Chapter 82: The First Wave (6)
"Was that you?"
"That explosion, that night..." The Fallen’s stare didn’t waver, all the earlier sarcasm burned out of its voice. "That was you, wasn’t it?"
"No," Malrik said, tone dramatically wounded, breath still ragged from the pain in his ribs. "I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about."
"You expect me to believe that?" The Morveth’s roar cracked with rage.
"Fine. No matter. I’ll kill you first, then everyone behind those walls."
Malrik didn’t answer. He watched, waiting for its next move.
The Fallen raised both axes slowly, and Malrik felt something shift beneath its skin — a pulse of dark energy spreading through its muscle. "You’ve earned a little more effort from me."
Its hide began to change color.
A cold metallic sheen spread across its body, starting at the fingertips and climbing to the hardened tips of its horns, until its whole frame had become a single mass of steel. Its axes changed with it, dull and gray, heavier just from looking at them.
Damn it.
The air around Malrik gained weight, like the ground itself had thickened beneath his boots.
"I never intended to use my Law against an Awakened," the Fallen said, his voice dropping to a low murmur. "But you’ve earned the privilege of seeing it before you die. Consider it an honor."
Then it charged.
Malrik didn’t try to meet it, He threw both hands outward.
Heavy Domain.
The skill spread silently across the battlefield. An invisible weight settled over everything within its reach, growing heavier with every passing moment.
The Fallen’s movements slowed almost immediately, its enormous body suddenly fighting against a force that hadn’t been there before.
Malrik didn’t stop there.
Gravity Field.
An unseen distortion formed around his body. Any projectile or long-range attack that entered it would have its trajectory bent away from its original path.
I don’t need to be stronger than it.
I just need to buy myself some time.
The Fallen’s charge hit the edge of the Domain and barely slowed.
Its axe came down where Malrik had been standing a heartbeat earlier, and the ground took the blow instead — a crater half a meter deep, dust and gravel thrown up in a ring around it.
Malrik was already moving, already three steps clear.
Faster than it should be. The Domain’s barely touching it.
He could feel Heavy Domain working — a faint drag, like wading through water up to his knees, except the water was pulling at the Fallen’s limbs instead of his own. It should have slowed something this size by a third, maybe more.
It hadn’t slowed it by a third. It had barely slowed it at all.
Damn it
The Fallen spun with the second axe already swinging, no wasted motion between the two attacks, and this one came in low and horizontal — aimed to cut his legs out from under him.
Gravity Field caught the edge of it and bent the path just enough.
Just enough meant the axe missed his shins by a hand’s width instead of opening them to the bone.
Malrik didn’t stop to feel grateful. He threw himself backward, rolled once across scorched dirt, and came up already forming Death Bullet in his palm — smaller this time, built for speed instead of size.
He fired it mid-motion, still moving, and the black mass struck the Fallen’s shoulder.
It rang. A dull, hollow, metallic sound, like a hammer striking an anvil wrapped in cloth.
No blood. No stagger. Nothing.
The steel’s soaking the whole thing.
He didn’t stop to confirm it. He fired again, then a third time, spacing the shots as he circled wide, using the scattered bodies and debris across the battlefield to break the Fallen’s line of sight for half a second at a time.
None of them left a mark deeper than a smear of soot.
The Fallen wasn’t chasing blind, either. Every time Malrik opened distance, it closed the gap in two strides — two, when it should have needed four inside a Heavy Domain — and each stride ended in a swing aimed exactly where he was about to be, not where he already was.
It’s reading my footing.
He adjusted, breaking his rhythm on purpose, planting on the wrong foot to throw off the next guess. It worked once.
It cost him a jarring wrench through his bad shoulder to pull off, and the axe still grazed close enough to tear a line through his sleeve.
This isn’t working. I’m bleeding, and it’s barely taking any damage.
He planted his feet instead of running again, and raised both hands.
Gravity Crush.
The air above the Fallen folded inward, gathering into an invisible fist of crushing gravity before slamming down onto it from directly above.
The creature’s knees buckled. One axe dragged against the ground to catch its balance, gouging a long furrow through the dirt, and for one full second, the charge broke into a stagger.
There.
Malrik didn’t waste it standing still. He used the second to put fifteen meters between them, mana already gathering for another Death Bullet — bigger this time, slower to form, aimed for the seam where the shoulder plating met the collarbone instead of open steel.
The Fallen shook the weight off before the bullet finished condensing in his palm.
It didn’t charge straight this time.
It cut sideways first, changing its angle mid-stride and forcing Malrik to adjust. By the time he realized what it was doing, the Fallen had already slipped around his side and was closing in from an unexpected angle.
He threw himself sideways, Gravity Field twisting the first axe’s arc just wide of his ribs — but the second axe was already coming, and there was nowhere left to bend it to.
He caught it on his forearm instead of his skull. Bone screamed under the impact, and the world spun sideways as he was thrown, skidding hard across broken stone before he managed to dig a heel in and stop.
