[IC] Multiverse: The Sadist's Maze

[Alphakoka]

The dragonoid stumbling backwards also caused Niks to fell forward. He recovered to her coughing and a billow of smoke covering his sight. He would've grinned were his suit's face allow it to, as it were, it only showed as a twitch. He waved his arms to clear the smoke from his face, only for them to reveal the girl lunging towards him with a punch. The punch connected to the unprepared Lich, throwing him backwards into his lingering Hex as it dissipated. Niks sat up with a grunt and glared at the humanoid, the punch had split open whatever remain of the nose. With a hand, he reached for the broken nasal flesh and ripped it off from his face. With the other, he prepared another coughing miasma, if he figured it correctly, if this one hit the humanoid, she would be too busy coughing to jump around.

[ImportantNobody]

Evvie kept up the offensive as her opponent was knocked down, still coughing but doing her best not to let that bother her too much. She had lost her ability to use fire but it seemed like she was able to do everything else well enough not to be too detrimental to her fighting ability. Her opponent was showing more battle damage then what he had inflicted on her as far as she was concerned, so she was still feeling rather confident.

She jumped upwards and did a flip so that her feet would land on his face as she came back down to the ground with all of her weight and power. If a punch was enough to wound him, such an attack might be able to finish him off in one fell swoop.

[Alphakoka]

Niks threw himself to his right just as his opponent flipped and stomped down, however, he was a bit too late and the brat sized bomb landed on his shoulder. He grunted on the impact as he fell onto his back from the force, feeling the flesh underneath her feet crumpling and losing aim of his miasma as her right hand jerked, sending the spell away to the darkness beyond. Glaring at the girl above him, Niks attempted to grab her legs with both of his hands, although in practice his attempt was more trying to claw her leg with his left hand and grabbing her other leg with his right.

If he could manage to make her immobile for awhile in front of him, he could cover her with the soul rot. His current position made it hard, however.

[ImportantNobody]

Evvie tried to make her escape by leaping off his shoulder, but he was just fast enough to grab onto her left foot as she almost got out of his range. Harrumph! Did he expect to be able to keep hold of a half dragon for very long? In that case had another thing coming for him, and that thing was her right foot coming back down to try and repeatedly stomp onto his face until he let go. In fact she was glad that he grabbed her foot so that she could more easily be kept in place as she was attacking. She remained in the air above his head, flapping occasionally but with some difficulty as her coughing had yet to subside.

[Alphakoka]

Niks' hand stubbornly kept on clinging to Evvie's foot. However, he did attempt to cover his face with his mangled left hand. Being undead, having his head stomped over and over did little to him, although having his primary sensory would hinder him a lot. The flesh of the suit had started to be torn away, flaps of his burned forehead had also fell in front of his eyes. Between the stomping and his opponent's wing flaps, he tried to move her away from his face using the grabbed foot as leverage, as much good as that do.

[ImportantNobody]

If only she could use her fire breath then this battle would be over in a second. Evvie gritted her teeth as she continued stomping on him. Why...won't...he...just...die! She thought to herself with each smash. Maybe she'd have to take a different approach. As he tried to shift her around she allowed some movement to the side and downward, but as she started to fall she bent her right leg back for a moment before arching her back and jerking her leg forward again in an attempt to punt his mangled head clean off of his body using all of the potential energy stored in her arched body. Even if he was good as absorbing head on (literally) blunt force trauma, at the speed and force of her kick it would be more like a blunt knife trying to cut off something. Even if it wouldn't be a clean cut it could still do the trick, she would assume.

[Alphakoka]

Niks' head flew and landed a distance away from the body. However, before Evvie could celebrate her victory, the hand holding her foot, along with the rest of the orc's body suddenly started to deflate as a cloud of bone dusts and one green will-o-wisp started to flow out of the new opening where the head used to be toward the separated head. The cloud and will-o-wisp then started to form a skeleton beneath the severed head before Niks sat up. Snarling with what left of the face, which would probably looked more disturbing rather than terrifying, Niks returned to his attempt of subduing his opponent and sent a hastily formed Miasma of sneezing towards her torso.

[ImportantNobody]

Evvie almost made a fist bump celebratory pose when all of a sudden his skeleton somehow managed to re-attach itself to his severed head, cutting her short. She was more surprised then disturbed, as she had fought many skeletons in her days. They just didn't have such a trick up their non existent sleeves as he did. Taking him out was beginning to turn into a huge pain, and she was still coughing enough to disrupt her fire breath. She couldn't even give him a funeral by cremation in her current state and he seemed to not mind her physical attacks very much, unless she just had to hit harder? Hitting harder usually solved most of her problems, after all. The skeleton sent another one of those mysterious fogs at her so she quickly dodged to the right, running in a small circle to get around to his backside. She then tried to punch his face in yet again, hoping that it would eventually do the trick.

[Alphakoka]

Niks prepared another miasma to be launched toward his opponent as she circled, he completed another one and launched it at her just as her fist connected to his face. Without the enhanced strength of the suit nor its weight, the punch send him flying to the wall. The sound he made as he hit the wall and slid down to the ground was akin to the sound made between a stone hitting another stone. The flame that were his eyes flickered as Niks stood while the flame contained in his ribs burned uncaringly. The effort was growing to be a chore now and while her physical attack did little to him, if the current routine continue, all it would serve would be him being a ragdoll, thrown around by her brute strength. At least she was far too dim to try anything else now.

[ImportantNobody]

Evvie was far too close and busy with her attack to dodge the mysterious fog he sent at her again. Her coughing intensified, causing her to wrap her arms around her body as if she had a stomach ache and bend down, hacking like she was some sort of an old man or something. She had gotten this sick before only once after eating some old food off of the floor, but she hadn't done so again...lately. Could it be a result of this fog he sent out?! The fog was as bad for her as old food? Finally she managed to catch on, as this was too much of a coincidence to ignore. That little troublemaker was making her cough! This wasn't good at all. She'd have trouble with any of her fine motor skills at this point. Luckily her basic fighting style was more brute force ungraceful movements so she could get way with it somewhat, but with her heaving chest it would make her wings have extreme difficulty to flap properly, as it relied on her back muscles not spasming every few seconds. He'd pay for this!

She flinched at the sound of him sliding down the wall. He appeared to be in bad shape now, although looks could be deceiving. In his chest burned a flame, similar to Evvie. "Are you half dragon skeleton?" she questioned in a soft tone, barely audible because she wasn't quite confident enough to make a more loud assumption such as this. If he was then where were his horns, tail, and wing bones? Perhaps she was just jumping to conclusions. There must be more reasons then just that to have a flame in one's chest.

Still coughing, she took a few stumbling steps towards him and then managed to steady her gait enough to charge at him and kick him in the chest with her right foot while soaring through the air at him. That flame could be his weak point and it wouldn't burn her, so she might as well try it.

[Alphakoka]

Niks raised a no-longer-existent eyebrow to Evvie's barely heard question. What sort of question was that? How did she even lead into that assumption? Niks deemed it better not to answer such an idiotic question. It was probably for the better as his opponent stumbled several steps as she coughed, seemingly gotten herself unstable enough. Niks stepped forward to close the distance so that he could breathe Soul Rot directly at her, only to be surprised when she suddenly charged and jump kicked towards his torso. It was only because his ribcage was as strong as steel that the kick didn't force its way through his bone and stomped his soulfire. That could have been proven fatal, if the kick didn't do it, then a shard of broken bone might do some damage. Niks questioned if the girl found out about his soul fire. No, it was just a coincidence, how could someone who guessed what he was wrongly figured that out?

Still, the kick did cause him to become wary of going close to her. Better for him to keep his distance from her now that she was coughing her lungs out. Or he could take his chance and hit her with some more Miasma. It didn't seem like she has anything that could go through his ribcage without reaching around from below, but he would see that one coming. Yes, if she tried to move in, he would try to move away, but if she coughed her lungs out, then he would hit her with a sneezing miasma, that should distract her enough from even standing.

[ImportantNobody]

Her kick collided against his ribcage, pushing her backwards a bit in a stumbling motion. So it would seem like his bones could withstand more force then normal ones. Call it overconfidence, but even so she could feel like it would break after enough hits. His fire might be stamped out yet. He cannot hide or protect it for long against the might of a half dragon! Unfortunately for her she was hit by yet another of his fog things before she could attack him some more. This time, rather then increase her rate of coughing, it caused her to sneeze, a sneeze that unleashed a plume of fire and smoke all over her opponent due to how close of a proximity they were standing. She had trouble controlling her fire when she sneezed, and in this case she didn't want to control it at all. In fact it was a godsend, had she believed in a God. If she couldn't breath fire out through her coughing lungs, then the forceful wind through her nose could propel the fire that she needed! Before the fire could dissipate she used her power to control it, forming it into a blade grasped in her right hand. From just one sneeze she could only capture enough to make it like a small dagger, but that would be better then nothing. It quivered and flickered as she coughed some more, making it hard to maintain it, although not impossible as long as she focused hard enough. Focusing wasn't her strong point, but now she was trying really hard at it. She sneezed again, trying to add that fire to her dagger. In the meantime she would take a slash at him if he tried to attack her, and was preparing to leap out of the way at any sign of him using more gas.

[Alphakoka]

Niks cursed as fire streamed from the short girl's nose, their close proximity meant the fire blew against his lower spine and he could feel the flame licking at his soul fire as he tried to dodge it as fast as he could by stumbling to his right. It was not a simple fire, much like most dragon fire. Much to his chagrin, the girl then shown that she was at least an adept at fire manipulation by creating a dagger of magical fire. He thought she was an adept from how it flickered in her grasp, though he didn't know how much of it was from her lack of control or from the miasma induced sickness. He assumed it was largely the former as he had saw some mages doing their specialty even when they were under Miasma's influence with more control than she was showing at the moment. Regardless, the dagger brought another consideration for him to stay away from the girl before she laid writhing on the ground.

Between her sneezing fire and creating the dagger, a small gap was formed between them from Niks avoiding the sneeze and the girl focusing on creating the dagger. It wasn't large enough to his liking as the meatsack would still be able to cross it quickly with her new knife. He would have to prepare something then. He inhaled and his soul fire dimmed as a small amount of green fog covered it. He should be able to spray it directly at her if she was to attempt to charge at him now.

[ImportantNobody]

By now she had two sneezes worth of fire to work with in her blade, making it between a knife and a sword in length. She got a little better at controlling her fire through her sneezing and coughing, although she was still not at the 100% that she'd normally be. She noticed an eerie change in her opponent's chest fire while she was doing this. Whatever the case may be, she wanted to beat him up before he tried any funny business. Now that she had her fire blade long enough she could stab his chest fire with it through his ribcage. Due to it being in her right hand she would try to stab him on his left side as she suddenly lunged at him at full speed, shouting out a battle cry.

[Alphakoka]

As expected, his opponent charged ahead towards him, the only difference was the fire dagger she brandished. Confident that she wouldn't reach him before his Soul Rot took effect, Niks started to spew the bile colored gas in front of him. His spine bend forward as he tried to lower the fog's height. Soon the Hex filled the space between him and the screaming half-dragon. Regardless, if the girl decided to brace the effect of her soul rotting without inhaling it and kept charging forward, his different position would likely hinder her attempt to stab him easily as the bone would shift the dagger's direction from stabbing his soulfire outright, although it would still nick it.

[ImportantNobody]

Due to her battle cry as she charged forward into the miasma, Evvie lucked out because she wasn't breathing in as a result. She ducked down as he did so and jousted the knife towards an opening, using her control of the fire to sent it darting forward hopefully into the cavity within the ribcage to wound his internal flame, or whatever he called it. However, it was difficult to get a precise strike with this flame so she was uncertain if she managed to hit him with it or not. With her attack complete she began to step back and unknowingly breathed in the miasma, instantly feeling the horrible pain flowing through her body. She cried out in anguish, stumbling forward to instinctively reach for something to stop herself from collapsing, which happened to be her opponent's skeletal body. Should she manage to grab on she would squeeze as hard as possible, nails digging into the bone as her knuckles turned white. This wasn't out a desire to wound him, though she certainly wouldn't be wishing him good will, but as a result of the pain. Her tail lifted up and then smacked down, jerking every which way with enough strength to knock someone off their feet should they make the mistake of getting behind her.

[Alphakoka]

Niks felt the dagger scratching against his bone and altered its course. The dagger's course was still in its original way enough that it burned a cut into his soulfire's binding and Niks could feel his soul starting to trickle away in a steady stream. He tried to push his opponent away before seeing her inhaling the Soul Rot and subsequently collapsed. Between her sudden stumbling and trying to grab a hold on him and his trying to push away, it led to the two of them pushing each other away. To be specific, Niks pushing himself away before his opponent's hand grabbed onto his arm and squeezed hard enough that his bone started to bent, and as both was fairly unbalanced for this, it led to to the two of them falling down to the ground.

Between the leak on his soul fire and suddenly falling down, Niks was immobilized momentarily as he tried to hold down the shock and attempting to patch the leak, unsuccessfully.

[ImportantNobody]

Evvie barely recognized the sensation of falling due to the amount of pain that she was in. What was that thing he had hit her with? All of the annoying poisons was a lame way to fight, although she couldn't exactly blame him as being cowardly or cheating, as much as she'd like to. She gritted her teeth, staring at him through watery eyes, some of the tears dripping down to his skull. She could feel her internal flame going haywire, disabling her fire breath and flight had they not already been out of the question. Would she die? It felt like she was dying. Would she ever recover from this? Her body was durable so she still had a chance. If she didn't die, that is. Her muscles grew tired and no longer seized up, causing her to flop limply down onto him, sweat now glistening off of her skin. Regaining enough control of her senses she began to each out with the intent of going underneath his ribcage and snuffing out the fire between the palms of her hands. It was damaged from her flame blade, leading her to believe that she could destroy it with one final attack.

[Alphakoka]

Niks struggled to stand up, hindered by both his opponent's grabbing him and crawling on top of him as she attempted to reach for his soulflame in the midst of coughing, sneezing and writhing in agony. She defied any expectations he had. Using his free hand, he swatted the grabbing hand away, normally, she would overpower him, but her current condition should weaken her that their strength difference was negligible. Likewise, his 'bleeding' made it hard for him to utilize his magic as long as he hasn't patch it up. Which meant his option was to hold out their position and see which of them succumb to their injury first, or try to break up so that he can patch his 'bleeding' as he watched the girl writhe to oblivion.

He chose the latter as he attempted to push the smaller but stronger person from him. If he succeed, he would then sit up and try to made a distance between them, if not, then he'd return to trying to block her attempt on grabbing his soulfire.

[ImportantNobody]

He pushed her backwards, causing her to flail around a bit in a futile attempt to regain her balance before crashing onto her backside and knocking her head against the cold hard ground. She was now seeing spots and had a throbbing head on top of the other symptoms, further complicating the matter. Her wings and tail scrapped forcefully along the ground as she writhed around. She was hardly able to focus on her opponent at that point, who was slowly getting away from her, but not quite yet. He had pushed her backwards but her legs were still lying in range next to him on either side. She would make an attempt to squeeze them around his lower body, starting underneath him and ending with her feet up on his chest, locked together with her left ankle underneath her right heel. She would try to use this position to keep him from getting up and way by forcing her ankles down onto his sternum. She wasn't exactly sure what she was going to do in that position once she got him into it, but she didn't want him to escape after getting him down. She hoped that her symptoms would clear up quickly, having no clue how long it would last.