Ashen Assassin - Mesuda Village Arc

After Ash used one of his ashen techniques he began to charge at the beast, but in particular the two that had rock and crystal aethers since they could do long range attacks which would put Ash at a disadvantage.

As he ran towards them the bears tried to stop him, one swiped at him with a claw coated in diamond, to which he parried and used to propel himself forward towards another beast which tried to gnaw him with fangs of molten magma.

As the fangs closed in, he switched the dagger in his left hand to reverse grip, then coated his fist in condensed ash and punched the bear in the head as hard as he could, causing the bear to fall down to the ground.

After the bear fell, he continued to run towards the two with long range attacks. As he got closer to the beasts another two bears attacked, luckily two without aether as only majority could use their aether, raising their claws the two bears were beginning to start slashing Ash.

He responded to their attack by slicing the paws off both the bears in a single swing of one of his blades before using the second blade to slash off their heads. As the heads of the bears hit the ground another shower of rock and crystal began to rain upon him, forcing him to go on the defensive and parry each of the projectiles.

As he got used to the speed of the projectiles, he began to run towards the two beasts again while still parrying each of the rocks and crystals raining down in him. As he closed in on the two two bears, another beast attempted to slam Ash to the ground to which he jumped over and used as a ramp to launch himself into the sky.

He was now above the two beasts shooting the rocks and crystals at him. As he began to fall, he yelled

“Ashen technique: hai no bēru”

As he said this a cloud of ash began to fall upon the area blocking any onlookers or beast's view of the fight and Ash. As the smokescreen of ash surrounding the beasts continued to fall all that could be heard was the bears roaring and meat being cut.

After five minutes the veil of ash finally dispersed revealing the two corpses of the bears with long range attacks and a third one, that had attacked him after, laying around Ash who held blood soaked blades while gasping for air.

Even though hai no bēru hid his presence and the sight of his opponents it also made it challenging for anything including himself to breath.

As he stood there the remaining beasts including the ones he had passed earlier had gotten back up and faced him.

“Hey guys, you good to switch yet I kind of tired myself out here trying to get rid of those beasts” shouted Ash in a calm voice as the remaining seven beast started to stare him down.

He got no reply from either Honō or Selene.

Ash sighed at he began to speak again “and here I thought I could have beaten them all before you got here, Witz.”

As he finished speaking something collided with one of the beasts launching it into a nearby wall raising a cloud of dust. A voice began to shout from the dust.

“Ehhhhh, how did you know I was watching your fight?” Shouted the voice from the dust.

“Huh you were?” Shouted back Ash as he immediately recognised the voice to be Witz’s

The two burst out laughing as the dust cleared to reveal Witz wearing her usual boots and gauntlets along with a new piece of equipment, in the form of a chest plate.

As they laughed the bear that Witz had knocked away had got back up and was beginning to raise it claw.

“Oh, time to test my new gear” exclaimed Witz excitedly as she stood facing the bear ready to take the full of the hit.

The bear slashed Witz across her chest plate leaving no scratch or mark, it was like it was a child hitting her. The chest plate had absorbed the entire impact of the hit and protected her.

As she saw her chest plate work and absorb the hit, she grew a devilish smile as she began to speak

“Bitch, now it’s my turn”