As Hualing rose once more from the rubble, her body reconstructing itself but with decreasing efficiency, the limitations of her approach beca apparent. Though her regenerative abilities kept her in the fight, each healing cycle consud more blood than the last. The battle had beco a war of attrition—one that, despite her considerable power, she was gradually losing.
Within their shared consciousness, Minghua observed the confrontation with growing concern. While Hualing fought with savage determination, reality was undeniable, there was just no way she could win. The princess possessed not just superior raw power but seemingly inexhaustible energy. Each exchange left Hualing more depleted while Athena remained dangerously close to her peak.
More troublingly, this destructive stalemate did nothing to help Ambrose, who remained unconscious and vulnerable. His situation required imdiate attention, not an extended battle that destabilized the entire palace while royal guards undoubtedly mustered reinforcents.
The ti for brute force had passed. This situation required a different approach. As Hualing prepared to launch herself at the princess once more, Minghua's voice cut through their ntal landscape.
This is taking us nowhere, she communicated with urgent clarity. Let handle this.
Hualing's resistance was imdiate but brief. Even her battle-intoxicated mind recognized the logic in Minghua's assessnt. With reluctant acknowledgnt, she relinquished control, retreating to their shared internal space as Minghua stepped forward to take command of their body.
The transition was subtle but unmistakable. The wild, unrestrained aggression that had characterized Hualing's movents gave way to sothing more asured. Where blood had flowed like chaotic rivers, it now moved with deliberate purpose. The princess, sensing this change in her opponent, paused montarily, bestial features contorted in confusion.
Minghua straightened their shared body, blood flowing back into her wounds.
…
"Your expression confirms it," she announced with growing confidence. "It's you, right? Chosen Hero Rothschild."
"Umm, what now?" Ambrose's voice carried genuine confusion, his mind struggling to make sense of her sudden conclusion.
The goddess's golden eyes studied him with increasing certainty. "Don't try to deny it, you look exactly the sa," she insisted, raising a delicate hand to her chin in contemplation. "Hmm, but you look much younger now. Did you reverse ti?"
Ambrose observed her carefully before responding, "Although my na is Rothschild, I'm not Rothschild the hero," he clarified. "After all, he died a thousand years ago."
"He died?" Shock rippled across her divine features, the chains around her trembling slightly with her movent. "How's that possible?"
"Aren't you a god? Aren't you supposed to know everything?"
Her luminous eyes narrowed slightly. "Goddess of Light is my title. It doesn't make a god," she explained, releasing a weary sigh. The chains clinked softly as she shifted. "You said Rothschild is your na. Are you his descendant?" Curiosity colored her lodious voice.
Ambrose offered a simple nod in response.
Aurora scrutinized him for several long monts before a knowing smile blossod across her face. "So that's what happened. I see." Without warning, she erupted into laughter that filled the chamber with crystalline echoes. "What a nice plan, as expected of the hero!"
Ambrose watched her display, wondering if she had finally lost it. When her laugh finally subsided, she composed herself and fixed him with an earnest gaze. "I have a request for the descendant of the hero," she announced, her tone shifting toward solemnity.
Ambrose wondered if he had triggered a quest scenario? "What request?" he asked cautiously.
"My child, I wonder if you can help her once," Aurora replied, her golden eyes imploring.
"You have a child?" Surprise montarily broke through his composed exterior.
"Well, she worships , so she's my child," she clarified.
Ambrose nodded in recognition. "What does your child look like, and why do they need help?"
"She should be about your age. I don't know how she looks, but in the Holy Church, she should be known as the Saintess," Aurora explained, the chains around her shifting as she moved her hands. "As for why she needs help... I don't know either."
"You don't?" Ambrose gave her a suspicious gaze.
"It's true," she insisted, moving her hands to demonstrate the limitations of her current state. The massive chains rattled ominously. "I can't use much of my powers here anyway."
"What do I get for helping her?" He asked, since it was a quest scenario, it was appropriate to receive a reward for completing the quest.
Aurora tilted her head thoughtfully. "What do you want? There isn't much I can give anyway," she admitted.
"Let's see..." Ambrose paused, recognizing an opportunity for information. "How about you start by explaining what this place is?"
…
The atmosphere in the chamber transford as Minghua took command of their shared body. Where Hualing's combat style had been a tempest of savage efficiency, Minghua brought a calculated elegance.
