back.
It pierced the scales, and he was rewarded with a pained screech from the bird.
Hope began to burn in his heart.
Until its long tail whipped through the air and crashed into the side of his chest.
He wheezed as he flew, his lungs burning as a pained gasp escaped his lips. The shadows pulled him into their empty embrace before he could crash into a ruined building.
Artorias only had a moment to take a desperate breath when he reappeared, before he was having to move.
Rolling his aching body, the morning star attached to the chimera's tail missed him by only an inch, breaking the road with a tremor and kicking up a cloud of dust.
Straining his eyes, he pushed himself up and searched for Seirios.
With his horn still stuck in the chimera's body, his body injured and unable to keep up and Seirios lost in his own mind, the best thing they could do was run.
The shadows swallowed him whole as he locked eyes with the shadow attached to Seirios, avoiding another swipe of the spawn's morning star.
"Seirios! Get up, now!" he growled a moment later, pulling his dazed cousin to his feet.
"Art…?"
It was only the sound of the air parting, and his own intuition, that saved their lives.
Pushing Seirios away, he allowed the shadows to take him once more, avoiding yet another strike of the morning star.
Appearing against one of the buildings littering the street, his frustration began to build. With so many powerful strikes of the morning star hitting the concrete below them, a large smokescreen was beginning to build, making his ability to travel more and more limited.
Something told him the chimera was doing this on purpose.
Maybe it had already figured out the requirements needed for him to travel through the shadows, or maybe it was just doing it to sow confusion and limit their vision.
Either way, he knew that the chimera was still only playing with them.
It grated at his pride, but it also made him weirdly thankful.
Because whilst smart, it was also arrogant.
That gave him something to work with.
Stepping through the shadows he could find, his blade gleamed in the grey smokescreen as he pushed himself to get closer.
Another tremor, and muted sound of an explosion rang out behind him as he did, and all he could do was hope that Seirios was okay.
He jumped through two more shadows, putting his blade back in its sheath, before appearing to its right.
The chimera's head snapped to look at him at inhumanly quick speeds, but he didn't dare make eye contact.
The lightning in his chest sparked to life, setting his nerves and muscles alight with what felt like liquid fire. He ignored the familiar pain of burning muscles with gritted teeth, and ran forward, stepping through another shadow.
His eyes locked onto the one cast by the abomination.
Faster than it could react, he appeared from below it, his body a blur as he was catapulted from the shadows thanks to both the running start he had taken and the lightning surging through him.
His body, a frail and weak joke of what it once was, burned as he came to a sudden stop, his left-hand gripping onto one of its curved horns and his feet finding purchase on its shoulders.
His shoulder seared with pain.
The knife, hidden in his right sleeve, fell into his waiting hand, its pointed edge seemingly glinting in the darkness around them.
Faster than the thing could react, he used the lightning coursing through his body, and moved in the blink of a second, stabbing through one of its amber eyes.
It howled in pain, its entire body thrashing as it uselessly tried to knock him off. He held on through sheer stubbornness, screaming as its pointed claws dug into his back and tried to rip him off.
His blood coated its claws, covered its scaled arms and dripped to the floor. His blood, which surged with the power of the heavens itself. His blood, which was made up of eighty percent water and conducted electricity.
A singular spark erupted from his wounds, then another, and another. The spark surging in his body soon began to build itself rapidly into the world, a static yellow charge of power manifesting between them.
He screamed as it tried to pull the claws dug into his body out, but they were stuck, wedged in between burning muscles, veins and bruised bones.
Through gritted teeth, and a manic grin fueled by the pain in his own rising bloodlust, he spoke.
"I'm going to break you!"
His voice rose as a howl broke through his clenched teeth, soon joined by the abomination beneath him.
The lightning, once a spark of a million lights, was now akin to a storm, incasing both of their bodies in a cage of burning gold that made their muscles seize and their pain receptors explode.
Whilst his body was being ripped apart, both by the chimera's claws and the countless bolts of lightning rippling through the air, he kept his hand wrapped around the blade in its eye.
The blade, which was metal, and conducted the electricity just as efficiently as his blood. The abomination shook more and more, its entire body, both inside and out, being burned through with millions of volts of pure plasma.
Finally, after what felt like hours but was at most a minute, it ripped its claws out of his back, tearing through enough flesh and skin to release even more blood which sizzled with unrestricted lightning.
He howled once again at the pain but didn't let go of the blade.
His mind was focused only on its death. Focused entirely on destroying its brain from within its body. Focused only on his victory and survival.
But that single-minded focus, as it turned out, was his biggest mistake.
Even through the pain of a million volts surging and ravaging its mind, breaking its scales and paralyzing its unnatural muscles.
Its tail rose. A shaking, barely responsive limb, that moved just close enough.
The abomination tilted its entire body forward, almost falling over through its thrashing and shaking, and grabbed onto the massive limb behind it, picking up and swinging it.
Artorias didn't even notice its action until it was too late.
His pained scream was garbled as the morning star hit him, his throat drowning in blood and raw suffering as he flew through the air like a golden comet.
The shadows moved on their own, grabbing him before he could break through the wall of another abandoned building.
Through hazy eyes, the world of nothing accepted him.
His pain vanished with the familiar sensation of feeling weightless.
But something was wrong.
The lightning, burning through his body and his wounds, still existed.
In a world of nothing, that couldn't be accepted.
So, the realm took inspiration from Artorias and did what he always did best.
It adapted.