Chapter 14: Oddly Simple

Seeing the argument going on between the Single Winged Being and Stein, I instantly retreated to my psyche.

Upon reaching 'Bibliotheca', I didn't see Athena on her counter. It was clear there was no other place she could be, so I began screaming out her name.

"Athena! Athena!! Where Are You!?" Then, from a very far distance from me within the maze of book shelves, she yelled back at me.

-{W-What Do You Think You Are Doing Here!! You Are In The Presence Of A Fallen Angel, And Not Any Fallen Angel, But The One Responsible For Beating Your Ass Till You Felt Life Slipping Through Your Fingers And Then You Actually Came Here. You Could Get Killed Before You Know It. You'd Blank Out In Reality If You Actually Brought Your Consciousness Here}

Without even waiting to reply to Athena, I returned to reality as quickly as I could.

But it seemed I was a bit too late.

The one they called Abezethibou was already right in front of my face again.

He was examining me very closely, and the curiosity could be sensed very clearly.

"Did I turn you into a Ghoul or something? How does one black out just like that?"

-{It'll Be Advised To Back Away, Azur}

As soon as I heard Athena say this, I leapt backwards fairly quickly.

I was right. I did underestimate the people present.

This was what pissed Abezethibou off when he tried to kill me, because I had a rather measly breakthrough. I began thinking I was the strongest being in existence.

After I leapt away, Anastasia performed her iconic Dragon Battle Cry.

The attack hit Abezethibou at point blank range.

He was clearly not expecting it at all. The attack kicked up a lot of dust, so Abezethibou was concealed.

I decided to take advantage of the current situation and then I rushed forward, igniting both my fists in flames and then bracing my right fist for a huge wallop.

To my surprise, my fist was caught by Abezethibou.

After the dust cleared up, I realized that he had also been using his affinity.

He coated his palm in a layer of crackling lightning. I was unsure if it was for defense, enforcement, or just him preparing for the next attack.

"So Bezeth used his affinity to block mine. Have I really grown that strong?"

I inquired as a simple provocation.

He was clearly enraged by it, and he threw quite a blow at me.

I barely dodged it thanks to my heightened perception and reaction speed, but my cheek, where the attack was aimed at, felt like it was burning.

I retreated to the side of Anastasia.

"Hello, Feminine dragon. Still pretty short, I see. But let us forget that now. Care to explain to me how your stuff works so I can make out a plan?"

Before Anastasia could reply, Bezeth just happened to move right before us at speeds that I couldn't even comprehend.

Almost immediately after, he braced for a roundhouse kick that went with the speed of a bolt of lightning.

I thought that the robe that he wore didn't seem to be as hard to move in as I thought. I put my hands out to block the attack.

It hurt really badly. The feeling of pain was yet another weird one.

Even with Enforcement my arm still got reddened and felt like it was on the verge of breaking.

I immediately braced my fist once more while he was still in the moment where he had to withdraw.

He didn't expect a burst of speed from nowhere, especially after he was sure he broke my hand.

My flaming fist finally connected with his jaw, and it left a burn mark on his face.

[A/N: Bezeth used that jaw blow on Azur. Wow, so Azur learnt it]

I didn't have time to rejoice over a single hit, so I grabbed Anastasia in my arms and bolted.

"Can you even do anything?!" I thundered at her.

"Must I remind you that I possess a superior kill count and that is directly proportional to ability?" She replied in this truly angering way. It turns out that this was all a game to all of us.

-{Azur, Don't Waste Time On Interrogations. I Can Get Her Info For You. The "Records Of Existence" Are All Here. I May Not Be Able To Directly Transfer It To You, And Even If I Read It To You, There Are Some Parts You Aren't Eligible To Know Yet, You Okay With That?}

Hearing that made me feel quite dumb.

A collection of books with all the knowledge in the world would, of course, possess information on people.

I dropped Anastasia on the floor abruptly and then bent over to talk to her.

"If you are at least half of what I think you are, then you should already understand this. We cannot win this head on. Please assist me."

I also seem to be becoming quite rude because my new habit involves me not waiting for a reply, which I did again right now when I went to face the still dazed Fallen Angel.

He saw me approaching him, and then he got enraged. His light red eyes grew brighter and his original irises became little slits.

"You insignificant stain! I will wipe your wretched existence completely!" he screamed out as his body began crackling and sparking with his lightning.

I took the time he so generously gave to me and I started trying to recover my energy. My Brio/Stamina seemed to be holding out too.

-{Anastasia: Draconic Kin. She Has The Peculiar Sound Affinity. She Can Perform The 'Dragons Battle Cry' And 'Great Dragons Battle Cry' To Supreme Lengths Despite How Young She Is. It's Beneficial Because Both Have Great Destructive Capability And Can Even Mess With The Ability Of The Body To Accept Energy.}

"I see. Anastasia! Each time I fail to land a hit. Make sure you do some damage!" I screamed out to her while I reignited the flames in my fists.

"Wait, what!?" She replied.

"You heard me!" I said without caring much about what she would say next.

I wanted to try something that I had always wanted to do.

This was the original attack that involved burning everything within a place.

I had almost no time to try to start drawing a Sorcerer's circle, so I just had to use the next alternative.

But I couldn't just use it from nowhere; I was trying to conserve energy.

I rushed towards the opponent with all the power I could muster and forced into each of my steps, just to increase my speed and, hence, the power within my attacks would increase.

I began exchanging violent and quick blows with Bezeth.

I was somehow managing to land attacks, but I was also taking too much damage.

Bezeth then hit me unexpectedly in the gut. It was quite painful and I coughed up quite a lot of blood since my insides took damage.

It felt like my empty stomach was ruptured.

Suddenly, from nowhere, I felt a painful second strike on the same spot.

He channeled a whole lot of electricity through, and not only was there the effect of a second impact, but there was the expected electrocution.

I didn't want other people to see when Athena would be directly affecting the outside world, but I couldn't continue in this way.

Even though it was unethical to have help from an intangible, unfathomable, and incomprehensible phantom librarian that resides within my mind.

"Athena, the Circle please?"

Immediately, I said that a Circle was very clearly forming from scrapes on the cinder floor.

Anastasia saw an opportunity and then attacked Bezeth head on with a battle cry. He really seemed to be neglecting her in this spar, but it didn't matter.

The raised and scattered dust was just starting to settle when Bezeth was revealed with blood dripping down the side of his head.

"These Fools! They can't seriously be giving me a hard time and I can't use any more than this."

After Bezeth said this, he decided to extend his singular wing and his energy output became overwhelming.

I then decided to do the same.

It wouldn't be much, but if he increased his abilities, I would be a fool to not do the same.

We rushed towards each other and, shockingly, we both had similar attacks in mind, and because of this, we both painfully head-butted ourselves.

I felt like my brain was turned upside down, but this time I made sure to set my entire being ablaze.

This was something I had yet to perfect. When my energy gets exhausted, the flames don't just stop burning, but instead they start burning me, so I refrain from using it.

The head attack seemed to also daze him to some extent, and then Anastasia approached Bezeth and hit him in the back with an attack with both her palms clasped together.

The attack pushed him to the floor and created shockwaves similar to her Dragon Battle Cry, and it even caused me to fall over.

This fallen angel guy didn't seem nearly as strong as they made him out to be. I didn't want to think too much about the reason, I just wanted to end this.