My Second Life Is A Heroic Power Fantasy 199 Throne Room Showdown Part 2

He intoned a familiar spirit, and shifted his gaze into the ethereal plane. Sure enough, there was no trace of the girl's spirit, but there, plain as stars in the darkness, were a set of footprints slowly working their way around behind him. Something about this felt eerily familiar to Rawgh'faz. He'd seen this trick before, and it'd nearly cost him his life the first time. He was not about to make that same mistake again.

"I can see you walking behind me, little girl!" He snarled and he twisted and dove with fury toward the exact spot she stood. To his surprise, however, the footsteps vanished as soon as his feet left the ground. He adjusted his position and tucked into a roll upon landing before springing back to his feet. Growing increasingly angry and impatient, he howled, "Where are you?!"

The reply came quiet as a mouse, and directly into his ear.

"Behind you."

Rawgh'faz spun around just in time to feel something solid crack against his face. The solid oaken staff in Eleanor's hands smashed into his teeth with enough force that it knocked him stumbling and sent his head into a spin. She followed through, her mouth spewing a slur of arcane formulae as she brought the staff around again. Rawgh'faz hissed and threw up a Barrier spell to block the second blow. The staff exploded against the arcane barrier in a blast of blue and yellow energy, sending burning shrapnel flying in all directions.

Blown backwards by the blast, Eleanor tumbled away, finally using a blast of air from her hands to bring herself back to her feet at the far end of the throne room. Once sse had her feet under her, she

hurriedly used her hands to put out the bits of fire that were burning at the ends of her hair. It was now a good bit shorter on one side. If she wasn't fighting for her life at this moment, she'd probably be pretty upset about it.

Rawgh'faz reached his fingers into his mouth, grimacing slightly as he pulled a broken tooth free from his jaw. He studied it with an immutable expression for a long moment before flicking it to the ground beside him. He leaned over and spat a mouthful of blood onto the stone, before wiping his mouth.

"Ordinarily, I would offer to spare you in exchange for you letting me go," Eleanor said, staring at the shaman, "but I've gotta be honest with you, dog... I think I'm past the point of leaving without killing you."

Rawgh'faz spat more crimson into the ground beside him, and laughed.

"Before I bound you and took you, I knew breaking you would be a rare treat indeed when it finally happened. Now, that inevitability is going to be even more sweet when you realize just how depraved our kind can be." He said, almost gently.

As he spoke, the air around him seemed to thicken and darken again, and Eleanor felt a sudden chill crawl up her spine as it felt like every bit of warmth in the room seemed to recede and vanish into that growing darkness. As she watched, his body seemed to shift and contort. At first she thought it was just a trick of the light, but it rapidly became apparently something was actually changing with him as the bones and joints in his body began to crack and separate, his jagged, heaving breaths interspersed with demented, otherworldy growls.

Then with a sudden, horrific tearing sound, the flesh on the shaman's back split wide open.