50.

  Curse of Bloodlust (Grand)

  You are the hunger in the night, the bloodletting shall only tickle your hunger as your strength soars. Drink and bathe in gore as your foes tremble before you, lost in the insanity of the kill.

  All Physical Stats increased by 100%

  Santi stared at the alert with horror, watching as he hit the highest ranking for the curse in a matter of moments the second his willpower relaxed. Elation raced through him, energy and joy suffusing in a toxic mix as the inner exorcism circle failed. Muscles bulged in his body, strength racing through him as he opened his mouth to scream in ecstasy.

  The leading edges of the fight paused as the sickly black-red veins of the curse appeared all over Santi’s body, throbbing with every beat of his heart. The morph weapon lengthened into a cruel hooked blade, barbs sprouting out along the edges as a manic laugh bubbled free from his chest.

  With the last gasps of his sanity he looked back at the shelter his friends and family had bought from the pillar and saw the flare racing across the sky.The signal to Daniel.

  Then his mind was lost in the haze, his willpower and intelligence collapsing like a poorly stacked house of cards. The trauma of the past came flooding forward in an onslaught, the feeling of helplessness, of being small and weak. The rage it had built in him as he felt smaller and smaller. The dead stacked higher than mountains, the cult fighting to the vicious end. The invaders slaughtering and enslaving without hesitation as they each carved their own kingdoms out of his home. The blinding red rage mixed with the red on the field as one last memory assaulted him.

  Dad. Laying there. Broken. Bleeding. His killers were the people Santi had protected. The killers that had escaped his justice, now rushing in to kill the cursed. To come here before his blade.

  Then he was moving, [Windstep] pushing him faster than the cursed could track as his laughter and joy spread as the blooming fields of blood deepened. A virtuoso of pain and death, Santi danced among the cursed, his own more powerful version of the curse suppressing theirs as he slaughtered his foes. Mercy was there, a beacon to him glowing ultraviolet as his entire world was red and black, the silver of his blade the only other color.

  Pulses of magic flared at him, skills cut his flesh, broke bones, but he was unstoppable in his frenzy. For the first time he truly let loose, spells spinning and combining as he carved his way through the thinning ranks of the cursed.

  Duncan’s arrival was hardly noticed, another shadow in the blanket of red, slashing and killing with indiscriminate haste. Trapped between the shield and Santi in front of them, and Duncan’s own people, the cursed fought back with the savagery of trapped rats. Those he had cut and slashed behind him were rising, not dead but wounded and soon Santi was in a bubble as the cursed surrounded him, isolating him from help.

  The curse controlling him didn’t mind, it was just more targets to bleed. So Santi danced, leaping from one part of the circle to the next, spells flaring constantly as he searched for a weak point. Every slash of his blade opened tender flesh and every cast of his spells pushed and searched for his next victim .

  Then she was there. That violet supernova that rose above them, floating in the sky as the gorgeous rivers of red wove around her into a suit that cloaked her. A spear of power formed in her hand, a crown glowing like a beacon on her forehead, and a wand in her other hand. A queen rising above her subjects, power incarnate as her own laughter synchronized with Santi’s.

  He hated her. Loved her. Worshipped her. Envied her. All of it a flash in his frantic mind as he rose. [Air Shield] making platforms for him as he cast [Windstep] off of them, bursting them apart to whip at the people below as he entered the skies. The figure turned to him and the wand raised, a bolt of violent energy swirling around it.

  Santi dodged as it cut through the space he had been, bleeding energy that resonated with him while scaring a small part of him, that kernel of intelligence that was trying desperately to reassert itself.

  Santi closed the gap, slicing apart the spear as it tried to stab him. The blood splashed against him, warm and salty and his smile widened further as his curse drank from the power of the fresh blood. Then the blood hardened, forming chains that locked his limbs in place. He missed his next step and fell, falling back into the scrum of fighting bodies as Mercy’s laughter strengthened.

  He spun, his powerful mana ripping apart the spell holding the [Blood Chains] together. Without his willpower and intelligence there was no searching for weak points, he just directed the entirety of his being into destroying them. Blood evaporated as he hit the sodden ground with a splash, rising up with the morph as a razor whip sliced apart bodies all around him.

  Duncan was there, lashing through as a shadow darker than the rest and his rage flowed thicker and hotter than before. He lunged, crossing the distance in a blink of an eye, slashing apart the thick shadow form he saw, enraged when the shadows simply burst apart not in blood, but in mana.

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  “SANTIAGO! CONTROL YOURSELF!” Duncan screamed, his voice coming inches from his ear, but there was nobody for him to see. Santi screamed out in rage and helplessness, the Acolyte still further advanced in skill than him, needling at the ball of fury in his chest.

  Mercy was there, casting bolts of power into the shadowy shapes that didn’t have the red pulsing core in them. Santi’s consciousness, drowning in the bloodlust, recognized them as Duncan’s people. The cream of the crop of the cultists in the region. Each blast ripped a body apart, scattering the pieces of Acolytes around like they were confetti.

