Red chains as wide as the average person burst forth from the ground. They reminded Erin of the Wyrms she fought but these chains were more vicious despite being inanimate objects. Barbs covered the chains, sawing through all that it moved through. Contrary to her foreboding feeling, only two red chains appeared and the caster herself was looking more haggard than before. She saw him downing another potion. She sensed his Mana rose in proportions right after.

“He’s hurt and his spells take a lot out of him,” Erin surmised. “But his spells’ conjurations are near instantaneous. This is going to be tedious.”

Aera, like always, lunged at the red chain with reckless abandon. The barbs extended as Aera’s fist collided with the chain. However, the barbs crumbled in face of her strength. The red chain twisted out of Aera’s trajectory but she pivoted her body with a foot on the ground and brought her leg around. She slammed her foot into the chain. It shook and the force dragged it across the ground. The chain snapped back into position and lashed towards Aera with newly-conjured barbs. Aera simply kept shouting and throwing herself at the priest. The red chain came into her path but neither she nor the chain was the victor in the repetitive clash. Aera didn’t have the wits nor speed but her strength and durability were unquestionable. No matter how many times she was hit, it left not a single scratch on her.

Erin made her move together with Aera though the latter was not in unison with the former’s strategy. Still, Aera’s relentless assault was enough of an assist for Erin. The other red chain darted towards her. She quivered slightly at the sight of the elongated barbs. The chain wormed its way across the ground like a snake with a saw for a body. Elliot was left wide open but Erin couldn’t get close with the red chain squirming about and she didn’t have enough Mana for another Warp. Her Fleet Foot and Lightning Rush were useless in the endeavour as the red gave her no space to manoeuvre. The priest waited for her to exhaust her uses of Warp before unleashing the red chains. She could replenish her Mana by using Mana Harvest but in order to do that, she would need to be still and the red chain, the priest would never overlook that window.

“If these are just Magic Arts…” She unleashed a wave of cyan flames at the red chain. The flames engulfed the red chain in no time. However, she knew reality was rarely favourable. The red chain shook itself off the cyan flames. There were evidence of damages on the chain but only barely. It wasn’t the result of Essence Flare being ineffective but merely due to the difference in level. She clicked her tongue and resorted to another plan.

With her blade clad in lightning and Arcane Edge, Erin ran across the red chain as she sliced at the body of the humongous chain. The result was as expected. She chipped the chain but the slight damage mended itself immediately. Mystic Blade would be useless too if the chain could mend itself. Attacking the chain was futile, she deemed. She forewent striking the red chain and made her way straight for the caster. She dodged the red chains attacks, flipped through a window of the red chain’s coiling, and landed in a position where she was offered a direct line of assault to the priest. She threw Aura Shots in quick succession. The aura blades flew like arrows towards Elliot.

The priest retained a calm facade and took out a coil of black chains from within his robes. The black chains were not spells but actual solid objects, albeit imbued with magic. He wielded the black chain as proficient as he wielded the spell chains. The Aura Shots were struck down deftly.

“I have underestimated you,” Erin confessed. “My apologies.”

“No, you did not underestimate me,” he refuted. “If you had, you wouldn’t have been so careful to strike from afar.”

“I was just being cautious but I’ll take your compliment. Say, couldn’t you have used that chain earlier before I took your arm?”

“Yes, I could have,” the priest said. “It was my mistake into thinking your blade would not cut through my flesh due to the level difference. Truly, my mistake.”

“Well, if you have any more tricks left, now’s the time to use them, before I take your other arm.”

Elliot snorted. “You’re more obnoxious than I presumed from the whispers.”

“I’m your enemy. I’m supposed to be obnoxious to you.”

Before he could manage another scoff, Aera had somehow overcome the red chain’s assault and charged her way to him. The red chain was just on her tail but Aera had her gaze locked on Elliot. The red chain slammed into her back but she merely wobbled and continued running. Elliot clicked his tongue and brandished the black chain at her. Aera grabbed the head that was swinging towards her. Instead of tugging the chain, he let it go. The chain slithered itself up to Aera and bound her limbs together. He then willed the chain to toss Aera aside. The fiery aura of hers began to allay. She roared and struggled but to no avail. Similar to Olivia’s circumstances, Aera’s brute force was rendered futile by the chains. The more she struggled, the stronger the chain tightened.

Elliot shrugged and took out another coil of black chain.

“I see…” Erin muttered. The black chain was no different than the chains he conjured from magic but seeing as how he was unable to use other spells when using the red chains, Erin could understand why he had the black chains at the ready. “You’re well prepared. If my foes were half as competent as you, I don’t believe I would still be alive today.”

“Your words exude arrogance but your actions are much too humble. Is this how you defeat your foes?”

“Some of them.” Erin chuckled. “Are you going to keep stalling?”

“I lost an arm. I’ll take every advantage that I can get.” He uncoiled the chain and crack it against the air.

Erin sighed. “I take no pleasure in killing. I truly don’t. It really doesn’t have to be this way, Elliot.”

“But it does, m’lady. That village is my home. I have to do this.”

Erin glanced towards Olivia and Aera, who were both trapped in the binds of chains. She wondered how easy it would be for the priest to just end their lives right here and now. It made her all the more understanding from the fact that he did not use them as hostages. “You’re strong. You don’t believe you are able to defy the one who threatened you?”

