Mirror [Chapter XI]

[Ayen]

With the Mirror Edge in hand, the blade balanced on her shoulder, the Demon Assassin circled the area as she kept a watchful view of the sky for Sparda. Once again she must faced her roots, once again she must be reminded where it is she came from even though she has been working all this time to turn away from it. To create her own identity. No more did she call herself the 'Dark Knight' the Demon Assassin was her new alias and while she would never be able to shed the original completely, it would be foolish to abandon her current weapons and fighting style, she didn't have to act like him. She especially wouldn't act like him.

[Sparda]

Eva's downfall descended from the dark sky.

His sword in hand and a look of dark determination upon his face, Sparda rocketed down after his clone, flipping in the air and employing a downward pulse of energy to slow his fall. Landing gracefully about ten metres from his opposite number, the Dark Knight slowly straightened up, the blade of his sword gleaming menacingly in the dim light.

"I'd be lying if I said I hadn't been rather looking forward to another opportunity to test your mettle, girl," he began. "In fact, I'll quite happily march through all of Maricul's little pawns to put this madness to an end."

[Ayen]

Eva watched his graceful fall and kept her eyes locked on him at all times as he decided to talk more.

"I'd be lying if I said I hadn't been rather looking forward to another opportunity to test your mettle, girl. In fact, I'll quite happily march through all of Maricul's little pawns to put this madness to an end."

“Give it a rest, S. I heard it all before.”

She was of course referring to the “Rockstar of Hell” who she faced during her time in Domino City before the supernova wiped that place off the face of existence. The fight itself had cost her her arm but it all worked out for her in the end and better to have your arm impaled to a wall to prove a point than to have your head nailed to it. Still if Eva ever ran into him again a rematch would be inevitable.

“Speaking of which I still owe him for the arm. In the meantime however–!”

And just like that the Demon Assassin rushed towards the Dark Knight, led by the tip of her blade rocketing forward in a Stinger but at the last minute moved to the side and hit with a Force Edge Combo.

[Sparda]

Already, the clone was on the move - with a Stinger of all techniques. Having no trouble keeping track of her approach speed, Sparda afforded himself a derisive frown. This would be a short battle if she was about to rely on his own style.

His defence would look easy. He got ready to lean casually out of the way of the Stinger she led in with, but seeing that she sidestepped into a combo at the last moment, he adjusted his own backstep accordingly and raised his blade. With but a few quick thrusts, he expertly parried each of her strikes, turning it harmlessly aside. The last blow would see her sword directed downwards towards the ground, and with his momentum behind him, Sparda lunged forward with blinding speed to drive his own sword into the replica's chest.

[Ayen]

Eva took advantage of the current position of her blade, lifting it up just in time to force the Legendary Dark Knight into a High Time launching him into the air and quickly turning it into an Air Raid.

[Sparda]

Sparda hadn't quite been expecting such a fast recovery of lost momentum. He had to cut his thrust short to bring his sword back in time to meet Eva's, but the force behind her swing was enough to float him into the air, and she leapt up after him to continue her assault.

Fool. Centuries of experience aside, aerial combat was second-nature to a demon whose true form gave him wings. Sparda had no trouble continuing to block and parry his opposite number, and as soon as an opening presented itself, he turned her blade aside once more and lashed out with a swift and brutal kick to the side of her head, packing enough force to completely crush the skull of a normal human.

[Ayen]

In that instant green demonic blades shaped like the Force Edge materialized and orbited around Eva's position, blocking the in-coming kick and then one by one piercing his flesh and exploding immediately afterwords. Once the force of gravity would come into effect and pull both back towards the ground the Demon Assassin would continue this relentless assault with a Dance Macabre.

[Sparda]

Summoned swords. He hadn't seen this technique in so long, he'd forgotten its presence among his own repertoir. The blades hit home, piercing his body and eliciting a minor grunt of pain; but in a display of masterful control over his demonic power, he managed to erect thin barriers of energy that lay flush against the blades within his flesh, absorbing much of the force of their explosions.