Princess Athena stalked forward, her bestial features contorted with predatory focus. Her transford state had reached its apex, muscles rippling beneath fur-covered skin, claws extended and gleaming in the dim light. Each movent carried the raw power of her Battle Frenzy talent.
Minghua stood poised, her posture perfect despite the nurous wounds that had yet to fully close. Blood swirled around her in intricate patterns, no longer the chaotic maelstrom of Hualing's approach but a disciplined array of crimson orbs that rotated with mathematical precision. Her expression remained serene, analytical—a stark contrast to the princess's savage snarl.
"Let's try a more civilized approach," Minghua murmured, though the words were ant more for herself than her opponent.
The princess charged with explosive force, crossing the distance between them in a heartbeat. Where Hualing would have t this aggression with equal ferocity, Minghua sidestepped with balletic grace, her body flowing like water around the attack. The princess's montum carried her past her target, claws raking through empty air where Minghua had stood a fraction of a second earlier.
Without breaking rhythm, Minghua pivoted on one foot, her movents resembling a courtly dance more than combat. She extended her arm in a fluid arc, sending a precisely calibrated barrage of blood needles toward the princess. Each projectile targeted a specific pressure point—joints, nerve clusters, and subtle weaknesses in the transford physiology that Hualing's brute force approach had failed to exploit.
Most of the needles were deflected by the princess's supernatural reflexes, but several found their marks, embedding themselves in seemingly insignificant locations along her shoulders and thighs. Athena snarled in irritation rather than pain, dismissing these minor wounds as inconsequential. She remained unaware that each needle served as a conduit, allowing Minghua to draw minute amounts of blood through these connections, gradually replenishing her depleted reserves.
The princess renewed her assault, this ti with a series of controlled strikes rather than wild lunges. She had begun to adapt to Minghua's evasive style, her bestial instincts working in concert with her trained combat awareness. Claws whistled through the air with deadly precision, forcing Minghua into increasingly complex evasive patterns.
A particularly vicious swipe grazed Minghua's shoulder, drawing fresh blood. Instead of allowing the wound to close imdiately, she channeled the escaping crimson liquid into a spiraling ribbon that hardened into a crystalline blade. With a single fluid motion, she brought this improvised weapon across the princess's exposed forearm, creating a shallow cut that mirrored her own injury.
Minghua absorbed the princess's spilled blood, tabolizing it to heal her own wound while simultaneously weakening her opponent. The process was far more efficient than Hualing's wholesale absorption, requiring less energy and yielding greater benefits.
Athena's bestial features twisted with growing frustration. She had faced countless opponents in her training—skilled knights, veteran warriors, even magical creatures with extraordinary abilities—but none had fought quite like this. Minghua moved with a dancer's precision, each step calculated, each strike asured, creating an ever-shifting puzzle that the princess's feral mind struggled to solve.
The transford princess dropped to all fours, her posture becoming fully animalistic as she circled her opponent. This regression to quadrupedal movent signaled a deeper surrender to her Battle Frenzy transformation, sacrificing human technique for pure predatory instinct. Her muscles bunched beneath her fur-covered skin, preparing for an explosive pounce that would overwhelm Minghua's defensive dance.
Anticipating the attack, Minghua prepared a complex blood barrier, drawing the crimson liquid from the surrounding area into concentric rings of protection. The princess launched herself with terrifying speed, her trajectory a perfect arc calculated to overco Minghua's defenses.
Athena's claws tore through the first two layers of the blood barrier, dissipating them into crimson mist, but the innermost shield held. The impact sent both combatants sliding across the chamber floor, locked together in a temporary stalemate. Minghua's arms strained against the princess's supernatural strength, blood reinforcing her muscles to maintain the deadlock.
Their faces were inches apart, the princess's feral snarl contrasting with Minghua's composed expression. For a mont, they remained frozen. Around them, the battered chamber bore testant to the extraordinary conflict, its reinforced walls cracked and floor shattered from the exchange of supernatural forces.
In this mont of perfect balance, catastrophe struck.
The western wall exploded inward with a thunderous boom, chunks of reinforced material flying across the chamber. Through the dust and debris stepped a figure of modest height wearing a rat-shaped mask, his casual stance belying the incredible force required to breach the supposedly impenetrable barrier.
"Oh, and what do we have here?" The newcor's voice carried a lilting curiosity, head tilting as he surveyed the frozen tableau before him.
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