Page 80 of Heartless Enemy

Lunging forward, I swung the blade at the white boot who had been sprinting towards me. His eyes only had time to widen in shock before the sword crashed into the side of his ribs, cleaving him halfway through. I could feel the strike hit bone, so I put my boot on his chest and shoved him backwards while yanking my sword free.

The brutal move had made the other constables hesitate for a fraction of a second. And that was all I needed.

I darted around the falling corpse and struck at them with quick swings. They at last lurched into motion, raising their swords to block my onslaught.

A short distance to my right, Eve was fighting two constables on her own. Even when outnumbered, she was a force to be reckoned with and held her own perfectly. But I didn’t want to risk her getting overrun, so I stopped pressing my own attacks long enough to twist my sword in my palm and brush my hands together.

Magic flared to life inside me, and I summoned a spear that I shot at one of her attackers. The sharp point hit the back of his head, passing clean through before lodging itself in the wall behind. Eve flicked a quick look at me before slamming her sword towards the other guy.

The moment of inattention to my own fight had allowed the white boots around me to recover, and I had to leap aside as a blade cleaved through the air where my ribcage was supposed to be. Twisting with the motion, I spun and slammed my sword into another attacker’s neck. The force of it took his head clean off his shoulders.

Cries of rage and sorrow rose from the others.

Outside on the street, a gigantic torrent of fire tore through the air. The heat of it was so intense that I could feel it from all the way through the broken windows.

Constables screamed in panic, issuing orders to pull back.

My mouth twisted in a vicious smile as Shinji stalked past, his face a mask of silent fury as he positioned himself in front of our door and shot another massive wave of flames towards them. By all hell, he really was incredible when he went all out.

However, going all out meant that he was draining his energy faster. He had done it to force the white boots back and buy us time to get back out onto the street. We really had to finish this fight right now and join him, otherwise he would weaken himself too much trying to hold them all back on his own.

I flicked a glance around the now ruined tavern.

Eve was still fighting the other guy a short distance from me, and three of the constables who had attacked me still lived. In addition to that, two more people had just barely managed to dive in through the door before Shinji launched his attack. They were rolling to their feet right now, so I still had a few seconds.

Six people left to kill.

This should be quick.

I swung my sword at the three guys in front of me right as a gasp echoed through the room.

Metal clanged as my blade met two swords, and I risked a glance towards the gasp.

The two people who had just rolled to their feet had stopped dead in their tracks. Their mouths were open as they stared at Eve in shock. The guy she had been fighting twitched with lightning and toppled to the ground. His eyes fluttered while his body jerked, so he must still be alive.

Then Eve looked up, and her mouth dropped open slightly too.

While dodging another blow and delivering one of my own, I cast another quick look at the two people.

Both of them were wearing white leather uniforms. One was a tall man with blond hair and blue eyes. The other a woman with dark curly hair and dark eyes.

Realization hit me.

I recognized them from that fight inside the watchtower on the north side. These were two of Eve’s former colleagues. Frank and Jamila.

The three white boots before me had thankfully also gotten distracted by the gasp and the sudden stillness to the fight behind them, so I used the second of grace to ram my sword through the closest guy’s chest. A huff ripped from his throat. I yanked my sword out. He coughed blood onto his white uniform while the other two snapped their attention back to me.

Red flames washed past the windows again as Shinji poured more fire down the street to keep the tide of white boots at bay. I had to get out there. Now.

Dodging a blow aimed at my back, I twisted down and around before driving my sword towards the man who had swung it. It speared him through the gut.

Frank and Jamila spun around at the sound, both of them bringing their hands together as if to attack me. But before they could, Eve shot a blast of water at them. A wet slapping sound echoed between the walls as it hit them in the back, making them stumble a step forward.

“Eyes on me,” she taunted.

Incredulity pulsed across their faces as they whirled back towards her.

I feinted a strike to the left and instead brushed my palms together. A spike shot up from the floor underneath my final attacker, impaling him. He grunted as the metal speared through him, and then slumped down on the ground when I retracted the spike.