All the same, the Dark Knight flipped away when they began falling, catching some distance in which to heal himself over. Eva's quick approach and entry into her apparently well-practiced Dance Macabre was met simply - and with overwhelming force. Smirking almost casually, Sparda stood and swung his sword in a wide arc; and the blade shot outwards along the shaft upon which it was mounted, the whole weapon extending a full five feet in length and catching Eva with a brutally powerful horizontal swing before her blade was within range of her foe.

[Ayen]

Eva was knocked back through the air and hit the ground. Immediately afterwords she rolled backwards and got back up to her feet, exchanging the Force Edge for the Coyote Ugly. Firing off a Charge Shot aimed towards the Legendary Dark Knight's chest.

[Sparda]

Back on her feet just like that. Sparda would expect nothing less from a clone, but he knew her repertoire would only get her so far. Eventually she'd run out of tricks, while he would still have more to fall back on, and then she'd be done for.

For now, he simply had to keep coaxing those tricks out of her, one by one. He caught sight of the shotgun she brandished against him and ducked low, cratering the ground with the force of his takeoff as he charged at her. Searing buckshot, ablaze with demonic power, whistled over his shoulder - that shot might've taken a limb off if he'd taken it.

Now, though, he was out of the line of fire. The Dark Knight bore down on his opposite number with blinding speed, leaving a red tracer in his wake as his blade wreathed itself in a raging plume of hellfire. He sprang up in front of Eva, unleashing a vicious upward swing of his sword, and the ground before him exploded as the flames that engulfed his steel roared forth towards the replica's body, seeking to sear her flesh off her bones where she stood.

[Ayen]

The Demon Assassin didn't move, didn't make any attempt to dodge. Nor did she seem to even try to block the in-coming hellfire that came her way, that was until... she absorbed the attack altogether. Royal Guard reeled its ugly head into this battle all while she raised the Coyote Ugly and delivered a devastating Gun Stinger to his throat.

[Sparda]

Of course! Why did Royal Guard never occur to him before?

In this proximity, Sparda had very little time to get away from Eva's counterattack. He almost managed it, hurling himself aside to get back out of the shotgun's line of fire, but caught a good portion of the spray of buckshot she fired at him and lost a large chunk of his neck as a result. Uttering a rasping growl of pain through his breached trachea, the Dark Knight backed off for a moment to strategise, the mangled wound already knitting itself back together with new flesh.

It was obvious to him that Eva had countered that so effectively because he telegraphed it. He knew Royal Guard well enough to know that its ability to nullify an attack relied on precisely timed blocks to negate momentum and power. That kind of timing required than an attack be anticipated. All he needed to do was catch her by surprise.

Scowling, the demon went back on the offensive, launching himself at Eva with lightning speed and bearing down upon her in an instant with his sword lunging forth in a devastating Stinger. At the very last moment, though, he pulled the weapon back just as quickly and deftly span around her right side. His sword extended once more, the blade twisting and reforming this time until the weapon resembled a great scythe, and the Dark Knight swung up at the clone from behind and to the right of her in a great diagonal arc that would drive the blade into her heart and lungs.

[Ayen]

For the second time in this battle, the Demon Assassin allowed for Sparda to get in at close range but not to block with Royal Guard. Instead this time the Legendary Dark Knight would find himself in the face of the Anger that was already built up before, inflicting twice the amount of damage his previous attack would have caused her had it hit.

[Sparda]

Here was the other trademark of the Royal Guard style; anger-fuelled counterattacks that turned an opponent's power upon them.

Just as Sparda had expected.

In an instant, his namesake weapon disappeared in a harmless flash of crimson flame, leaving the demon's hands free. In that same instant, he prepared a Royal Guard stance of his own and readily received Eva's strike, stopping her dead in her tracks with a masterful Royal Block.

And in that same instant, with a guttural roar of exertion, the Dark Knight turned Eva's attack back upon her with a lightning-quick, rage-empowered straight punch to her chest that would shatter bones to pieces and rend organs asunder.

[Ayen]

The Demon Assassin instinctively shot up her right arm towards the in-coming rage, the glove and sleeve on the arm tearing up revealing a large, spectral demonic arm pulsing with demon energy which then went to work and absorbed in the rage from Sparda's punch, with his arm now caught in the Devil Bringer's clenches the superhuman strength went to work, crushing the bones in his arm and then pulling backward, hurling him into the air and firing off a Fireworks Air from the Coyote Ugly.