Reborn as the Last van Ambrose-Chapter 83: Talyra Slyphine Vs Grim Van Ambrose Part 4

Talyra stared at Grim’s silver blade, its ethereal glow pushing back against her darkness. For a heartbeat, the arena remained perfectly still, the two combatants locked in a standoff beneath the artificial moon.

Talyra made the first move, she rushed forward straight for Grim.

Talyra’s swing of her sword repeatedly causes the lighting to come at Grim from multiple angles. Grim would strike the black tendrils of lighting with Luna, and as he did this the lighting would just vanish into his blade.

"Soul Shade: Void Current!" Talyra called out, her blade becoming a nexus for streams of darkness that surrounded her like a protective shell.

Grim responded by charging directly into her defenses. Each swing of the silver blade dispersed more of the darkness, forcing Talyra to continuously reform her protective shell.

"How?" she growled as Grim broke through her defenses once again. "Soul Shade cannot be countered by ordinary weapons."

"Luna is far from ordinary," Grim replied, a cold smile on his face. "She’s been waiting decades to devour someone. "

They exchanged a flurry of blows, their movements nearly too fast to follow. Where Echo had struggled against Talyra’s dark energies, Luna seemed to thrive. With each attack, Luna seems to grow brighter.

In the Luminaris box, Julius leaned forward intently. "That sword... it’s absorbing the darkness somehow."

"Is that even possible?" Max asked, his voice tight with concern.

"Not with any metal I’ve ever heard of," Julius replied. His plans had assumed Grim’s death or at least a humiliating defeat. This unforeseen development threatened everything.

Back in the arena, Talyra launched another attack, this one more desperate than the last. The black lightning from her blade intensified, splitting into multiple arcing tendrils that attacked from every angle.

"Soul Shade: Endless Night!"

The darkness above them deepened, the artificial moon’s light dimming as Talyra drew more power from it. The temperature dropped further, and the arena floor began to frost over.

Grim deflected the first wave of attacks, but the second came too quickly. A tendril of darkness slipped past his guard, striking his side and leaving a black burn mark on his skin. He staggered, clearly in pain.

[That attack is depleting your mana,] the voice warned. [Don’t let it touch you again.]

Talyra pressed her advantage, her silver eyes gleaming with renewed confidence. "You’re not as special as you think, Ambrose. Your precious silver blade won’t save you from Lord Malaxis’s judgment."

At the mention of that name, something shifted in Grim’s expression. The cold calculation gave way to something darker, more primal. His scar pulsed with that strange purple hue once more.

"You elves," he snarled, "always so proud, it’s time you learned your place trash." novelbuddy.cσ๓

"You know nothing of my people!" Talyra shot back, launching another attack.

"I know enough," Grim said, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. "I saw what your Master was capable of when he gave me this scar."

His scar was fully purple now, and those nearest the arena could see that his eyes had taken on the same eerie hue. The crowd murmured in unease.

In the royal box, Archmage Marcus frowned. "Your Majesty, something is happening to him. That’s not just anger....."

"I see it," Empress Alexia responded quietly. "Whatever darkness is in him, it’s responding to hers."

On the arena floor, Grim shifted his stance, holding Luna at a precise angle that caught the light from the artificial moon. The blade seemed to drink in the moonlight, growing impossibly bright.

"Silver Crescent Second Form: 24 Sword Strike."

The sword flashed blindingly, causing many in the audience to shield their eyes. Then his body became a blur of silver light. Each movement left a trail of silver crescents hanging suspended in the air.

Talyra attempted to counter, her black blade cutting through the first few silver crescents, but there were too many. They surrounded her, cutting off any avenue of escape.

"What is this technique?" Julius muttered, standing now as he strained to understand what he was witnessing.

"I’ve never seen anything like it," Chancellor Levenhart said from the royal box, his voice tight with apprehension.

By the twenty-fourth strike, Grim had created a perfect sphere of silver crescents around Talyra, each one poised like a predator ready to strike.

"Silver Crescent Third Form: Execution," Grim commanded.

The suspended crescents activated simultaneously, collapsing inward toward Talyra. She attempted to deflect them, but there were too many, coming from too many angles. The first few she managed to block, but then they began to find their marks.

One sliced across her sword arm, cutting deep enough that her weapon clattered to the ground. Another took her left arm clean off at the shoulder, sending it spinning across the arena floor. More crescents tore through her legs, and her torso, leaving her bloodied and broken but somehow still conscious.

As a final insult, Grim walked calmly toward her battered corpse. Without hesitation, he sliced off her pointed ears, one after the other.

The crowd had gone deathly silent. This was beyond the violence expected in a tournament match; this was something darker, and more personal.

Grim knelt beside the ruined form of Talyra, who somehow still clung to life despite her grievous wounds. He leaned close to her, his words meant only for her ears, but in the unnatural silence of the arena, they carried.

"Tell your master, tell Malaxis, that Grim Van Ambrose is coming for him." His voice dripped with venom. "I will exterminate every last one of your filthy kind. Everything that looks like him will burn."

Talyra’s silver eyes, clouding with approaching death, still managed to find his. "You... you know nothing," she gasped. "The truth... would break you."

"The only truth that matters is this," Grim replied. "House Ambrose has returned, and your master’s days are numbered."

Grim put Luna back in her scabbard. And shouted "Aurora Flash: Sundering Slash!" Within seconds whatever was left of the elf had been disintegrated by the Aurora Energy.

The artificial moon above the arena began to fade, natural sunlight once again streaming through. He turned to face the royal box, Luna gleaming in his hand, his face expressionless despite the brutality he had just displayed.

The tournament official, clearly shaken, raised a trembling hand. "V-victory to Lord Grim Van Ambrose!"

From his box, Julius Luminaris stared down at the arena floor, now stained with Talyra’s blood. His plans had gone catastrophically wrong. Instead of eliminating a threat, he had revealed an even greater one.

In the royal box, Empress Alexia exchanged a significant look with Archmage Marcus. "I believe," she said quietly, "that we have much to discuss with Lord Van Ambrose."

As the crowd finally began to respond with scattered, uncertain applause, Grim walked out of the arena.

But in his mind, the voice was unusually silent, as if stunned by the depths of hatred Grim had just displayed.