That’s the arm gone. Can’t grip anything with it now.
He forced himself up anyway, cradling it against his chest, breathing through his teeth.
The Fallen didn’t rush him. It walked, unhurried, axes trailing at its sides, steel gleaming dull under the smoke-choked sky.
"Where did all that courage go?" The Fallen laughed as it chased after him. "You were talking like you had no fear of death."
It raised its axe, a mocking smile spreading across its face.
"Or have you finally realized... the gap in strength between us?"
"You say that like it’s a bad thing," Malrik said, though the joke came out thinner than he meant it to, more air than words.
I need more distance. I need it away from me entirely, or the next hit finishes this.
He fired Death Bullet again with his good arm — full size, this time, no more holding back for speed. It struck the same shoulder seam he’d been aiming for, and this time something gave.
Not much. A hairline crack in the plating, a thin seam of black rot creeping along the edge of it, no wider than a fingernail.
The Fallen actually paused to look down at it.
That pause was the only reason Malrik was still breathing when the next axe swing came — he’d already started backpedaling, Heavy Domain re-forming under the Fallen’s feet as it stepped forward again, buying him half a second he wouldn’t have had otherwise.
He used it to gain ten more meters. Then five more after that.
Just keep it away.
For a while, that worked.
Bullet after bullet struck the same weakening seam near the shoulder, each one prying the crack a little wider. The Domain kept slowing the Fallen by inches — a half-step here, a stumble there. Never enough to stop it, but enough to keep it at a distance.
But Malrik’s own reserves were thinning fast. Every Death Bullet at that size pulled hard on his mana, and the Domain and the Field were both still active, drawing from the same well.
His vision swam for a moment. He blinked until it cleared
Not yet. Not yet.
The Fallen must have seen something in his stance shift, because it stopped playing along with the distance.
This time, it didn’t charge straight at him. It shifted its approach at the last moment, cutting sharply to the side before closing in from an unexpected angle.
He saw it a half-second too late to fully avoid it.
The edge of the axe caught his side.
It tore through his light armor and the flesh beneath in one long, burning line, and the world tilted sideways before he understood he was already falling.
He hit the ground on one knee, hand pressed to the wound, blood slipping fast between his fingers.
If this keeps up, I die here.
The Fallen stood over him, looking down without pity, but without its earlier mockery either — just the cold assessment of an opponent about to be finished.
"I’ll admit, you surprised me." It raised an axe for the final blow. "But this is enough."
Malrik looked up at it for a moment, wiped the blood from his lip, and smiled — thin, but real.
"Who said I was finished?"
Soul Rend.
A green flame ignited in his palm, swelling by the second. It ignored flesh and steel alike, reaching past the physical world and tearing straight at the Fallen’s soul.
The falling axe stopped halfway down.
The creature shuddered violently, its entire steel body ringing like something struck from the inside. Its scream this time was nothing like the ones before it — not physical pain, but something deeper, more terrifying, like some part of its existence had just been torn open.
It dropped to one knee, a few meters from Malrik, the axe falling from its hand and hitting the ground.
For a few seconds, neither of them moved.
Then the Fallen’s breathing steadied — faster than Malrik had expected.
The damage... less than I hoped.
Damn. Its soul is strong, as you’d expect from a creature of the Fallen Rank.
That was because a Fallen’s soul was reinforced through its Law, dense and powerful in a way an ordinary Awakened’s soul simply wasn’t.
The Fallen raised its head slowly. Something crossed its gleaming metal face that Malrik hadn’t seen there before — not rage, not condescension.
Confusion. Genuine disbelief.
"That..." Its voice came out hoarse, nothing like the steady, metallic tone from moments earlier. "How? How could you hurt my soul?"
Malrik didn’t answer. He was only trying to stay conscious, blood still leaking from the wound in his side, both knees trembling from the sudden drain of using so much mana at once.
The Fallen rose slowly, its movements noticeably heavier than before.
It stared at Malrik with an entirely new expression — the look of an opponent reassessing someone it had badly, dangerously underestimated.
"Who... are you?"
Malrik didn’t answer the question. He didn’t have enough breath left for an answer.
Instead, he drove the broken half of his spear into the scorched ground and used it to push himself upright. Blood still ran freely from the wound in his side, making the world tilt for a moment before his eyes.
"Who I am doesn’t matter." His voice came out rougher than he’d wanted, but it remained steady. "What matters is that I’m the one who’s going to kill you."
The Fallen tilted its head, almost amused "Big words from someone who can barely stand."
Malrik smiled anyway. Thin, but real.
Then he screamed it "Lokris. Now!"
****
Author’s Note:
A huge thank you to Chris_Hemphill_2618 and DaoistW2139t for the gifts!
And thank you to everyone for your continued support of the story. Every gift, Golden Ticket, comment, and review means a lot to me and keeps me motivated to keep writing. I truly appreciate all of you! ❤️