  He looked back up to Mercy and leapt toward her, the ground blasting apart under the force of his leap as he sailed upwards toward her. He blasted off an [Air Shield] and cut the distance in a heartbeat, shearing the air as he tried to behead her. The cursed anchor ducked under the blade and kicked him in the gut with her shin. He bent in half, air whooshing out of him as he gagged and then he was falling again.

  Halfway to the ground he realized some of the blood was his, pumping out from punctures in his stomach from where Mercy’s spikes had impaled him. He cast [Gust] angling it so it started above Mercy and forced her down to the ground.

  Santi landed on someone, breaking them under his much more durable body. He spun up and lashed out around himself again while Mercy was driven from the sky to land amongst Ducan’s shadowy soldiers. She rose up and then red lines sprang out, connecting her to a half dozen of them. The shadows turned and leapt at the violet pillar of light, energy erupting from hands and weapons. Then the red lines went tight and the figures collapsed, blood rushing free of bodies to fill the battered armor and covering Mercy again, blanketing the violet light she emanated.

  “Santiago, we need to kill her together. Control yourself!” Duncan hissed in his ear as the thick shadow figure appeared next to him. Santi shuddered as his willpower flared, his conscious mind trying to exert control over the rampaging curse. Slowly the red vision faded away, reality asserting itself.

  Pain came in waves, overwhelming his fading euphoria as he gasped in agony. His body was riddled with injuries, lacerations and puncture wounds making him feel like a pinata. He suppressed it all with a powerful flex of his willpower, straining against the mindless nature of the curse while also still letting it roll through him to keep the increased stats. It was like trying to control an overflowing river, holding tight to how the energy was directed through his body.

  “You sane?” Duncan asked, his power emanating from Santi’s own shadow..

  “Enough. I distract her, you stab her?”

  “Good enough for me,” Duncan said.

  Then Santi was moving again, cutting the distance between himself and Mercy in two with a single lunge. He rolled under a cursed warrior’s axe swing, jumped over a fallen cultist and then had to turn and twist at the waist as Mercy’s spear leapt at him. His morph blade rose to hit it with a blunt edge, preventing it from exploding again.

  He snapped upright and got within feet of the woman, who was still smiling widely. A full bloody helm covered everything except her mouth and eyes, liquid plate metal covering her from head to toe. It swirled and pulsed, eddies appearing as they rotated about herself.

  “Hello.” Her voice was rich and pleasant, happiness and joy infused in her words.

  Santi slashed, a wide shoulder to hip blow that would have cut her in two, armor be damned. The woman just chuckled and leapt to the side, avoiding the cut, and stabbed out with her spear. Santi blocked again, but Mercy fired a bolt of energy out of her wand that he was forced to cast [Air Shield] to stop.

  The shield exploded, sending drops of blood everywhere, and then they were attacking with their weapons again. Mercy flowed well, her armor a constant swirl as she lengthened or shortened her spear. Tendrils of blood flowed around her, constantly feeding into her armor as every blow sent drops bursting away from her from the pools all around them.

  The fight was nearing its apex as the few remaining fighters on both sides were the pinnacle of their factions, but the levels were against Duncan and Santi. The raiders had built their levels off of slaughter and warfare and it was showing. None of Duncan’s people could match their ferocity, the perfect blend of skills and martial prowess as they killed.

  Only a few of Duncan’s people were left on their feet, outnumbered nearly two to one as they circled up, trying desperately to keep their opponents blades away. Their faces were slick with fear sweat and Santi could see the infection in them, the small pulsing lines of the curse’s corruption. He could also see how the remaining cursed weren’t going all out. They were waiting, stalling, keeping Duncan’s people in place.

  The infection was spreading across them, infiltrating their minds and whittling down their willpower, helped by the mortal fear and what was likely the largest battle they had ever been in. A cloud of dark energy radiated around the killing field, swirling above head height, breaking apart and around the shield that Santi’s family had bought. The shield that was sure to run out soon.

  Santi turned his attention back to Mercy and the woman’s unwavering smile. She was waiting as well, her dark eyes drifting back and forth as she searched for Duncan. Santi was glad he wasn’t the only one who couldn’t keep up with the elusive assassin.

  “You are beautiful. All that rage and desire to bleed the world out. You would be better with me than here,” Mercy said. Santi could tell she was being serious too, there was no trace of duplicitousness in her, the offer genuine and similar to what he had heard the others say she was like.

  His curse surged upward, eager to rejoin the anchor and continue bathing in the blood all around them. With the mightiest of effort, Santi forced it down as a cold sweat broke out on his neck. His plan would work, he just needed Daniel to hurry it up.

  “Little shadow, come out and play. You two are the only ones worthy of my time here,” Mercy said as her armor continued to thicken in preparation of Duncan’s strike.

  The three of them stayed like that for a moment before another group of figures came rushing behind Mercy. It wasn’t Daniel and Hana. Santi had to fight back a curse at his scouts for being so slow.

  “SANTIAGO!” A voice bellowed and Santi turned his gaze away from Mercy and towards the man who had yelled at him.