The Nymph whose core Twiggy had just pierced didn't stop moving. Instead, its whole body shuddered violently, flinging out a storm of blades that forced Geno and Twiggy back.
"Are you all right?"
"Fine."
One careless moment had cost her a good number of cuts, but thanks to her Ether armor, none of them were serious.
Twiggy shook her head. The gashes closed up again within moments, but she found herself staring blankly at the broken saber in her hand.
"Hm? What's wrong? It broke — want me to make you a new one?"
Geno had noticed her broken weapon too, and was just considering whether to forge her a replacement out of Ether crystal when light flared from Twiggy's hand — and the saber simply grew back on its own.
"That's..."
Geno blinked at the familiar trick. Wasn't that his move?
"Well, now I know it too."
A smug little smile curled at the corner of Twiggy's mouth. She seemed to be thoroughly enjoying his stunned expression.
"How did you even— never mind. Let's deal with the thing in front of us first."
He'd meant to ask her what was going on, but with the Nymph twins already circling for another opening, Geno swallowed the question back down.
The Nymph whose core Twiggy had just shattered had already fully healed — even the broken core had re-formed.
"What is even going on with this thing? Shattering its core and it just comes back to life — that's not how any of this is supposed to work.
Geno gritted his teeth. Could this one be nothing but a clone, with the real body hiding somewhere else?
The thought settled it — he'd catch her off guard. He whipped his blade out in a diagonal slash of sword qi that instantly closed the distance and struck the black-veiled Nymph waiting behind.
That Nymph clearly hadn't seen it coming and took the hit square-on, her core shattering just like the grey-veiled one's had — and just like before, she didn't die.
"This one isn't the real body either?"
Geno still figured it for a decoy — after all, with Ether Sight switched on, both of them showed up as an unresponsive black, and that was exactly why he hadn't been able to find a trace of the Nymph earlier.
Just as he was about to try again, Twiggy spoke up.
"Odile says both cores have to be shattered at the exact same instant — even a second's difference won't do.
In her mind, Twiggy replayed what Odile had just told her.
The black-veiled Nymph was her younger sister's true body; the grey-veiled one was a clone she'd made. But in creating that clone, the Nymph had split off part of her own core along with it — seemingly in some attempt to bring Odile back to life.
Which meant that unless both cores were destroyed at the same instant, the Nymph simply couldn't be killed.
"Talk about Pacific Rim-style training. No, wait — more like some kind of co-op combat protocol?"
For a moment Geno couldn't decide whether to file this under Pacific Rim or Eva, but Twiggy couldn't care less what strange nonsense was rattling around in his head right now.
"Still cracking jokes? Time to end this. Drag it out any longer and Nicole and the others will be in danger."
Twiggy hadn't forgotten that their companions upstairs were still in danger.
The two of them needed to race against the clock now — the faster, the better.
"Got it. In that case, let's show them just how in sync we are!"
"Bring it."
Geno and Twiggy exchanged a glance, nodded to each other, and moved.
The two of them surged forward in a burst of speed. Seeing this, the Nymph twins tried again to hold them off with a hail of thrown blades, their two forms spinning ceaselessly like a pair of tops.
But against the tidal-wave force of Geno and Twiggy's assault, it barely counted for anything — after all, a powerful gimmick always comes at the cost of weaker raw stats.
The Nymphs might have concealment and twin-splitting abilities, but their offensive power was far too weak to compensate, forcing them to rely on razor-sharp spikes and agile speed for hit-and-run tactics.
Against a head-on breakthrough like the one Twiggy and Geno were mounting, they were actually at a disadvantage.
Geno casually swatted the thrown blades aside, then closed the distance with a sudden charge, landing right in front of the Nymph twins.
The grey-veiled Nymph immediately lashed out with a kick to force him back, only for Geno's charge to turn out to be nothing but a feint.
He'd already pulled back before her leg even landed. Right behind him came Twiggy, circling in from the other side — she blocked with her blade held sideways, then gave it a sharp tug, and the grey-veiled Nymph lost her balance and went down.
The black-veiled one tried to move in to help, but before she could so much as twitch, Geno cut her down with a single stroke.
The Nymph twins both lay sprawled on the ground.
"All right. Time to finish this."
Geno and Twiggy's synchronization had hit two hundred percent. In perfect unison, they flipped their weapons around and drove them straight into the cores at the two Nymphs' waists.
Crack!
The instant blade met core, a sound like shattering glass rang out — but it wasn't the sound of the cores breaking.
What was shattering were the two Nymphs' bodies!
Fwip fwip fwip fwip fwip!
A storm of fragments burst outward like shrapnel from a grenade, forcing the two of them to fall back.
There's a damn second phase!?
Geno and Twiggy each spat out a silent curse, but it didn't matter — they'd just have to do it all over again.
But things weren't going to be as simple as they thought.
The shattered fragments of the two Nymphs kept reforming in midair, coalescing into a single brand-new Nymph, pure white.
At the same moment, the two cores fused back together into one.
And at that same instant, Geno and Twiggy both saw it — nestled inside the fused core, a gem glimmered.
"That must be the ring Odile mentioned, right?"
Geno's eyes flicked briefly toward Twiggy — or more precisely, toward the ring still sitting on the middle finger of her right hand.
"Right, that's it. Most of the Nymph's power probably comes from it too."
Twiggy glanced down at the ring on her own hand without meaning to. She'd used its power herself, so she knew exactly how strong it really was.
'Odile, how much power do I still have left to draw on?'
Twiggy asked Odile silently. Right now she was borrowing the ring's power, but what she could actually control was limited — after all, the ring's true owner was still Odile.
'Half.'
'That's enough.'
Twiggy turned it over in her mind. With half her power left, she could hold this form for a while longer. All she had to do was seize the chance to shatter the core and pull the ring free — victory would be hers for the taking.
"Geno!"
"What!?"
"All-out attack!!"
"Copy that!"
At Twiggy's call, Geno flashed back a bright, sunny grin — and then his body abruptly surged, growing larger.
Dead End Butcher Mode! Activate!
____
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