“They are some of the strongest individuals on this continent, not just this kingdom. An army would have difficulty fighting them even with the former’s advantage in numbers.”

“Truly so?”

The priest nodded. “Truly.” The red chains slowly encircle Erin. “I have another proposition for you.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”

“I was ordered to capture you or kill you if the first wasn’t an option. Seeing as how you’re a reasonable person, what say you?”

“You want me to let myself be captured?”

“I won’t have to kill you and you won’t have to kill me. Nobody will need to die.”

“I doubt I will live long in the hands of those who threatened you. So I don’t think I will be going with you accordingly.”

“It was worth asking,” Elliot said, shrugging, and willed the red chains to attack.

Erin dodged the strikes at the last moment and lunged in retaliation. The red chains chased after her. She led them under a fallen log hefted by a stump and a boulder on its ends. The chains rammed through the log. She made a sharp turn and the chains followed without fail. She turned around flipped over a chain. The other chain followed. She ran in an arc and the chains slithered in her track. She stopped and ducked low, letting the chains swoop overhead. She then took off into a dash towards the caster, Elliot. The chains recovered their directions and stalked after Erin. However, the chains shuddered and crashed into the ground as if they were paralyzed. And they were, by themselves. They had become entangled with one another in the chase.

Erin grinned and put her all into her feet, dashing straight towards Elliot. The priest dispelled the red chains and summoned the lesser chains, which Erin cut down all without a drop of sweat. He left a chain by his side and coiled it around his arm, entangling with the black chain in his grip. The chains in his hand straightened and solidified, and he met Erin’s slash with the straightened chains.

“Neat trick,” Erin praised.

But Elliot deflected the shallow praise with a tut.

“But are you sure you want this to be turned into a melee?”

“I’m very sure,” he said and lunged. As he slashed low, a chain struck from high above.

Erin muttered a curse and blocked the low slash with her sword while she parried the chain with her tails clad in Arcane Armour.

As Elliot slashed horizontally, a chain swiped from the opposite direction. Erin spun and deflected the twin blows with her sword. She slashed down but chains appeared out of nowhere to defend her strike. The chains disappeared once they fulfilled their purposes and Elliot struck. The chains mimicked his movements in an inverse manner.

The fight was treading the line of stalemate. Elliot had the higher stats but Erin compensated for the level difference with her skills and experience. Be that as it may, the odds were gradually tipping in Erin’s favour as Elliot’s wound was taking its toll. His stump throbbed with every clash of their blows and the throbbing would upset his balance. As the exchange of melee went on, the victor became more apparent.

Erin slashed in a wide arc and she sent Elliot staggering back with his hand trembling from exhaustion and numbness. He was gripping his weapon so tightly that he had drawn some blood.

“You’re a monster,” said the priest who was struggling with his breath. “I can see why they want you. If they can’t have you, no one else can. How typical of them.”

“An insult and a compliment, which is which?”

“Take it how you will. That’s the truth.” He expelled a deep breath with a forlorn look tinged with resignation. He dropped the chain in his hand and fell to his knees. At the same, the chain prisons disappeared along with his will to fight.

Olivia had a complicated look but there was empathy in her eyes. As the priest had submitted himself, she also retracted her wings and hostility.

She had won, that was apparent to Erin but the battle-fiend side of her was discontent. In a fair confrontation, her chances of victory were null. The fight was disappointing. Various circumstances were in place that impede her opponent’s true potential. It was already taking a lot out of him to suppress Olivia, a Dragon-kin, and also Aera, a Divine Apostle. Moreover, he was up against a Divine Apostle that was also a Fae. His defeat was clear from the start but he had chosen to fight.

“I’m sure you have a good reason for doing what you did,” Erin said, “but I have my own to take care of. I'm sorry.”

The priest scoffed. “Don’t be. This is just how—” Before Elliot could finish his sentence, a punch knocked him off the ground and sent him tumbling across the ground.

“Aera!” Erin shouted.

Aera did not respond to Erin. Her gaze was fixed on the priest whose jaw was dislocated and blood trickled endlessly from his ruptured mouth. Yet, he remained unmoved and resigned to his fate.

“Kill me,” he taunted meekly. “Just rid me of my misery.”

“Aera, don’t!”

Her face was blank but the rage was apparent in her eyes. Even she herself couldn’t understand where the rage was coming from. Wrath took hold of her body and she moved to the beckon of her fury. And it was telling her to pulverize the Apostle in front of her. She roared and threw herself with her fists bared. But she stopped midway as Erin stood in her path.

“Move…” Aera muttered with a quivering voice.

“No.”

“I have to kill him… He’s wrong…. He’s one of them…”

“He will die but not like this! Come to your senses, Aera!”

“Move!!” Aera screamed.

“No,” Erin whispered. She stepped closed enough to Aera to cup her cheeks. “You can be at ease now, Aera.”

“Move…!”

Erin leaned in. “No,” she whispered again and her body moved by itself, driven by an instinct that couldn't have originated from anywhere but her accursed skill, Lust Deviant. Erin cupped Aera's cheeks and planted her lips lightly on Aera’s lips. In an instance, the fiery aura dissipated, seemingly dispersed by that one single kiss. Reasoning returned to Aera’s eyes.

At that moment, Erin felt a great change within her.

[Conditions met. Lust Deviant has evolved into Lust]