Chapter 113: The Fallen and the Serpent Part 3

The loud clanging of metals reverberated to the whole crater that was formerly a part of the forest, two people, one attacked relentlessly while the other defended seemingly with ease continuously clashed as if they wanted to create battle music instead of killing each other, however, Sophia long knew that she is in a disadvantage as she cannot even push back Hebi enough to be able to use the same technique as her, it is not like Sophia's background training with her rapier is lacking, it is just that swordsmanship is one of the minor aspects of her battle system, so after knowing that she is in a helpless struggle, she immediately decided to use what she is best at.

[Siginarugan]

As Sophia's voice echoed through the battlefield, a gigantic being of molten rocks emerged at her back, one of the four arms of [Siginarugan] immediately descended in the direction of Hebi, she looked at the fist for a fraction of a second and gritted her teeth.

_Why did Sophia name a disposable spell to her lord?_

At the same time that she was thinking something like that, a massive amount of purplish light appeared at her back, and soon, a giant in a purple metal armor that was a head larger than [Siginarugan] emerged, the giant of Hebi was clad in spikes over the edges of its armor and on his hands is a giant hammer that he immediately swung towards the jaw of the molten giant in front of it.

[Boysenberry]

Alongside such a whisper is the hammer bashing the jaw of the supposedly sturdy giant of Sophia, and as if it has a brain that got jumbled by the attack, [Siginarugan] was stopped, his head was destroyed and lava started to flow, it back down 3 large steps away from the epicenter that is Sophia and Hebi, Hebi thought that she had neutralized the attempt of Sophia to destroy the deadlock as he commanded her giant to give chase and prevent [Siginarugan] from interfering further, that action just caused 1/2 second of her attention, however, she suddenly felt one of her assault is not blocked by any metal, she immediately looked at her front and saw Sophia have already restarted her stance.

Her eyes are calm as a lake and the only ripple that can be seen on her face is her luscious lips as she muttered.

[Pierce Heaven 'till it Breaks]

Hebi became alarmed as she cursed the bullshit speed of Sophia's brain, she moved slightly to the side and blocked the first strike, she then infused mana to her feet and made metal knuckles appear in front of her as she kicked them towards Sophia, the good thing is that, she has longer limbs than her counterpart, so realizing how troublesome her opponent is, she was perfectly fine in admitting that she needed the most insignificant advantages she can get, the sword of Sophia was left in the air as she was sent flying backward with her whole face bones receiving damage and not only that, the impact of the kick was so strong that her body punched through the two giants' legs.

Yet despite that, The fallen hero was still smiling and only have one thought in mind as Hebi realized that her ass is bleeding, she looked at it with a stunned expression as she saw a blue rip in space with a face sneering at her direction, at the same time her butt cheek has a black dagger oozing with dark nature mana embedded in it.

Sophia landed on the ground and tumbled like a ball, Hebi looked at the mind monster in the shape of a little girl beyond the deformed giants as her vision of the crater was slowly changed by a potent illusion, only the smirk of Sophia could be seen before she was swept by the strong lucid dream she was forced to have.

"One More..."

Sophia muttered as she saw the dazed stare of the serpent bearer in her direction.

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Hebi was breathing heavily as she saw herself in a very different place than the beautiful scenery from the last time she got cheap-shotted by Sophia's daggers, there is some shame in her being stabbed in the ass, however, Hebi felt that the illusion she was in was much stronger than the last one which made her confused.

_The dagger has the same dark nature mana output as the last one that stabbed me, so why does this illusion feel so heavy? Also, I noticed that she was not attacking me despite me probably being in a daze in front of her, free for the taking... What the hell is going on?_

Hebi, of course, should not be confused like this, after all, she is the leading figure of Loki's subordinates and as a hero herself, she has fought several opponents that has tried to use strategy to overcome their weakness compared to her, but all of them were overwhelmed by one of her "Serpent Arts" before even gaining an understanding of her abilities and formulating counters against them, no one has calculating powers that overrides the destruction Hebi can cause before she can even cause them.

Of course, like she always says, except for her husband, Loki Darkbringer.

