Chapter 498: CHPT 498: Skin and Blood
They'd been running for a mile at least. The shifting fractals of sunlight beaming through magical constructs and elements soaring overhead made gauging distance difficult. But they trusted Maris.
Ursula carried her on her back as she led the way, holding out her hand where the Yokai blood hovered like a living ball of slime. He could only assume the closer they got the more spiked and unstable it became.
It was either that or the sparks of lightning in the air slowly beginning to magnetize his armor.
No use gambling. Isaac had already done that one too many times. But his dad always told him good leaders were decisive.
"We need to st—"
KRSHSHSKSKSKK!!!!
A roiling shockwave of lightning ripped through the ruin streets like a tidal wave of white light. Isaac activated another Defensive Boost to the group as he guarded Warren. The blast busted through the old walls, burning them as they crumbled and toppling the taller buildings creating flaming roadblocks.
Isaac recovered with small flaming pieces of wood falling from his Aura.
In the distance Isaac and the others became conscious of a full scale war. Obviously what they heard wasn't new, but the view…..
The Yokai leaped and bound from broken down building to broken down building, swooping down to swipe and grab at students while the other monsters battled. Monsters like a massive two headed Ogre. A three headed giant twisted up inside of a skyscraper spitting fireballs and icy winds down at the students. The students put on a light show of power display. The Chosen students were like the gods reborn.
It was working. The floor was littered with eviscerated corpses. The only problem was it was human and monster.
WOOSH!
Ursula busted through a wall behind them with a snarl and got into a scuffle with something. It lasted all of six seconds before Ursula came back out wiping blood off her knuckles.
"Hexenbiest or something…."
Isaac nodded, "We're underpowered. We could get seriously hurt by our teammates. I wouldn't put foul play past some."
"But if we don't fight or lend a hand we could all die." Warren finished.
"We know where it is. I just need to get closer." Maris headed for the chaos with a stumble.
Oddly enough it was her stumble that stopped the blade from hitting her in the head.
SHLCK!
It bit into her shoulder armor as she jumped backward towards the group.
"AURA UP! Eyes on the buildings!" Isaac's cloak fluttered as he ignited himself to increase his defense.
They all searched the empty blocks of dilapidated ruins. Just on the other side the war continued. And somewhere in between something hunted them.
"Got it." Ursula pointed at the top of a sky scraper with no ceiling. It's busted glass windows gave its apex a sharp reflective blue line of teeth. It was in those glassy teeth— the windows, that Isaac caught a slitted pair of glowing eyes watching them.
"WHY does he have favorites?!" Warren's stress was tangible.
Isaac would've engaged him but the SkinWalker tapped the glass causing all the windows on the floor he occupied to shatter.
Something about watching it from so far away made it more horrifying. Maybe it was the fact that Isaac knew he'd catch them. Maybe it was how he stood over all the chaos— completely disconnected from it and focused on them. The weaklings. The runts. In his lean hard green veined hands he held a dead student and a snake.
The Beast Tamer Claude spoke to when they first arrived.
He threw the student off the ledge.
"Run."
They all took off as the SkinWalker began skinning the massive King Cobra.
They ran towards the madness. Hoping they'd be able to hide inside the war. Hoping the full assault of all students would lessen the intensity of the SkinWalkers hunt.
They hopped and flipped through buildings, tripping over waterlogged and burned furniture. Breaking through doors that crumbled to dust and sullied their armor. They waited inside others as the Chosen students turned the sky black— or rose the dead or called forth and avatar of their patron that dropped them all to their knees with each horrifying visage.
Even still.
Isaac pushed through his last wall and found himself in the open field of chaos. It had a physical threshold where even the air was so different it looked as if they fought in something other than earthen atmosphere.
Everyone else escaped their buildings and kept onward when a ripple in the ground tripped them all one by one. In his tumble he saw the creature slither up and out of the earth behind them.
The SkinWalker looked horrifying. He'd read stories and seen artwork of them. Magically gifted men and women who gave into dark magics. Deathly power and curses that changed both victim and perpetrator alike. They took vows of silence to make communications in every other aspect that much more intense.
They were strange.
As was this one.
He'd melded the skin of the dead King Cobra to himself in no time. It sat over his skin as if it were his own. Sandy gold scales. At his elbows and shoulders it thickened into spikes dripping with poison that reflected the light show of war ahead. His muscle flexion caused the scales to click and spark off one another. When he hissed the frilled hood around his neck and head flapped like wings. And his four eyes danced through an array of mind numbing colors.
