Velastra stared at Darek for several long, assessing seconds. He had simply appeared—out of thin air, as far as her senses could tell. Teleportation, likely. The suddenness of it drew a flicker of wide-eyed surprise from her, but the feeling lasted only a heartbeat before her expression slid right back into its usual easy smirk. She began to chuckle, even clapping her hands once in delighted approval.
"Now that is a good line," she praised, voice warm with amusement. "Feels like something straight out of an epic."
She tilted her head as she looked him up and down, her grin sharpening. "But forgive me if I don't find it intimidating. You did just run away before."
She flicked her eyes toward the nearest cluster of imps and gave a small nod. They hesitated—just for a moment, still unsure how he had appeared so suddenly—but obedience won out. They hurled themselves at Darek, claws outstretched.
They never reached him.
Darek pivoted on his heel, movement smooth and controlled, and swept his hand in a low arc. A compressed wave of gray fire edged in deep violet roared outward. The flames hit the imps mid-leap, erasing them instantly in a burst of ash.
*Soul Flame,* Velastra recognized, her smile tightening with interest.
Darek lowered his arm and met her gaze evenly. "I don't blame you for not finding me intimidating. That's how it should be when you don't know me."
His attention dipped toward Mari. The girl's eyes had widened at the sight of the flame—only for the awe to break under the weight of her worry as she looked to the dying black knight and the collapsed Lennix.
Seeing this, Darek lifted both hands toward the two fallen fighters. A pulse of power surged outward—not fire, not light, something else entirely. Their wounds closed. Their strength flooded back. Confusion tightened their expressions as sensation returned; then, realizing they were whole, they pushed upright at once.
The black knight called his shadow greatsword into being, the weapon forming with a deep, swallowing thrum. He stepped forward and swung down at the demon knight, who barely managed to bring his longsword up in time to catch the attack.
"Round two," the black knight growled as steel and shadow locked.
Lennix, newly restored, flexed his fingers—nails lengthening into those familiar black claws—before charging straight through a cluster of demons, ripping through their ranks on his way toward the imprisoned women.
"We're going to have a serious talk about this later!" he barked at Darek while running. "But take care of her for now!"
Darek nodded once, eyes already shifting back to Velastra.
She slowly turned her gaze around the battlefield, taking in the restored fighters, the fallen demons, the sudden shift in morale. "Impressive," she murmured. "Really impressive."
Mari, watching the black knight stand again and Lennix tear through enemies with renewed strength, felt her fear melt into wonder. "Thank you!" she called to Darek before hurrying back to the cluster of villagers and guards.
Hope—true hope—was spreading among them now.
"I don't care if you find me impressive," Darek said, stepping toward Velastra. A dense aura bloomed around him, the same colors as his Soul Flame, rippling off his body in a slow, destructive pulse. "All I care about right now is punishing you for invading this world."
Velastra's smile returned in full. She even laughed. "Another great line—"
She didn't finish it.
Darek was already on her, closing the distance in a single, decisive burst, right fist pulled back to strike.
Velastra snapped her left leg up in a rising kick as she leaned back, trying to slip just outside the reach of Darek's incoming strike. But Darek didn't simply block—his left hand swept in from the inside, catching her shin with a soft redirecting touch, guiding the force past him rather than stopping it. The motion let her momentum carry her torso open, her balance hinging on the single leg still grounded.
His right hand shot forward, not clenched but open, a sharp palm strike driving straight into that supporting thigh. The impact lifted her clean off the ground, her body flipping backward through the air.
Darek pivoted on the ball of his foot and came up into the motion, his right leg rising in a snapping upward kick aimed at her jaw as she spun overhead—
—but before the strike could land, the sharp snap of fingers rang through the air.
Velastra vanished.
Darek's eyes narrowed. His left arm rose instantly, angled to catch the descending force from behind. Velastra's heel slammed into his forearm, her kick carrying all the torque and acceleration she'd built from spinning the moment she blinked behind him. The ground beneath Darek's back foot cracked from the pressure he absorbed.
"Wow! You aren't half bad," Velastra chimed, flipping away in a light, effortless back-handspring, landing with a delighted grin.
She didn't wait. Her leg blurred into a sweeping round kick aimed for his temple. Darek shifted his weight, rolling his shoulder under the arc, letting the strike graze past. His hand glided along her shin in a controlled parry, turning her momentum into an unintentional spin. She vanished mid-rotation—
—reappearing low to his right with a whipping side kick. Darek's stance dropped, hips turning, and his palm met her ankle again, soft contact redirecting the blow just wide enough to miss his ribs. He stepped through the motion, folding into her blind angle to counterstrike, but she blinked out the instant he entered her space.
She reappeared above him this time, knee dropping toward his sternum. He slid half a step, heel scraping the dirt, and intercepted the strike with a rising forearm, the collision sending a burst of displaced air exploding outward. She flipped off the blocked knee, spinning in midair—blinked—and came in from the left with a crescent kick.
Darek rotated on his lead foot, spine turning with perfect precision, his hand brushing her calf and letting her own momentum swing her leg past him harmlessly. He flowed after the redirected strike, his other arm rising to counter, but her body disappeared with another soft snap, leaving him striking empty air.
For a moment, they were little more than flickers—her appearing and disappearing in sharp, angled bursts of motion, legs slicing in from every possible direction; him responding with seamless redirections, absorbing her force and using it to keep her just off-balance enough that none of her kicks found a true target.
Velastra finally landed several paces back, boots skidding lightly over the dirt. She laughed, hands on her hips. "Okay, not half bad was an understatement. You're really, really good. I can't even get a proper hit in after all that."
Darek didn't chase her. He watched her with a tightening expression, a thought echoing in his mind.
*I thought I could take her out with martial skill alone. I know I'm better. Absolutely better. But that blinking of hers… it's a pain to deal with.*
Fine.
*I'll use more magic.*
He straightened, drawing in a deep breath. Then, without warning, he thrust both hands forward. A violent burst of yellow lightning erupted from his palms, roaring toward her in a jagged torrent.
Velastra's mouth opened, grin faltering. "Are you throwing a tantr—"
The lightning swallowed her before she could finish.