Hebi stopped thinking about her opponent for a moment and decided to survey her surroundings like she said, she was in a very different place than last time, the stench of dried-up blood was very noticeable even without having Hebi's capabilities, and the only three people who are watching her from the wooded platform she was in was looking at her with rage and sadness that was manifested through their tears, Hebi was specifically drawn to one of the young men that is in the very front, the man is not even a teenager, yet her eyes were red like that of a demon whilst he gritted his teeth, actually, he is gritting them so hard that her mouth started to bleed.

Hebi tried to move her limbs, but she noticed that she was sitting on a rather sturdy chair with cuffs tightly restraining her movements and strangely enough, she could not break through it, the "people" who had put her here were very anxious about her escape it seems that even her waist was tightly tied in a rope, in her neck was a circular metal that doesn't have a distance whatsoever from her skin and in her nape she can feel a large long object pushing on it.

_Garrote?_

Hebi was confused at this display and sensed the place, there were no people except the three children in front of her, she ignored the tightening metal on her nape as she tried to make sense of this situation.

_What is this? Why is it a public execution? Normally, wouldn't illusions from dark magic will gouge out the worst fears of the target? That is the basic principle of Dark magic's illusory abilities and I can see that Sophia used it when she made a grim reaper appear in front of me, so what are her plans?_

Unfortunately, Hebi's thoughts of what a plan is quite different from what Sophia was thinking, so in the end, she cannot think of anything that can suit the way Sophia fought until now.

_Doesn't matter, I have to get out of here quick._

Hebi immediately gave up trying to figure out the intentions of her opponent as she realized that figuring it out was out of her league, she just had to brute force her way out of the strategies Sophia might employ, after all in this world, problems that can be solved with violence is not a problem at all.

She immediately bit her tongue hard and sharpened her gaze, however, the illusory world did not disappear, hell it did not even budge, and Hebi also did not feel any pain upon biting her tongue that fell to her lap, with that action of hers, the executioner behind her back seem to be agitated and sped up the killing process by spinning the steering wheel faster which made Hebi grunt.

_It's really more powerful that a sudden intense pain won't work!_

She did not hesitate after once again cursing the illusion and banged her upper and lower teeth hard, the impact of the two molar sections colliding was so intense and powerful that all of the teeth sunk to the gums that were holding them, causing severe bleeding and excruciating pain due to the nerves in her teeth being over stimulated, Hebi grimaced as she endured the torturous pain and finally saw the illusory world glitch, as she has expected she just have to hurt herself in a prolonged period to destroyed it slowly, she smirked when she finally saw the whole new world collapse into shattered mirror shards.

And as expected she found herself in her previous position and it seemed like it was only 30 seconds or such when she left for the "other world", she immediately scanned her surroundings and noticed that the giants' body parts were already scattered around the battlefield as if two gods have fallen in the hands of a mortal's sneak attack, and as she was doing that, her attention was drawn to a voice.

"Oh? How was the world I created? I was waiting for you and received the reports of my subordinates, you see."

The tone of Sophia was incredibly relaxed, however, despite her voice that seem to talk with a friend, in front of her are corpses of unimaginable forms.

One corpse, one pile of blood pudding-like gross thing and a head, the corpse has her whole stomach caved in with bones protruding out of her hands, feet, ribs, and other places, her large and small intestines seem to have fallen through her anus and if one looked closely, her heart and lungs are being puked out of the corpse's mouth whilst its eyes were missing.

Hebi's eyes were wide as she saw such a scene, she did not even have to see who the other two were as tears flowed down her eyes, she had failed, she had failed to protect them, her students that she raised like her children, Hebi's eyes shifted at Sophia who was still smiling, her small stature makes her smile look innocent that made the boiling anger within her finally erupt like a volcano, her injured teeth rapidly went back to place as her canines slightly protruded and her body swelled up.