Maris was in his face with no hesitation, playing off the involuntary trip as a preemptive roll before aiming for the head.
The SkinWalker lunged at her blade, biting into it and crushing the weapon into a dozen metal shards that melted before they hit the ground.
Warren shoved her away from the Monster with a heavy wind blast. Within the blast he let his sword ride the winds into the SkinWalkers chest. Smart. But scales over inhumanely dense muscle didn't care about craftiness. Maris wasn't far enough away as the SkinWalker grabbed her by the leg and slammed her into the earth like a mallet.
He went after Warren. Isaac tackled the Cobra Skinned Monster and received a knee drive so hard his chest plate broke.
CRACK!
[30%HP Remaining]
He was off the ground before he could recover just long enough to see Ursula's ice barreling towards them like a falling glacier.
The SkinWalker threw him at the ice. A shard hit the back of his helmet hard enough to knock him out.
So fast it was embarrassing.
***
When he woke up his ears rang. Whatever happened, he wasn't out long. But still he could hear a nearby repeated banging. Just in front of him as he lay with one side of his head in the crumbled streets, the SkinWalker repeatedly slammed Ursula's face into the ground.
She growled, swatting at his face and arms as they leaked with thin lines of blood.
She must've gotten Warren's dagger at some point.
Ursula continued to fight as best she could. Her eyes had long since gone full white and her red skin steamed like fire was held within.
Isaac tightened the grip on his blade and immediately felt the response of busted bones.
"ISHAAC!" Ursula roared out despite the hand over her mouth before being slammed again.
"ISHAAC! YOUR HELMET! MINE!" Ursula grabbed the SkinWalkers face and it sniffed her hands. "LIKE MY SMELL?! HUH?!…. DuMb bIT—"
The SkinWalker hissed after the freeze burn breached its scales, causing a few to fall off.
She was slammed again.
From the crater she was held down in, her hand surged upward.
Isaac's helmet was already off and rolling to her.
When she caught it, she tossed her own less covering helmet and shoved on Isaac's.
Immediately after a bearish roar shook the floor. Ursula pulled the SkinWalker into her. The struggle waged onward. The veins in her arms bulged…. Swelled….. grew? Her red skin gained a browner almost bronze tint as she was able to pull the SkinWalker closer to her.
With a grunt she swung her arm into its mouth. Repeatedly. The icing forming around her thickened after each break. For some reason it was hesitant to bite her…. Or truly harm her. Even so she continued. Again and again until it had no choice but to open its mouth and bite her.
Isaac yelled out to her as it bit down, busting through the ice and sinking into her skin… her bone. Breaking it clean.
Ursula howled in pain but forced herself to stand, adjusting her position until she stood and the creature hung on both transfixed and stunned.
She placed her freehand on its head, freezeburning it to hell as icy winds flickered and spiraled around her. The scales broke and shattered like glass, revealing the human beneath. She ripped away at the skin with a bear glove of pure ice all while the SkinWalker remained unmoving.
Quickly enough, his human head was visible once again. All the blood drained from his face. Massive fangs split his lips as they sunk into Ursula's skin.
She snarled and head butted him in a very animal fashion before locking his head in her massive legs and ripping her arm out of the SkinWalkers mouth.
SNAP!
The fangs broke. She moved quick, growling as she pulled out the dagger sized fangs holding both in one hand. It seemed like as soon as the SkinWalker came back to reality she was hammering the fangs into his eyes with a wet and icy crunch.
"UGHK—"
"DUMB FUCKING RAHHHHHHH!!!!" Ursula raged, punching the fangs deeper into his head before she grabbed him by the chin and ripped his head off.
The head froze into an ice ball in her grip and she threw it at a vision rune carved into the wall in the distance.
In the midst of her rage she stopped, grabbing her head with a grunt. Her arm dangled hideously.
"ClAUde….. fOcus…. FOCUS! NO…no…. Focus. In the mouth OUT THE NOSE!…. No smells…. Friends hurt. Chase sister…"
"The Healer…" Isaac caught onto her lost ramblings of rage.
Soon enough he forced himself to his feet, using his sword as a cane at times.
Ursula grabbed the others, stacking them over her left shoulder like sacks of potatoes. They didn't stop for conversation, they just ran. Trying to find safety in the chaos. There was no fight. They just barely dodged death against the weakest link and that was only because they got lucky.
Lucky that SkinWalkers seemed to be both weakened by and obsessed with Ursula.
And she's somehow immune to searing venom.
He just wanted them to survive. But even then, as he hobbled underneath of madness bright enough to blind...
Even then…
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone