First Demonic Dragon

Apophis' mind ran through several different possibilities in the span of a few seconds.@@novelbin@@

The oddities going on in this battle were simply far too many for him to proceed further without proper analyzation.

But Apophis' opponent was not so inept that he would have allowed the dragon to spend too much time formulating a plan.

With his bladed arm, Percival attacked Apophis with a crude, rudimentary level of skill. Making him realize that this was probably why he had stayed on the defensive this whole time.

His level was only that of the average major in one of Tehom's armies.

Apophis started to swipe back with his own blade, when a realization suddenly clicked within his mind.

Separated flesh.

That had to have been how the stranger made a duplicate.

And since it was likely an inborn ability, that would have surely accounted for the reason why Apophis couldn't sense anything before it happened.

In hindsight, perhaps a blade wasn't the best weapon to use here.

He would be relegated to only dealing shallow wounds or piercing attacks to finish this fight.

Swordplay wasn't exactly designed for that. At least not his approach to it.

Sticking to strictly magic in this fight may have been the way to go, but for some reason Apophis was reluctant to do so thus far.

"Are you not done over here yet?"

Apophis' problems practically doubled when the original body returned to the battle. The limb that Apophis severed had already regrown.

"He is floundering a bit more than the others."

"Were you expecting him to go quietly?"

"A bit. We've had so many decisive victories before now."

"Our powers don't seem to work well on him for some reason. It's inconvenient to our progress."

"Ah.. I see. Well, she did tell us they would have several preparations made for us."

"I know. I just had not expected the son to be so annoying."

"Well, you know what they say. Two heads are.."

"More difficult to contend with. Let us finish this."

"Not exactly where I was going with it, but sure."

Both copies adopted differing stances as they prepared to rush towards Apophis.

There was much of their prior conversation that he didn't understand, like who exactly 'she' was who'd supposedly warned them about him.

But the one thing his mind did finally catch was their continued insistence that Apophis was resisting their tricks somehow. But he wasn't sure what they meant initially, since he had hardly done anything out of the ordinary.

And then it finally clicked. From the beginning, Apophis thought that his enemy was just trying to defend himself from his blows, but what if he just wanted to goad him into attacking?

He was reminded of an acquaintance he'd made on earth. A woman who became charged with kinetic energy whenever she was struck.

The virtue of humility.

Abaddon gave the sacred gift to his wives and children so long ago that Apophis forgot he had it around 2,000 years ago.

If his hypothesis was right then this whole time his enemies had been trying to take his power, and the virtue was standing in their way.

He was almost amused now.

Apophis ducked underneath both copies as they came rushing towards him.

He grabbed one of the clones by the back of the collar and sent him crashing into his duplicate.

In the brief moment that he was out of their sight, he reappeared above their heads and stepped on the back of one clone with all his might.

The two were knocked out of space and sent hurtling towards the sun.

His plan was simple. The best way to deal with these two was by keeping actual contact with their to a minimal and, if possible, letting them collide with each other.

He watched them plummet into the flaming gases, but was almost certain that it would not kill them. That was the one thing his plan just wouldn't account for.

He still had to get his hands dirty if he wanted this to be truly over with.

Before he could attack again, uninvited company made their appearance.

"Prince Apophis!"

"What is going on here?!"

"Who are you fighting??"

Apophis looked over his shoulder at the various other sun gods who he supposedly shared responsibility with.

Sol, Apollo, Inti, Surya, Xihe, and several others. Even Ra was here.

And Apophis literally couldn't think of a worse time for a bunch like this to arrive.

"Stay behind me, and do not ask questions!!" Apophis roared back. "The enemy is extremely dangerous and I know not from where he hails!!"

Apophis was 'young' for a sun deity, but his power and status were undeniable.

So even though the other sun gods did not understand the full picture, they still backed away as soon as he gave the demand.

"What do you mean you don't know where he comes from, snake-boy?" Apollo remarked snakily. "So he just popped up and attacked your castle when-"

An ear-splitting roar filled up every crevice of the earth's solar system.

A huge mass shot out of the sun, nearly unequaled in it's dreadfulness.

It almost looked like a bat, but had long, thick and powerful arms with five fully posable digits. It's torso and lower body was that of an adult demon with clawed feet and a club-like tail behind it's back.

On either side of his head there sat two great horns that easily covered it's entire face from view. Behind it's back were a pair of enormous wings that were bigger than the creature's entire body.

It wasn't that large, only around the size of a large truck or so. But that didn't mean that anyone here was any less afraid of it.

"What... is that..?" Hepa shuddered.

"Stay back-" Apophis tried to warn again.

"Fuck that, don't let that thing get close to us!!" Apollo was already unslinging his bow from his back and notching an arrow.

The sun gods beside him followed in his example, much to Apophis' agony. "I said STOP!"

His roar scared some gods into halting, but not all.

At the same time that Apophis snatched Apollo's arrow out of the air, Arinna and a few others hurled their attacks.

These ranged from small suns themselves, to just bolts of pure, divine power.

Apophis raised his hand and summoned a barrier of magic to block the attacks, but he was far too late.

He saw the creature smile, and at the same time that the projectiles became snuffed out, he felt something heading towards him.

His instincts screamed at him to duck, so he did. But not before he managed to tackle Mawu-Lisa, Ra, and Apollo to get them to safety.

And as a result, they narrowly managed to avoid being completely bisected from a force they couldn't even see.

But some of the other sun gods were not as lucky as they were.

Out of the sixteen sun gods assembled, nine were cut down the middle so quickly that they could barely perceive what happened.

The others were either saved by Apophis, or managed to get away- either with small or grievous injuries.

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But this was still considered a positive outcome.

Apollo was rather flustered at the fact that he had to be saved. "Y-You..."

"Shut it! When I tell you to do something, just do it!"

Apophis mashed his fellow sun god in the face and pushed him aside.

He turned back to face his enemy, and found him barreling towards him with his barbed horns lowered like a bull.

Changing his weapon into a spear, he waited until the very last moment and flipped over his enemy- landing directly on top of his back.

He wasn't sure if he was imagining it or not, but... he almost seemed spikier than before.

landing between the creature's wings and finding a suitable position on his shoulder blades, Apophis raised his spear overhead and prepared to bury it in the exposed skull of the demon.

But instead of pricing his enemy, it was Apophis who was pierced himself.

The creature's formerly club-like tail had grown a rather nasty point, similar to a scorpion's barb.

Apophis didn't scream, but he would be damned if he wasn't in pain.

The creature flung him off of it's back using it's tail, all the while laughing victoriously in Apophis' ears.

"That's one. Your father tore my chest three times, remember?"

Apophis would have rolled his eyes if he weren't starting to feel odd.

His body was too warm. Eyelids heavier than bricks.

His joints felt like they had jello in between them. And he was finding it harder and harder to stay up.

'Poison..? No, it can't be.'

Nevi'im were fundamentally immune to all toxins and poisons. He dismissed the idea almost as quickly as it had formed.

With Percival still barreling towards him and hs body no longer listening to him, Apophis knew he had only one option left.

But after everything he had just seen, he was absolutely positive that it was a bad idea.

He'd hit a wall.

And that was when he remembered that he wasn't exactly alone.

*Crash!*

Everyone heard the sound that was almost reminiscent of glass breaking.

Apophis smiled at the sight.

Claire and Rita were standing beside a rather sizable crack in the barrier that certainly wasn't there before.

The atmosphere surrounding the sun changed.

And for the first time today, Apophis saw what his enemy's face looked like when he was nervous.

"Shit."