W̵̢̨͎̗͈͙̱̲̜̹͖̫̝̖̓̀͗͊̽̎͌͆̏h̶͕̹̘̻̓͋̌̓͆͒͊͗̏ȧ̴̡̡͎͈͙̺̼͓͎̲̹͎͓͎̱͗̇̃̓̚͘͝ţ̴̨̢̨̜̲̜̲̭̯͚͈̤̖͍͘̕ͅ ̸̮̯̰̇̔̄̌̓͒̅̏͘h̷̡̜͉͐͆̔̚͝͝a̵̛̫͈̔̽̍̎͋͂̏̈́͗͘͘v̵͚̿̉͆͛͒͒̇̍̇̍͛̀̍͆͒̈́͘e̵͕͆̊̐͐̉͐̾͑͐̏̈͘͠͝ ̶͖͍̩̰̎̈́͒̇̌̌̍͋͋͗̇̆̈́͝ÿ̴̰̲̪̜̹̯̝͎̘͇͆̅̒̽́́͒͗̉̃̐͊̊͜͝͠͝ͅo̸̡̘̩̼̙̺̮̮̺͍̥̯͍͈̘̖͌͆̐̎̂̀͛͂̓̏̊͑̀͜͝u̵̢̢͕͚̍͛́̾̈́̀̇͂̏̓̄́́̿́̋̽̃͠͝ ̸̛̳̺͔̍̅̾̂̆̐̍͊̎̄̉͌̐̈́̈͌d̸̨̧̨̮̱̤̻͕̭̹̖̙͍̺̘̯̲͌̓͐̾̄͑̄͆́̎̅͑̚͝͝ͅő̵̢̧̘̜̺̣̝̘͖̩̹̪͍͇͔̗̾̽̄̆͌͋̓̎̃̕͜ņ̸̢̝̰͕̜͔̘̭͕̜̜͎̝̱̼̄͐̑̋͌̀͗͜ê̷̢̺̣̠̹̯̖͙̫͈̠̭̼̯̙̭͈̏̔͐̅̎͊̽̑̈͐̚͝!̷̡̧̛͖̥̺̪̣̫̖̮̞̪̯̜͂̊̾̆̂̍͋̈́̊̑͛̍͆͝ͅ?̶̨̣̣͙̦̮̹̝̭͓̔̒̀͜

Sophia's smirk grew wider.

_This one is in the bag._

________

30 seconds before Hebi regained her lucidity, Sophia immediately communicated with Eleanor, Philo, and Bakunawa that a portal would appear beside them and instructed the three to enter it alongside the person they killed, somehow, Eleanor managed to create blood pudding out of the remains of Liyab, Sophia was fascinated by such a skill but did not asked about it, after that, she made her subordinates immediately go and lay what remained on their enemies to the ground in a neat position. Of course, all of this is part of her game plan against Hebi.

Back to the present, Sophia looked at her opponent who was transforming, a large amount of pressure made out of nearly materializing anger could be seen all over her being, her tight suit began to rip as Hebi's figure expanded and expanded until it was already 100 meters in height, her beautiful figure is still present, however, her skin became purple as her nails became so long that it reaches the ground, her face was covered with numerous sealing talisman whilst her purple hair was changed with sleeping anacondas of the same color, Sophia's face immediately paled, she did not expect that the discrepancy in power is so high that she will actually feel scared.

_It's a good thing that I know that she's a musclehead who got wisdom because of her age, also Urduja made it to a point that one of her weakness are her students that are raised like her children because she's infertile, if not, then I would risk to run away here with the crown and hide in Urduja's back, which will not look cool to my future mother in law._

As Sophia was thinking of that,  Hebi's bloodshot eyes looked at her as she raised her hand and swung it towards the midget in front of her that killed all her students, however, like Sophia said, the moment Hebi lost control of herself, all of Hebi's winning prospect went down the drain. The pinky of Hebi's feet was stabbed by another dagger, but this time, it had a lot more dark magic than the previous two, Hebi however did not notice it and continued attacking Sophia.

Even though she never doubted her victory, the body of Sophia shivered as the nails looked closer, she could have dodged, but because the 'thing' that she will be doing right now would be her first attempt, she had to focus hard, thankfully when a nail was just one inch away from her face, Hebi's whole body suddenly shuddered and went on a screeching halt, behind her, a gigantic magic circle formed in a split second and there emerged a being that towered over her already gargantuan size by a large margin.

The being was clad in a black cloak with a scythe several times bigger than the devil form of one of the devil race's strongest individuals and despite being in the dead of the night, the reaper cast a shadow over the two heroes that surprised even the caster herself, though that only made the said individual to think of a cool attack name (she cared more about her figure recently because she was about to get married) whilst Hebi looked at the figure unconsciously as the anger on her heart was slowly being replaced by existential fear.

[The Shadow at the Valley of Death]

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Reference art for the devil form of Hebi Tsukaiza: https://ph.pinterest.com/pin/12596073952369526/